At Pitchfork, music journalism has become like fine art catalogue texts; something in and of itself, with no real reference to its subject, an exercise in self-pleasing pseudery. This extract is typical –

“[this CD] is anti-physical music for an anti-physical time … these 10 songs are invocations of the hyperreal, created to meet the anxieties of an age where bodies are rarely written about as sites of joy or authenticity, and more frequently discussed as zones of inequity, violence, embarrassment and pain. The desire to exist as a well-tended garden of pixels fuels many of our culture’s dominant systems: the databases of altered thoughts, distorted images, the avatars that demonstrate reaction or stand in for action. Like all of these networks and products, [this CD] answers our desire to escape the burden of physical presence — and in the process ends up sharpening and perpetuating the desire even further.”

Ri-ight. All we learn from this is that there are ten songs on the album. And that the writer needs a good slapping. Maybe the review is entirely appropriate; maybe the music is quite as arch and pretentious as the review. I for one don’t have the nerves of » Continue Reading.