DIY or die
The price of writing about music is plunging. Supply is skyrocketing. Anyone with Internet can start a blog. This by itself is not a bad thing. Professional critics are often blowhards. Laymen’s blogs can be appealingly accessible. But language has become cheap. Standards have disappeared. People still pay for photographers and graphic designers, but often...
Obituary - Darkest Day
Obituary has a shirt that says, “20 years of Florida death metal.” Perhaps it should read, “15 years of boring riffs.” The band’s last great record was arguably 1994’s World Demise. (Some would cite 1992’s The End Complete, or even 1990’s Cause of Death.) Obituary since then has tread water. Faceless riffs, flat songs, and...