bristling confusion

[onedeadjet]

I'm used to having a different take on things, but when things go this off course, I feel like it's the end of 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' and everybody's making that keening sound and pointing at me...

I hated 'You Are Free.' I'll get to why shortly. But is it just me, or is the positive press so appalingly uniform in praise? Almost every review says exactly the same thing about the same songs as every other review.

Since I have no music stores in my area, I had to bribe some friends to make a road trip the day it came out. I had avoided individual snippets on teh web for I wanted to experiece it as a whole. I didn't listen to it at all until I was all by my lonesome, cuz that's where Cat Power was most powerful.

Fundamentally all my gripes have to deal with evolution, and the more knee-jerk of you are going to ask me who I am to criticize Chan for getting happier or growing or whatever. I can't help that. My point is simply that there is a need in my life for a certain kind of music. Chan once filled that niche so completely that it resized and fractured the size of the niche. Only things shaped like Cat power could juice me anymore.

'You Are Free' does not hit me like it should (my opinion) and does not hit me like it could (verifiable fact - you should have seen my face wrinkle at 'Names').

Every review is so positive, which is all very well, I guess. It's really hard to give a negative review to something you really, really wanted to like but ended up being really, really, disappointed with. I probably shouldn't have tried to review it, but for those of you who want to see what a negative review looks like, you can find my review at www.volanteonline.com/news/375680.html

I'm going to go try to find another negative review. Feel free to point and keen.

[Ben]

Well, Jim, you weren't on my bad side. Until now. Why would you publicly mope about not getting a copy of the record, when you know all you have to do is email me? You didn't seem to have a problem yesterday with emailing me for a photo of Chan. Why was that easy, but not getting a copy of the record without even asking for it indicative of you being on my bad side?

And, I a dick if I don't just send you a record? Is that what things have come to? Nobody just gets everything, and, like I tell everyone and I'm sure I've told you, stay in touch with me and I'll be sure you continue to receive things, since we don't have a straight out mailing list for press. Like my Little League baseball coach once said, what people in this country need is a little more hussle.

[bitterfruit]

Keep up the good work. When you graduate you could have an aspiring career at Pitchfork.

Criticising the guy for writing a fucked up review will only get his rocks off even more.

With a record like this that is getting so much critical acclaim, you're bound to have one dude who knows he'll just have to lambast it. Plus, he's playing in the minors hoping to get drafted one day. Dorm living will do this to you.

[Ben]

Just to clear up any confusion, I was replying to a mention Jim made of me in his post which has since been removed. I wasn't responding to the review itself.

[soot]

If someone's gotta get cut from the promo list...
South Dakota is good place to start
(no letters please !)

[amazonida]

http://www.playboy.com/arts-entertainment/music/
http://www.slatch.com/review/

from the most reliable sources I could find.

[johansen smith]

I always thought South Dakota was just a rumor.

[Paul]

I know that reviewing records is a completely unscientific and subjective activity, but damn. How am I supposed to take anything you write seriously when your choices for best song beginnings read like a page out of the sour indie rocker's handbook?

Don't blame Marshall for moving forward. If you want to keep moping around, find another singer to mope with you, fuX0r.

[onedeadjet]

I was afraid that that damn 'Mattitude' I was warned about was going to leave me completely vilified. Thank you for the info, folks. Since I've listened to it about thirty more times, I've started to warm slightly on some things, although I still cringe at the vocal overdubs.
I would love the John Lee Hooker song were it not for the last word repetition.
'I don't blame you' has risen inestimably, except for the fact I still can't help singing the Gilligan's Island theme along to it.
And I think everybody who hasn't heard it needs to download the live version of 'Good Woman.' It's off some Australian music show or something. It closes with the host saying 'that was off one of the earlier records' and Chan giggling and saying it had never been released at all. It may very well have been the show where she sat on a couch barefoot, wiggling her toes proclaiming in the deepest, goofiest twang ever, "Mah feet R dir-tay."

And yeah, i should move on, shouldn't I? Anybody know of any artists who kick it Chan old school? With complete bone-chill action?

And 'sour indie rocker's handbook?' Hey. I likes what I likes.

[silversurfer]

fair enough dude/ you're not the only one who isn't completely happy with the new album. I think choosing Adam Kasper wasn't really the right producer to go with, but hey, here we are, it is still a good album, it's just not a s good as some of us wish it would have been after 4 years of Chan's absence...

[bitterfruit]

There's nothing wrong with not liking this or any other album. It's the fucked-up-wannabe reviewer's tone that I hate. Instead of creating a disparaging-fuck-Chan kind of review, you could have shown a little dignity.

[onedeadjet]

For what it's worth, Pitchfork prints their letters with what seems to be a week's delay...