Originally posted by mankie:
I've often wondered why should anyone give a rats arse about what a "critic" thinks, wether it be music, book or movie. Isn't it only just a matter of opinion when we get down to "hey lads hey"
I don't care what the critics think, but am using the 'zines to find out about bands I don't know. So that, if there's an album described as indie power pop (or either Cheap Trick or Big Star are listed as influences), I wanna check it out! There are very few people in my circle with vasts knowledge (or even minimal knowledge) of music, especially anything new. So that's what I'm after from the magazines (I find I have a bit of ADD reading whole articles on the internet -- I print 'em then never read 'em).
It can become a glorious game of "follow the reference" to find more and more bands you dig.
And, just throwing this out there, I watch 120 Minutes on MTV2 (tape it so I can fast forward through the crap). It's now called "Subterranean," but I found Soundtrack of our Lives, Hot Hot Heat, Arlo, Ok Go, etc. by watching that show. A lot of the bands that open at 9:30 have videos show up just before or after their show....
