Here's my essay for this year's Pazz and Jop

And here's a sentence that got removed (apparently Pazz commentators aren't allowed to contradict each other)

"... It gets boring, doesn’t it, acclaiming Timbaland’s genius for the tenth year in a row."

And here's the original Phil Freeman screed--received first as an irate email, then published on his blog

I love this bit where he parodies the supposed attitude of me and my friend:

'Folks gotta stop expecting US and UK mainstream pop to give them everything they need…. "This pablum you're spoon-feeding me sucks! I demand you spoon-feed me a higher grade of pablum!"...'

Yeah right that's me, sucking languidly on the teat of the Kapitalist Pop Industry! Whereas my diet this decade has mostly been either ruffage like grime or the audio-gourmet equivalent of artisanal cheeses (Ghost Box, Mordant, Ariel P, et al)....

(Freeman, incidentally, doesn't actually like the hipster-approved metal at all, as you can tell by his list, he likes the real-deal proggoid-stuff. That Xasthur record--"pretty much metal's own Burial"--sounds kinda alluring, doesn't it? Talking of hauntological metal, in my trawl through the netherworlds I came across a group who did an album called the Music of Eric Zann--back in 1988!)

This latest efflorescence of hipster respect and ardour for metal is intriguing because--having been around the block a few times--I can remember at least two earlier distinct phases when hipsters woke up and started concertedly paying attention to the genre. Indeed the first one, me and MMine participated in the rehabilitation. I'm curious why it doesn't stick (well, evidently for a few people it does stick, they carry on checking for metal, but most don't) and also wonder if this latest adoption of metal (or a certain strand of it) will stick this time or if the hipsters will soon drift off to something else, the flighty faddists that they are. More on this later...