Pitchfork gets “Best New Album” Wrong 70% of the Time.
By Tep No
As I’m listening to a very underwhelming Charlie XCX album (it’s closer to a 6.8 than a 8.6/10), I can’t help but think of the many albums that Pitchfork gets wrong, as well as albums they get right.
They’re owned by Conde Nast, and so I understand that they need to dick ride some artists to some extent, although they did get it right on the new Taylor Swift album not being as good as Peppa Pig’s last album, so yes, they can be accurate at times. The Travis Scott album, aside from him still having a career after the Astroworld murders somehow, was graded properly as well.
My complaint, outside of the fact that they never reviewed an album of mine (Trash it damnit I don’t mind!), there’s many albums that get 7.5 or under that should get more, and then there’s album that get 8 and more, that sometimes only have 1 or 2 good songs on it (100 gecs comes to mind). I get it, you got mesmerized by the first two songs (Cindy Lee new album?), but 2 songs out of 10 or 13 doesn’t equate a great album. Recently they rated the new Mannequin Pussy album “I got Heaven” at an 8.8, and while the first 5 songs were great, the rest sounded like filler unpolished tracks. Same with the Caroline Polachek album, the 1st song was so strong (probably because I heard it on Tik Tok plenty), I didn’t feel like the rest of the album was this good.
Here are a few albums that I’d rate an 8 and over that were not rated as high on Pitchfork:
Cory Hanson – Pale Horse Rider (sure, it sounds like Pink Floyd, but it’s still well recorded and there's lots of nice creative ideas)
Blood Orange – Negro Swan (although having Diddy on your best song hurts the album a lot as a whole)
Sun June – Somewhere (6.8, really? This album is an 8 out of 10 at least).
Jet – Shine On (0 out of 10 really? Sounded like the reviewer was jealous of them, or maybe their GF was stolen by a band member? No need to get your anger out on a well made album.
I sometimes wonder if I’m not hearing things right, if I’m crazy, if I don’t have good taste, but then I remember that most of these reviews are written by people who have no music careers, have never created anything significant in their lives, and writing is the only thing they have going for them.
I guess those who can’t do… write bad reviews?
