Jack vs. Blogs Pt. 1 - The Bittersweet Taste of Irony

What is happening to me?

How did I get here? I am facing the abyss, and the abyss has a terrible, terrible name, a word I never thought I would be the type of person to say.

Blogosphere.

It sounds, phonetically, like vomit. But to explain my state of mind, I have to explain myself. I am trying to be a music writer. Once they were a rare breed, at least in terms of popular music. And sure, that sounds elitist. I appreciate the fact that the internet gives everyone an opinion, because everyone is entitled to one, but the sad fact is that there is a miniscule number of people out there who will ever have an opinion about music and articulate it as creatively, intelligently, and readably as Lester Bangs or Greil Marcus. These and others were the voices it took to elevate music writing from blurbs and PR to a section in Barnes and fucking Nobles.

I came too late to this party, it seems. Long form music criticism is looking terminally out of vogue. British mags like Mojo still feature extended, somewhat literary-minded pieces on various artists, but these are increasingly unnecessary gushings over seminal artists who’ve already inspired enough ink to fill an encyclopedia. Velvets, Joy Division, the Rolling Stones, the Beatles. Old masters for old readers.

The youth writes online, but all too often the deluge of options, information, and the sheer volume of music being put out results in flash-in-the-pan hype and hypocritical backlashes, infighting and elitism. Ironically, the freedom granted by the internet has flip-flopped the elitism of print music journalism. What was once a semi-exclusive club with pay and perks is now a free-for-all, with so many voices clamoring for attention, it’s almost necessary get attention through snarkiness that too often crosses over into cattiness.

Because I want to stay current, I find reading music blogs to be necessary. And before I come off like a curmudgeonly Luddite (if I haven’t already), let me say that there is a lot of quality writing on the internet right now that wouldn’t have been possible otherwise. I just feel that it has impacted some fields negatively, such as arts criticism and criticism in general. I’m not a Luddite, I’m just a broke writer wondering if I’m ever going to be able to make a living doing what I love to do.

But lately I find myself disagreeing with so much of what is being pushed out there. Examples? You betcha.

The National: Will someone please tell me what about this band is actually good? And before anyone counters with “give them a chance,” I'll have you know I have listened to both Alligator and Boxer, and have seen the band live. After all of this effort to like them, because the mighty blogosphere commanded it thus, I still think the National sounds like Coldplay covering Joy Divison. As a friend of mine put it, “It’s like a really boring version of good music.”

Cloverfield hype/Cloverfield backlash: First the internet was buzzing with rumors about producer J.J. Abrams’ real time, handheld mysterious Manhattan monster mash, with one rumor even generating the ludicrous theory that the monster was, in fact, a lion, due to some dumbass mishearing the line: “I saw it! It’s A-LIVE! It’s huge!” But once the movie actually came out a great deal of people seemed to be devoting a great deal of unnecessary energy into hating on a totally decent - if not mind-blowingly magnificent - sci-fi horror movie. Perhaps the genre element caused a lot of angry nerds to come out of the woodwork, but I find a lot of the e-bitching to be totally ridiculous. I saw the movie, and enjoyed it, and yes, suspension of disbelief was required, as is always required when dealing with Godzilla, Rodin, Mothra, Megalon, Mecha-Godzilla, Ghidra, Gamera, or the Blair Witch. I’ll also go on the record as saying that I felt no urge to vomit due to the shaky-cam, and that it sounds like a lot of people out there have their own personal gastric problems to attend to.

Vampire Weekend: ATTENTION ALL YOUNG AMERICAN BANDS: STOP PRETENDING TO BE BRITISH. IT IS NOT WORKING. THAT IS ALL.

This is but a helping of my recent blog-resentment. I intend this feature to be a running commentary on my search for writing work, as well as on the online music climate. Or, for lack of a better word, scene. Oy.