Who and what brought me to the music, 2009

[koganbot]

Over on his own Pazz & Jop ballot, Josh Langhoff recommends that we list the "gatekeepers" who introduced us to our favorite music. Someone named "Chuck Eddy" recurs on his list. In any event, here's my P&J ballot again, this time with the added info of who or what first led me to the music. (I don't think "gatekeeper" is the right term, really.)

Singles 2009

1. Shystie ft. DJ Deekline "New Style" - Kat Stevens on poptimists
2. The Black Eyed Peas "Boom Boom Pow" - Lex Macpherson on his lj
3. Love And Theft "Runaway" - Chuck Eddy on the ilX Rolling Country 2009 thread
4. MC Lars ft. Brett Anderson & Gabe Saporta "Hey There Ophelia" - Moggy on her lj
5. Timberlee ft. Tosh "Heels" - Lex on his lj
6. The Lonely Island "I'm On A Boat" - Dave Moore, either on his Cure For Bedbugs blog or his Tumblr or his lj or by email
7. Das Racist "Combination Pizza Hut And Taco Bell (Wallpaper Remix)" - Kat Stevens, either on her lj or on poptimists
8. Rich Boy "Drop" - MySpace music front page (and my previous fandom of artist, whom I'd first heard back in '05 on Denver's reggaeton station when it was playing the shit out of the remix of "Get To Poppin'" featuring Pitbull)
9. Girls Aloud "Untouchable" - ?? I think it was through the Singles Jukebox
10. Röyksopp ft. Robyn "The Girl And The Robot" - Dave Moore by email, but I didn't start liking the song until it came up for review on the Jukebox and I revisited it

Albums 2009

1. Taylor Swift Fearless - My own vast insane fandom brought me to this one, with the help of Big Machine Records and various radio stations and other outlets (first heard Taylor on the radio in summer '06 but it was Jimmy Draper who insisted later in the year that I listen to her first album)
2. The-Dream Love Vs. Money - I think it was Lex who was talking this up first, but it might have been Dave. My interest already existed because of "Ditch That" (recommended by Luc Sante) and "Umbrella"
3. Ashley Monroe Satisfied - A Columbia publicist sent me the promo back in early 2006, probably at the instigation of Chuck Eddy, who was still music editor at the Voice (alb was shelved, finally released on iTunes this year)
4. Rihanna Rated R - The world at large
5. Scooter Under the Radar Over the Top (The Dark Side Edition) - Chuck Eddy, on my own lj (but I'd gotten him interested in Scooter in the first place, and I think it was Jeff Worrell who'd gotten me interested in Scooter)
6. Lily Allen It's Not Me, It's You - The world, again, with special input from Erika Villani; but it was Mitya who first talked up Lily to me in March '06 on Rolling Teenpop, with enthusiastic support from David Orton and William Bloody Swygart; Mitya'd heard about her from Popjustice
7. Martina McBride Shine - The Ross-Broadway branch of the Denver Public Library (but it was Chuck Eddy who got me interested in McBride back in '99 or so)
8. Electrik Red How To Be A Lady: Volume 1 - This must have been Lex, again, on lj, with Dave right on his heels
9. K'naan Troubadour - Heard "ABC's" by accident when the record company was promoting it as its single of the week on its YouTube site which I was visiting for some other artist's track; finally got back to the album because Chuck and Xgau had praised it
10. Brad Paisley American Saturday Night - Chuck Eddy on ilX's Rolling Country 2009 thread

Comments

[koganbot]

Is interesting what a small window I seem to be looking through, and how reliant I am on the Internet. If you go farther down my extended lists, the Singles Jukebox probably looms larger. As for people I see face to face, the ones my age aren't interested in contemporary music, while the ones younger are, but music's not what we've tended to talk about. They lean towards country or towards hip-hop/r&b.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I am not sure I want to take responsibility for "Boom Boom Pow" :/

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Anyway, my own (not ballot, final list as per Tumblr) -

1. ELECTRIK RED - How To Be A Lady: Volume 1 [ILX R&B thread]
2. TAYLOR SWIFT - Fearless [Frank Kogan]
3. THE-DREAM - Love vs. Money [Already anticipated based on Love/Hate]
4. DJ QUIK & KURUPT [ILX thread on "Hey Playa!" started by RTC]
5. RIHANNA - Rated R [Already anticipated based on entire career to date]
6. FEVER RAY - Fever Ray [Already anticipated based on The Knife - weirdly the first I realised she had a solo project was when I was browsing 7digital in Dec 08 and saw that the "If I Had A Heart" single had been quietly released, and wondered why I hadn't seen it mentioned anywhere - I bought on sight obv]
7. MARIAH CAREY - Memoirs Of An Imperfect Angel [Already anticipated]
8. GUCCI MANE - The Movie 3-D: The Burrprint/The Writing’s On The Wall [Already anticipated based on Back To Da Trap House, obv the combined sterling efforts of Jordan Sargent and David Drake made me pay a lot more attention to him]
9. THE XX - xx [Sophie Heawood, who I saw going on about them before anyone else]
10. MEANDERTHALS - Desire Lines [an actual promo CD sent to me by an actual PR! archived emails reveal this to be Jim @ Ampersand PR]

1. THE-DREAM - Fancy [already anticipated blah blah]
2. VISTOSO BOSSES - Delirious [Maura on Idolator]
3. KINGDOM ft. SHYVONNE - Mind Reader [Alex Bok Bok and Sara Manara - the Kingdom mix on their Lower End Spasm site and the countless times they played it at Night Slugs this year]
4. SADE - Soldier Of Love [whoever started the ILX thread alerting us to new material]
5. STUSH - We Nuh Run [Alex Bok Bok tweeting excitedly about this]
6. ELECTRIK RED - Drink In My Cup [ILX R&B thread]
7. SHYSTIE - Pull It (Ill Blu Funky Mix) [Tim Finney]
8. RICHGIRL - He Ain’t Wit Me Now (Tho) [RTC on the ILX R&B thread]
9. CRAZY COUSINZ - Inflation [first heard during a Crazy Cousinz set at FWD]
10. GUIDO - Orchestral Lab/Way U Make Me Feel [uh not a clue, actually! last.fm tells me I first played them on 27 March, lj tells me I'd only just joined Twitter at the time so probably not that, no emails about Guido from then...would guess that Dan Hancox mentioned him to me in person]
11. ALICIA KEYS - Try Sleeping With A Broken Heart [Maura on Idolator]
12. ROYAL P - Between Us [Tim Finney]
13. JEREMIH - Birthday Sex [ILX R&B thread]
14. MS DYNAMITE - Bad Gyal [Gabriel on The Heatwave]
15. STICKY ft. LADY CHANN - Your Eye Too Fast [Gabriel on The Heatwave]
16. NICKI MINAJ - Beam Me Up Scotty [heh I think I discovered this one ON MY OWN - probably after someone posted a youtube with a Minaj verse on the ILX autogoon thread and I went a-youtubing]
17. THE BANGZ ft. PINK DOLLAZ - Get It Girl [Alex Ostroff on Twitter]
18. TEEDRA MOSES - Put It In The Wind [on her Lionhearted mixtape, which I ordered off her myspace to ~support real talent~]
19. SUBEENA - Boksd [Melissa Bradshaw had been talking about Subeena for a while, one day I realised I hadn't actually heard any of her stuff and acquired this from the internet]
20. NINA SKY - On Some Bullshit [hmm I think this might have been the Jukebox, actually!]

[koganbot]

Dear Alex Macpherson,

We'd like to thank you for supporting "Boom Boom Pow." Without you, we'd not have reached number one.

Sincerely,

will.i.am, Fergie, Taboo and apl.de.ap

Scooter?

[jeff-worrell.livejournal.com]

In the words of Shaggy, "It wasn't me" - unless you automatically go and check out things I say online are rubbish >:-(

More likely it was the Scooter posse on FT who piqued your interest, however: Kat or Tom or Carsmile.

Re: Scooter?

[koganbot]

Must've been Kat then.

[theastronomymod.livejournal.com]

I like this meme, so I've nicked it.

And it's come to my attention that I kind of use ILX like most people use hypem - as an aggregator of the blogosphere's taste. But it made me realise I've started to recognise the names of people on ILX whose opinions I should listen to.

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

more accurate maybe than the term "gatekeepers" is the phrase "gateways and their keepers": except it's long and clumsy


gatekeepers is about keeping stuff out and people away from stuff: but these acknowledgments are about people who have coaxed you through and in among stuff

i use -- and seem via s.reynolds to have made semi-popular -- the word "portals", but i woould use this not of people so much as things people write or say or sing... which makes them portal-operators

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

Ha ha, I love this thread!

Anyway, here is my (incorrectly named) gatekeeper list for this year:

Benny – Amigo Charly Brown: Die Hits Von Gestern Und Auch Heut (Found out about Benny on a bunch of used German K-Tel-style '70s and '80s compilations that Metal Mike Saunders mailed me about a year ago. Once I noticed I loved all the songs by him on those, I googled him, and found out this album was on Rhapsody.)
Scooter – Under The Radar Over The Top – The Dark Side Edition (Right, Frank got me interested in them last year -- I edited a piece at the Voice several years ago where Barry Walters had talked about them, but for some reason that didn't spur my interest; maybe the time wasn't right. Anyway, toward the end of 2009 I somehow wound up on their Rhapsody page, noticed they had a new album - in two different versions - and listened to it.)
Collin Raye – Never Going Back (Time Life) (Got this in the mail as a promo, and it pretty much blew me away on the spot; had never given him any thought before.)
Uz Jsme Doma – Cod-Liver Oil (I have a few of their early CDs -- Don Allred had written about them in the Voice in the early '00s, I think, so either I found out about them through him or I alreay knew about them from promos, I'm not sure which. This year, Spin asked for some pitches for their 100 Best Bands Of The Past 30 Years You Never Heard Of Issue, and I pitched Uz Jsme Doma among many other bands, and they went for it. In researching my blurb for the issue, I'd noticed they'd put out a new album in the past couple years, which I also noticed was selling for cheap on Amazon, so I ordered a copy.)
Jono El Grande – Neo Dada (Got an email from Forced Exposure which listed this CD, and it sounded interesting, so I asked for one.)
Lady GaGa – The Fame Monster (Deluxe Edition)(First heard her while doing a column on new Billboard chart entries called "Next Little Things" for Idolator in 2008; didn't like what I heard at the time. But the car radio, assisted by several emails from Metal Mike Saunders, convinced me I'd been missing something, which I had.)
K’Naan – Troubador (Had received, and kind of liked, a promo CD of his previous album a year or two back, so I was ready for this one when it came in the mail.)
Death – …For The Whole World To See (Read about them on an ILM reissue thread -- Andy Beta, I think, had suggested I'd like them. Asked Drag City for a copy of the CD, which they sent me.)
Kid Sister – Ultraviolet (Read about her "Pro Nails" single somewhere back in mid '08 I guess, probably in an article about jerking music or Chicago hipster rap; checked it out on youtube; got an earlier version of this album in the mail later that year; got this one this year.)
Brad Paisley – American Saturday Night (A couple people -- Anthony Easton was one -- had asked me what I thought of this album, on the Singles Jukebox and ILM Rolling Country, before I heard it. Was kind of meh about the prospect, since I've never been a particularly huge fan of the guy. Eventually asked the label for a copy, but I'm not sure what the final catalyst was.)

[chuckeddy.livejournal.com]

Singles
Jamey Johnson – “High Cost Of Living” (Heard the song on his album when it was sent to me in '08.)
Love and Theft – “Runaway” (Saw this listed on Billboard's country chart; checked it out on youtube.)
Das Racist – “Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell (Wallpaper Remix)” (Frank Kogan put this on one of his mix CDs he sent me.)
Larry Shannon Hargrove – “I Need A Bailout” (Heard this on Austin radio station KAZI's Southern soul show.)
Nicki Minaj – “Beam Me Up Scotty” (Another song I first heard on a Frank Kogan mix CD.)
White Wizzard – “High Speed GTO” (Was included on a metal compilation from Earache Records called Heavy Metal Killers, which I'd read about on ILM Rolling Metal then requested from the label; liked it, but it actually wasn't my favorite track at first. Eventually Earache sent me the band's EP, which led with the song, hence highlighting it more for me. Jen Guyre from Rhapsody emailed me a link to their video, which was hilarious.)
John Rich – “Shuttin’ Detroit Down” (Noticed the title on Billboard's country chart, and was naturally intrigued.)
Sarah Buxton – “Space” (Again, heard about this on Billboard's country chart, then checked it out on youtube.)
Busy Signal – “Da Style Deh” (Appeared on a Greensleeves compilation CD I was sent, The Biggest Ragga Dancehall Anthems 2009.)
Charlie Wilson – “There Goes My Baby” (My wife Lalena had heard this on Austin's aforementioned KAZI -- one of the station's r&b shows for grown folks -- and asked me if I knew who did it; I heard it several more times on the same station as the year went on. Fwiw, I also inititally heard Robin Thicke's "Sidestep," which made Josh Langhoff's P&J list after he'd heard about it from me he says, on that same station.)

In Praise of "Gatekeeper"

[joshlanghoff.livejournal.com]

I'm gonna make a defense for "gatekeeper," which I think I swiped from Christgau's introduction to the Best American Music Writing book that he edited. He was talking about writing, not music. (So he gatekept that word for me? Maybe I could go either way.)

"Gatekeeper" DOES have negative implications, but for me that's sort of how music works--I want to hear EVERYTHING, and since that's not feasible, I rely on people who have already heard more, or other, stuff. In my fantasy of how, say, Christgau or Jody Rosen works, they get a bunch of CDs in the mail from label PR departments, hear stuff through various media outlets, and write reviews. (We probably wouldn't dispute that record labels and radio stations are gatekeepers.) Critics who don't work for big print media outlets are a little bit further down the chain, so they have to depend on a series of gatekeepers--Columbia sent this to Rosen, who wrote about it for Slate, which was read by somebody on ILX, who bought it and talked it up, so I checked it out from the library, where the buyer had heard about it through a different source, etc etc.

If all our gatekeepers disappeared, it's not like their recommendations wouldn't exist; we'd just hear different music. We'd trawl through myspace or spend way too much money at stores or go through every CD at the library (which I am SO going to do this year). And while unlikely, it's possible we'd stumble across the same stuff. So while there's a positive sense to what the people on our lists are doing--guiding us toward this music that we love--that music would always be there anyway, as part of the overwhelming crowd with pitchforks bursting to get inside the gate of our ears. If that makes sense.

(Hi Chuck! Thanx!)

Here's mine

[(Anonymous)]

http://m-matos.blogspot.com/2010/01/stealing-from-frank-kogans-livejournal.html -- thanks, M