BOLD SPICE: A Watershed Moment in Music Criticism
Most of you (Canadians), I'm sure, are aware of the fact that Exclaim! magazine is the most respected and trustworthy and free source of intelligent and innovative music criticism our fair country has to offer
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this is Vish.
thanks a lot for your review of my review here. for what it's worth, I found it really amusing.
I've been pretty conflicted over this review ever since I saw it in print. it does seem somewhat convoluted and certainly overblows a pretty straight-forward pop record. I obviously heard and saw something within the record and videos that piqued an odd response in me initially and, in retrospect, the review kind of plays out as I processed aspects of the Information.
I got a copy of the record with no expectations. I was a fan of Beck's as a kid (meaning like 17-18 years-old) but I hadn't really followed him too closely since. I did review Guero when it came out and liked a couple of songs. Essentially though, I haven't really cared about him too much in recent years.
I think my enthusiasm for The Information stems from being surprised by how much I enjoyed it and my feeling that, for Beck anyway, there was actually something kind of edgy about the record, the artwork, and the videos.
and so, there's a lot of wanky hyperbole and lofty suggestions about what the record might mean on some grand scale. ultimately, it likely means nothing and my review is worth less. I probably should have edited it a few more times and re-thought it even more, but a deadline's a deadline and I moved on a bit too quickly. even though I do think the record is great, it's not really gonna change the artistic universe and my enthusiasm for the record caused me to make some admittedly outlandish proclamations. You're totally right to call me/Exclaim on this stuff; it's likely a bit much.
I have to go but maybe we can discuss this some more if you like.
oh, to briefly address a few of your comments/questions:
"fundamentals of..." - I think this was a fancy way of saying, he's singing to a beat but with a bunch of weird shit on top.
"...Rolling Stones..." - a few things sounded a lot like songs from Let it Bleed, Sticky Fingers, and Exile on Main Street to me. like, stealing the same structures and melodies but tweaking them slightly and adding some beats. uh, like sampling maybe?
"hapless hipsters" - the people in the videos.
"back to go forwards" - within the Stones stuff, I was suggesting that Beck's new songs clearly seem inspired by older songs but still sound "contemporary." this was definitely not clear in the review
"non-commercial nature" - well, videos are usually just commercials I'd say. Beck's videos on the CD aren't completely fucked up but they're odd and lo-fi enough that I doubt they'd get much rotation. so, if these are actually the videos used to promote the singles, they're not really conventional music videos.
"adequately equipped" - again, that's me processing something that I wasn't sure what to think of. this was likely the first thought in my head and it stayed in the review. probably could've clipped it. again, the record is likely not that mindblowing.
"Bold Spice" - I didn't title this review.
okay, thanks again.
vk
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Thanks for being such a good sport about this.
I hope it's clear that you were absolutely a scapegoat here. I really don't think that Exclaim is a good magazine on the whole. That's why I hadn't read it in a long time. Picking up that last issue, all the reasons for my dislike of the magazine (which I won't go into because really I doubt that anyone cares) became very evident. By the time I got to the reviews section, I was distinctly annoyed by "Canada's Music Authority".
So your review just kind of acted as a screen onto which I projected all the negativity that Exclaim! generated within me.
I really could have chosen any number of other pieces in the magazine to write about. Yours was just an easy target, mostly due to its Beck-centricity (I clearly find "the cult of Beck" pretty silly). The point is, I wrote about your review not because it was exceptional but because it was wholly representative.
Anyway, it was written in the spirit of fun, so I'm glad you were amused. I think I need to go back to avoiding Exclaim! because reading it obviously makes me a very mean person. I've figured out once and for all that it's not my cup of tea.
Thanks for responding and for being nice, Vish,
TS
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