COLDPLAY VS. BLACK EYED PEAS
This week's big music question will be: who will get worse reviews? Coldplay's X and Y or Black Eyed Peas' Monkey Business?
Credit the NY Times with offering Round 1, with Jon Pareles crapping all over Coldplay while today, Kalefa Sanneh mashes the Black Eyed Peas. And Neil Drumming deserves credit as the first major critic to take a swing at Monkey Business.
It's tempting to say that critics hate both these artists because they sell well and while there are many examples of where criticism and populism are estranged, in this case, the main offense is that both groups lack offense. People find them incredibly boring, not to mention intellectually insipid, though Coldplay gets extra special points for also being maudlin. Some highlights:
Pareles on Coldplay, whom he calls "the most insufferable band of the decade":
- "...the tunes straddle the break between his radiant tenor voice and his falsetto. As he hops between them - in what may be Coldplay's most annoying tic - he makes a sound somewhere between a yodel and a hiccup. And the lyrics can make me wish I didn't understand English."
"In its early days, Coldplay could easily be summed up as Radiohead minus Radiohead's beat, dissonance or arty subterfuge."
"...from the beginning, Coldplay has verged on self-parody. When he moans his verses, Mr. Martin can sound so sorry for himself that there's hardly room to sympathize for him, and when he's not mixing metaphors, he fearlessly slings clichés."
- "I've come around to viewing the Black Eyed Peas' worldwide success as a comfort — rather than a sign of the apocalypse."
"...the Black Eyed Peas on their fourth album, Monkey Business, once again declare no, no, no — rap need not be threatening. In fact, edge has nothing on familiarity."
...when MCs will.i.am, apl de ap, and Taboo get topical, the result is laughable pseudo-profundity."
- "Perhaps it was inevitable that a group like this would eventually emerge, peddling an energetic but inoffensive variant of hip-hop. But did we have any way of knowing that the results would be so unpleasant?"
[Note: doesn't "energetic but inoffensive" hip-hop go all the way back to the old school? Did I miss
"These folks can make even a race riot sound dull."
"Their verses are often hobbled by rigid metrical schemes and overeager enunciation, which means the lyrics lack the one thing they need most: someplace to hide."
"Fergie also co-stars in the track most likely to live in infamy: it's called "My Humps," and it requires her to declare, "You love my lady lumps." Uh-oh. Sounds like someone may have just earned herself a singularly unpleasant new nickname."
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