Christgau's Worst Review

The Dean should have been sent to the principal's office for this one:

[www.robertchristgau.com]


(Plus, I love Cass Elliot's voice.)

Ohhh, that's just awful. Whatever respect I had for Christgau just took a massive hit.

His leaning towards the snide and sneering hasn't aged well.

Wow; that's really not cool.

Pretty hateful. Anyone who calls himself "the Dean of American rock critics" is too narcissistic to command any respect from me. Particularly if all he offers are catty soundbites from his direction.

Former TP subscriber [81, 82, 83, 84]

[postpunkmonk.com]
For further rumination on the Fresh New Sound of Yesterday®



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/2022 10:17AM by Post-Punk Monk.

I laughed out loud! His opinion means nothing, and he's obviously an insensitive jerk, which is what makes it so funny from my perspective.

I enjoy Christgau's writing quite a bit and he's usually pretty good at summing up his opinions in a pithy and humorous way. He has major blind spots in musical styles that he writes off too easily and other styles he gives to much weight to, to be sure. But he was certainly better in his music reviews in the Village Voice in the 70s than the god-awful Dave Marsh was in the pages of Rolling Stone (not a high bar, I know).

That being said, this review is pretty indefensible.

In a YouTube video essay about rock critics' response to prog, the host read Christgau's reviews of THE LAMB LIES DOWN ON BROADWAY and the first Ramones album back to back. Like many critics, Christgau was best writing about music he loved. But it was striking that while he admitted liking THE LAMB LIES DOWN ON BROADWAY, which he gave a B, his review is condescending as hell, with every bit of praise immediately followed by an insult. The reasons why prog turned out to be a dead end and punk felt like such a breath of fresh air by the mid '70s are apparent, but with the passage of time, it seems like a glaring lapse that he was unable to engage with a band like Genesis on their own terms. He was even worse with heavy metal, while going to the opposite extreme in his praise of African music.

Pretty ironic coming from a dude who often criticizes male musicians for their sexism. It also says something about whatever editor who let that pass.

That occurred to me, too. Assuming it was the Village Voice, who let that go thru?

And why does Christgau leave it on his site?

Hah, I saw the thread title, and that was exactly the one that came to mind. I wonder if he's ever apologized for it?