[NewMusic] breathtakingly bad

[Sarah - 21 Grand]

Phillip pondered:
PG:
I don't tend to like reading any kind of prose where a writer has so
much contempt for his/her subject. I didn't enjoy reading this article.
There's no reason why I should enjoy reading everything, but I don't
tend to finish reading things I don't enjoy.

- to me it seemed like the author was content to focus mainly on Zorn's
persona - hence dwelling on the camo pants as well as the easiest targets of
his work (i.e. the Radical Jewish Culture series and it's arbitary
definition of Jewishness). He didn't really make much of an attempt to
examine Zorn's music on the terms that Zorn sets forth, or in the context of
his peers.  

- Yeah, the contempt is really obvious, which to me, lessens the force of
the author's arguments. The most effective method, I've noted, is to let the
subject hang himself, metaphorically speaking.

PG:
OK, I'm not a professional writer. But personally, I don't tend to write
about things unless I enjoy them. I don't see the point in joining the
ranks of critics who jeer things just because it isn't their cup of tea.
Why write merely to throw mud at others?

- Well, uh, speaking as someone who has written harshly about art I didn't
enjoy and made said writing public ... I tend not to write about art I
dislike that just "isn't my cup of tea." There are things I dislike because
I find the genre/medium boring, conventional, things that just are at odds
w/my personal aesthetic/sensibility, things that are mediocre made by
someone or shown somewhere I'd expect no more from. I don't write about
these things. I'm not going to write a scathing review of sloppy collages
shown at a café. I'm not going to write a negative review of an installation
that has whimsical birdies on model tree branches that's really just too
cutesy and fey for my tastes.  I'm not going to write a negative review
about derivative ab-ex painting - mainly because I'm not that interested in
painting to begin with, and as a piece of writing, what would that really
contribute to any discussion or give the reader something interesting to
think about. Yep, people are still imitating ab-ex painters from the 40s and
50s ... most of the current stuff sucks. It's kinda like dissing Phil
Collins' mid-80s output here.

- However, thinking about my rationale for writing and publishing harsh
critiques, I decided the following:
- My primary impetus to do so is based on the work failing or being
deceptive on its own terms, the terms themselves, or the goals the work has
set for itself, or the ideas it's trying to explore are things that interest
me.
- In order for the critique to be fair (and relevant), I need to look at it
in the context it set for itself, its intent, similar work/projects in the
same genre, etc. I won't write about something I don't know enough about.
- and some of it is about taking something down a notch ... I might not have
written one of the harsh show reviews I did if it had been at some
artist-run gallery or warehouse, but because it was Yerba Buena, I felt
better about it.

sl