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133-425: Robert Thomas Christgau ( / ˈ k r ɪ s t ɡ aʊ / KRIST -gow ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most well-known and influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and later became an early proponent of musical movements such as hip hop , riot grrrl , and the import of African popular music in
266-407: A Twitter hashtag was created under #womengaytaleseshouldread. In June 2016, the credibility of Talese's book The Voyeur's Motel , whose subject was Gerald Foos , was questioned when it came to light Foos had made false statements to Talese which Talese did not verify. When news of the credibility broke, Talese stated, "I'm not going to promote this book. How dare I promote it when its credibility
399-548: A freelance writer after a story he wrote about the death of a woman in New Jersey was published by New York magazine. He was among the first dedicated rock critics. He was asked to take over the dormant music column at Esquire , which he began writing in June 1967. He also contributed to Cheetah magazine at the time. He then became a leading voice in the formation of a musical–political aesthetic combining New Left politics and
532-591: A "scrum in rugby", in that "[e]verybody pushes against everybody else, and we move forward in a huge blob of vehement opinion and mutual judgment". Music critic and indie pop musician Scott Miller , in his 2010 book Music: What Happened? , suggested, "Part of the problem is that a lot of vital pop music is made by 22-year-olds who enjoy shock value, and it's pathetic when their elders are cornered into unalloyed reverence". Miller suggested that critics could navigate this problem by being prepared "to give young artists credit for terrific music without being intimidated into
665-434: A "slap at the establishment, at publications such as the hippie homestead Rolling Stone and the rawker outpost Creem ", adding that the "1980s generation" of post-punk indie rockers had in the mid-2000s "been taken down by younger 'poptimists,' who argue that lovers of underground rock are elitists for not embracing the more multicultural mainstream". Powers likened the poptimist critics' debates about bands and styles to
798-470: A 2010 interview, stating, "Most of us [critics] begin writing about music because we love it so much. We can't wait to tell our friends and neighbors about what we're hearing." According to McCall, even over the course of a long professional career, the enthusiastic impulse to share "never fades". McCall expressed his interest in "examining why people respond to what they respond to. I hazard guesses. Sometimes I'm wrong, but I hope I'm always provocative." In
931-941: A B+ or higher to be a personal recommendation. He noted that in practice, grades below a C− were rare. In 1990, Christgau changed the format of the "Consumer Guide" to focus more on the albums he liked. B+ records that Christgau deemed "unworthy of a full review" were mostly given brief comments and star marks ranging from three down to one, denoting an honorable mention ", records which Christgau believed may be of interest to their own target audience. Lesser albums were filed under categories such as "Neither" (which may impress at first with "coherent craft or an arresting track or two", before failing to make an impression again) and "Duds" (which indicated bad records and were listed without further comment). Christgau did give full reviews and traditional grades to records he pans in an annual November "Turkey Shoot" column in The Village Voice , until he left
1064-657: A B.A. degree in English . At college, his musical interests turned to jazz , but he quickly returned to rock after moving back to New York. He has said that Miles Davis 's 1960 album Sketches of Spain initiated "one phase of the disillusionment (in him) with jazz that resulted in my return to rock and roll." He was deeply influenced by New Journalism writers including Gay Talese and Tom Wolfe . "My ambitions when I went into journalism were always, to an extent, literary", Christgau said later. I am interested in those places where popular culture and avant-garde culture intersect. As
1197-409: A Cold ", is one of the most influential American magazine articles of all time, and a pioneering example of New Journalism and creative nonfiction . With what some have called a brilliant structure and pacing, the article focused not just on Sinatra himself, but also on Talese's pursuit of his subject. Talese's celebrated Esquire essay about Joe DiMaggio , "The Silent Season of a Hero" – in part
1330-540: A February 2017 interview with Haaretz , Talese said, “This crazy Trump, hustler, real estate tycoon, I think he’s better than Obama. We love to say Obama is Frederick Douglass , Obama is Booker T. Washington , Obama is Paul Robeson , the enlightenment. Well it didn’t work." In April 2016, Talese spoke at a panel at a Boston University journalism conference. During the panel, Talese was asked what nonfiction women writers he found inspiring, to which he responded, "I didn't know any women writers that I loved." In response,
1463-707: A bona fide American institution. For music writers, his year-end essays and extensive 'Dean's List' are like watching the big ball drop in Times Square ." These are Christgau's choices for the number-one album of the year, including the point score he assigned for the poll. Pazz & Jop's rules provided that each item in a top ten could be allotted between 5 and 30 points, with all ten items totaling 100, allowing critics to weight certain albums more heavily if they chose to do so. In some years, he often gave an equal number of points to his first- and second-ranked albums, but they were nevertheless ranked as first and second, not as
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#17328550218871596-629: A booklet called "Jungle to Jukebox" that used racist, exotic tropes to illustrate the dangers of rock music to white youth. In the 2000s, online music bloggers began to supplement, and to some degree displace, music journalists in print media. In 2006, Martin Edlund of the New York Sun criticized the trend, arguing that while the "Internet has democratized music criticism, it seems it's also spread its penchant for uncritical hype". Carl Wilson described "an upsurge in pro-pop sentiment among critics" during
1729-486: A challenge "for those of us concerned with historical memory and popular music performance". Simon Frith said that pop and rock music "are closely associated with gender; that is, with conventions of male and female behaviour". According to Holly Kruse, both popular music articles and academic articles about pop music are usually written from "masculine subject positions". Kembrew McLeod analyzed terms used by critics to differentiate between pop music and rock, finding
1862-526: A challenge to taste hierarchies, and has remained a pugilistic, exhibitionist business throughout pop's own evolution". Powers claimed that "[i]nsults, rejections of others' authority, bratty assertions of superior knowledge and even threats of physical violence are the stuff of which pop criticism is made", while at the same time, the "best [pop criticism] also offers loving appreciation and profound insights about how music creates and collides with our everyday realities". She stated that pop criticism developed as
1995-439: A closet ' American Woman ' fan" (from Christgau's review of the 1983 Police album Synchronicity ). "Calling Neil Tennant a bored wimp is like accusing Jackson Pollock of making a mess" (reviewing the 1987 Pet Shop Boys album Actually ); and " Mick Jagger should fold up his penis and go home" (in a review of Prince 's 1980 album Dirty Mind ). In 1978, Lou Reed recorded a tirade against Christgau and his column on
2128-553: A considerable amount of criticism from conservative Christian communities within the United States. This criticism was strongest throughout the 1960s and 70s, with some of the most prominent Christian critics being David A. Noebel , Bob Larson , and Frank Garlock . While these men were not professional music critics, they often claimed to be qualified rock critics because of their professional experiences with both music and religion. For example, Larson tried to assert his authority as
2261-455: A contributing editor at Rolling Stone (which first published his review of Moby Grape 's Wow in 1968). Late in 2007, Christgau was fired by Rolling Stone , although he continued to work for the magazine for another three months. Beginning with the March 2008 issue, he joined Blender , where he was listed as "senior critic" for three issues and then "contributing editor". Christgau had been
2394-462: A critic, I want to achieve a new understanding of culture in both its aesthetic and political aspects; as a journalist, I want to suggest whatever I figure out to an audience in an entertaining and provocative way. —Christgau (1977) Christgau wrote short stories, before giving up fiction in 1964 to become a sportswriter and later, a police reporter for the Newark Star-Ledger . He became
2527-559: A frame of mind where dark subject matter always gets a passing grade", stating that a critic should be able to call a young artist "a musical genius" while "in the same breath declaring that his or her lyrics are morally objectionable." Reacting to the state of pop music criticism, Miller identified a major issue as critics' failure to "credit an artist with getting a feeling across", specifically pointing out critic Lester Bangs as "a ball of emotion at all times", who nonetheless "never really related to his favorite artists as people who develop
2660-459: A gendered dichotomy in descriptions of "'serious,' 'raw,' and 'sincere' rock music as distinguished from 'trivial', 'fluffy,' and 'formulaic' pop music". McLeod found that a likely cause of this dichotomy was the lack of women writing in music journalism: "By 1999, the number of female editors or senior writers at Rolling Stone hovered around a whopping 15%, [while] at Spin and Raygun , [it was] roughly 20%." Criticism associated with gender
2793-490: A graduate degree. One critic of the study pointed out that because all newspapers were included, including low-circulation regional papers, the female representation of 26% misrepresented the actual scarcity, in that the "large US papers, which are the ones that influence public opinion, have virtually no women classical music critics", with the notable exceptions of Anne Midgette in the New York Times and Wynne Delacoma in
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#17328550218872926-418: A little interest in pop music, they're a treasure." While regarding the early columns as "a model of cogent, witty criticism", Dave Marsh in 1976 said "the tone of the writing is now snotty–it lacks compassion, not to mention empathy, with current rock." Fans of Christgau's "Consumer Guide" like to share lines from their favorite reviews. Wolk wrote, " Sting wears his sexual resentment on his chord changes like
3059-662: A long time he's been called the 'dean of American rock critics'", wrote New York Times literary critic Dwight Garner in 2015. "It's a line that started out as an offhanded joke. These days, few dispute it." Christgau married fellow critic and writer Carola Dibbell in 1974 and they have an adopted daughter, Nina, born in Honduras in 1986. He said that he grew up in a " born-again church" in Queens but has since become an atheist . Christgau has been long, albeit argumentative friends with critics Tom Hull , Dave Marsh , Greil Marcus and
3192-468: A lot of white guys in their 60s waving the flag for Lil Wayne 's Da Drought 3 , especially not in the same column as they wave the flag for a Willie Nelson / Merle Haggard / Ray Price trio album, an anthology of new Chinese pop, Vampire Weekend , and Wussy ..." Christgau reflected in 2004: "Rock criticism was certainly more fun in the old days, no matter how cool the tyros opining for chump change in netzines like PopMatters and Pitchfork think it
3325-417: A meditation on the transient nature of fame – was also published in 1966. For his part, Talese regarded his 1966 profile of obituarist Alden Whitman , "Mr. Bad News", as his finest. A number of Talese's Esquire essays were collected into the 1970 book Fame and Obscurity ; in its introduction, Talese paid tribute to two writers he admired, citing "an aspiration on my part to somehow bring to reportage
3458-668: A number of other major newspapers "still have full-time classical music critics", including (in 2007) the Los Angeles Times , The Washington Post , The Baltimore Sun , The Philadelphia Inquirer , and The Boston Globe . Music writers only started "treating pop and rock music seriously" in 1964 "after the breakthrough of the Beatles ". In their book Rock Criticism from the Beginning , Ulf Lindberg and his co-writers say that rock criticism appears to have been "slower to develop in
3591-790: A personal list of his favorite releases called the "Dean's List". Only his top ten count toward his vote in the poll, but his full lists of favorites usually numbered far more than that. These lists–or at least Christgau's top tens–were typically published in The Village Voice along with the Pazz & Jop results. After Christgau was dismissed from the Voice , he continued publishing his annual lists on his own website and at The Barnes & Noble Review . While Pazz & Jop's aggregate critics' poll are its main draw, Christgau's Deans' Lists are noteworthy in their own right. Henry Hauser from Consequence of Sound said Christgau's "annual 'Pazz & Jop' poll has been
3724-456: A perspective previously reserved for jazz artists to the rise of American-influenced local rock and pop groups, anticipating the advent of rock critics. Among Britain's broadsheet newspapers, pop music gained exposure in the arts section of The Times when William Mann , the paper's classical music critic, wrote an appreciation of the Beatles in December 1963. In early 1965, The Observer ,
3857-635: A press event for the 5th Dimension in the early 1970s. According to Rosen, "Christgau was in his late 20s at the time – not exactly an éminence grise –so maybe it was the booze talking, or maybe he was just a very arrogant young man. In any case, as the years passed, the quip became a fact." When asked about it years later, Christgau said that the title "seemed to push people's buttons, so I stuck with it. There's obviously no official hierarchy within rock criticism–only real academies can do that. But if you mean to ask whether I think some rock critics are better than others, you're damn straight I do. Don't you?" "For
3990-442: A regular contributor to Blender before he joined Rolling Stone . He continued to write for Blender until the magazine ceased publication in March 2009. In 1987, he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in the field of "folklore and popular culture" to study the history of popular music. Christgau has also written frequently for Playboy , Spin , and Creem . He appears in the 2011 rockumentary Color Me Obsessed , about
4123-430: A rise of music critics who used YouTube and social media as their platform. According to Vice magazine's Larry Fitzmaurice in 2016, Twitter (X) is "perhaps the last public space for unfettered music criticism in an increasingly anti-critical landscape". In 2020, The New York Times described YouTuber Anthony Fantano as "probably the most popular music critic left standing." Fantano's channel, The Needle Drop,
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4256-560: A rock critic by stating: "As a minister, I know now what it is like to feel the unction of the Holy Spirit. As a rock musician, I knew what it meant to feel the counterfeit anointing of Satan". Christian criticisms of rock music in the mid 20th century often centered around arguments that rock was both sonically and morally bad and physically harmful to both the body and soul. Using these central arguments, Noebel, Larson, Garlock, and other Christian critics of rock music wrote extensively about
4389-424: A skill of conveying feelings. You don't feel that he comfortably acknowledged being moved as a result of their honest work. Artists in his writing were vaguely ridiculous, fascinating primitives, embodying an archetype by accident of nature." Jezebel ' s Tracy Moore, in 2014, suggested that one of the virtues of writing about how music made one feel, in contrast with linking it to the sounds of other artists,
4522-456: A song", in the way that working musicians might discuss "the A-minor in the second measure of the chorus". Stevie Chick, a writer who teaches music journalism at City University London , said, "I think more than any other journalism, music journalism has got a really powerful creative writing quotient to it." Tris McCall of the Newark Star-Ledger discussed his approach to music criticism in
4655-476: A sympathetic readership, given the nature of his publication, Goldstein's task was to win over a more highbrow readership to the artistic merits of contemporary pop music. At this time, both Goldstein and Williams gained considerable renown in the cultural mainstream and were the subject of profile articles in Newsweek . The emergence of rock journalism coincided with an attempt to position rock music, particularly
4788-462: A three-volume book series, the first of which was published in 1981 as Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies ; it was followed by Christgau's Record Guide: The '80s (1990) and Christgau's Consumer Guide: Albums of the '90s (2000). In his original grading system from 1969 to 1990, albums were given a grade ranging from A+ to E−. Under this system, Christgau generally considered
4921-446: A tie for first. The list shows only his number-one picks. No one in this time and place has the time to sit and listen uninterrupted for sixty minutes to anybody's music. I think Robert Christgau is the last record reviewer on earth who listens to eight records a day twice before giving his opinion on it ... Christgau is the last true-blue record critic on earth. He gave us an A-plus. That's pretty much who I make my records for. He's like
5054-531: A tradition of writing about rock since the 60's" has been "largely hidden in American culture". Brooks theorized that perceptions of female artists of color might be different if there were more women of color writing about them, and praised Ellen Willis as a significant feminist critic of rock's classic era. Willis, who was a columnist for the New Yorker from 1968 to 1975, believed society could be enlightened by
5187-544: A trustworthy individual in whom they could confide. Talese graduated from the University of Alabama in 1953. His selection of a major was, as he described it, a moot choice. "I chose journalism as my college major because that is what I knew," he recalls, "but I really became a student of history." At university, he became a brother of Phi Sigma Kappa fraternity. It was there that Talese would begin to employ literary devices more well known for fiction, such as establishing
5320-457: Is "hard" to write about in an "impressionistic way", that he is "not at all well-schooled in the jazz albums of the '50s and '60s", and that he has neither the "language nor the frame of reference to write readily about them." This was even while critiquing jazz artists like Miles Davis , Ornette Coleman , and Sonny Rollins ; he said "finding the words involves either considerable effort or a stroke of luck". Christgau has also admitted to disliking
5453-421: Is arguably one of the two most important American mass-culture critics of the second half of the 20th century... All rock critics working today, at least the ones who want to do more than rewrite PR copy, are in some sense Christgauians." Spin magazine said in 2015, "You probably wouldn't be reading this publication if Robert Christgau didn't largely invent rock criticism as we know it." Douglas Wolk said
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5586-426: Is being documented in a non-fiction book he has been working on since 2007. They have two daughters, Pamela Talese, a painter, and Catherine Talese, a photographer and photo editor. Talese was a close friend of fellow journalist and author Tom Wolfe . Talese is a lifelong Democrat . Despite this, he was a fierce critic of President Barack Obama and has defended President Donald Trump on several occasions. In
5719-526: Is called "popism" – or, more evocatively (and goofily), "poptimism". The poptimism approach states: "Pop (and, especially, hip-hop) producers are as important as rock auteurs, Beyoncé is as worthy of serious consideration as Bruce Springsteen , and ascribing shame to pop pleasure is itself a shameful act." In 2008, Ann Powers of the Los Angeles Times argued that pop music critics "have always been contrarians", because "pop music [criticism] rose up as
5852-440: Is centered on a perception that rock critics regard rock as "normative ... the standard state of popular music ... to which everything else is compared". At a 2006 pop critic conference, attendees discussed their "guilty pop pleasures, reconsidering musicians ( Tiny Tim , Dan Fogelberg , Phil Collins ) and genres " which rock critics have long dismissed as lightweight, commercial music. Rosen stated that "this new critical paradigm"
5985-620: Is down the toilet?" In subsequent interviews and on an appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers , Talese recanted this disavowal, stating that his story was still accurate despite the discrepancies found by the Washington Post . In a November 2017 interview with Vanity Fair at the New York Public Library 's Literary Lions Gala, Talese made comments about the sexual assault accusations against Kevin Spacey that had surfaced over
6118-410: Is his main outlet, but he also streams music commentary on Twitch and posts on X. In an article published in 2024, Jessica Karl, a Bloomberg News columnist, opined that "the way we critique music is broken". She argues that the current culture of consuming new music, particularly with the release of Taylor Swift's album The Tortured Poets Department (2024), is unhealthy. While she found some of
6251-645: Is now regarded as classical music. In the 1960s, music journalism began more prominently covering popular music like rock and pop after the breakthrough of The Beatles . With the rise of the internet in the 2000s, music criticism developed an increasingly large online presence with music bloggers, aspiring music critics, and established critics supplementing print media online. Music journalism today includes reviews of songs, albums and live concerts, profiles of recording artists , and reporting of artist news and music events. Music journalism has its roots in classical music criticism , which has traditionally comprised
6384-527: Is now." In a broad sense, Christgau says he responds to qualities of "tone, spirit, [and] music", disregarding, for instance, scholarly analysis of artists such as Bob Dylan . He readily admits to having prejudices and generally dislikes genres such as heavy metal , salsa , dance , art rock , progressive rock , bluegrass , gospel , Irish folk , jazz fusion , and classical music . "I admire metal's integrity, brutality, and obsessiveness", Christgau wrote in 1986, "but I can't stand its delusions of grandeur,
6517-531: Is perhaps best known for his "Consumer Guide" columns, which have been published more-or-less monthly since July 10, 1969, in the Village Voice , as well as a brief period in Creem . In its original format, each edition of the "Consumer Guide" consisted of approximately 20 single-paragraph album reviews, each given a letter grade ranging from A+ to E−. The reviews were later collected, expanded, and extensively revised in
6650-534: Is still really intellectually active? It is tremendously flattering and gratifying that there are people who are ready to help support me." Between 1968 and 1970, Christgau submitted ballots in Jazz & Pop magazine's annual critics' poll. He selected Bob Dylan's John Wesley Harding (released late in 1967), The Who 's Tommy (1969), and Randy Newman 's 12 Songs (1970) as the best pop albums of their respective years, and Miles Davis 's Bitches Brew (1970) as
6783-600: The Neue Zeitschrift für Musik (founded by Robert Schumann in 1834), and in London journals such as The Musical Times (founded in 1844 as The Musical Times and Singing-class Circular ); or else by reporters at general newspapers where music did not form part of the central objectives of the publication. An influential English 19th-century music critic, for example, was James William Davison of The Times . The composer Hector Berlioz also wrote reviews and criticisms for
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#17328550218876916-539: The Chicago Sun-Times . In 2007, The New York Times wrote that classical music criticism, which it characterized as "a high-minded endeavor that has been around at least as long as newspapers", had undergone "a series of hits in recent months" with the elimination, downgrading, or redefinition of critics' jobs at newspapers in Atlanta, Minneapolis, and elsewhere, citing New York magazine's Peter G. Davis , "one of
7049-1050: The Sentinel-Ledger . Talese credits his mother as the role model he followed in developing the interviewing techniques that he would during his career. He relates in "Origins of a Nonfiction Writer": I learned [from my mother] ... to listen with patience and care, and never to interrupt even when people were having great difficulty in explaining themselves, for during such halting and imprecise moments ... people are very revealing—what they hesitate to talk about can tell much about them. Their pauses, their evasions, their sudden shifts in subject matter are likely indicators of what embarrasses them, or irritates them, or what they regard as too private or imprudent to be disclosed to another person at that particular time. However, I have also overheard many people discussing candidly with my mother what they had earlier avoided—a reaction that I think had less to do with her inquiring nature or sensitively posed questions than with their gradual acceptance of her as
7182-410: The Voice dismissed Christgau after the paper's acquisition by New Times Media . He continued to write reviews in the "Consumer Guide" format for MSN Music , Cuepoint , and Noisey – Vice ' s music section–where they were published in his "Expert Witness" column until July 2019. In September of the same year, he launched a paid-subscription newsletter called And It Don't Stop , published on
7315-485: The counterculture . After Esquire discontinued the column, Christgau moved to The Village Voice in 1969, and he also worked as a college professor. From early on in his emergence as a critic, Christgau was conscious of his lack of formal knowledge of music. In a 1968 piece he commented: I don't know anything about music, which ought to be a damaging admission but isn't... The fact is that pop writers in general shy away from such arcana as key signature and beats to
7448-544: The guitar shop , and now social media : when it comes to popular music, these places become stages for the display of male prowess", and adds, "Female expertise, when it appears, is repeatedly dismissed as fraudulent. Every woman who has ever ventured an opinion on popular music could give you some variation [of this experience] ...and becoming a recognized 'expert' (a musician, a critic) will not save [women] from accusations of fakery." Daphne Brooks, in her 2008 article "The Write to Rock: Racial Mythologies, Feminist Theory, and
7581-559: The murder of John Lennon : "Why is it always Bobby Kennedy or John Lennon? Why isn't it Richard Nixon or Paul McCartney ?" Similar criticism came from Sonic Youth in their song " Kill Yr Idols ". Christgau responded by saying "Idolization is for rock stars, even rock stars manqué like these impotent bohos –critics just want a little respect. So if it's not too hypersensitive of me, I wasn't flattered to hear my name pronounced right, not on this particular title track." Christgau has named Louis Armstrong , Thelonious Monk , Chuck Berry ,
7714-446: The prizefight level. He wrote 38 articles about Floyd Patterson alone. Talese was then assigned to the Times' Albany Bureau to cover state politics. It was a short-lived assignment, however, as his exacting habits and meticulous style soon irritated his new editors so much that they recalled him to the city, assigning him to write minor obituaries. Talese puts it, "I was banished to
7847-633: The "ecstatic experience" of visions expressed through music's rhythm and noise and that such joy would lead people to different ways of sharing. Brooks wrote that "the confluence of cultural studies, rock studies, and third wave feminist critical studies makes it possible now more than ever to continue to critique and reinterrogate the form and content of popular music histories". In Brooks' view, "By bravely breaking open dense equations of gender, class, power, and subcultural music scenes", music journalists, activists and critics such as Ellen Willis have been "able to brilliantly, like no one before [them], challenge
7980-474: The "scene" with minute details and beginning articles in medias res . During his junior year, he became the sports editor for the campus newspaper, The Crimson White , and started a column he dubbed "Sports Gay-zing", for which he wrote on November 7, 1951: Rhythmic "Sixty Minute Man" emanated from the Supe Store juke box and Larry (The Maestro) Chiodetti beat against the table like mad in keeping time with
8113-470: The 1978 live album, Take No Prisoners : "What does Robert Christgau do in bed? I mean, is he a toe fucker? [...] Can you imagine working for a fucking year, and you get a B+ from some asshole in The Village Voice ?" Christgau rated the album C+ and wrote in his review, "I thank Lou for pronouncing my name right." In December 1980, Christgau provoked angry responses from Voice readers when his column approvingly quoted his wife Carola Dibbell 's reaction to
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#17328550218878246-531: The 2010s, some commentators noted and criticized the lack of negative reviews in music journalism. Saul Austerlitz from the New York Times Magazine noted that unlike other art forms, "music is now effectively free. Music criticism's former priority — telling consumers what to purchase — has been rendered null and void for most fans." He argued that this and " click culture " causes music critics to act as "cheerleaders" for existing stars. The 2010s saw
8379-605: The American south among black populations. Early conservative Christian criticisms of rock music had strong footings in racism. Most white conservative Christians in the mid 20th century understood that rock started among black populations and feared what the success of the genre implied for the church, segregation, and racial equality. When critiquing rock music, Christian critics commonly portrayed rock music with "primitive and exotic imagery to convey [its] African-roots". For example, The American Tract Society in New Jersey released
8512-471: The Beatles , and the New York Dolls as being his top five artists of all time. In a 1998 obituary, he called Frank Sinatra "the greatest singer of the 20th century". He considers Billie Holiday "probably [his] favorite singer". In his 2000 Consumer Guide book, Christgau said his favorite rock album was either The Clash (1977) or New York Dolls (1973), while his favorite record in general
8645-443: The Beatles' work, in the American cultural landscape. The critical discourse was further heightened by the respectful coverage afforded the genre in mainstream publications such as Newsweek , Time and Life in the months leading up to and following the release of the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album in June 1967. Within this discourse, Richard Meltzer , in an essay for Crawdaddy! in March, challenged
8778-468: The July 2010 installment would be the last on MSN. On November 22, he launched a blog on MSN, called "Expert Witness", which featured reviews only of albums that he had graded B+ or higher, since those albums "are the gut and backbone of my musical pleasure"; the writing of reviews for which are "so rewarding psychologically that I'm happy to do it at blogger's rates". He began corresponding with dedicated readers of
8911-514: The Paris press of the 1830s and 1840s. Modern art music journalism is often informed by music theory consideration of the many diverse elements of a musical piece or performance, including (as regards a musical composition ) its form and style, and for performance, standards of technique and expression. These standards were expressed, for example, in journals such as Neue Zeitschrift für Musik founded by Robert Schumann , and are continued today in
9044-517: The Pleasures of Rock Music Criticism", wrote that in order to restructure music criticism, one must "focus on multiple counter narratives" to break away from racial and gender biases as embodied in "contemporary cultural fetishizations of white male performative virtuosity and latent black male innovations". Brooks focused on "the ways that rock music criticism has shaped and continues to shape our understandings of racialized music encounters, and what are
9177-679: The Replacements . He previously taught during the formative years of the California Institute of the Arts . As of 2007, he was an adjunct professor in the Clive Davis Department of Recorded Music at New York University . In August 2013, Christgau revealed in an article written for Barnes & Noble 's website that he was writing a memoir. On July 15, 2014, Christgau debuted a monthly column on Billboard ' s website. Christgau
9310-478: The U.S. than in England". One of the early British music magazines, Melody Maker , complained in 1967 about how "newspapers and magazines are continually hammering [i.e., attacking] pop music ". From 1964, Melody Maker led its rival publications in terms of approaching music and musicians as a subject for serious study rather than merely entertainment. Staff reporters such as Chris Welch and Ray Coleman applied
9443-410: The United States "the emergence of a 'serious' rock press and the rock critic" began in 1966, presaged by Robert Shelton , the folk music critic for The New York Times , writing articles praising the Beatles and Bob Dylan , the last of whom had just embraced rock 'n' roll by performing with electric backing at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival . Paul Williams , an eighteen-year-old student, launched
9576-521: The West. He was the chief music critic and senior editor for The Village Voice for 37 years, during which time he created and oversaw the annual Pazz & Jop critics poll. He has also covered popular music for Esquire , Creem , Newsday , Playboy , Rolling Stone , Billboard , NPR , Blender , and MSN Music ; he was a visiting arts teacher at New York University . CNN senior writer Jamie Allen has called Christgau "the E. F. Hutton of
9709-523: The World Music Institute interviewed four New York Times music critics who came up with the following criteria on how to approach ethnic music: A key finding in a 2005 study of arts journalism in America was that the profile of the "average classical music critic is a white, 52-year old male, with a graduate degree". Demographics indicated that the group was 74% male, 92% white, and 64% had earned
9842-425: The alternative stories that we might tell". Brooks pointed to Christgau's statement that, after the Beatles' arrival in America, "rock criticism embraced a dream or metaphor of perpetual revolution. Worthwhile bands were supposed to change people's lives, preferably for the better. If they failed to do so, that meant they didn't matter." Unsurprisingly, according to Brooks, "the history of women who've been sustaining
9975-494: The art. Applying critical theory ( e.g. , critical gender studies and critical race theory ) to music journalism, some academic writers suggest that mutual disrespect between critics and artists is one of many negative effects of rockism . In 2004, critic Kelefa Sanneh defined "rockism" as "idolizing the authentic old legend (or underground hero) while mocking the latest pop star". Music journalism "infected" with rockism has become, according to Yale professor Daphne Brooks,
10108-413: The baseball team. The assistant coach had the duty of telephoning in the chronicle of each game to the local newspaper and when he complained he was too busy to do it properly, the head coach gave Talese the duty. As he recalls in his 1996 memoiristic essay "Origins of a Nonfiction Writer": On the mistaken assumption that relieving the athletic department of its press duties would gain me the gratitude of
10241-437: The beats used in rock music could cause rebellion in younger generations due to their hypnotic and influential nature. Drawing from styles like rhythm and blues and jazz music, rock and roll was first innovated by black communities, but was soon appropriated by white populations. This aspect of rock's history has been overlooked by historians and the media, but music experts now widely agree that rock's true origins lie in
10374-402: The best jazz album of its year. Jazz & Pop discontinued publication in 1971. In 1971, Christgau inaugurated the annual Pazz & Jop music poll, named in tribute to Jazz & Pop . The poll surveyed music critics on their favorite releases of the year. The poll results were published in the Village Voice every February after compiling "top ten" lists submitted by music critics across
10507-406: The best rock is treated condescendingly unless it conforms to Christgau's passion for leftist politics (particularly feminism ) and bohemian culture." Marsh named another prejudice of Christgau's to be " apolitical or middle-class performers" of rock music. Christgau has been widely known as the "dean of American rock critics", a designation he originally gave to himself while slightly drunk at
10640-532: The blogging platform Medium . In August 2015, he was hired by Vice to write the column for the magazine's music section, Noisey . In July 2019, the final edition of "Expert Witness" was published. In September 2019, at the encouragement of friend and colleague Joe Levy, Christgau began publishing the newsletter "And It Don't Stop" on the newsletter-subscription platform Substack . Charging subscribers $ 5 per month, it has his monthly "Consumer Guide" column, podcasts , and free weekly content like book reviews. He
10773-645: The climactic moment when the mask would drop and true character would reveal itself." In 1964, Talese published The Bridge: The Building of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge , a reporter-style, non-fiction depiction of the construction of the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in New York City. In 1965, he left The New York Times to write full-time for editor Harold Hayes at Esquire . His 1966 Esquire article on Frank Sinatra , " Frank Sinatra Has
10906-551: The coach and get me more playing time, I took the job and even embellished it by using my typing skills to compose my own account of the games rather than merely relaying the information to the newspapers by telephone. After only seven sports articles, Talese was given his own column for the weekly Ocean City Sentinel-Ledger in Ocean City. By the time he left for college in September 1949, he had written some 311 stories and columns for
11039-443: The column, named as "The Witnesses" after the column. On September 20, 2013, Christgau announced in the comments section that "Expert Witness" would cease to be published by October 1, 2013, writing, "As I understand it, Microsoft is shutting down the entire MSN freelance arts operation at that time ..." On September 10, 2014, Christgau debuted a new version of "Expert Witness" on Cuepoint , an online music magazine published on
11172-454: The columns of serious newspapers and journals such as The Musical Times . Several factors—including growth of education, the influence of the Romantic movement generally and in music, popularization (including the 'star-status' of many performers such as Liszt and Paganini ), among others—led to an increasing interest in music among non-specialist journals, and an increase in
11305-413: The country's highbrow Sunday newspaper, signalled a reversal of the establishment's cultural snobbery towards pop music by appointing George Melly as its "critic of pop culture". Following Tony Palmer 's arrival at The Observer , the first daily newspaper to employ a dedicated rock critic was The Guardian , with the appointment of Geoffrey Cannon in 1968. Melody Maker ' s writers advocated
11438-453: The differences between 'good' and 'bad' music. In The Beatles: A Study in Drugs, Sex and Revolution , Noebel explained why rock music was 'bad' by contrasting it with qualities of 'good' music. In The Big Beat: A Rock Blast , similar arguments were posed by Garlock, with the additional argument that 'good' music must come from distinguished and educated musicians. Additionally, Larson argued that
11571-493: The earliest "Consumer Guide" columns were generally brief and detailed, but "within a few years... he developed his particular gift for 'power, wit and economy', a phrase he used to describe the Ramones in a dead-on 37-word review of Leave Home ". In his opinion, the "Consumer Guide" reviews were "an enormous pleasure to read slowly, as writing, even if you have no particular interest in pop music... if you do happen to have more than
11704-406: The early 2000s, writing that a "new generation [of music critics] moved into positions of critical influence" and then "mounted a wholesale critique against the syndrome of measuring all popular music by the norms of rock culture". Slate magazine writer Jody Rosen discussed the 2000s-era trends in pop music criticism in his article "The Perils of Poptimism". Rosen noted that much of the debate
11837-632: The email-newsletter platform Substack and featuring a monthly "Consumer Guide" column, among other writings. Christgau was born in Greenwich Village in Manhattan , New York City, on April 18, 1942. He grew up in Queens , the son of a fireman. He has said he became a rock and roll fan when disc jockey Alan Freed moved to the city in 1954. After attending public school in New York City , Christgau attended Dartmouth College graduating in 1962 with
11970-574: The emergence of Crawdaddy! Lindberg et al. say that, while Williams is widely considered to be the first American rock critic, he "nevertheless looked to England for material". According to Gendron, Goldstein's most significant early pieces were a "manifesto" on rock 'n' roll and "pop aestheticism", and a laudatory assessment of the Beatles' Revolver album. Published in late August, the latter article provided "the first substantial rock review devoted to one album to appear in any nonrock magazine with accreditory power". Whereas Williams could be sure of
12103-485: The first, Thy Neighbor's Wife , due in 1973. Paperback rights to Thy Neighbor's Wife were sold to Dell Publishing for $ 750,000 in 1973. He missed Doubleday's initial deadline and spent 8 years researching the book, including managing massage parlors in New York and running a sex shop . In 1979 United Artists paid Talese a record $ 2.5 million for the film rights. The book was eventually published in 1981 but no film
12236-580: The highbrow aesthetic of rock proposed by Goldstein. The latter's mixed review of Sgt. Pepper in The New York Times was similarly the subject of journalistic debate, and invited reprisals from musicologists, composers and cultural commentators. Among other young American writers who became pop columnists following Goldstein's appointment were Robert Christgau (at Esquire , from June 1967), Ellen Willis ( The New Yorker , March 1968) and Ellen Sander ( Saturday Review , October 1968). Christgau
12369-444: The intellectual and political activism and agency" of the entire music industry. Gay Talese Gaetano " Gay " Talese ( / t ə ˈ l iː z / ; born February 7, 1932) is an American writer. As a journalist for The New York Times and Esquire magazine during the 1960s, he helped to define contemporary literary journalism and is considered, along with Tom Wolfe , Joan Didion , and Hunter S. Thompson , one of
12502-517: The jumpy tempo. T-shirted Bobby Marlow was just leaving the Sunday morning bull session and dapper Bill Kilroy had just purchased the morning newspapers. After graduation in June 1953, Talese relocated to New York City , yet could only find work as a copyboy . The job, however, was at The New York Times . He was eventually able to get an article published in the Times , albeit unsigned. In "Times Square Anniversary" (November 2, 1953), Talese interviewed
12635-586: The last of that whole Lester Bangs generation of record reviewers, and I still heed his words. He gets my vision, and I'm cool with that. But half these people, they read Pitchfork , and they base half their opinion and quotes on that. — Questlove , 2008 "Christgau's blurbs", writes Slate music critic Jody Rosen , "are like no one else's–dense with ideas and allusions, first-person confessions and invective, highbrow references and slang". Rosen describes Christgau's writing as being "often maddening, always thought-provoking... With Pauline Kael , Christgau
12768-410: The late Ellen Willis whom he dated from 1966 to 1969. He has mentored younger critics Ann Powers and Chuck Eddy . Rock critic Music journalism (or music criticism ) is media criticism and reporting about music topics, including popular music , classical music , and traditional music . Journalists began writing about music in the eighteenth century, providing commentary on what
12901-479: The magazine Esquire – a series of scenes in New York City – appeared in a special New York issue in July 1960. When the Times newspaper unions had a work stoppage in December 1962, Talese had plenty of time to watch rehearsals for a production by Broadway director Joshua Logan for an Esquire profile. As Carol Polsgrove indicates in her history of Esquire during the 1960s, it was the kind of reporting he liked to do best: "just being there, observing, waiting for
13034-576: The man, Herbert Kesner, Broadcast Editor, who was responsible for managing the headlines that flash across the famous marquee above Times Square . He followed this with an article in the February 21, 1954 edition concerning the chairs used on the boardwalk of Atlantic City. However, his budding journalism career would have to be put on hold, as he was drafted into the United States Army in 1954. Talese had been required (as were all male students at
13167-413: The measure ... I used to confide my worries about this to friends in the record industry, who reassured me. They didn't know anything about music either. The technical stuff didn't matter, I was told. You just gotta dig it. In early 1972, Christgau accepted a full-time job as music critic for Newsday . He returned to The Village Voice in 1974 as music editor. In a 1976 piece for the newspaper, he coined
13300-565: The media. At that time, leading newspapers still typically employed a chief music critic , while magazines such as Time and Vanity Fair also employed classical music critics. But by the early 1990s, classical critics were dropped in many publications, in part due to "a decline of interest in classical music, especially among younger people". Also of concern in classical music journalism was how American reviewers can write about ethnic and folk music from cultures other than their own, such as Indian ragas and traditional Japanese works. In 1990,
13433-421: The most respected voices of the craft, [who] said he had been forced out after 26 years". Viewing "robust analysis, commentary and reportage as vital to the health of the art form", The New York Times stated in 2007 that it continued to maintain "a staff of three full-time classical music critics and three freelancers", noting also that classical music criticism had become increasingly available on blogs, and that
13566-669: The music world–when he talks, people listen." Christgau is best known for his terse, letter-graded capsule album reviews, composed in a concentrated, fragmented prose style featuring layered clauses , caustic wit, one-liner jokes , political digressions, and allusions ranging from common knowledge to the esoteric. Informed by leftist politics (particularly feminism and secular humanism ), his reviews have generally favored song-oriented musical forms and qualities of wit and formal rigor, as well as musicianship from uncommon sources. Originally published in his "Consumer Guide" columns during his tenure at The Village Voice from 1969 to 2006,
13699-436: The nation. Throughout his career at the Voice , every poll was accompanied by a lengthy Christgau essay analyzing the results and pondering the year's overall musical output. The Voice continued the feature after Christgau's dismissal. Although he no longer oversaw the poll, Christgau continued to vote and, since the 2015 poll, also contributed essays to the results. Each year that Pazz & Jop has run, Christgau has created
13832-406: The new forms of pop music of the late 1960s. "By 1999, the 'quality' press was regularly carrying reviews of popular music gigs and albums", which had a "key role in keeping pop" in the public eye. As more pop music critics began writing, this had the effect of "legitimating pop as an art form"; as a result, "newspaper coverage shifted towards pop as music rather than pop as social phenomenon". In
13965-483: The newspaper in 2006. In 2001, robertchristgau.com–an online archive of Christgau's "Consumer Guide" reviews and other writings from his career – was set up as a co-operative project between Christgau and longtime friend Tom Hull ; the two had met in 1975 shortly after Hull queried Christgau as The Village Voice ' s regional editor for St. Louis. The website was created after the September 11, 2001, attacks when Hull
14098-457: The number of critics by profession of varying degrees of competence and integrity. The 1840s could be considered a turning point, in that music critics after the 1840s generally were not also practicing musicians. However, counterexamples include Alfred Brendel , Charles Rosen , Paul Hindemith , and Ernst Krenek ; all of whom were modern practitioners of the classical music tradition who also write (or wrote) on music. Women music journalists in
14231-455: The obituary desk as punishment – to break me. There were major obituaries and minor obituaries. I was sent to write minor obituaries not even seven paragraphs long." After a year working for the Times obituary section, he began to write articles for the Sunday Times , which was then managed as a separate organization from the daily Times by editor Lester Markel . Talese's first piece for
14364-456: The pioneers of New Journalism . Talese's most famous articles are about Joe DiMaggio and Frank Sinatra . Born in Ocean City, New Jersey , the son of Italian immigrant parents, Talese graduated from Ocean City High School in 1949. Talese's entry into writing was entirely happenstance and the unintended consequence of his attempt as a high school sophomore to gain more playing time in
14497-456: The plaudits and criticism. She condemned the Paste review for making "a litany of petty, exclamation-pointed digs" at Swift, and dismissed the rave Rolling Stone review for calling the album a classic within a day, as well as criticizing articles by "reputable publications" like Time and The Philadelphia Inquirer for catering gossip to the masses and fandom instead of serious journalism of
14630-563: The pop journal Crawdaddy! in February 1966; in June, Richard Goldstein , a recent graduate and New Journalism writer, debuted his "Pop Eye" column in The Village Voice , which Gendron describes as "the first regular column on rock 'n' roll ... to appear in an established cultural publication". Rock journalist Clinton Heylin , in his role as editor of The Penguin Book of Rock & Roll Writing , cites "the true genesis of rock criticism" to
14763-554: The previous weeks. Talese stated, "I would like to ask [Spacey] how it feels to lose a lifetime of success and hard work all because of 10 minutes of indiscretion 10 years or more ago. I feel so sad, and I hate that actor that ruined this guy's career. So, OK, it happened 10 years ago... Jesus, suck it up once in a while! You know something, all of us in this room at one time or another did something we're ashamed of. The Dalai Lama has done something he's ashamed of. The Dalai Lama should confess... put that in your magazine!" CNN reported
14896-614: The realm of rock music, as in that of classical music, critics have not always been respected by their subjects. Frank Zappa declared that "Most rock journalism is people who can't write, interviewing people who can't talk, for people who can't read." In the Guns N' Roses song " Get in the Ring ", Axl Rose verbally attacked critics who gave the band negative reviews because of their actions on stage; such critics as Andy Secher , Mick Wall and Bob Guccione Jr. were mentioned by name. Rock music received
15029-539: The records of Jeff Buckley and Nina Simone , noting that the latter's classical background, "default gravity and depressive tendencies are qualities I'm seldom attracted to in any kind of art." Writing in a two-part feature on music critics for Rolling Stone in 1976, Dave Marsh bemoaned Christgau as a "classic, sad example" of how "many critics... superimpos[ed] their own, frequently arbitrary, standards upon performers." Marsh accused him of becoming "arrogant and humorless–the raves are reserved for jazz artists, while even
15162-414: The reviews of the album were "well-considered", she opined others were pre-written and "daft". She explained that critics are "staying up until dawn to finish listening to an album as if it's a college paper we're cramming to complete by the morning" and long albums like the 31-track Tortured Poets frustrate them. Karl also felt that reviews appearing online within hours of an album's release discredits both
15295-414: The reviews were collected in book form across three decade-ending volumes– Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981), Christgau's Record Guide: The '80s (1990), and Christgau's Consumer Guide: Albums of the '90s (2000). Multiple collections of his essays have been published in book form, and a website published in his name since 2001 has freely hosted most of his work. In 2006,
15428-451: The study, discussion, evaluation, and interpretation of music that has been composed and notated in a score and the evaluation of the performance of classical songs and pieces, such as symphonies and concertos . Before about the 1840s, reporting on music was either done by musical journals, such as the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung (founded by Johann Friedrich Rochlitz in 1798) and
15561-465: The term "Rock Critic Establishment" to describe the growth in influence of American music critics. His article carried the parenthesized subtitle "But Is That Bad for Rock?" He listed Dave Marsh , John Rockwell , Paul Nelson , Jon Landau and himself as members of this "establishment". Christgau remained at The Village Voice until August 2006, when he was fired shortly after the paper's acquisition by New Times Media . Two months later, Christgau became
15694-821: The time owing to the Korean War ) to join the Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) and had relocated to New York awaiting his eventual commission as a second lieutenant . Talese was sent to Fort Knox , Kentucky, to train in the Tank Corps. Finding his mechanical skills lacking, Talese was transferred to the Office of Public Information where he worked for an army newspaper, Inside the Turret (known today as The Gold Standard ), and soon had his own column, "Fort Knox Confidential". When Talese completed his military service in 1956, he
15827-556: The tone that Irwin Shaw and John O'Hara had brought to the short story." In 1971, Talese published Honor Thy Father , a book about the travails of the Bonanno crime family in the 1960s, especially Salvatore Bonanno and his father Joseph . The book was based on seven years of research and interviews. Honor Thy Father was made into a TV movie in 1973. Talese signed a $ 1.2 million contract with Doubleday in 1972 to write two books, with
15960-484: The traditional high / low culture split, usually around notions of artistic integrity, authenticity, and the nature of commercialism". These review collections, Shuker continues, "became bibles in the field, establishing orthodoxies as to the relative value of various styles or genres and pantheons of artists. Record collectors and enthusiasts, and specialisation and secondhand record shops, inevitably have well-thumbed copies of these and similar volumes close at hand." In
16093-652: The twentieth century who covered classic music performance include Ruth Scott Miller of the Chicago Tribune (1920-1921), Henriette Weber at the Chicago Herald-Examiner , and Claudia Cassidy , who worked for Chicago Journal of Commerce (1924–1941), the Chicago Sun (1941–42) and the Chicago Tribune (1942–65). In the early 1980s, a decline in the quantity of classical criticism began occurring "when classical music criticism visibly started to disappear" from
16226-416: The way it apes and misapprehends reactionary notions of nobility". In a 2015 interview, he described heavy metal as "symphonic bombast without the intelligence and complexity, although there's a lot of virtuosity.[...] That music is so masculine in a really retrograde way; I don't like that at all. It seems to me to have a very 19th-century notion of power." He said in 2018 that he rarely writes about jazz as it
16359-402: The web site, especially its high searchability and small interest in graphics, are his idea of what a useful music site should be". In December 2006, Christgau began writing his "Consumer Guide" columns for MSN Music , initially appearing every other month, before switching to a monthly schedule in June 2007. On July 1, 2010, he announced in the introduction to his "Consumer Guide" column that
16492-457: The world of pop music criticism, there has tended to be a quick turnover. The "pop music industry" expects that any particular rock critic will likely disappear from popular view within five years; in contrast, according to author Mark Fenster, the "stars" of rock criticism are more likely to have long careers with "book contracts, featured columns, and editorial and staff positions at magazines and newspapers". Author Bernard Gendron writes that in
16625-624: Was Monk's 1958 Misterioso . In July 2013, during an interview with Esquire magazine's Peter Gerstenzang, Christgau criticized the voters at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame , saying that "they're pretty stupid" for not voting in the New York Dolls. When asked about Beatles albums, he said he most often listens to The Beatles' Second Album –which he purchased in 1965–and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band . Wolk wrote: "When he says he's 'encyclopedic' about popular music, he means it. There are not
16758-465: Was graphically discussed in a 2014 Jezebel article about the struggles of women in music journalism , written by music critic Tracy Moore, previously an editor at the Nashville Scene . Moore described how another female music blogger, an "admitted outsider" who threatened no stereotypes, was greeted with enthusiasm by men, in contrast with Moore's own experiences as a self-described "insider" who
16891-446: Was nevertheless expected to "prove" or "earn" her way into a male-dominated journalism scene. According to Anwen Crawford, music critic for Australia's The Monthly , the "problem for women [popular music critics] is that our role in popular music was codified long ago"; as a result, "most famous rock-music critics – Robert Christgau, Greil Marcus , Lester Bangs , Nick Kent – are all male". Crawford points to "[t]he record store ,
17024-655: Was produced. In 2008, The Library of America selected Talese's 1970 account of the Charles Manson murders, "Charlie Manson's Home on the Range", for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American True Crime. In 2011, Talese won the Norman Mailer Prize for Distinguished Journalism. In 1959, Talese married writer Nan Talese (née Ahearn), a New York editor who manages the Nan A. Talese/Doubleday imprint. Their marriage
17157-418: Was rehired by The New York Times as a sports reporter. Talese later opined, "Sports is about people who lose and lose and lose. They lose games; then they lose their jobs. It can be very intriguing." Of the various fields, boxing had the most appeal for Talese, largely because it was about individuals engaged in contests and those individuals in the mid to late 1950s were becoming predominately non-white at
17290-468: Was skeptical of the platform at first: "Basically I told Joe that if I didn't have enough subscribers to pay what I made at Noisey by Christmas I was going to quit. I wasn't going to do it for less than that money. I had that many subscribers inside of three days." By May 2020, "And It Don't Stop" had more than 1,000 subscribers. Christgau was ambivalent about the platform at first, but has since found it "immensely gratifying" explaining that, "A man my age, who
17423-426: Was stuck in New York while visiting from his native Wichita . While Christgau spent many nights preparing past Village Voice writings for the website, by 2002 much of the older "Consumer Guide" columns had been inputted by Hull and a small coterie of fans. According to Christgau, Hull is "a computer genius as well as an excellent and very knowledgeable music critic, but he'd never done much web site work. The design of
17556-431: Was the "originator of the 'consumer guide' approach to pop music reviews", an approach that was designed to help readers decide whether to buy a new album. According to popular music academic Roy Shuker in 1994, music reference books such as The Rolling Stone Record Guide and Christgau's Record Guide played a role in the rise of rock critics as tastemakers in the music industry, "constructing their own version of
17689-467: Was to avoid excluding readers who may not have musical knowledge as broad as that of the writer. In contrast, Miller believed that analytical readers would appreciate "more music talk in music criticism", suggesting that "sensitively modest doses" of musical analysis would provide helpful support for a conclusion "that great melody writing occurred or it didn't". For example, Miller noted that critics rarely "identify catchy melodies as specific passages within
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