Oh i don't loathe Ben Watson - he's very entertaining, and obviously incredibly smart and knows a lot of stuff that is brought to bear in provocative ways. but yes the deploying of the Frankfurt School and early Soviet formalist criticism to justify Frank fucking Zappa - and not even the Sixties stuff which is sort of at least historically interesting / peculiar - but things like "Dinah Moe Hum" and Joe's Garage etc... i can't take it seriously.
it's a taste thing. the taste lapse is unarguable, or rather, no arguments however clever or backed-up with authorities could dissuade you out of your somatic revulsion for the music.
it's a reverse syndrome of how it's supposed to work, in a way - it should be that the authority of the thinkers invoked validates the music, but in fact the shitness of the music makes you start to doubt the theorists.
of course all the above is the kettle calling the pot black to the power of 1000
yeah Ben - even though he's been rude about me in print - I appreciate the conviction and rigor - the bristly, prickly tone, the caustic sweeping dismissals. i'm not sure i'd actively seek it out though outside the printed page!
I don't actually dislike David Keenan either, have enjoyed his writing and he's come up with some really interesting ideas. i just don't go along with the whole beat-outsider more-underground-the-better obscurist mindset.
But anyone who can be bothered to work up sort of consistent aesthetic viewpoint or set of values, an idea of history and what the righteous music is - that's going to be valuable on some level.
i don't read things in order to agree with them. it's good to be tested, provoked.
and as regards the old music press, and the golden age of the Wire, there's definitely something to be said for that kind of rivalrous, staking out ideas-territory as a milieu - willy-waving for sure, territorial pissing - but it's not only that. as a byproduct, you get interesting, starkly defined sets of ideas - and energised prose.