Sasha Frere-Jones Hates MySpace, Young Women
In his latest New Yorker piece, pop music critic and white-indie-rock hating Sasha Frere-Jones takes on MySpace, and the horror that is young, cute 20-something women making annoying music.
While the article alerts us to how MySpace tragically forces artists into the limelight before "they've played a live show, mastered the art of songwriting, or found their voice", it also serves the more prosaic purpose of hating on Kate Nash. After listening to Nash's latest, Made of Bricks, Sasha feels sorry "not for Nash's anonymous boyfriends..but for her listeners." He goes on to call her songs "infinitely annoying", "grating", and the kind of stuff "that might have earned Nash an A in third grade." Burn!
Despite his seeming disdain, Frere-Jones is no stranger to Web 2.0: his former band Ui has a very nice MySpace page, and he routinely updates not one, but two blogs. It's okay for an intelligent, 40 year-old New Yorker critic to go online every day, just not young women who use the Internet to complain about their weight and stuff, or to post their trite little Garage Band songs.
But never fear, Sasha is no misogynist. He makes sure to note that Kate Nash, Lily Allen, Amy MacDonald and other 20-something female artists simply hold no candle to PJ Harvey, Tori Amos, Liz Phair and Courtney Love, women he adores. This new crop of girls is just "less political, less aggressive, and so far, less inspired" than their older contemporaries. Ah, if only people born in the 60s could keep making music and writing about it, indefinitely.
Teenage girls of the world, take note! The lyrics of Courtney Love are deep and significant, not like Kate Nash's sad little warblings about her boyfriend throwing up on her trainers. Just take this 1994 example from Hole's Live Through This:
I'm stupid
I'm smarting
I'm stupid
I'm smarting
I want my baby, where is the baby
I want my baby
Who took my baby
The pathos! Nevermind naive and earnest artists like Amy Winehouse, bring back the lipstick-smeared, baby-dolled girl-rock of yore. And for the teeny-bopper set, getting back to the 90s has never been easier. PJ Harvey, Tori Amos, Liz Phair and Courtney are all conveniently available for download on a MySpace page near you.
Thanks to my sister for the pic of Kate Nash, above.
Comments
hahaha, Sasha Frere-Jones is the WORST!
The snobbery and lack of taste & knowledge of some music critics is astonishing. aka: Sasha Frere-Jones Courtney Love has no talent, plus she is the stereotypical bad sample for young people of a drug addict, mentally inestable so call rock star. Kate Nash is real, honest, talented, & a nice person for a change... not full of herself like most of the big label musicians & their suck-up critics. aka... Believe or not we do have our own minds & higher intelect than most of you music establishment critics.
Well it's about time someone strikes back at this critic. What right does he have to criticize these young talented women, let alone compare them to crack whores like Courtney Love. I personally really enjoy artists like Kate Nash, whose story-telling lyrics strike a chord with myself and personal experiences I've had, not to mention countless of other listeners as well. If you're too stupid to read between the lines and understand the true meanings of the lyrics, don't go bothering the rest of the world with your idiocy. PJ Harvey is one of your musical idols? Honestly? Wow.
Actually he has a point. In the UK we have to keep listening to these faux-cockney 20 somethings as every label now wants one of their own there has been a glut of them. This stuff has been rushed out and has as much gravitas as a paper cup.