THE L MAGAZINE PROVES THEMSELVES TO BE WRITTEN EXCLUSIVELY BY A BUNCH OF SOFTIE INDIE ROCK KIDS…AGAIN
Friday, December 5th, 2008 at 1:40pm by Kip WingerschmidtFrom the event listings in this week’s issue of The L Magazine:
| 6pm In Flames, All That Remains, Gojira, 36 Crazyfists |
| No matter how bad a day you’re having, it can’t be worse than the day In Flames devoted themselves to earsplitting death metal, or the day Gojira decided to name themselves Gojira (that’s a STD, right?). Vampire Weekend… come back. |
Now obviously this was written by someone who is anti-metal, or at least extremely un-metal — for those of you not “in the know”, Vampire Weekend is a super-buzzy indie-rock band from NYC that recently blew up (pretty sure one of their tunes is in some boppy commercial or another) — but for realz, it’s like comparing apples n oranges…the fact that a self-respecting journalistic rag could make reference to a metal show but describe under a clearly “indie” lens seems to miss the point of having show listings in the first place.
I am not only offended as a fan of aggressive music (duh), but also as a music lover and show-goer of all different genres. If I were genuinely curious about this show (and rest assured, I already have a ticket, natch), a description such as this wouldn’t help in the least.
Word to the un-wise, L Magazine: Gojira’s new album is among the best of the year, and perhaps you ought to employ a “metal” aficionado that can accurately report on “earsplitting” shows/albums. The truly hep kids know how cool and “cool” metal is, especially in our current musical climate. You also might wanna stop pretending to be anything more than a softie one-dimensional ‘zine.
After the jump, a much more reputable (and diverse) NYC publication’s blurb on the same show…
From The Village Voice:
The can’t-miss band on this hodgepodge metal bill is France’s Gojira, who released one of the year’s best discs in The Way of All Flesh. Its subtle mix of death-metal tradition and music school chops made for one of the best listens since their riff-centric breakthrough release, 2005’s From Mars to Sirius. Headliners In Flames tested their fans this year with the corny cover art on A Sense of Purpose, which is really too bad since the album pushes the oft-imitated melodic death-metal sound they pioneered even more towards euphony. With All That Remains and 36 Crazyfists.
Now that’s a thorough description I can sink my teeth into, informed and informative, whether I agree with it or not.
For shame, L Magazine…for shame.
-KW
And here I though Pitchfork were the indie snobs, To Hell with L.
Gojira Or Nachtmystium show, Decision decisions
Who actually reads that magazine anyway? A free mag that ain’t even worth the paper it’s printed on!
Am I really the only person who loved A Sense of Purporse’s artwork?
Indie kids are boring. They’re so full of themselves and think that knowing the most obscure band names is the key to getting in the pants of some anorexic coke head with a pixie cut. Fuck them. Fuck them in their stupid ears.
Nobody is more opinionated about metal than I am (or at least hated for my opinion) but this makes me sick. I’m not a huge Gojira fan or In Flames for that matter but this article is clearly written by people who have no no understanding of this music. To be honest you don’t have to love metal to write an insightful article about it but you do have to understand it. Sending a bunch of snot nosed hipsters to stand sarcastically in the background, smirk at a genre they don’t understand and then write about it for publication is simply a reflection of bad editing practices.
You don’t have to send a superfan to review a genre of music but you do have to send somebody who gets it and can attack it with a critical eye.
So yeah, not to but in twice in one week, but I think we should point out that a) duh, Gojira is not named after a venerial disease, L Magazine, and b) I have a whole lotta friends who love indie rock, and they think Vampire Weekend is TERRIBLE. Repping indie rock and name checking Vampire Weekend is like “being” metal and name checking Black Tide.
I see this all the time in local reviews. Clearly the reviewer at L Magazine doesn’t know shit about metal or anything about In Flames and Gojira.
However, he ego is too big that he can’t admit that he doesn’t understand the appeal of these bands, so he hides it behind a sarcastic review that tells you nothing, disses the bands, then name drops some douchebag Indie rock band (Vampire Weekend) that is the flavor of the month in some lame attempt to prove his has good taste in music.
LAME!
Indie music is where people who normally listen to pop music turn after their parents convince them that they’re failing school because they’re individuals.
HAHA, well fucking said Dr J. Vampire Weekend is about as lame a band name as My Chemical Romance or As I Lay Dying. “I’ll be a tool and name my band after a William Faulkner novel” thinks the black drenched consumer. It’s trendy, cookie-cutter, flavor of the week bullshit like this that makes me sometimes thank the Buddha that I don’t live in NYC.
So not only do they not know shit about metal, but they also don’t know shit about movies. I guess the cool thing these days is being a bunch of dumbasses who listen to stuff that would make the folks at Muzak seem hardcore.
Gojira is the original Japanese name for Godzilla(in case anyone didn’t know) and if you actually thought it was a venereal disease, I hope you get one.
And DON’T MAKE A FUCKING INDIE SHITROCK FAN REVIEW A FUCKING METAL SHOW!!!
Feed the scenesters to the lions. Come back as the sun sets…
L Magazine has always been terrible. Their articles are crap and their reviews boring and uninformed. I recall last year when they scoffed at the name “grindcore” in a blurb about a Pig Destroyer show.
“Pig Destroyer play a style of music called grindcore, whatever that is” and etc. Even on indie rock they fail and are pretty just a useless pile of C-grade snark.
Vampire Weekend is shit.
This “zine”is worth as much as the hipster band.
As for the other one, Gojira does own, and why does everyone hate on A Sense of Purpose?
Oh right, metal kids can’t handle change… lol
Is L magazine a zine for lesbians???
Haha thats what I thought of when I saw L Magazine.
Gojira will make you eat your babies.
I saw this lineup in LA two weeks ago and the bands owned all over the universe.
In Flames is earsplitting death metal? Hmm they really know their stuff. I bet they even have a thumbs-up review of Chinese Democracy on their website.
hipsters are supposed to like gojira lol
Wow, I don’t have a problem with indie rock, but I do have a problem with hipster douchebags who write biased reviews based on what they believe is “uncool”.
Man, that show would have been awesome.
Indie hipsters are some of the most pretentious, annoying people on the planet. Why this ‘L’ magazine (side note: what a stupid fucking name) review even made it onto this website mystifies me. They obviously know nothing about metal except for preconcieved sarcastic opinons. Why even bother going to the show if you know you’re not going to like the music?
@ teaches of peaches: Alex Pardee is one of my favourite artists (except for his art for The Used (LFTL) and Aiden (Conviction)… bad decision…) so no, you’re not alone. It might be a little too colourful (and therefore ‘not metal’) for some people, but that doesn’t make it bad. Same goes with the album: In Flames aren’t the Gothenberg death metal they once were, but that doesn’t make the album terrible.
@ Nixon: I thought Gojira was French for Godzilla? I could be wrong but Japanese people (ironically) don’t have the letter J in their phonetic alphabet. So French kind of makes more sense.
(Anyone who confuses it for gonhorrea – which I assume was the STD they were referring to – is a fucking moron. Enough said.)
@ell
Gojira is the Japanese pronunciation. Godzilla actually came about because of a mix up in the interpretation when the film was dubbed for english.
Just found this. Whale thing kind of fits in with the band’s motif.
Gojira (ゴジラ, Gojira?) is a combination of two Japanese words: gorira (ゴリラ, lit. “gorilla”?) and kujira (鯨 (くじら), lit. “whale”?).
@ lern2swim
Ohh, ok. Obviously I was wrong then. You’re right, the whale does fit.
Not like it really matters anyway, Gojira slay regardless of where their name comes from.