#other genres? besides rock?? I don't know does that even exist? /j

[insanelyadd]

Making playlists for the Collector and my Archivists and I don't know whether I should laugh or feel embarrassed about how much angsty 2000s rock is on these.

[francisp0rter]

BLINDSPOT/ROCKIFICATION

Why does this dude have such a massive blindspot when it comes to trap and street rap?

Just take a look at his new top 50 albums list. Not one trap or drill album. Not a single one. Are you fucked in the head? How are you gonna call yourself "the internet's busiest music nerd" when you don't even acknowledge the existence of the biggest rap subgenre in the world currently.

Imagine leaving Babyface Ray, Icewear Vezzo, BabyTron, Quavo & Takeoff, Duvy, Lucki, iayze etc. off of your end of the year list in favour of some generic, derivative garbage like The Forever Story. Just try and imagine that. Try and imagine having that bad of taste while also calling yourself "the internet's busiest music nerd."

The bald man seems like a nice guy but he needs to learn to listen to music properly. You're supposed to be this bigtime music critic right? So why you still listen to music like a fan then?

The thing that drives me nuts about Fantano is the simple fact that he tries to cover pretty much all music in the popular and indie spheres. There's a reason that reporters and critics have "beats" or specific areas of expertise that they cover. Pitchfork wouldn't send Al Pierre to review a Carly Rae Jepsen record. They know that's not his wheelhouse. They'll get Dylan Green or some other poptimist sycophant to do that kind of bidding. So why is Fantano reviewing shit that he doesn't like, is never going to like, and doesn't understand? That's not to say critics shouldn't give negative reviews. That would be ridiculous. I'm saying that a critic should not speak on music that they don't understand, and based on Fantano referring to Chief Keef's "Finally Rich" as "ridiculous novelty" (as well as his general ignorance on street rap), I think it's fair to say that he has no understanding of it. A 16 year old kid recounting all the murder, addiction, and destruction he's seen in his life is "ridiculous novelty" to you? Come the fuck on, bald man.

Remember when this dude was sucking off Brockhampton being all buddy buddy with them? That shit was unbelievable. What kind of self respecting music critic would ever make friends with an artist? There is a very necessary division between critic and artist and you can't just go around playing jump rope with it. Lester Bangs didn't start kissing up to Lou Reed when he interviewed him, despite Reed being Bangs' idol. No. He did the exact opposite. He called Lou Reed a bitch to his face and said his music sucks now and he should give it up. That's a real critic.

This guy needs to realize that traditional albums have never been a good way to consume rap music. Sure, you get an Illmatic or a Butterfly every now and then, but for the most part rap is a singles genre, and rappers' attempts to create albums in the rock & roll tradition (ten to fifteen songs, cohesive, with a curated tracklist and reflective cover art) is always annoying. It rarely ever works out. That's why J. Cole sucks so bad on albums but on features he's pretty good. Because when he's on a feature or a single he's just rapping. He's not concerned with making some great cohesive rap album, he's just spitting bars.

Idk. I love albums. I hate them in the context of rap sometimes. I "hate" them for the same reason that I hate when rappers perform with a live band. This is Hip Hop. It's not rock music. We don't need to conform the genre to the popular standards of music, because none of this was ever about that. The whole thing I fell in love with about rap, besides the music itself, is that it existed in stark contrast to and firm defiance of established musical norms. Rappers didn't try and be popstars. If one became a popstar, like Em or Wayne or Hov, it was almost always in spite of them being a rapper, not because of it. And I loved that. I mean, it's great that rap is popular now, but also it's terrible at the same time. I'm glad more people are being exposed to it, but also I wish that they would please just leave us alone and stop trying to make this genre into something it's not.

I'm aware that I'm not making the clearest point here, so let me say this: Trap and drill music are the new blues. It is a hyper-violent blues, but it is blues nonetheless in that it is poetics and rhythms that speak on a working class Black American experience. And it is being received with the same ignorance and narcissism that blues was received with.