From an email regarding today’s 1.6 rating of their self-titled full-length:
Dear Ian,Thanks for your review of our record. It’s clear that you are a good writer and it’s clear that you took a lot of time giving us a thorough slagging on the site. We are fans of Pitchfork. And it’s fun to slag off bands. It’s like a sport — kind of part of the deal when you decide to be in a rock band. (That review of Jet where the monkey pees in his own mouth was about the funniest piece of band-slagging we’ve ever seen.)
We decided a long time ago not to take reviews too seriously. For one, they tend to involve a whole lot of projection, generally saying more about the writer than the band. Sort of a musical Rorschach test. And for another, reading them makes you too damned self-conscious, like the world is looking over your shoulder when the truth is you’re not a genius or a moron. You’re just a person in a band.
Plus, the variation of opinions on our record has bordered on absurd. 80 percent of what’s been said has been positive, a few reviews have remained on the fence and a few (such as yours) have been aggressively harsh. We tend not to put a lot of stock in this stuff, but the sheer disagreement of opinion makes for fascinating (if not a bit narcissistic) reading.
And anyway we have to admit that we found ourselves oddly flattered by your review. I mean, 1.6? That is not faint praise. That is not a humdrum slagging. That is serious fist-pounding, shoe-stomping anger. Many publications said this was among the best records of the year. You seem to think it’s among the worst. That is so much better than faint praise.
You compare us to a lot of really great bands (Arcade Fire, the National, Bright Eyes, Bruce Springsteen) and even if your intention was to cut us down, you end up describing us as: “lyrically moody, musically sumptuous and dramatic.” One is left only to conclude that you must think those things are bad.
We love indie rock and we know full well that Pitchfork doesn’t so much critique bands as critique a band’s ability to match a certain indie rock aesthetic. We don’t match it. It’s true that the events described in these songs really happened. It’s true we wrote about them in ways that make us look bad. (Sometimes in life you are the hero, and sometimes, you are the limp-dicked cuckold. Sometimes you’re screaming about your worst fears, your most vicious jealousies and failures. Such is life.) It’s also true that the record isn’t ironic or quirky or fey or disinterested or buried beneath mountains of guitar noodling.
As writers, we admire your tenacity and commitment to your tone (even though you do go too far with your assumptions about us). You’re wrong about our intentions, you’re wrong about how this band came together, you don’t seem to get the storytelling or the catharsis or the humor in the songs, and you clearly have some misconceptions about who we are as a band and who we are as people.
But it also seems to have very little to do with us. Much of your piece reads less like a record review and more like a diatribe against a set of ill-considered and borderline offensive preconceptions about Los Angeles. Los Angeles has an extremely vibrant blogging community, Silver Lake is a very close-knit rock scene. We are just one band among many. (And by the way, L.A. does have a flagship indie rock band: they’re called Silversun Pickups). We cut our teeth at Spaceland and the Echo and have nothing to do with whatever wayward ideas you have about the Sunset Strip. That’s just bad journalism.
But that is the nature of this sort of thing. It’s always based on incomplete information. Pitchfork has slagged many, many bands we admire (Dr. Dog, the Flaming Lips, Silversun Pickups, Cold War Kids, Black Kids, Bright Eyes [ironic, no?] just to name a few), so now we’re among them. Great.
This band was borne of some very very dark days and the truth is that there is something exciting about just being part of this kind of thing. There’s this long history of dialogue between bands and writers so it’s a bit of a thrill that you have such a strong opinion about us.
We hear you live in Los Angeles. We’d love for you to come to a show sometime and see what we’re doing with these lyrically moody and dramatic songs. You seem like a true believer when it comes to music and writing so we honestly think we can’t be too far apart. In any case, it would make for a good story.
all our best–
Mikel, Steven, Anna, Daren, Noah
the Airborne Toxic Event
1 Marc // Sep 18, 2008 at 10:59 am
Oh man, where to begin? First, I’m not really a fan of Pitchfork (not that it’s, as the above letter protrays it, some hydraheaded beast looking to dictate taste to America’s youth), but Ian Cohen’s review was pretty accurate. Also, at no point in the review did I get the impression that Ian was out to dis a certain segment of the LA indie scene, whatever that is. Nor did I get the impression that Ian was trying to equate The Airborne Toxic Event’s close-knit little indie scene with the Sunset Strip. I think the band should have relaxed and taken a chill before writing this letter (and maybe not namedropped/alligned themselves with so many bands, or use the term “slag”), or maybe not write it at all. Oh, and I thought it was funny that they “heard” Ian lives in LA, when he kind of says that he does in the review.
2 tdk // Sep 18, 2008 at 12:04 pm
There is a lot of good music out there why would you review something you don’t like? Also take it like a man, writing an email blast is lame.
3 hane // Sep 18, 2008 at 12:15 pm
seriously, i think the last time i read a review in pitchfork was about 2001. i’m not that familiar with airborne toxic event, but writing this letter lends PF a relevance it just no longer has.
4 Bentley // Sep 18, 2008 at 1:45 pm
“A Review of the Airborne Toxic Event in the Style of Pitchfork”
A central premise in White Noise, Don Delillo’s classic postmodern commentary on late capitalism, is that within a culture where mass production and consumption are widely prevalent, one inevitably will be surrounded by simulacra, that is, inferior copies of copies that have little or no relation to the original object they attempt to simulate. Put differently, a simulacrum is an imperfect representation of a replica, which in itself is a flawed facsimile of some original, true thing. For example, a diamond is a real thing that has value as a result of the specific properties it possess. On the other hand, a cubic zirconium is a copy of a diamond that only superficially resembles it and, upon closer inspection, does not posses the true features that make a diamond valuable. Finally, there are crappy pieces of fake glass that are made to look like cubic zirconia but only cost $11.99. These are the kind of trinkets that guys from Jersey or Long Island buy their dates to make it seem like they are really in love, but in reality they are just trying to get lucky. Most people can’t tell a diamond from a cubic zirconium, but a phony glass ring is easy to spot.
To take this clumsy metaphor to its inexorable conclusion, if The Smiths, The Arcade Fire, and early U2 are diamonds (originals); and The Killers and The Bravery are cubic zirconia (copies); then The Airborne Toxic Event, a band from Los Angeles (a place French philosopher Jean Baudrillard called “no longer real but rather belonging to the hyperreal order of simulation”) is a bunch of Grey Goose Vodka bottles and crushed red bull cans at the end of your driveway calling itself a 10 carat stone.
Being a simulacrum themselves, that is, copies of bands like The Killers who were trying to emulate groups like U2, it is no small irony that The Airborne Toxic Event has taken its name from a seminal event in Delillo’s book that deals so extensively with the subject of what is real, what is a copy, and what is a copy of a copy that has lost all essence of the original. On the group’s self-titled debut album, attempts to channel the heart of Bono, the passion of Win Butler, the proletarian compassion of The Boss, and the yearning of Morrissey fall flat. The songs seem like vain attempts to copy originals that can’t be duplicated.
The band’s single, “Sometime Around Midnight,” which has already received two thumbs up from KROQ (they who incessantly play Red Hot Chili Peppers, Avenged Sevenfold, and “Date Rape” by Sublime), starts off with a promising viola line; however, once the vocals of lead singer and guitarist Mikel Jolett (a former writer for Filter Magazine and the L.A. Times) begin, the song lurches forward, never progressing. Jolett repeats the same melodic phrase throughout the song, there is no verse, no chorus, no innovative arrangement, simply a steady crescendo filled with hackneyed phrases like “she’s holding her tonic like a cross.” “Papillon,” a song with an upbeat guitar line, is a stark change in tone from “Sometime Around Midnight;” however, Jolett’s penchant for repeating simple melodic vocal lines throughout songs persists. His adolescent laments about girls, alcohol, and cigarettes are constantly repeated throughout the album, albeit using a smattering of advanced vocabulary that one would find in a 12th grade copy of Wordly Wise. “This is Nowhere” is the album’s strongest track and features a catchy verse; however, the overwrought and introspective lyrics do not fit the upbeat tone of the track. In the album’s final track, “Innocence,” Anna Bulbrook’s viola once again shines, but as with most of the band’s work, the song fails to take any interesting, creative, or original turns, simply offering a simple rise and fall. The album reaches its nadir with the track “Missy,” a song so simple in its structure and so repetitive in melodic lines that it sounds like it was written by a young teenager who just received his first Stratocaster-pack from Guitar Center.
When all is said and done, The Airborne Toxic Event bring little or nothing new to the table, and what they do bring has been done better by artists like the Arcade Fire, Bruce Springsteen, and even The Killers. Jollet’s attempts to appear heartfelt and tortured simply end up sounding like someone trying to ape the style of an emotionally ravaged person rather than the true yowls of an agonized soul. The band need to find a sound of their own instead of producing third rate replications of the sounds of their more gifted predecessors.
5 john prune // Sep 18, 2008 at 2:13 pm
man that’s a pretty real review!
6 Bonofied // Sep 18, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Blowback anyone?…
——————————
Warm-up act hot, headliner not
By Mikel Jolett
August 01, 2005 in LA Times print edition E-6
It’s never a good sign when a band is one-upped by its opening act, but that happened to British ska-dance punk outfit the Dead 60s on Saturday at the Troubadour.
Hard Fi, from London, stomped its way through an inspired set that sounded quite a bit like early Clash – even if the band looked rather like frat boys.
The Dead 60s, who arrived here on the heels of a minor radio hit, “Riot Radio,” followed with a flat set that was something of a mediocre pastiche of their fellow traveler bands: Franz Ferdinand without the style, Bloc Party without the energy, Kaiser Chiefs without the ambition.
All these bands trade in the angular guitars and disco beats of Frankie Goes to Hollywood, the Clash, Josef K and a whole scene of dancehall ska that thrived in the underbelly of the U.S. and the U.K. throughout the ’80s.
And though the Dead 60s cannot be faulted for a lovely set of influences (or talented friends), they simply lacked authenticity.
At the core of the Clash’s music was a strongly anti-establishment political ethos. The sneer was directed at the Man – or, perhaps in their case, “the Woman” (Margaret Thatcher). In the Dead 60s, front man Matt McManamon’s sneer didn’t seem to be directed at anything but a camera or a radio DJ. Which is all well and good, music being a business. Maybe he pulls it off some nights.
But when the songs are hollow, the attitude is aped and even the frat boys rock harder than the headliner, the 60s (or, more accurately, the early ’80s) seem dead indeed.
*
The Dead 60s
Where: Spaceland, 1717 Silver Lake Blvd., Silver Lake
When: 9 p.m. Friday
7 Proposal // Sep 18, 2008 at 2:26 pm
Irresponsible journalism! Pitchfork should realize the damage they’re doing to Silver Lake’s growing vibrant music community by publishing reviews like this!!!!
8 A // Sep 18, 2008 at 5:04 pm
First, I’d like to say that negative reviews come with the territory if you’re in a band. The best idea is to grow thick skin and let the bad comments just roll down your back. That said, I agree with whoever else said that they don’t read PF record reviews. The big reason why is that it seems to me that they review bands that are hot favorably, but give bands they are not familiar with or not currently hyping unfavorable reviews. Lending substance to my comments is the way they’ve hyped bands that they later took a poo on (Black Kids) and ripped bands that they’ve later LOVED (Crystal Antlers who they once said “lacked substantiality”). While I’m at it, it also seems as if most of their references are new, which makes me think that many are not record geeks or music historians. Those are the types of people that i’ll read record reviews by. Most times PF just seems gassed with their ability to make or break bands, but I would say that I believe the reviewer must have honestly not liked the record, so you can’t fault somebody for the opinion.
9 Scott Schultz // Sep 18, 2008 at 8:28 pm
Pichfork as a relevent music site: 4.0
Ian Cohen as a competent C.D. Reviewer: 0.8
Ian Cohen’s credibility discussing anything regarding the Silver Lake Scene: 0.00
10 Salossie I // Sep 19, 2008 at 2:51 am
An artist that can’t take criticism should just stay in his room and not show it to anyone. I haven’t heard the Airborne album but I’ve heard them live twice. The first time, in my opinion, they sucked. The second time (and it must have been pretty obvious to everyone) they blowed massive cocks. Oh well, the Asian guitar player was the only one rocking out, kind of making it up for the lame lyrics and boring melodies.
And by the way, fuck the Silverlake scene.
11 Steve Corey // Sep 20, 2008 at 1:50 pm
Agree w/ a lot of this. That band sucks and is totally unoriginal. why don’t they write about good new stuff out of silver lake? there’s plenty of it going ignored (see The Movies, Happy Hollows, Afternoons, Rademacher, Henry Clay People, etc.).
ATE need to quit whining and take it like men. And to say they’re “very much part” of the silver lake band scene is hilarious. everyone pretty much can’t stand their band.
12 Really Tho // Sep 22, 2008 at 1:48 pm
I would rather listen to a whole album by Dominos Pizza’s Pasta Dude than TATE .
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