diane? i’ve just landed at YVR and i’m looking for a tim hortons. going to need a hot cup of something after all the recirculated air in that airplane.

GEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEENE~

Still another post about my problems with the way people engage with idiosyncratic musicians that happen to be attractive women

boundtothewater:

My friend nick (nickminichino.tumblr.com) was trying to work out his issues with Grimes (Which amount to purposeful obscuring of pop tendencies, willfully lo-fi style that can come across as lazy, and contextless jacking of freestyle signifiers - all of which I also take issue with) and someone in the discussion chimed in oh so helpfully with “well I just looked up one of her videos and she’s cute and she has bangs so now I ‘get’ while other people like her” and then proceeded to belittle her use of Yamaha bass presets and thin recording in a thinly veiled “this cute girl is popular but she doesn’t know what she’s doing” attack. And it pissed me off.

Grimes’ press materials position her as this musically omnivorous young woman who has no musical training and tons of reviews and interviews of her bring up her lack of formal composition and her self-described lack of tonal consistency (which is a load of horseshit if you listen to her stuff). This positioning infuriates me because not only does it invite dismissals of her music on account of being a “cute girl,” but it also plays on the outsider artist-genius mythmaking that is so grossly prevalent in indie music writing. It makes Claire Boucher out to be this girl who has no idea what she’s doing so takes bits of gothy synth pop and freestyle and eighties radio r&b and Cocteau twins and mashes em together because she just doesn’t know that you’re not supposed to do that. In reality I think she’s a very savvy omnivore with a great ear for pop who is deliberate about her stylistic choices and dismissive outsider language does her a great disservice.

And I don’t even like Grimes that much. I think some of her songs are too willfully obscured and some of her more meandering stuff comes off as lazy. I’m just sick of seeing this language bandied about.

more on how not to write about women.

nickminichino replied to your post: it feels weird to listen to pavement

youtube.com/watch?v…

nick always knows just what to say.

nickminichino replied to your post: re: horses

“Can I name one Epona?” —oldtobegin negotiating terms. (alternate punchline: “we’re all looking for stable employment these days.”)

sometimes i feel really just abstractly sorry for anyone who isn’t friends with nick

nick always knows just what to say

nickminichino replied to your post: sorry but PHILADELPHIA SPORTS FANS ARE THE WORST PEOPLE ON EARTH OK

counterpoint: boston sports fans

i mean they’re a close second but at least there’s like a sad epic poem you could write about boston sports fandom

philly sports fandom is just a racist limerick

nickminichino replied to your post: i really don’t hate many things

it’s cause he’s a troll

i mean, yes, but i tend to think saying someone is a troll is like an attempt to let them off the hook. i know that’s not what you’re doing here, but the implication often seems to be that if someone is a troll, they are in the right because they know what they are saying, and you, as the victim of the trolling, are the idiot. i don’t think that’s fair, because i think people should be held accountable for what they say they believe.

nickminichino replied to your post<span >: <em >riograndegorgeous replied to your photo<span >:…

why would you encourage people to read it

so i didn’t have to be alone :(

nickminichino replied to your post: Ugh. You making an observation about a relationship is EXACTLY what making something about something else is. Literally. I’m not cheesed off because you have a problem with sexist behavior, but that you put words in someone’s mouth. You have what’s known as cognitive bias. The idea was that as we progress, we step further away from the patriarchy that you’re obsessed with. That specific enough terms for you to get a clue?

lmao RESPOND TO MY WORDS NOT TO THEIR IMPLICATIONS

WORDS HAVE NO CONNOTATION THEY ARE MERELY UNITS OF THOUGHT THAT YOU SHOULD ABSORB LIKE A ROBOT