PITCHFORK TOP 50

[signature]

what a load

Annie? Franz Ferdinand? JUNIOR BOYS??

and then there is no Fall, Black Dice, Isis, Wilco, Castanets, or Clouddead.

[jeph]

Oh, stop whining about Pitchfork. It's their subjective opinion, not some sort of gospel.

WAH WAH NOT EVERYONE HAS THE SAME MUSICAL TASTE AS ME WAH

[devils_daughter]

WAH WAH NOT EVERYONE HAS THE SAME MUSICAL TASTE AS ME WAH

Hell can you imagine how boring the world would be if we all did have the same taste?!

[happybirthdaygelatin]

pitchfork?

[arkturus]

*reads their list*

Sure, whatever. I think I agree with their exclusion of Wilco; I found A Ghost is Born to be somewhat confined. And Blueberry Boat was my antidote for this year's lack of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, even if it's 289 billion times more whimsical.

[Jamoky]

I like Franz Ferdinand, thank you.

and if you made a top 50 list, I'm sure there would be someone in the world who would disagree with one/some/all of your choices.

[Hector Gilbert]

There are some albums I like there and the inclusion of Espers surprised me a bit.  Otherwise it's not too exciting, and lacks Kesto.

[Rhomboid]

Hehehe happybirthdaygelatin you are awesome. And you live really close to me, even awesomer, go Puget Sound!

O and the list seems fine to me, although I thought that they could have chosen something other than Funeral for the #1 spot, I mean I love the album and everything but I just don't think that it should get any higher than top 7 or 8.

[synecdoche]

I think I am missing something-- I just don't like Funeral much.  Oh well,  to each their own and all that.

[Rhomboid]

Yeah, I like my music more......guitary? Im not sure.....something about it gives me sorta weird vibes. But even without being very 'guitary' Funeral manages to be a fairly decent album.

[signature]

oh my god whoever is loving kesto is my hero

also goddamn you all who disagree with me


also i am hella drunken




where is isis

?

[flowers for charlie]

you mean the ancient Egyptian goddess of fertility?  turns out she's not real!  sorry, pal!

devendra banhart's CD is devoid of hooks or anything that would make you want to continue listening to his music.  it sounds like the stuff they played on the radio in the 1930s, which was maybe okay back then, because it was the only thing to listen to, but it doesn't quite fly with me.  no, not in the new millenium!  no sir!

here i was going to go into a long rant about the artists on the list whose albums i found to be just abysmal, but there are too gosh dang many of them!  i will say that they include Dizzee Rascal, The Junior Boys, Interpol, TV on the Radio, and Brian Wilson, which I think should be locked in a vault in the center of the earth and never mentioned again under penalty of death.

music suuucks

[happybirthdaygelatin]

Hehehe happybirthdaygelatin you are awesome. And you live really close to me, even awesomer, go Puget Sound!

O and the list seems fine to me, although I thought that they could have chosen something other than Funeral for the #1 spot, I mean I love the album and everything but I just don't think that it should get any higher than top 7 or 8.

i love washington, the puget sound area especialy.  i use to live out on the olympia penisula so tacoma is a huge change.

i really didn't bother to read the list.  not yet anyway.  funeral is good but it's a grower.

did "who will cut our hair when we're gone" by the unicorns come out this year or last year?

[rocknrollsultan]

I read Pitchfork frequently, and there are plenty of times when I don't agree with their writers' tastes.  Some of the artists/bands that they love are stuff hipsters orgasm over that I really don't think is good music (if it is music) at all, (i.e. Xiu Xiu, Animal Collective).  They also spend WAY too much bandwith covering sh|tty pop hip-hop, i.e., throwing garbage like Petey Pablo's "Freek-A-Leek" in the We are the World section instead of covering a decent single that we may not have heard...   Yet for all of my disagreements with their tastes and their top 50, there have been a bunch of times where I've bought albums solely on the basis of a Pitchfork review and loved it--the Arcade Fire's "Funeral," for example, which Pitchfork and I both think is the best album of the year

Oh well, de gustibus non est disputandum

[jeph]

hurrr

Looks like we have a (drunken) troll. Consider this your warning, Captain Alcohol.

[church]

did "who will cut our hair when we're gone" by the unicorns come out this year or last year?

2003.

[happybirthdaygelatin]

eh, well it counts in my book and thanks for answering.

[geoff]

hurrr

Looks like we have a (drunken) troll. Consider this your warning, Captain Alcohol.

I'm confused?

[Mercurial]

Jeph refers to:

also i am hella drunken

"Troll" seems a little harsh, though.

[Johnny C]

and then there is no Wilco

That was actually what surprised me most about the Pitchfork Top 50. Well, no, not "surprised." More "disappointed." Obvious cred-grabs (the inclusion of Ghostface in the top 10, and the Streets in the top 5) were present, as well as apparently a shitload of bands from Sweden and Norway (though Sondre Lerche was conspicuously absent), and Elliot Smith's final album was nowhere to be seen. So how come the Number 1 band from two years ago dropped to number 36, and the Number 2 band from the same year is nowhere to be seen?

As an alternative, I propose Tiny Mix Tapes. Their Top 25 is far more encouraging.

[El Opium]

yeah, tinymixtapes rules. My fave was the top songs I could draw feature. What is it with their whole staff having sung tongs by Animal Collective on their top lists. I'm also hoping to get a copy of kesto by pan sonic for christmas. Pitchfork is pitchfork, its free isn't it? so what have you lost if you disagree with something there?

[jeph]

Jeph refers to:

also i am hella drunken

"Troll" seems a little harsh, though.

This particular board is constantly dancing on the edge of flamebait and retardation, and so I police it a little tighter than the other places.

My top 10 (which you'll see on Monday) features a lot of the same bands mentioned on PF's list, but in a mostly-different order and with a couple extra fellows thrown in.

What you have to take into account is that nowhere on PF's site do they claim to be objective or even authoritative reviewers of music. They have a very specific set of tastes (so much so that after reading it for a couple years I can usually predict their ratings pretty accurately) and either you agree with some, all, or none of it. I happen to fall into the "some" category, as do most people who visit their site I'd imagine. You also have to remember that ALL of their output is filtered through their editor (Ryan Schreiber) who has final say on the ratings and reviews that pass over his desk. It's fine if you disagree with what he (and his staff) think, but getting all bent out of shape over someone else's opinion is always kind of silly.

The only omission on their list that surprised me was Ratatat.

[Mercurial]

This particular board is constantly dancing on the edge of flamebait and retardation, and so I police it a little tighter than the other places.

Of course.  As you should.  I just meant that Trolls are generally intentionally belligerent to stir up trouble, while this was more of a faux pas...