Cokemachineglow recently held a "contest" for amateur concert photographers. It was inspired by a series of angry/defensive user comments that responded a CMG writer's rant about how annoying and useless concert photographers are. Though I'm in full agreement with CMG's Clayton Purdom, I couldn't resist submitting one of my own photos. The concert in question was a special occasion. I was four feet away from Stephen Malkmus. How could I not snap a few pictures? And, funny enough, I actually won.

Here are a few more shots from the same show.

christian (indie) music: a guide for the perplexed

Just so we're clear, I've always counted myself among the perplexed. Most articles from people like myself (who haven't actively sought out "Christian music" since they were a misguided youth) begin with a narrative or anecdote from personal experience. While I'm certainly not short on those, I'm not going to bother this time. Nor do I intend to give a you a genealogy of Christian rock, create a list of "indie" musicians who self-identify as Christians, sing the praises of Asthmatic Kitty, or discuss the strange (but fitting) history of some of Menomena's members. There are books and magazines that do that (although as far as I know they're still meant for hipsters of the Christian variety). I'm sure that at some point, perhaps in the near future, one of the many critics who grew up in the CCM cloister (apparently there are quite a few of us) will publish a detailed analysis of the Christian pop music phenomenon.

This is all just a roundabout way of introducing a recently published review of Starflyer 59's latest record by cokemachineglow's Chris Molnar. He offers some helpful advice to those of us who simply don't get why this bizarre subgenre should exist, and I think I agree with him.

In his review for 2008’s Dial M, Conrad asserted that “the best move this band can make isn’t stylistic but personal.” In other words, the negative effects of Christianity make Starflyer 59’s persistence within the Christian music industry immoral and inconsistent with their large, quality, and rarely religious body of work. I disagree: for me, as with Conrad, it was the impressive original roster of Tooth & Nail which helped make the bizarre nature of a Christian upbringing bearable. Those bands, including the Danielson Famile, Poor Old Lu, and eventually MewithoutYou, remain common points between me and anyone from a similar background. If I hadn’t heard Pedro the Lion’s Whole EP (1997)—released on Tooth & Nail—in the listening booth at Family Christian Stores, it would’ve taken me that much longer to emerge from the bubble, to grapple with the immateriality of the limits Christian music imposes on itself. Labels like Tooth & Nail seemed to once grapple in secret, hiding bands more ambiguously identified with Christian music behind a brand permissible to religious parents while introducing variety and perspective to music-hungry teenagers allowed precious little. They are, in other words, doing God’s work.

I suppose I was lucky. Much of the pressure to discover my music at the local Christian bookstore was self-generated: when I thought I'd covered the terrain and was still unable to locate an artist that I could honestly like, it was relatively easy to focus my energy on musicians that actually appealed to me. It's a shame I was never introduced to Starflyer 59 or Pedro the Lion. I might have lasted a bit longer.

more reasons to love cokemachineglow

It's summer, and that means that a good many people have places to go and music festivals to attend. These days it seems like the internet's favourite festival belongs to Pitchfork (at least, according to websites I frequent). Believe it or not, a couple years ago, I almost decided to go; but then I realized I had now real way to get there or money to spend on a frivolous trip to Chicago. It's a shame that I stumbled on this a week late, but cokemachineglow has done the shut-ins of the world a great service: CMG's Guide to Not Attending the Pitchfork Music Festival.

Funds, day job, infant, IBS; whatever the reason, you won’t be there, unable to observe a hoard of perilously cute early-20s scenesters, unable to disdain them by being older and thicker in the waist and, because you’ve started caring about your health, closer to death. Who will you stare at with thinly veiled contempt? Your cat? 

Having recently attended the Winnipeg Folk Festival, I felt a strong connection with the second point on their guide, which is probably the best reason to stay away from large music festivals: where a nasty amount of heat and an even nastier amount of substance abuse have joined forces to make your trips to the portapotties feel like some obscene punishment.

2. Poop in a real toilet. Though my uncle once told me that sitting over an uncovered john for too long could predicate some serious colon trouble (bacteria gets in there too easily?—he didn’t specify), now’s the chance to really enjoy the cold safety of well-cleaned porcelain against your unthreatened behind while the festival throngs stand in line waiting to make in a fetid pile. In fact, why not spend a whole set on the toilet? Bring the laptop in the bathroom with you; if Kevin Drew [of Broken Social Scene] only knew you were laying cable while watching him sing…

Oh, and they also have a regular Guide to the Pitchfork Music Festival, which is just as entertaining.

why i love cokemachineglow

There is a profound lack of feeling in much of this music, bone-deep, one that makes Beyonce’s most “independent” statements seem embarrassingly vulnerable. Being crazy in love, or wanting a ring put on “it”—the paradox of the brassy delivery may not make strict logical sense, but the basic emotions are universal, just as effective when warbled by Antony as when backed up by Jay-Z. On the other hand, M.I.A.’s emotional palette is at most concerned with a kind of distant empowerment of the idea of the oppressed, reminiscent more than anything of Ivan’s empathy in The Brothers Karamazov, of a sullen, isolated love for the idea of people more than for, y’know, actual people. 

-Chris Molnar, Review of /\/\ /\ Y /\ by M.I.A.

Another review, also recently posted on cokemachineglow, responds to the unprecidented backlash against M.I.A. with a fairly weak defense (i.e. that we're losing sight of what she's doing: she's playing with our expectations and testing our "predetermined prejudices"). To some degree, I can appreciate the reviewer's point (when it comes to M.I.A.'s music, though, most of /\/\ /\ Y /\ still sounds annoyingly self-indulgent to me), but there's no debate when it comes to the album cover. It's just awful. You can't tell me it's not awful. And as someone who only mildly liked Kala, I'm really not that disappointed with /\/\ /\ Y /\; besides, I have a hard time disagreeing with a pop music review that does such a good job of referencing a novel by Dostoevsky.

this is getting ridiculous...

...in other words, prepare for the backlash.

In a hilarious new post on MBV, Pitchfork's Ryan Catbird laments the pickle they've gotten themselves into with the new Grizzly Bear album, Veckatimest, which hits record stores next Tuesday. As I've mentioned in previous posts, the album leaked over two months ago and has been gaining steady, almost unconditional support from practically everyone who follows new music. Catbird gives us the breakdown:

Here’s the rub: by busting out of the gate this year with that 9.6 for Animal Collective’s Merriweather Post Pavilion, they’ve created a situation where it’s going to be virtually impossible to rate an album above 9 without drawing a direct comparison to Merriweather.

Look at what we've gotten ourselves into. It's a telling problem for current web-gods and tastemakers like Pitchfork. Has popular music criticism always been this contrived, this full of posturing? Probably, but with the internet, it's reached a new level of absurdity. I've always had issues with Pitchfork's rating system. That decimal place drives me nuts, but at least now we have an instance where it's clear why they use it. Damn that Merriweater Post Pavillion! It's caused so many problems.

I'd like to say that Grizzly Bear doesn't deserve this. The music should speak for itself, but these days it often doesn't. Cokemachineglow just offered their review of Veckatimest, in which the writer falls on reactions around the office to contextualize his evaluation. Everyone, it seems, is already bored with it.

Even around the CMG watercooler there are at least as many dissenters as there are proponents. Veckatimest, you are boring Conrad. Chet said “snooze.” Somebody called them “Grizzly Bore.”

Pop music has always been inextricably linked with novelty, but contemporary critics especially seem consumed by this search for the "new" and it bugs me a little bit. I suppose I'm as guilty as anyone, but if I may... Sometimes I think I'm living in an age that privileges the "debut" and has a built-in hostility toward bands with any longevity, artists who actually want to grow and evolve.

Rants aside, I've been saving myself for next week's release. Ever since the follow-up to Yellow House (my favourite album of 2007) was announced, I've been giddy.

Speaking of Grizzly Bear, keep your eyes peeled for the next issue of Stylus, which features an interview of the band by UMFM's Jeff Friesen, host of "It's Okay, We're Lo-fi." I nearly got to do the interview, but Jeff beat me to the draw.