hornby

[Philip Sherburne <philip@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>afternoon reading:
>Nick Hornby "High Fidelity" (for us who haunt lists such as these, a 
>brutal and hilarious portrait of record geekery)

very true - even funnier (scarier?) for those of us who have worked in
record stores... however, i will say that hornby lost most of my respect
after his review of radiohead's "kid a" in the new yorker.  i don't really
care whether or not he liked it (he didn't), but i can't really believe in
the critical capacities of a writer whose summation of the album was, to
paraphrase a bit brutally, "dude, radiohead used to rawk, and 'kid a'
doesn't rawk; therefore it sucks."

in a completely surreal maneuver, he argued that the album was music for
teenagers because the track titles didn't seem to make any sense and the
lyrics were so abstract and "experimental" - therefore, only teenagers have
the time and inclination to sit around in their bedrooms puzzling over such
things.  us grownups are too darned busy for those kinda shenanigans.

this in a year where "teen music" - a la britney, cristina, 'n sync et al -
have dominated the charts.  go figure.

phil