Music Criticism and the Art of Band Name-Dropping

Michael

Conner-Simons is the Elvis Costello of music criticism.

Mungo181

Washington Post's Josh du Lac on My Bloody Valentine: "Not a lot of people heard them, but the people who did either started bands or started writing about music."

du Lac on The Velvet Underground: "They never were a huge commercial force, but it seems like everybody who picked up their albums started a band."

C'mon. For reals? It's hard to believe that someone who spews this nonsensical apocrypha not once but TWICE in one conversation has a job in music criticism. Perhaps the writer shouldn't have used those quotes, and perhaps the editor should have taken them out.

Leah

I want to go back in time and make this article required reading for new DJs at my college radio station.

Nessa Nix

So nice to see someone else taking this topic on. I recently wrote a piece for a Portland, OR paper using a local band's press release (which was chock full of comparisons- none of which were accurate.)My column was viewed as extremely controversal and the band's only excuse was, "We didn't write the press release"...
WTF?? When I contacted them to try and understand why a total stranger would have written a professional looking press release for them- they suddenly backtracked- it was a friend of theirs who wrote it as a favor but they approved this as their press release. Just makes you shake your head. Ultimately what I object to is the self comparison (such as in a press release) to greats and legends...what kind of ego does that take?

lauren viera

Thank you for tackling this huge issue. Name-dropping is, most often, completely worthless when describing a band's sound. I plan to make this article required reading for my Reviewing the Arts class.

kmwilliams@tribune.com, erosenbaum@tribune.com, dgeorge@tribune.com, rrogers@tribune.com

I wish this were required reading for our freelancers. Nice tips from Greg, too.

kmwilliams@tribune.com, erosenbaum@tribune.com, dgeorge@tribune.com, rrobinson@tribune.com

I wish this were required reading for our freelancers. Nice tips from Greg, too.

John

You forgot SWANS, predecessors to everything from Nirvana to Bloody Panda...

Jam Science

Uh, people. It's music. Comparing one band to another is often a starting point to a deeper analysis. If the so-called name-dropping is faulty, that's on the reviewer. It doesn't make the technique wrong. Idiots.

lucy

Hey do your research please,'Isn't anything' wasn't M.B.V's first release. They have more than two records to their name. You could try a copy of Ecstacy and Wine. Mind you I wouldn't do your job for all the dancing around buildings I could summon the energy to perform. 'This Is Your Bloody Valentine' their first release a 'mini-album' whatever that means x The point is the music was released so it goes into their catalogue? Such an amazing band as they are deserves to get that right really. Thanks for the article x

Vin

Good stuff, but I gotta agree with Mungo's minor point regarding du Lac. I own, and enjoy, both "Velvet Underground & Nico" and "Loveless" and never had any particular desire to start a band, or even write about music. I'd guess it is a kind of minor, almost semantic, point, but that just seems a kind of lame way to say "their influence exceeded their popularity" (which could be said of many bands).

Adam

Jam Science - actually comparing one group to another group is an end point. Like calling someone a racist, when an iconic group comes up there is generally little discussion after that.

Part of the problem is that bands are an easy reference point whereas there is no vocabulary that is regularly used by no musician fans. When you hear a band, can you point to the production as something that is meaningful? How about whether the drummer is ahead of the beat, on the beat, or behind the beat?

Also, what a band sounds like and its influences are different and very important. As pointed out in the article, it is usual to say that a band is like Talking Heads, but what about saying that a band is a) influenced by Fela as Talking Heads clearly were or b) that a band is making sharp changes in their sounds as Talking Heads did.