Apologetics

I want to explain my Sonic Youth piece a little bit more. When I was assigned a feature on that band, I immediately knew I had two choices: I could bone up on the band, spend 2 weeks reading about them and getting familiar with some of their old albums (by either buying them or downloading them), or I could just write honestly about my own experience with the band which is, essentially, I don’t know anything about them, and have always felt like I should, but hey, I listened to their new CD and it turned out to be pretty good.

I decided not to do the former because I think it’s stupid, and although it takes more time, easier. I suppose writing a “personal-essay” style piece is meant to be a reaction against being a “music critic” or a “music writer” or a “music journalist” or anything like that. Those people usually are smug know-it-alls who adopt a voice of Critical Authority about subjects they don’t always know like the back of their hands. (How often have you seen a critic, even in a major magazine, get an obvious detail about your favorite band wrong?)

Music means a lot to me, and has had a profound influence on my life. I write about it because I care about it, and – at least on better days – not because I want notoriety, or to seem witty and urbane, or to prove how many CDs I own and how much trivia I know.

Stuff:

The Ditty Bops - Moon Over the Freeway
Nouvelle Vague - Bande A Part
Amy Millan - Honey from the Tombs