The Pelican’s Perch

Airborne Toxic Event - Another Pitchfork Bashing

Posted by Kevin
September 18, 2008

Ah, I love it. I got a simple, unassuming email today with the header, “An Open Letter to Pitchfork from Airborne Toxic Event”. I smiled immediately knowing exactly what the email would contain; another ridiculously harsch review and a very well thought out, subtlely sarcastic response back from the band. SOUND Team went the more direct route, filming themselves burning a doll with their bands name on it and stabbing it with pitchforks. Now that’s literal, but Airborne took the much more tasteful, effective route and I love it.

I personally could care less about Pitchfork anymore. I stop by once every few months to click on the myspace links at the end of reviews while never reading the review itself, because honestly, I find bands they rate 7.0-8.5 my favorite ones. Sure, they’re pretentious, stuck up, indie snobs that are everything that is bad about the indie music culture, but you check in one every few months and that’s hundreds of new bands to listen to, whether or not Pitchfork liked them. I stopped getting all worked up about Pitchfork a while ago, as most of their reviews in the 9.0 and above range, and oppositely in the super low score range, are usually laughable, but great reads for obvious reasons. So, when I see a story like this, I simply smile and say, “I know, I know. What can ya do?” Of course, it’d probably be a completely different story if it were my music they were talking about. But then again, I’ve got you guys and all kinds of people telling me they love it, so a Pitchfork writer bashing the heck out of it would probably make me happy because that means I’ve gotten big enough for Pitchfork to take note. Even better, I hope Marc Hogan reviews it. I can see the quotes now. “Singing of long lost moments under Apple Trees, searching for love and finding it or losing it in nearly every song, and lyrics that border on infintile, the music of Honest Artist is pretty to say the least. With piano, strings, and multiple singers. But can I be honest for a second here? The 3rd grade called. They want their songs back. -Marc Hogan” Yeah, that would be awesome. I think I’m going to write the first bad review for my own album once I get it done and released. Why not beat everyone to the punch? Plus, if I can pull out more of what I just wrote, it’ll probably be hilarious.

Anyway, the kids in Airborne Toxic Event wrote their open letter to Ian and the Pitchfork gang, responding to their hilariously harsch, just because they can, review, and as you can tell, I’m all about this kind of controversy. I commend the band and their stellar letter writer for such a good response, and I encourage all of you to head over to the following links to read the letter, the review that spawned it, and the various blog reactions to this whole situation. I can guarantee their responses won’t be nearly as all over the place and “what is he even talking about right now” as mine was. But at least you got a few smiles from my Pitchfork bashing right. Let do some more shall we? Hogan’s response to this post:

“The Pelican’s Perch, yet another so-called music blog that’s really just more pointless stream-of-consciousness go nowhere music dribble in the already over-saturated terrible music blog landscape, has responded to our colleague Ian’s review of Airborne Toxic Event, a review I personally gave a 9.4 (does a review get any better than that, near perfection), and I must say, did this blogger even graduate from elementary school. Such a shame for such a big tube on the internet to be occupied by such lack of talent. Hey Kevin, the 3rd grade called. They want their blog back.”

Ha. I need to start a satire blog. I think I’d be pretty good at it. Anyone want to write one with me? Here’s a few mp3’s from Airborne Toxic Event which I find to be quite good. Early score from yours truly based solely on these two songs, 7.23/10