So, there’s stuff all over the place about the death of rock criticism — clearly, one of the things that has kept rock criticism alive in the 2000s is the endless discussion of its own death? — but scant little attention is ever paid to the real roots of the stuff — that is, its pre-Crawdaddy! roots. Is there such a thing?

Inquiring about rock ‘n’ roll criticism — as opposed to rock criticism — Tom Ewing at Freaky Trigger asks a good question and opens up a great conversation: How come rock’n'roll didn’t trigger the birth of rock criticism? Why was no one assigning A-minuses to Elvis is Back!, declaring Bobby Vinton “marked for death,” or writing polemics about the grain of Little Richard’s voice? Or were they and we just don’t know about it?

Drowned in Sound have been posting pieces all week about the death of music criticism, featuring such provocative titles as:

• Being a music critic when music criticism is dead
• The strange and cryptic lore behind assigning numbers to records
• Love thy reader
• Kissing without the sex

Looks interesting (I haven’t read it). Any thoughts? Either on the pieces themselves or the general idea(s) being bandied about?

Lyrical Assassin: “For a music critic, being immortalized in song could be the highest compliment…unless the song is a death threat.”

Music critic Michael Azerrad gets the sort of publicity every critic secretly craves. Until it happens (at least in this fashion). (Some interesting mentions in this piece as well of songs I had no idea existed, about Gina Arnold, Ira Robbins, and… Robert Hilburn?)

Who are you listening to and what releases are you anticipating over the next three months?

In regards to critically divisive musicians, I noted in the comments box last week that the early Ramones were more or less as good a case study as any — as this great, great ad attests. It’s for the group’s second album, Leave Home, and it consists entirely of excerpts from reviews of their debut. (I had to blow up and splice the ad in half so as to render it legible online… The ad also contained pics of the first two albums and was headlined “Ramones Get Noticed.”) When I think of how difficult this must’ve been for someone to compile back in 1977… Clearly SIRE had a publicist on board more than earning their keep.  

Obviously, the reaction is far from split down the middle here — the majority of these are positive comments. Some of the negative ones are pretty harsh, though, and funny. And no one but no one can be said to sit on the fence.

I have to wonder, though, about this comment by Steve Morrissey: “Degenerate no-talents.” Is that THE Morrissey? If so, is he merely being cheeky? (Or perhaps the maker of the ad is being cheeky by pulling that particular line? Maybe he meant “degenerate no-talents” as a term of affection?) Didn’t Moz write a book about the New York Dolls?

I don’t mean to rudely cut into A.C.’s usual “Q of the Week” feature, and anyway, this is a somewhat different kind of question for anyone who cares to take a stab. I’m trying to compile a list of what I call “critically divisive musicians.” I’m not talking merely about “controversial” musicians (though in most cases, the critically divisive musician is in fact somewhat controversial), but rather, musicians who receive both a lot of praise from critics and a heaping of vitriol as well. It has to be both — that is the key — and the more equal those two streams are (i.e., equal ratio of good reviews to bad reviews), the better. Obviously, there isn’t a revered musician on the planet who hasn’t received their share of negative reviews, so I guess I’m formulating this question with a longer view in mind. Um, perhaps I should illustrate with a few examples.

Take the Beatles and Prince. Both have surely had a few brickbats tossed their way through the years (from the critics, I mean), but in the overall trajectory of their careers, I’d be hard pressed to call either of them “critically divisive” (though you could certainly make a stronger case for Prince, especially post-80s Prince). The critics, by and large, have been on their side (and in the case of Prince, I think in the ’90s a lot of critics simply lost interest or gave up on him rather than slammed him per se… he was nonetheless always highly revered — and his current sins duly forgiven — for the work he did in the decade prior).

On the critically divisive side, two examples come to mind immediately: Madonna and M.I.A. Madonna’s an interesting case in that during the mid-’80s the scales were tipped way in the negatives (with just enough positives — Marsh comes to mind, also the folks at SPIN — to make her such a compelling critical figure), but the balance shifted hard in ’89 with the fairly mass critical acceptance of Like a Prayer. Following which, I’d argue that she’s been riding a teeter-totter effect ever since (I’m reasonably certain, for instance, that the Sex book and the “Justify My Love” video drew sharply divided responses). M.I.A.: I admit I’m judging solely on the basis of all the web arguments that took place around the time of her first album — i.e., all the back and forths about her supposed terrorist ties, questions of her “authenticity,” etc. However, last years Kala received what caption writers like to refer to as unanimously glowing reviews; out of the many that I perused (including the 4.5-star one I wrote myself), I think I came across only a couple that weren’t entirely convinced. So maybe she’s not a great example any longer — perhaps her built-in awesomeness ensured that her role as the Great Divider would be short-lived?

Does this make any sense? Can you think of some examples of Critically Divisive Musicians? Any era or genre is fine, including people outside of rock/pop. Do any jazz artists fit this bill? Electric-era Miles Davis, perhaps? (Also, feel free to slice careers into sub-careers; is it fair to say that the Rolling Stones overall are not “criticially divisive” but that the Rolling Stones post-Exile are?) Don’t be shy about chiming in with hedged responses, as, quite truthfully I’m not even sure this idea is going anywhere or if it’s a total non-starter… it’s just something that’s been nagging at me a bit lately.

Related to the Q. of the Week… I heard old Neil put her down, at least fairly recently. At the Berlin Film Festival last week he said, “I think that the time when music could change the world is past. I think it would be very naive to think that in this day and age.”

And in a rather Devo moment he added, “I think the world today is a different place, and that it’s time for science and physics and spirituality to make a difference in this world and to try to save the planet.”

However, like any good revisionist he later amended that in the commentary found here.

But, of course, that wasn’t the end of it, and he had to throw this near-Belinda Carlisle curve. And continue along those lines with his former bandmates. Sheesh, make up what’s left of your mind, Percy.

Lately, it seems that many of the pieces that get linked to around here are about how dismal are the prospects of music criticism. The equation regarding criticism that is more than “consumer advocacy” seems to be: readers don’t want to read it, publishers don’t want to publish it, writers thus slouch in their duties to provide it. But are there counter-examples to this mentality and to this assumption? (And if so, where are they?) Anyone out there thinking otherwise?