New eds, say voice music section "too academic"?

This is important and might be the one of the biggest stories of 2006 but only about two Obner types will really care. It’s about the changes at the Village Voice from ownership from Phoenix (and you laugh at ILM, whatever).

Here is a quote "Here's the first paragraph of an email Chuck just sent to the Voice music writers:

As many of you have probably heard through the grapevine, I am leaving the Village Voice tomorrow, after seven often wonderful years here as the music editor. To make it brief, I have been "terminated for reasons of taste"; if you're wondering what that cryptic phrase means, my advice would be to look at just about any random music section in one of the many other New Times alternative weekly papers around the country, compare it to any random music section I've put together here at the Voice, subtract the difference, and draw your own conclusions. To also be brief, I need a new job now, so if you have any leads, don't hesitate to say so."

-- Frank Kogan April 20th, 2006 8:47 AM.





edit to add the rest as it was posted on... :

My replacement, who begins Monday, is Rob Harvilla, formerly at the East Bay Express. (His email now is ‘xxxx@eastbayexpress.com’; I assume that, starting next week, he’ll be reachable at xxxx@villagevoice.com.)

As for me, I definitely plan to keep writing about music in some capacity or other — especially now that I’ll finally have time to actually write. So it would of course be great to keep getting unfathomable piles of promo CDs to listen to every day. Problem is, I can’t tell you yet where to send them; in my neighborhood in Queens, turns out there’s a 10-day waiting list for PO Boxes. As soon as I have one, I’ll be sending you another email, letting you know where to send the music you want me to hear. Meanwhile, if you have ideas about where I should go from here, or if you just want to drop me a note, I’ll be reachable at xxxx@yahoo.com, an account I just set up two days ago.

Whatever I do, it’s hard to imagine I’ll ever find another job half as fun and rewarding as this one was. I hope I did the job justice. Talk to you soon, good luck, and be good. — Chuck Eddy

I love Dylan (will only post one more replay, since this is Obner) :

Matters of taste. The person who thinks that Rob Harvilla is more qualified to be music editor of the Village Voice than Chuck Eddy is a person with no taste. The decision of course is not just aesthetic, it's political. I apologize for the preaching that will follow. From what I gather, and I admit that my research is less than thorough, the pre-Voice papers range ideologically from more or less conservative or libertarian to somewhat liberal, with NT management apparently being more tolerant of liberalism in dominantly conservative markets. Their favored image is of the lonesome cowboy or smirking pariah, though prankish fraternity brother seems to be closer to the truth. As they constantly remind interviewers, they have broken some major stories involving corruption and wrongdoing, but they are by no means anti-establishment, a quality which of course many of see as essential to the alt-weekly aesthetic, and which was generally able to survive in perhaps diluted form even after the major alt-weeklies became corporate. The idea that hard reporting and commentary can't coexist is of course silly. As a reader, I want analysis woven in with reporting--that's precisely what you don't often get from the dailies, especially in smaller markets, and alt weeklies should offer something different than the dailies.
With respect to arts coverage, I agree that alt weeklies sometimes indulge in gratuitous conservative bashing and sanctimonious p.c. stuff, but they've also been the ones to offer a feminist critique of an album or art opening, or point out the racism or homophobia in a movie that other reviewers are praising to the hilt, or point out, maybe indirectly, the classism and elitism that infects so much pop criticism at the expense of metal and country and R&B and crunk, which is one of the things Chuck has done as a writer and editor. Good alt-weekly writers that sort of good-lefty stuff while celebrating other aspects of the art and throwing in some good jokes, because, you know, interesting art like every interesting thing is complex and not easily reduced to thumbs up, thumbs down. You don't find that type of criticism in daily newspapers or mainstream magazines, and I haven't seen it in New Times papers, either. In New Times reviews, I've seen frat-boy-style gay jokes and sexist jokes, designed of course to offend allegedly humorless leftists such as I, and I'm sure the writer didn't "mean it." Well, it functions the same as sincere bigotry. So for me it's not just a matter of whether some New Times writers are competent (big deal, so are lots of daily critics and the Blender blurbists)--it's political. This stuff comes into play with respect to what art gets covered, too--not just that obscure, non-commercial art is typically overlooked, but in the way that mass culture is analyzed (or not analyzed)--lots of snark, very little cultural critique (since that's just pointy-headed bullshit), lots of "button pushing," nothing meaningful rebellious. And yeah, "high" art is fucked--New Times doesn't do book reviews, for instance, and who knows how long they'll last in the Voice.
The ideological sense I get from New Times, and I'm talking about their management and some of their writers and not trying to generalize about their obviously diverse staff, is not so much of conservatism but of nihilism--nothing matters, expect maybe success; music and movies are merely entertainment and thus inherently trivial; fuck you and your family.

-- Dylan Hicks April 20th, 2006 9:13 AM.

wut

Like I said this isn't for but about two people on Obner, and wonder if they are even around these days. This is devastating news for people who follow this kind of thing...

BTW, Chris Ott being beat up for posting about Pitchfork is pure gold, no wonder he left that board because they can stand up to his bullshit unlike that other board.

now you've piqued my interest. link?

Chuck Eddy wrote little pieces on both of the bands on my label...Blew me away....Considering they were my first two, and how small we were, and how much music must cross his path. I owe him a thanks!

First line in this post is the link. (warning: very, very long)

I thought you meant literally beaten up