The next (last?) phenomenon in music journalism popped up in the American Midwest, when a young Fugazi fan whose lack of writing experience did little to deter his infatuation with fanzine culture decided he had next.
Unlike Rolling Stone and Spin, or Time and Newsweek, fanzines offered passion on the cheap. Few endured beyond a fistful of issues, but longevity didn’t matter. Enthusiasm mattered. The expression spiral mattered. Pitchfork Media, for a time, mattered.
Let revisionism ne'er reign; an online publication highlighting the alternative and indie rock scenes was necessary. Sharp up here, sloppy down there, the imperfections of early Pitchfork were as invaluable as they were inevitable. The Internet age had its Village Voice, albeit one where everyone thought they were Robert Christgau, and wielded numbers instead of letters as they subverted conventional wisdoms. Find them passionate or pretentious, authentic or phony, quirky or elitist, Pitchfork’s reviews at minimum broadened the idea of what music critics should and shouldn’t write about, how they should or shouldn’t write.
No group of writers can co-exist for long before one of them says, “Why don’t we make a list?” Unlike Rolling Stone, however, who apparently believe their 500 Albums list is sufficient to cover the music released during their peak respectability, Pitchfork brought their trademark snark to albums released before their founder was. Why not? The Sixties ushered in the first great wave of pop and rock music, a overhaul of the building that embraced the open-floor plan and cared little for “resell ability.”
Pitchfork’s 200 Best Albums of the 1960s displays what worked about the site (passionate listening, ambitious writing) and what did not (overreach caused by distance, vicious tone caused by petulance--can you imagine how a PF scribe might’ve annihilated, say, Strawberry Alarm Clock)? I only disagree with one entry in the top 20 (guess now for a free prize in your mind) and the variety is truly admirable: Ennio Morricone, Wanda Jackson, Cecil Taylor, Donald Byrd, Peter Brotzmann and Alice Coltrane stake claims on the same ground as Velvet Underground, Jimi, the Beach Boys and Alice’s husband.
PF scaled back for the 1970s, and whether credit rests with reduction or revelation, this list hits the right nail most of the time, with my personal yeas outnumbering the nays 30 to 11. The top 10 especially is redoubtable. (No extra credit for diversity here, since any list of that decade that refuses to give props to disco, soul, funk and punk is basically a half-inflated parade balloon in a squall.) Any article that possesses the good sense to put XTC’s best album in the top 40, and the better sense to keep the Sex Pistols out of the top 50 is fine by me.
And then, something funny happened. Not funny like J. Elvis Weinstein on Cinematic Titanic, but funny like J. Elvis Weinstein on Mystery Science Theater 3000. Music fans eager for the newest and hottest sounds began seeking guidance from these Chicago-based hipsters in greater numbers than ever. From 2001 to 2005, monthly readership increased thirtyfold. The site’s 10-point rating scale became an easily-parodied, hotly-contested symbol of cultural commentary run amok, the heat rising the more onlookers realized Pitchfork review could prove helpful or harmful to an artist’s career (just ask Arcade Fire and Travis Morrison). Pitchfork relished their roles as narrative-shapers, proclaiming themselves “The Most Trusted Voice In Music.”
Come 2003, the website referred to as “Bitchdork” by its more piquant naysayers turned its discriminating peepers to the 1980s, AKA my favorite decade ever. Exactly how dicey a read this list will be is foreshadowed in the introduction:
Pitchfork seeks to prove that, amidst the smooth-jazz of Kenny G, the vanilla soul of Hall & Oates, and the hair-rock of Warrant lay a revolution in sound. Respect is due.
Pitchfork, I’m gonna tell you right now like my father told me back then: No one likes you, they just tolerate you. Like, who in hell lumps Hall & Oates in with Kenny fucking G? (Okay, my dad didn't say that last part.)
Now, to my ears anyway, they mostly got it right (or at least right enough). I guess no Sonic Youth fan worth their red pepper flakes is going to flame any list that places Daydream Nation at the peak, and if just one reader sought out Nurse With Wound as a result of a PF endorsement, great. Hope they made their way to Sun City Girls, at some point.
Fifteen years later, the site was hit by something resembling repentance, and decided to not only redo the ‘80s Albums list, but to expand it by another hundred. Per the editorial preface, the former article “represented a limited editorial stance….its lack of diversity does not represent the voice Pitchfork has become.” In other words: we need to start reflecting the tastes of the modern listener.
Whatever cynicism I may have harbored, the yeses clock in at 61 versus a mere 5 I can’t justify. (I swear I let out some sigh-groan-laugh hybrid when I saw Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love in the top 5. Last list? 93. I get it, she’s influential). The extra room allows for the inclusion of massively-deserving records by Paul McCartney, the B-52s, and MC Lyte, and drowns out whatever grumbles I emitted upon noticing Sonic Youth’s Sister had been left by the roadside.
No grumbles over Daydream Nation's bump back; who didn't see that coming? Celebrity creates clicks, and it's a real pop-averse soul to bristle at Purple Rain and Thriller. It's not like Pitchfork picked Lovesexy and Bad, okay? I’ve read some consternation over the high placements of Control and Criminal Minded; why these records the missed initial list is a more puzzling question to me. There’s more rap and metal representation, although the choices are far from daring. Again, Pitchfork is now officially in the business of determining importance and cementing legacy. So get your Celtic Frost outta here.
(Some pretty hilarious plummets: Skylarking fell 118 slots and Second Edition fell 85. Not very amused by the 77-number nosedive for motherfucking Rio, one of the premier every-song-is-a-single album in pop history.)
1990s. Oh the 1990s. I maintain you can discern the amount of salt in a writer’s water by how they judge the music of the 1990s. A multitude of genres burst from the cocoon: electronic music, alternative rock, urban admixtures. It’s therefore pretty easy to fill predetermined slots with important albums. It’s also easy, for listeners like me anyway, people who lived through it, to fill those slots with albums that we happen to think are just goddamn great. PF’s first Nineties Albums list appeared in 1999, and above all it is marked by the editor’s blatant instructions to voters that they not fret over cursory acknowledgments for “the most important, best, or most inifluential recordings” and instead vouch for their favorite albums—“the ones they most enjoyed listening to.” How novel! And ‘zine-y. Doomed to fail, really.
Two Fugazi records don’t make the Greatest list; Repeater will, or maybe In On the Kill Taker…but not both. Writers love Tom Waits to the point of self-loathing, so he’s right behind Loveless for the top spot. When it’s time to present a historical record, however, it’s difficult to narrow his influence down to just the one, so better to just make a pick and stick it near the back.
If you really want to know the distinction between a favorite list and a greatest list though, behold, at no. 17, Walt Mink. A band remembered nowadays, if at all, as Joey Waronker’s first band. Polvo’s on there. Dirty is on here, a rare critical acknowledgment that SY actually made more than one great record for a major label. My favorite Stereolab album and my favorite Built To Spill are here, which will simply not happen if the editor asks for the “best.”
It didn’t take long for the editor to realize credibility is currency, and in 2003, PF indeed presented the Best Albums of the 1990s. Come on, guys, we're not totally insufferable!
“Our perceptions of the decade are different now, our personal tastes have expanded, our knowledge of the music deepened….”
As in, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is suddenly top 5. In Utero is suddenly top 15. The Soft Bulletin, which no one vouched for on the previous list of albums 1990s they liked to listen to, is now the third-best album of the 1990s. The great Pavement battle starts here, as well.
Unfortunate casualties include: Archers of Loaf, Sebadoh, Sunny Day Real Estate, Sleater-Kinney, Cat Power, Polvo, Shellac and Mobb Deep. Three albums ranked in the top 20 dropped completely off, and I’m positive brand self-consciousness is as culpable as individual exploration.
The third go-round in 2022 didn’t hurt as much. Actually, I only blew one raspberry reading 100-51. Dig Me Out is back, Bratmobile’s in the house. This recent critical trend of placing Live Through This over Nevermind is weird; a case of holding a band’s fanbase against them?
Once the Internet caught wind of Pitchfork’s plan for this update, yak soon centered around which previously feted act would suffer the torment of noxious rejection. Pavement were a popular choice, and sure enough, their once-sacrosanct debut plunged from 5 to 70. Other mystifying choices: The Low End Theory the top-ranked Tribe while Midnight Marauders clings on by the fingernails (almost makes me wish Jive Records hadn’t interfered with Low End)…RKO off the top rope, it’s The Velvet Rope, a very good offering from Janet Jackson…no Pantera, despite a wealth of options, not to mention if we’re talking importance, a record as heavy as Far Beyond Driven hitting the number one albums spot shook the industry.
Oh well, Loveless is back on top, baby!
New century, new problems. The rise of Napster and the fall of the album means Pitchfork must reach heights of batshitness heretofore undreamed. PF’s review of Kid A cements the site’s reputation as wackacocka wanna-bes. When the staff looks back on the 2000s, they find much of value in the White Stripes, Wilco and goddamn Panda Bear. Albums such as One Beat and You Are Free can’t even crack the top 70 and 120, respectively.
Judging the 2010s had to be bittersweet. With the increased prominence of streaming platforms, less listeners sought out Pitchfork for guidance. Algorhithms did the dirty work for them. Now, concerted conciliation is the name of the game for sites like PF, which means most of the great rock music, the tunes which would have been celebrated in PF’s heyday, the artists which they would have gleefully galvanized, get the shaft (seriously, no love for White Lung?) Instead, it’s lotsa love for Tame Impala, a racket-gang who at their most tolerable sound like Kevin Shields in the throes of apoxia.
Tomorrow…Wrapping up the albums lists with a mingle-mangle of opinions!
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