And just to show you that not all music writing is the hipster hash I've been slagging in the Voice:

"Its songs of romantic ruin, paranoia, and doubt are spare, inelastic, and ceaselessly on edge. Even when the songs are at their bounciest and most alluring, they have an insular and alien quality."

Now see, this writer is reaching for something, trying to tell you something about the music and what makes it distinctive. In fact, I think I need to change my tagline in honor...

Here he describes why Jilli might like them:

Erroneously regarded as a synth pop band -- and, every now and then -- as a band that peaked with a song placed in a scene of Real Genius, the Comsat Angels were one of the finest bands of the post-punk/new wave era. Often as moody if less dramatic than Joy Division, their first and best albums -- 1980's Waiting for a Miracle, 1981's Sleep No More, and 1982's Fiction -- featured abstract pop songs with spare instrumentation, many of which were bleak and filled with some form of heartache. The albums were almost unrelentingly sullen, but they were always transfixing. The band then fell prey to various commercial pressures for several years. In the '90s they resurfaced with a pair of powerful albums that resembled logical extensions of their earliest work, and then they vanished again.

Heh. "Unrelentingly sullen."

Corwood, I think they might interest you.

They sound interesting. Loved the Albini letter, too, but I'm always glad I don't know that guy in real life.

Picking on a tiny Southern queer for his music tastes and calling him a "cracker" is about as stupid as criticism can get. _________________ steve albini

"As" stupid as calling hip hop "profoundly stupid", and slagging Beck, Outkast and Radiohead in the same breath? Noting "I know what kinds of music speak to me the least, so I don't spend my energy [listening to it]"?

I'm always glad I don't know that guy in real life.

From all I've heard (Bob Weston is an old friend) he's quite pleasant.

Really? My impression is that he breathes fire and sticks needles in voodoo dolls all day.

I don't get people who say they hate whole genres of music--when the genres are defined as broadly as "rap" and "heavy metal". I can't imagine dismissing a whole style of music just because I didn't like the few examples of it I happened to hear.

I don't get people who say they hate whole genres of music--when the genres are defined as broadly as "rap" and "heavy metal". I can't imagine dismissing a whole style of music just because I didn't like the few examples of it I happened to hear.

Right the eff on. I can't wrap my head around people who love music but hate certain genres or only listen to one genre. It actually makes me angry (I know that seem irrational but there you go). People don't love music and "hate rap, heavy metal, country, gospel, etc."? Whatever whatever. But fans? I do not get it.

I am done reading about the SFJ/Merritt debacle. As per usual, I think all sides drew extreme conclusions. I have to say though, I think SFJ pretty much redeemed himself by apologizing for the cracker remark while still maintaining that there is something weird about a musician/music critic mapping out the greatest albums of the 20th century and leaving music by black people out of the equation completely.

I have to say though, I think SFJ pretty much redeemed himself by apologizing for the cracker remark while still maintaining that there is something weird about a musician/music critic mapping out the greatest albums of the 20th century and leaving music by black people out of the equation completely.

It wasn't much of an apology:

An apology? Because I used an unkind term in a snarky post? "Sorry" will make you feel better? Sure. I am sorry I called Stephin Merritt a cracker. It's not nice, and it's distracting.

Bah. And he didn't even try to apologize for calling him a racist. He just asked if we could move the discussion "away from the big bad 'r' word".

He just asked if we could move the discussion "away from the big bad 'r' word".

If we move away from the 'r' word, is there any more discussion?

I certainly understand the idea, from personal experience, that there are large (as opposed to many) genre's of music where the time and effort it would take to find something in it that appeals to me (and might not appeal on anything other than an intellectual level). I try not to disparage music other people are fans of, and I'm a helluva lot less elitist, music-wise, than I was in my teens and twenties. I'm not terribly forgiving what I assume to be TOP 40 music, however, but that has as much to do with being subjected to it in stores and resturaunts as anything else.

That's a lot of "I" statements.