Critics changing music history

It was Nik Cohn. At the time he wrote for the Observer.

 

Interesting article, thanks for the share. I find it fascinating to see how 1) that era has (thankfully) passed so very recently and 2) that it really seems to have rattled the artists affected so badly. I have no nostalgia for the days when critics held (and could abuse) such power; that their powers as tastemakers evaporated in the blink of a technological cycle is one of the happiest outcomes of the otherwise often double edged sword of the relentless advance of information technology.

 

The notion that any review on Pitchfork ruined an artist's career is questionable, as it is based entirely on the logical fallacy of false causation. In other words, just because Pitchfork gave an album a zero review and it then sold poorly, that does not prove the Pitchfork review had any effect whatsoever on sales.

 

Well Landau was one of the top critics early on in rock. He was in Rolling Stone as well as the real paper, because he was from Boston. He had produced the MC5. And the real paper was not obscure. It was the offshoot of a strike at the Boston Pheonix. They were competitors for a few years there. It was like two weeklies in Boston. (The Pheonix has produced it's share of critical blurbs in national ad campaigns) He ended up producing the record Bruce was working on at the time of the show. The quote was used every time you heard about him. It would make sense that the quote became famous when Bruce did. Because Landau became famous at the same time.

 

Two thoughts:

- indeed it's hard to say whether a negative review in Pitchfork harmed sales, but it's also true that when they handed out the dreaded 0.0's word got around. For ex, I had no idea who Travis Morrison was, until he received that legendary thrashing. And I'm sure that had some effect on record store orders and airplay.

- conversely, a positive review in Pitchfork could help make a band's career. In particular I know this was the case with Broken Social Scene, whose 9+ review put them on the map.

 

I remember Rolling Stone put out a book of all their album reviews in the late 70's (red cover). Michael Jackson related albums were all rated low. Then post Thriller, the revised (blue cover) book upgraded them all with more stars. Lame!

 

If you still have them both check Gentle Giant. I recall the red one was vicious and called them "bathetic bathwater." It wasn't even apparent they had listened to the group to write this. The blue one fixed it somewhat.

 

And JJ Burnel played some wicked bass in that band.

 

In the New Wave era of the 80s, UK press & journalists were very negative towards the Progressive rock as a genre, and therefore contributed a lot to the obscuring of the genre in that decade and beyond.

 

LW was already a critics darling and this was her first release in 6 years. I suppose any good review in RS will help but a lot of others had her back too. Also, she promoted the hell out of the record even playing live on a local LA morning news program....

 

Lenny Kaye changed music's past well as its future when he cobbled together a comp filled with pimply faced Beatle wannabes and psychedelic pretenders, called it "garage rock" and insisted it was a movement.

and I love him for it.

 

IIRC the first RS Record Guide gave the Doors albums solid ratings, including five stars for the first two. after the Hopkins book and Morrison revival the second edition reduced the ratings to one star.

 

In the popular arts where critics could be influential was in breaking new artists. Once the artist is established, especially big stars, the critics are much less important.

 

Thanks for posting this. The article bothers me a little bit. I was unaware of Pitchfork until 2016 when I joined this forum. I never take the opinion of a critic seriously and more often then not, I will not read the reviews until after I have heard the album. If I do happen to read a review before, I take it with a grain of salt. I assumed most people were like this but apparently I was wrong.

I have a hard time understanding how people can rely more on the opinion of a critic then actually listening to it first and then form their own opinion.

 

Rolling Stone helping to convince Clapton to abandon Cream!

 

Yes! Easily one of the most important books about pop music ever. Tremendous writer. How I wish we had someone like Cohn writing about music now....

 

More important than critics are the record labels themselves. Most likely they can't make something people don't want at all a success but they can make sure something doesn't succeed. I think to a frightening degree the industry decides what we listen to. If they want bands, they'll be back.

 

That's the example I first thought of.

"Pinball Wizard" being written (supposedly) to please Nik Cohn, who was a pinball freak. The history of music didn't change, but a hell of a song was born. Anyway, it was very easy for Pete to write amazing songs back then, with or without a critic to please.

 

Wow, that was a terrific article. As much as we can laugh Pitchfork off these days, they could be pretty nasty in their prime.

 

We've discussed this one in some Sonic Youth threads, it has some good discussion on the issue with Thurston Moore. I think SY was too embedded as a respected group by the time they got the 0.0 rating, but it can really hurt lesser known artists I am sure

 

Yes. I find the notion to be somewhat like saying that a pebble is responsible for what happens to the river. Not denying it's there and has an effect, but that there are so many confounding variables that you can't attribute a particularly good or bad review, no matter how notorious in retrospect, to the success or failure of a particular recording. And definitely not a career. Much less musical history.

 

Lisa Robinson and Charles Shaar Murray's reporting on the CBGBs scene in the NME in 1975

 

The Bends upgrading from 2.5 stars in 95 to 4 stars in 2000

 

Exactly. Landau wasn't obscure--he was plugged in. He had a lot of influence. He was married to a New York Times film reviewer .He'd actually already produced at least a couple of albums by diverse artists. And that quote wasn't just off the cuff. It sounds polished, like he was trying to sell himself as well as Springsteen. Landau might as well have written "......and I saw MY rock and roll future....."
And Springsteen made Landau feel young? Landau was 27 when he wrote it.

That quote was just a little too good. But it definitely put Springsteen on a career trajectory. Mike Appel--who Landau would replace--did the rest by getting Springsteen the covers of Time and Newsweek.

 

Well, that wasn't everything - Savage also disliked them because of their "laddishness" and lack of an intellectual or political angle. He also hated Sham 69 for similar reasons - they had the politics, but were too loutish for him.