A Look at Criticism

Hi guys, this time I'll be writing about something I'd like to think I'm good at: critiquing things. Throughout my relatively short tenure on this earth, I've been called a complainer, whiner, nagger, elitist and belly acher. I like to re-frame all these pejorative terms into one concise label- I'm a critic.

I've heard many people spout phrases like "Those who don't act, criticize", "critics have no talent", and other fun syllogisms demeaning criticism. Yet I feel criticism is necessary in everything- art, film, politics, religion, science- all these fields require discerning eyes to point out faults, but also praise to praise merits. In this post, I'll only be focusing on one type of criticism- art. When I say art, I mean things like film, books, television, music, paintings, etc. I could just call these things "media", but that seems so cold and detached. I would discuss other sorts of criticism, but that would require me writing a 32 page paper, and let's face it, you're not going to read a 32 page paper some guy published on his blogspot website.

Most people think of art critics as needlessly snarky people that can't enjoy anything, and I would respond to them, "That's right, sometimes".  Critics often get a bad reputation, as they point out the flaws in a work and demean them. Articles that critics write completely bashing something often get a lot of attention. Who among us doesn't love to read someone's scathing, biting review of Garfield?(the movie, not the comic strip- though I'm sure there's a blog out there where some guy reviews every comic strip of Garfield.). It's fun for us to see a work ripped to shreds, chewed up, and spit out. We get a great sense of schadenfreude from observing this.

It's always been a secret aspiration of mine to become a movie critic, ever since I was a child. I still have fond memories of tuning into Siskel and Ebert as a kid and watching them argue and discuss the merits of particular films. It really instilled a sense of watching movies with your brain "turned on" at an early age. I've heard many people say "I go to see movies so I don't have to think", and this irritates me to no end. I feel that works need to be discussed and processed within your mind and with others. Even if a work's intent is pure entertainment, such as a martial art film, it's worth talking about.

Sadly, what I took away from criticism during my teenage years was a delight in watching a piece of work torn apart. It's easy to emphasize the negative. How many of us find it simpler to complain than to reflect on the good in their life? Humans tend to find negative stories more interesting- just read the news on any given day of the week. How many of us would rather hear a story from our coworker about how she broke up with her boyfriend than a story about how everything in their relationship is fine? We just naturally find bad stuff interesting. This mean-spiritedness is evident on my early posts on this blog, as I dedicated whole blog posts to tearing down summer movie offerings. While I enjoy ranting about how I hated a film, I realized in recent years that I need to work on writing about things I actually enjoyed.

I believe that a critic with true talent is able to sift through all of the trash and find the gems that others might miss, and point out a work's merits. Critics are often complained about by artists as not having any talent since they didn't create a said work to begin with, but a good critic is able to mine details and meaning out of a work that's not visible to everybody.

There have been times where I've watched a movie or television show and took it purely at face value, and didn't think much about it. Then, in a discussion with a friend or reading a review, I discover that someone else found a deeper meaning in the work that I didn't even think to observe. I then begin to see the work in a completely new light. This is the joy of criticism- you help others to discover things about something that wasn't apparent, and help them to gain a deeper appreciation for something.

I've been mentioning movies a lot in this post, so let's keep using them as examples. Thousands of movies come out per year, and many of them go overlooked due to the louder sound that "mainstream" movies make. It's the task of a critic to seek out these lesser known films, watch them, and praise their merits so the general public can watch them. Do we really need 100 critics dedicating their time to the third installment of "Alvin and the Chipmunks?". While these scathing reviews are fun to read, critics need to be watching a great foreign film, a unique piece of sci-fi, or a documentary that was released the same week and encouraging readers to see it.

Don't be lazy when consuming media, find people to discuss it with. Whenever I finish watching or reading something, the first thing I do is search for topics on the work on Reddit so I can discuss it with other people.   Share your voice, there may be others that could benefit from your insights, and you could introduce somebody to a piece of art that could really change the way they look at the world.

A final disclaimer: don't let critics dissuade you from watching or reading something that you really want to see. Sometimes,  It often becomes popular to gang up on a work and bash it in a vicious cycle of mutual hate, but you may end up enjoying the work. In the end, you like what you like, and you don't have to feel angry if other people don't like something that you like. Criticism is by it's nature incredibly subjective, and that's what makes it so fun.

Listening to Music Intentionally

Music: Let’s talk about it. You know what music is: that strange combination of sounds that comes out of your car on the way to work, that background noise you play while you write papers or enter data. It’s that stuff that seems to come out of the empty, eerily high ceilings at the supermarket. Or maybe it’s that barely audible pattern that plays while you’re on hold trying to fix a problem with your cell phone contract.

Let’s forgive that last paragraph of attempted pithiness for this post. This week, we’re going to be talking about listening to music, specifically, how to listen to music. You may be telling yourself that you should not have to be told how to listen to music, but I’m here to say that you need to. In today’s society, where we’re blasted with music at gas stations, through television commercials and before Youtube videos, it’s become difficult to really appreciate a song or piece. I’m going to tell you how you should be listening to music. Before we begin, I should say that I do not know how to play a musical instrument or read music. I can’t tell you what a time signature is, I vaguely know about chord progression, and I’ll admit that I’d have to Google what a stanza is. What I do have is close to 21 years of hearing music on a regular basis and learning to appreciate it, so those will have to be credentials enough for now.

If you’re like me, music often becomes the background of your daily activities. Everyone listens to music in their car, whether it is through the Great Satan that is the radio, or by plugging our Ipods, smart phones, what have you into our car’s stereo. If you’re also like me, you need music while you work. It’s been shown that my generation is uncomfortable without music or sound while working- we need constant stimulation as a result of our media-addled mind.  While we’re listening to this music, we sometimes forget that songs have little conventions called lyrics. You know, lyrics- those things that people are singing to the pretty sounds coming out of your stereo? How many of us ever stop and listen to them?

As a teenager, one of my favorite things to do was to buy a new CD, pop it in, and lay on the floor and read the lyrics in the little CD booklet as the songs played. For people older than me (or hipsters), you may have enjoyed or still enjoy putting on a record and reading the lyrics in those awesome liner notes. This is an immensely enriching experience that helps you fully understand the music you’re listening to, and when you listen to the songs in the future, you’ll remember what the songs are actually about. But doesn’t knowing the exact lyrics of a song cheapen the song’s magic?

A few months ago, as I was browsing Reddit, I came across a comment someone made saying that the mark of good songwriting is when the lyrics can be interpreted in different ways and listeners can get different things out of a song that may relate to circumstances and events in their life. Knowing the full lyrics of a song helps you tap into this magic- the lyrics of the Smashing Pumpkins “Bullet with Butterfly Wings” (don’t ask why I’m using this as an example, it was the first thing to come to mind) will mean something different to you at 15 than at 30. At 15, you may consider yourself a rat in a cage due to being forced to bow down to the demands of your parents and teachers. At 30, you may consider yourself a rat in a cage as you look upon the forces in the world that are larger than yourself, and, despite all your rage, you realize you are quite powerless to stop them.

There are albums with endlessly rich lyrics that I first neglected because I was playing the album as “background noise” that I’m only now revisiting. For example, I’ve been quite enthralled lately with The Decemberist’s 2009 album “The Hazards of Love”. I played the album once or twice in 2009 and wrote it off as bizarre, and it sat on various hard drives for 3 years without being listened to. I recently decided to give it a good, honest, intentional listen and I’m sure glad I did. It’s an indie rock opera set in an 1800s European fantasy setting about a pair of lovers trying to avoid the schemes of two evil villains. There are moments on that album of humor, passionate love that will make you misty eyed, and over the top anthems from the villains- it really must be heard to be believed. The thing was, I missed out on all this richness the first time because I played the album at low volume while surfing my Facebook.

Well what about “instrumental music”? I hold that you need to give this music your full, undivided attention as well. I know that it sounds pretentious, but I challenge you lay back sometime and put a full classical piece on and really absorb it. One of my personal favorites is Antonin Dvorak’s “New World Symphony”. If you listen to the entire thing, you’re treated to quiet movements reminiscent of early morning in a tiny village to truly epic moments that remind you of world leaders clashing on a battlefield of thousands. You don’t get a lot of this subtext if you just sit and play the music while you microwave your Lean Cuisine at work.

The other thing about sitting and intentionally listening to music is that the album “clicks” quicker. All of us have been through the disappointing experience of listening to the latest album from our favorite band for the first time and hating it. When you’re just listening to the album in the background, you may miss out on some clever lyric that just makes sense to you, or a change in the mood of the piece that may move you to tears. I’ve found that if I lay back and read the lyrics with a piece of music the first time I listen to it, the music really shines. Subsequent listens only build upon my love for the piece, and eventually I get into that indescribable joy of being addicted to an album or band and having a love affair with it for weeks. That album then becomes the soundtrack for a short period of your life, and when you look back in 20 years at major milestones in your past, that music is an essential part of who you were, who you are and what you’ve become. It’s really a beautiful and profound thing that science can explain, but can’t fully capture.

It’s so easy to throw on the latest pop songs while we do whatever and only mildly pay attention to them. Pop music is scientifically designed to stick in your brain as quick as possible so you keep revisiting it, and if it’s “poppy” enough, the music is able to overpower whatever else it is we’re doing and lodge in our minds. However, I think it’s sad that we take music for granted at times- it’s this thing beyond description that is amazing in the truest sense of the word. Myself, being a Christian, marvel that God created humans with the ability to come up with something so heavenly. The nonreligious among you may find it awe inspiring that humans were able to create these patterns of sound that evoke all ranges of emotion as well. Regardless of your religious preference, I think we can agree that good music demands our full attention.

Now I’m not going to be the ultimate snob and say that you should never listen to music in the background while you’re doing other things, I play music every day while working and would be a massive hypocrite if I told you to do so. Listening to music while running, for instance, has been shown by scientists to increase intelligence and motivate you to continue running longer. I personally enjoy playing intense, epic, high tempo music while running, and nothing compares to being dog tired toward the end of the run and sprinting at the final stretch because a hot blooded, over-the-top part of a song comes on.

I just encourage you to sit and listen to a piece of music once in a while and only listen to that music. You will gain a new appreciation of what you’re hearing, and it will affect you in a positive way that you’ll look back on as you move through the great checkpoints of life.

I Hate the Radio.

Good evening everybody. It's been too long and all that. I come to you tonight to write about something of grave importance to us all. It's a matter that is to be taken very seriously so I'll need your full undivided attention. You may even want to take a seat, because the news may be difficult.

I. Hate. The. Radio.

To be quite honest, I'd like to use a few expletives in the previous statement as descriptives to show much I hate the radio, but I'll forgo that in the interest of public taste. In the mean time, just imagine the previous statement laced with horrible words of your choosing.

You know the feeling you got as a kid when you were rough housing with your sibling and he accidentally hit you in the nose and you became filled with rage? That's the feeling I get whenever I hear a Top 40 station, except it's that feeling for 8 hours on end.

I suppose a narrative may be necessary to provide the kind reader with some background here. I currently work in an office with 6 other women (my wife included), myself being the only male. These women all insist on listening to the same radio stations without fail everyday: Power 96.5, which is a Top 40 station that is repetitive even by Top 40 standards, and Alice 95.5, which claims to play "90's, 2K, and Today!". What this really means is that the station plays all the same songs as Power 96.5, but will play "Kiss Me" by Sixpence None the Richer or "How to Save a Life" by the Fray once in a while.

 On a tangential note, "How to Save a Life" may be in my top 10 most hated songs of all time. I blame this mostly on a guy that lived in the dorm above me my freshman year that would play it on repeat in the morning, afternoon, night, and when I was trying to put my beaten soul to sleep. Seriously, if I'm ever detained at Guantanamo Bay, they will play this song on repeat to torture me, and I'm sad to say I'll break.

These stations each play the same 10 songs over, and over, and over, throughout the 8 hours I am there. My coworkers continue to work on happily as if they are not in the auditory prison that I am-how can they function as this madness is playing? How many times can I hear Adam Levine say "I'm at a payphone, trying to call home all of my change I spent on you!" in his horrible harpy voice? Or Taylor Swift tell me 1700 times about how we are never, ever, ever getting back together? Not to mention Taio Cruz telling me that sometimes he likes to throw his hands up in the air, and says aaaaio gotta let go. Don't even get me started on Adele- she's a fantastic artist, but if I ever hear "Rolling in the Deep" again I will have a mental breakdown. Bonus round: What the heck does Fun mean when they say "My seat's been taken by some sunglasses, talkin' bout a scar" in "We Are Young"? You see what I mean people? I've heard these songs so many times I'm starting to analyze individual lyrics. Meanwhile, beads of sweat are forming all over my body, a visible vain appears in my forehead, and my eyes widen as I am reduced to a state of primal fury after being antagonized by the same songs all day. It will only take me hearing "Girl, look at that body" for the beast within to break free and turn my office into a pile of shredded office furniture.

Sometimes, my coworkers allow me to change the radio station. "Fine" I think, "Anything is better than this drivel". Springfield doesn't have the best variety of radio stations, so I decide on one of the two classic rock stations in town. It's the case of out of the frying pan into fire- I am treated to AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long", Led Zeppelin's "Rock and Roll" and Billy Idol's "Rebel Yell", and again, these are played on constant cycles throughout the day. I want to drive over to the radio station, launch my car through the wall in an over the top fashion and fly out of my vehicle, shouting "YOU HAVE 40 YEARS OF EXCELLENT MUSIC TO CHOOSE FROM! WHY DO YOU KEEP PLAYING THE SAME TEN SONGS?" I then want to wrench the DJ's out of their chairs and play David Bowie's "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders from Mars" in its entirety, some lesser known Queen Hits, or other songs from Pink Floyd instead of "Comfortably Numb", "Wish You Were Here" and "Another Brick in the Wall". Don't get me wrong people, these are wonderful songs, but familiarity breeds contempt, and that contempt has been born, gone through puberty and is now an adult. An adult that I hate.

If you can believe it, sometimes I switch to country radio, as my coworkers tend to like it. I dislike country music, but most of the country music stations in Springfield are locally owned and operated, and thus don't play the same songs over and over. It's also fun to hear the local element- there are reports on the price of cattle, advertisements for feed auctions, and farmers discussing drought conditions. I can respect this.

This brings me to my next point. As some of you may know, most of the radio stations in this country are operated by an evil corporation called Clear Channel. In the late 90's, Clear Channel came to power because Bill Clinton signed an act deregulating the airwaves from corporate takeovers.The result was that big business won and ate everything. Clear Channel's approach to radio is to do market research to find the most popular songs possible in every genre of radio station, and keep pumping in these songs incessantly. Most live DJs have been eliminated as they are deemed to expensive, and much of the playlist you hear is the result of a computer picking tracks based on algorithms of what's popular. The result is that radio stations all across the country are indistinguishable from one another, and many of the independently run radio stations have been bought out or closed down as they cannot compete. The few independent radio stations that are left use the same format as Clear Channel as this is what hooks listeners.

People today also listen to the radio differently than they did years ago. Most people just listen to the radio in the car. Radio stations know this, so they repeat songs so often because they have found that most people want to hear songs they know when they turn on their car radio as they drive over to pick up some diapers for their whining child.

Also, radio today is not targeted at people in my demographic anymore. I am a male in between the ages of 18-34, and research has shown that people in this demographic don't listen to the radio. They have found that males tend to be early adopters of technology, and are using things like Spotify, Pandora, Sirius, or plugging their Ipod into their car and listening to their own music. Thus, all of the terrible Matchbox 20 songs, Usher, and Black Eyed Peas tunes play constantly because women like this kind of music, and women are the people that are listening to the radio. NOT ME. So if you're a woman, thank you for bringing this blight upon mankind.

Part of the problem could be me. I am either blessed or cursed with a very good memory, so every lyric of every song I hear is instantly recorded into my brain. The lyrics are then stuck in my head, bouncing around like some sort of tiny demon. At times, I want to re-instate the practice of trepanning, the defunct Middle-Age science of drilling into the brains of mentally ill people. Maybe drilling a hole into my head will allow these abominable sounds to escape. In the best case, the songs will escape my head and I'll never hear them again. In the other best case, I'll die and never have to hear these songs again.

There is one ray of light in this sea of darkness for me: NPR. As soon as my fellow employees leave, I flip the dial over to that station and get to listen to their excellent news stories, interviews with scientists and policy makers, and on Friday nights, I get to discover new, eclectic music. This is how radio should be done, and I am earnestly considering supporting NPR as they provide a service I use regularly. NPR really improves my life- it introduces me to new ideas, and I feel like I learned something, even if I listen to it for five minutes. If you don't listen to NPR, I encourage you to check it out.

Throughout this whole thing, you may be asking, "Why don't you just listen to Pandora at work?". The answer is that my job blocks any online radio players, and there is no sound on our computers, so I am forced to listen to the radio.

Thus ends my rant! Let me know what you think of the current state of radio. I realize my criticisms are nothing new, but I've felt this way for a long time and had to get it out!