30 Jul 10
28 Jul 10
23 Jul 10
An incomplete list of films that fall under the category of “high-concept sci-fi/action movies, 1993-1995”
-Timecop
-Virtuosity
-Demolition Man
-Judge Dredd
-Tank Girl
-Johnny Mnemonic
-Hackers
-Mortal Kombat
-Waterworld
-Species
-Street Fighter
-Double Dragon
-Brainscan
-The Meteor Man
-The Last Action Hero
-Super Mario Bros.
-RoboCop 3
-Cyborg 2
-Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III
-Theodore Rex
When kids that were born 10 years ago inevitably turn these movies into camp cult classics, that is when I give up all hope of a society that lets terrible things stay terrible.
8 notes
no wonder we all lost our shit for 'The Matrix'
douglasmartini:
camiwillknow:
If I had pirated this movie, I wouldn’t have to watch your dumb anti-piracy ad.
“YOU WOULDN’T DOWNLOAD A CAR.” FUCK YOU. I WOULD IF I COULD!
—++==FULL VERSION Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X USA-SPEC LHD [[2008]] (cRaCkEd by /\/\3g@\/\/|-|!pz)==++—.torrent
22 notes
douglasmartini asked: I just wanted to say that I loved your rebuttal to my piece. You made a bunch of great points, and you know specifically where I'm coming from and why I chose not to apply. With that said, I'm sure you're aware that I don't necessarily find Pitchfork to be "the enemy" in any way, shape or form.
I think there's always going to be an inherent self-consciousness among non-Pitchfork writers who happen to like a record that gets Best New Music'd. People (present company sometimes included) don't want to be "that person". I think you're right though; I think for there to be a true alternative to Pitchfork, it has to be a portal that is not reactionary of the site, one that works completely independent from Pitchfork's sphere of influence.
Thanks — the reason I went off like that is that you’re a writer (and a dude in general) I respect, so there’s that. I was reminded indirectly of other blogs/sites that overdo it when it comes to being reactionary towards Pitchfork, including some listed on the blogroll of that site you linked to, and in general I think it’s kind of like the way people go off on sports: a ballplayer is a fairly innocuous guy who can be a pest to your team but not enough to make you hate him, and then the Yankees sign him and now thanks to the uniform he’s a total fucking bastard (at least until he gets traded to, say, the Padres). Whether or not Mariano Rivera or Derek Jeter are good at what they do and are also decent human beings, it takes a backseat to the fact that they’re part of an Empire and therefore must be taken down.
(This analogy was weird for me to write because as a Twins fan I hate the bejesus out of the Yankees.)
3 notes
I think this makes me AJ Burnett?
When I linked my Meridian Signals review to my peer and good buddy Michael Powell, he mentioned that there needs to be a voice for the other side, and I knew exactly what he meant. With Altered Zones co-opting some of the biggest names in the blogosphere, it’s becoming increasingly necessary for there to be alternatives to Pitchfork.
[…]
My status as an artist notwithstanding, as a music writer, I’m trying to be the alternative voice. I’m trying to beat Pitchfork.
Even speaking as a freelancer for the site in question, this is an understandable sentiment — and it’s one I more or less held until I was asked if I wanted to contribute to the site. But when I mulled over the offer, it came down to this: here is a high-profile music website that will pay me to tell indie kids that Mantronix and Steinski are great. Caramanica’s notion of a “Pitchfork hive-mind” in his NYT article was a running gag amongst the staff during the festival: have you ever tried to get five music critics, no matter whom they write for, to agree on 50% of what each critic thinks, much less everything? And so much of what dragged the site out from its early years as a stereotypical bastion of indie snobbery starting around seven or eight years ago was the fact that they started hiring independent freelancers who had tastes the site had no use for in its original incarnation. People who had more interest in Kompakt or Rap-A-Lot than Matador and Sub Pop, people who gave in-depth thought to chart pop instead of reflexively rolling their eyes at it, people who actually went on their blogs and wrote things like “what the fuck are those dipshits at Pitchfork thinking, giving Rooty a 3.8?” When Andrew WK’s I Get Wet went from its original 0.6 score to the 144th best album of the 2000s in the span of nine years, well, that should’ve been a sign of something: people who disagreed with or even hated what Pitchfork decreed eventually got to help shape what Pitchfork decreed. (Maybe this is what people are angry about, actually — that a famously indie-isolationist site is now going around giving high marks to The-Dream albums.) In any case, the rep isn’t exactly a universally-applicable thing.
My interest in defending Pitchfork is partially self-preservational: I don’t like it when people get weird guilt-by-association ideas of who I am and where my tastes are supposed to come from based solely on the fact that my byline appears on a site that has an overinflated reputation. And it’s partially in the interest of fairness, in that many of the current contributing writers are more interested in getting into what makes music work instead of playing the part of breathless kingmaker hypemen. (And people should read some of the contributing writers’ work via other sites or mediums — Douglas Wolk’s 33 1/3 on Live at the Apollo; Tom Ewing on Freaky Trigger — and keep it in mind when they stumble across — or write — yet another blog post about how Pitchfork writers don’t know shit.)
But it’s also a matter of wasted opportunity: people are so absorbed in what Pitchfork’s supposedly doing to dictate/take over/ruin the whole indie-hype criticism beat that they’re letting it dictate their own agendas and skew things into a weird reactionary place, until they actually feel ashamed when it turns out that they like an album that gets a positive review there. I can’t count how many times other review sites have snidely name-checked Pitchfork to make a point about what an album’s really worth, but I can count how many times it actually gave me any sort of insight into what a band’s doing with its music, assuming it is mathematically accurate to consider stopping at 0 as “counting”. Aspiring music critics should spend less time worrying about the pernicious influence of a site they can’t remember the bylines of and more time listening to music without caring what anybody but themselves thinks about it. I would like to see alternatives to Pitchfork — I’d be fine with writing for an alternative to Pitchfork, though I’d probably wind up keeping bylines in both camps on some Yojimbo business — but the alternative has to come from someplace that isn’t fueled by spite, pettiness and the constant urge to look over one’s shoulder. Want to reduce your enemy’s influence? Stop letting them dictate everything you do.
59 notes
22 Jul 10
![yvynyl:
…and for the sick, sick album cover art!
douglashaddow:
Solomon Burke: Cool Breeze
Composed By, Vocals - Solomon Burke Engineer - Angel Balestier , Jack Hunt Orchestra - Gene Page Other [Music Coordination] - Jerry Styner
Recorded at MGM Recording Studios, Hollywood, California.
If you ever see this in a record shop, pick it up immediately. Even if you don’t own a record player, buy it for posterity’s sake.
I first heard the title theme of this soundtrack after trying to find out the source of the beat to Ghostface’s “Apollo Kids”. It is absolutely, diabolically monstrous.](http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l5y6un2Jfv1qzpt5vo1_500.jpg)
yvynyl:
…and for the sick, sick album cover art!
douglashaddow:
Solomon Burke: Cool Breeze
Composed By, Vocals - Solomon Burke
Engineer - Angel Balestier , Jack Hunt
Orchestra - Gene Page
Other [Music Coordination] - Jerry Styner
Recorded at MGM Recording Studios, Hollywood, California.
If you ever see this in a record shop, pick it up immediately. Even if you don’t own a record player, buy it for posterity’s sake.
I first heard the title theme of this soundtrack after trying to find out the source of the beat to Ghostface’s “Apollo Kids”. It is absolutely, diabolically monstrous.
14 notes
19 Jul 10
What I meant when I said Freddie Gibbs’ photographer had “a Pharoah Sanders hat”
2 notes
