Depends. Every site's got its good writers and bad writers, but overall I really enjoy the music section of TMT (their film section tends toward horseshit, unfortunately). P4k's editorials are generally well thought out and, if nothing else, their criticism is entirely free of the shitshow aspects it sometimes had when it was new and brash. Popmatters is usually pretty okay and sometimes they write something really good.
Since I'm a big electronic dude, I frequent Resident Advisor's review section and FACT Magazine pretty frequently.
If contrarianism and MFA-flexin' are your thing, head on down to Cokemachineglow, who have inherited all the snobbishness of P4k's youth but haven't gained much notoriety, yet. They seem to take great pleasure in naysaying - they made a point of singling out Deerhunter as the worst band of the year back when
Microcastle came out and floored every other music publication (they gave
Halcyon Digest an 80%, so I guess it stopped being fun), and their latest project seems to be Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All. Observe -
I seen it. Dudes got dumb all over the stage, like yelling at Jimmy Fallon and shit; we had fun. But such hype carries with it an air of well-fed sycophancy. There is, to be sure, nothing dangerous or even offensive about Odd Future; the continued suggestion that their music is somehow a “challenging” or “amoral” listen undercuts actually challenging music, not to mention actual amorality. You know what’s challenging? Noah23 is fucking challenging. But anyway. I can’t stand in the way of a good myth. Nor can I do much to ease the tide of hyperbole, or the faux-handwringing of a nattering, faintly hip-hop-literate media intrigue diligently discussing @tylerhashtag’s latest rape gag, mostly so they themselves have an excuse to re-make said rape gag (here’s one: “Your mom’s a bitch so I ripped her fucking tonsils out / Ski-mask and switchblade, waiting until prom gets out.” I just made that up!), or so they can say the word “swag” again. Because that’s funny, see: they wouldn’t normally get to say “swag.” Just as Lil’ B recycles Gucci’s (and so Wayne’s) eccentricity without bothering to ground it in any notion of aesthetic merit, so too does Odd Future recast the wild menace of the Wu-Tang Clan as an affectation to be worn for laffs, forgetting so far to produce any good rap music to accompany it. But I may just be old-fashioned. Who knows.
This was brought to you by G-Side’s new album, which is excellent, by the way, and Pusha T’s new single, which sounds like the fucking apocalypse. In a cool way.
So yeah,
don't read that rag.