I was thinking the same. Contemporary reviews of classic '60s and '70s artists skewed overly negative - angry dudes like Lester Bangs and Robert Christgau with very definite ideas about what was kosher and what wasn't who'd gleefully trash some of the best music ever recorded - but things have swung way over the other way now. Critics ar…
I was thinking the same. Contemporary reviews of classic '60s and '70s artists skewed overly negative - angry dudes like Lester Bangs and Robert Christgau with very definite ideas about what was kosher and what wasn't who'd gleefully trash some of the best music ever recorded - but things have swung way over the other way now. Critics are so afraid of looking like elitists or "born in the wrong generation" nostalgists that they'll routinely write about stuff that's faddish, childish or just not very good as if it's brilliant, deep and meaningful.
I was thinking the same. Contemporary reviews of classic '60s and '70s artists skewed overly negative - angry dudes like Lester Bangs and Robert Christgau with very definite ideas about what was kosher and what wasn't who'd gleefully trash some of the best music ever recorded - but things have swung way over the other way now. Critics are so afraid of looking like elitists or "born in the wrong generation" nostalgists that they'll routinely write about stuff that's faddish, childish or just not very good as if it's brilliant, deep and meaningful.
Christgau & Bangs were right more than wrong.