Idolator

Everywhere you go—and this is assuming you go to a lot of dive bars and conference rooms—you hear the same complaint from music writers: "Dude, nobody gives you the big word-count real estate anymore! Review spaces are shrinking. Feature wells are taken up with goddamn charticles and sidebars and charticles that explain the sidebars! Where can I possibly publish my Bangs-ian 7,000-word piece on the new wave of new-wave?" Good points, yes—but have you ever considered that maybe it's a good thing for some stories to run short, or maybe even not run at all? After the click-through, some recent music pieces that could have dealt with some prudent pruning. More »

From today's L.A. Times. Oddly, this back-and-forth is similar to Spears' own inner monologue, though she often throws in a few more "for reals?" at the end of each sentence. More »

There was little doubt that James Brown's death on Christmas was going to inspire some posthumous re-appraisals (the guy was no angel, after all). But we didn't expect anything like this piece from the U.K. Guardian, in which writer John Harris tries to be contrarian, but winds up coming off like an ill-informed turdsmith: More »