"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core - Idolator Comments

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

Lucas Jensen — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 10:56:42 EST

@RickSlick: I just don't see Magnet as being run by a bunch of young hipsters. Do you guys know their writers? Most of them are 30+. I think this edition of Anono-Critic is way off.

Lucas Jensen

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

BakerStreetSaxSolo — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 06:18:48 EST

thanks for this:
"band exists; colorless anecdote No. 1; band is good; band met each other and bonded over appreciation of older artists; band makes album; colorless anecdote No. 2; band is touring with another band more familiar to readers; sleepy kicker."
I'm going to use this as a model to avoid.

BakerStreetSaxSolo

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

RickSlick — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 03:18:40 EST

@MisterHippity: I rofled in my pants a little there.

And yes, Magnet is like being stuck in a room full of college DJs, but it's just the young kids that're there because they think a radio show will get them laid/cred, and none of the crazy professors or 45-year-old grad students that actually play some cool shit.

My show was on from 12 to 2 am. I played mainly Built to Spill, Pavement, Modest Mouse, and the Pixies. I once said that the Pretty Girls Makes Graves debut album was "astonshing." On air. I'm gonna go stare in the mirror for a while, unblinking.

RickSlick

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

Bjork Rhymes With Pork — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 22:22:56 EST

@tigerpop: Boo!

Even if the Mats were overrated, they still wouldn't be as overrated as the fucking Doors.

Bjork Rhymes With Pork

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

prolixrush — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 18:46:26 EST

Jim James looks super-intense without his corona of curls. I miss 'em. Speaking of "horn-rimmed beardos" and their scarf-wearing ilk, "Girls Make Me Sick" by Butcher Boy just came up on my iTunes at random. OR WAS IT?!

(I'm onto your game, version 7.5.)

prolixrush

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

ddb4 — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 17:48:30 EST

I respect Magnet, but their extremely narrow aesthetic sense is the reason I recently stopped reading them after 7 years. They'd always had a bad case of the indie myopia, but it had become positively intolerable over the last 2 years or so, around the time when the bands they covered started going top 10 on Billboard, curiously enough. Say what you want about Pitchfork, but Magnet makes them look like a cornucopia of variety.

ddb4

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

TheMojoPin — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 17:17:39 EST

Ended up having.

Jesus.

TheMojoPin

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

TheMojoPin — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 17:17:16 EST

@Captain Wrong:

Which, ironically, ended haing some of the best songs of his solo career.

TheMojoPin

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

righteousmaelstrom — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 17:13:55 EST

How can Pyromania be a guilty pleasure?!? It's got one of the best singles of the 80's on it! ('Photograph' if you're wondering)

righteousmaelstrom

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

Captain Wrong — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 15:01:34 EST

@crookedlawyer. And he did the entire OST for Open Season...another piece of CGI family fare.

Captain Wrong

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

tigerpop — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 15:00:12 EST

@musicquizking: Damn right.

Also, bring on the chorus of boos, but the Replacements are the most overrated band in music history.

tigerpop

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

tigerpop — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 14:58:46 EST

@Bob Loblaw: This page was brought to you by Daft Punk.

tigerpop

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

musicquizking — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 14:57:47 EST

Best part of Magnet = Andrew Earles

musicquizking

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

Bob Loblaw — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:50:46 EST

@Ned Raggett: @Lucas Jensen: Seems to me as long as there's a canon, there'll always be guilty pleasures. I think every one of the guilty pleasures cited here are willfully false--Rio? Really going out on a ledge there, chief--but that doesn't mean the concept's bunk.

Saying "An individual either likes a piece of music or doesn't" is hard to argue with, but it ignores any sense of historical / musical context. Do I like Justice? Sure. But I'd feel a lot less conflicted (read: guilty) about it if Daft Punk had never existed.

Bob Loblaw

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

Ned Raggett — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:22:51 EST

Oh dear.

Ned Raggett

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

jordan_s — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 12:39:57 EST

ned ragget is my guilty pleasure.

jordan_s

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

rhythmchyc — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 12:14:15 EST

Guilty pleasures can be social suicide. Especially if you thoroughly enjoy "I love New York" as much as I do...

rhythmchyc

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

crookedlawyer — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 11:15:42 EST

Hey Phil -- I'm pretty sure the Replacements and the Kinks managed to make some money along the way, chief. Moreover, Paul Westerberg has had songs on both a Starbucks sampler and the Friends soundtrack.

And while John Mayer may have written "Daughters" and "Your Body is a Wonderland" (and is pretty self-aware about the lameness of both, I might add), technically speaking, he's approximately ten times the musician anyone in either of those bands is.

crookedlawyer

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

Lucas Jensen — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 11:02:30 EST

Having said that above, I must part ways with Anono-Critic and say that I find Magnet's writers to be the least blogger-y, fanzine-y out there, and, in fact, many of these writers are older, established types who write for such "blogger"-y outlets as MOJO and Harp as well. I just read that issue and didn't really get the same sense of it that AC did.

Lucas Jensen

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

Lucas Jensen — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 11:00:22 EST

@Ned Raggett: I second that.

I'm real tired of ABBA being a guilty pleasure. They could write airtight pop hits that make today's crop look like 90 pound weaklings. And TLC's CrazySexyCool as a guilty pleasure is just bizarre. That record was critically and commercially-beloved, and every white boy rocker I knew owned it and loved it.

Lucas Jensen

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

Ned Raggett — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 10:56:22 EST

Stop with the goddamn "Guilty Pleasure" conceit. It's appropriate to feel guilt regarding something that harms one's own health or the well-being of others. It is not appropriate to feel guilt over enjoying a song. An individual likes a song or doesn't, so please, Magnet and any other similarly doctrinaire media outlet, stop reinforcing readers' insecurities regarding "correct" or "incorrect" in music and discontinue this shopworn editorial device.

THANK YOU. And thank you a goddamn thousand times over. I have loathed and spoken against this idiot concept for years upon years.

Ned Raggett

"Magnet" Attracts A Bearded, Bespectacled Core

MisterHippity — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 10:43:43 EST

That guy on the cover looks like he has a big magnet in his mouth and his beard is made of iron filings.

MisterHippity