WOEBOT

"... but I'd warn readers that what I'm up to is imparting my enthusiasm. "

Yes, and THAT'S what it's all about, isn't it Matt? You know all those great chats down the pub, where you're half-cut and telling anyone who'll listen about this fucking great record you've just found, or banging on about some brilliant theory you've come up with? Well that's what music blogging should be all about: a giant virtual boozer where we can all shout our mouths off- regardless of whether or not we know what we're talking about.
I bought John Foxx's 'Metamatic' LP after being told about it by a mate in the pub, all those years ago - and when Tufluv gets me all excited about the new Hell album now, it's exactly the same thing.
United we stand etc

Virtual boozers are fine by me.

I think you underestimate how casually authoritative you can sound Matt, especially with the backup of all those gorgeous sleeves. Speaking as someone who usually knows less than you I like your big long posts a lot because you're so good at communicating the stuff you *do* know. It never comes across as nonsense and maybe that's why people who do feel more expert get the wind up them.

i've never been rude to you though matt, and i USUALLY am nice enough to correct you via email, not publicly.

i reccomend leaving no space for comments and never leaving your email address. thats the way i do it and as a result i've never had any hate mail.
its true about those 'urban' mags too, the writing is shite, no thought involved, just blather. not even good for knowing whats new out cos you hear it all on radio long before they'd get in magazines.
don't worry yourself sunshine, if you like it you like it and there's no one that can make you apologise for it.

Less usefull than Reynolds? Maybe, but a damn sight more readable.

i liked the fact you hadnt bothered even giving the time of day to the empty criticism coming your way though!

there will always be critics...do not dignify them with anything less than silence...

Fuck the haters Matt.

Dem jus jealous of ya.

"Not authoritative enough?" Do these people READ your blog? Shit, this makes me angry -- not any individual, just at the lazy slag offs that get dished out.

No-one has to get it right 100% of the time, not in a book, not in a blog, and let's face it with your blog you get (at least) what you pay for ;-). But even so, your blog is way more accurate than most journalism and books, certainly in terms of "here's what it looked like to ME, NOW".

As I always say -- approximately evey three months at the current run-rate -- I know about a quarter of what Eden@Uncarved knows, he knows about a quarter of what you know, and you know about a quarter of what Reynolds knows -- and HE knows about a tenth of what there is, or was, to know. Meaning that -- as anyone who surfs the Blood&Fire boards for five minutes will discover -- NOBODY knows it all, there's always a bigger expert round the corner. That's the nature of street knowledge. I can't really believe people are making a fuss about you being authoritative or getting it wrong for any reason other than jealousy.

I mean, look - the older I get the more I realise I know next to nothing about the music I love. Let alone the music and culture I like. You get more and more aware of your own ignorance. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to shut up about any of this stuff -- quite the contrary. A misinformed -- if not completely factually incorrect! -- rant is worth ten times a factually correct whimper. In fact I'd go so far as to say that off-the-wall, I-made-it-all-up mythologysing is an essential component of the creative process of culture. It worked for Leary and it worked for Peryy, so it's fair game for the rest of us, that's what I say.

So let's have LESS carefully researched factual accuracy and MORE drunken shooting from the hip, Matt!

Big up Phil Wilkins, BTW, he's a good guy.

good one memeos! i like that.

Yeah. There's one real question posed by dance music: "CAN YOU FEEEEEEEL IIIIIIIITTTTT?"

matt hasnt got any haters! unless you are counting arthur lowe over there on ilx

alright matt? you can stop feeling persecuted now you big nancyboy!! we all love you.
when you coming out for a drink with all your fans?

I often think the same myself - why bother spending time and effort on proper research and listening to construct an informative and incontestably personal weblog when I could just throw together a lot of digital photos of record sleeves and write a lot of thrown-together, ill-informed rubbish underneath them, peppered with the usual patronising racism of 35-year-old middle-class writers trying to talk like black teenagers (and let's throw in some Richard Littlejohn-ish "all these black people are nutters, you wouldn't want to live next door to them" pseudo-bile while we're at it)? Or indeed writing lies about his supposed "mates" (the inaccuracy of Ingram's previous comments about me may lead more discerning readers to determine how much "reality" there is in anything else he writes)? "Casually authoritative" sums it up - from a distance it looks impressive but when subjected to close analysis it is more full of holes than Camden High Street. Although the comments of his yes-men as listed above iObviously it's better to be stupid if one is "passionate" about one's stupidity. So the passionate Osama bin Laden has it over the considered and temperate Nelson Mandela, and we have the predictable spectre of Ingram's lickarses telling us how proud they are to be stupid.

But then doing my sort of writing involves things like hard work and effort, and also necessitates having to listen to the records inside those sleeves, which I understand is probably difficult when the records are drowned out by the sound of Ingram's own self-satisfied voice - no change in Ingramland then.

It's a pity because I did like Twanboc when it started, but unfortunately the ego took over after a while and has not yet abated.

Jealously? No, just disappointment that this sort of mediocre writing is hyped up as some kind of way forward. What have I got to be jealous about? I'm the one who's having a book published, I'm the one who gets paid to do what Ingram does for free, I'm the one who's made a career out of it...but I'm not going to continue with this; as Luka said about me, Ingram and I live in different worlds, and so obviously do our separate groups of readers, it's like that and that's the way it is

(and let's underline that shall we - "Naked Maja" is not one of Ingram's "blogz" and never will be. It's mine. I decide whether or not anyone else takes it under their wing, no one else)

Maaaaaaaan, let's face it:
There is NO "reality" in music writing

Hard work and effort ? We don't need it, so
you might want to wash the dishes harder instead.
Plus this is only blogging, you know. It's naturally worthless and disposable
it's the sui generis of blogs. throwaway

I want passionate sharp writing, not
research.

Votre,
Guy.

What Carlin does is good. I for one am glad he's doing it, it's just that what I do is different.

I've never "taken on" Carlin for anything other than attempting to write off EVERY blog as he did when he terminated COM.

I did do a rather cheeky post about Marcello and me "going down the pub" but it wasn't intended cruelly. I'm in no way pretending he's a friend of mine. I met him once and he wore me down. From that cheeky post I learnt (once and for all) that what someone says deprecatingly about themself is not something they want said about them. Marcello was very offended. So I'm sorry. We "agreed" to leave eachother well alone, but Marcello clearly wanted to have another dig at me. So here we are again.

I don't think I try and talk like a black teenager.

That comment in the Ra piece about "people who you wouldn't want living next to you" had nothing *whatsoever* to do with race. You might not necessarily want Father Yod living next to you either. Actually I'd be delighted to have the Arkestra living next door. It'd be a laugh.

I'm not jealous of Carlin either. Actually I have a career (of a kind) already. Sure I admire the pros, but I ENJOY doing it for free. Lots of people do similar things for for free. You yourself did COM for free!

I think you should take a big breath and relax. All this infighting is making people think that this loosely affiliated community of writers (OK you're not a member!) is just an arena for bitter struggle, for hegemonic supremacy, a scrap for links bar status. You could so easily have this community eating out of your hand, cheering your book into the shops. All these people are essentially on your side. It seems like hari kiri if you ask me....

I never asked anyone to write nice things about me. But if it's any consolation I'm definitely last years flavour. When you say like you do that that "this sort of mediocre writing is being hyped as the way forward" you're overestimating the strength of people's love for the shite that i post here. I think you're overestimating how great i think I am too. I think I'm OK.

I'd sincerely like to draw a line under this now. I REALLY REALLY don't want to fight any more. Like I said in the Toast Ramble, I was "this close" to showering praise on that 1985 thing before I found you hunting me on ILM.

If not, then do the decent thing and leave me to my own devices.

Peace. (Oh shit now I am sounding like a black teenager!)

oh yeah and everyone else can stop picking on marcello too. lets keep the vibes sweet. peace.

shame...was looking forward to some ultra-violence...keep it up...can we have round three today? please?

I shan't bite as this is Matt's house, but have a point to make about:

"the usual patronising racism of 35-year-old middle-class writers trying to talk like black teenagers"

I've no idea where Marcello lives, but all the teenagers where I live talk the same whether black or white.

Most of them don't respond well to people saying how "dissapointed" they are in them because they haven't worked hard enough, either.

It's more than being "yes-men" for Matt (as if nobody on this thread has ever given Matt a hard time!), this whole discussion is about what blogging is, or should be. On the one hand, a job, on the other something which is done for more hedonistic reasons. There's room for both, as Matt says.

The Osama/Nelson example is a false choice as well. I imagine Nelson had a fair bit of passion in the old days of ANC armed struggle. I imagine Osama has some reflective moments when buried away in an Afghan cave.

Passion, using emotion, energy, doesn't make you a terrorist. Do you want to listen to records which are carefully crafted or ones which bleed with emotion? Again, room for both, but I'll take DJ Scud or Congo Natty over serialist intellectual mathematical biz on most days.

"I don't think I try and talk like a black teenager."

Hahaha! Bwoy... Sucker punch! FWIW I talk like who I am -- just another Essex boy from the 8Ts. Marcello, you have no sense of fun! Just to make it clear, I haven't slagged off Marcello, and I don't intend to here -- I jus' reckon he's a leeeeetle bit out of order, lacks a bit of perspective fer sure. I mean, to even BEGIN to compare different blogging styles to the continuum that runs from Mandela to that bloke with the funky beard and the robes is, like... earth calling! We're -- correction, he's -- writing about POP MUSIC. Stuff to dance to. THERE IS NOTHING HERE TO GET UPSET ABOUT. Certainly nothing to go around being nasty to people about. And whether you're trying to be hurtful to people or not, that's how you're coming across and that is, I think, what you're doing.

And that's not a criticism! Certainly not a slag off. But it is an observation, meant kindly but firmly.

I'd have thought since you are -- by your own admission! -- the "big man" with the book contract and the "career" (in music journalism! with free records and everything!), then you'd have felt pretty fucking good about it. I know I would -- cos I feel pretty fucking good about my career ;-). (At times. When I'm not paranoid about never working again!) And that would therefore mean that little, community-of-friends-having-fun writers like Matt would be, well not even worth your breath slagging off. If you were due so much respect -- and writing a book and getting it out there IS hard, does deserve respect, in the right circumstances -- then I'd have thought you'd be confident enough to let your (real or imagined) criticisms of people like Matt lie. I mean -- and I don't want to be patronising here but I probably will sound it -- Pick on someone your own size, Marcello!

But... you're going around, talking about how you do so much WORK (who cares? well, we all care a bit, but it's only a blog!!) and you're gonna be paid SO MUCH MONEY... Again, not slagging off, just putting up a mirror to what you said... Do you think you might sound just a bit arrogant? When you let your anger subside a bit, and read back what you wrote... did you really want to look like that?

Cos, I can't quite believe that someone who constructed such a delicate, emotional medium with CoM, something that danced so effortlessly between the ephemeral and the memorable, could lack quite so much self-insight and grace and, well, manners. And that's not a slag off. And it's not personal. And it is, believe it or not, meant kindly.

But it is a judgement. and one you've invited by being personally hurtful. You've shored up arguments which are really not that convincing, and certainly pretty generalised (what WERE the huge errors in the Un Ra piece that make it quite so partronising? Given the fun, frolicsome premise of the piece?) with invective. It's not right. Cos Matt's not powerful, he's not -- as you have pointed out with such relish -- being paid. He is not, in short, an acceptable target for this kind of attack. And that's a moral (and political) judgement, not a slag off, which Marcello should be able to read without hurt.

BTW, my opinion is that blogging is the preserve of People Like Us, and while I don't MIND the professionals coming in to play, they should understand what their place is. And I wrote a fucking ace piece about it last night, which I wrote before I saw Marcello's comments here. Which is good, cos it isn't even aimed at Marcello. No, it's aimed at that con artist Luka, what with his column in Country Life (you're not taken in by the "urban" foxes schtick are you?!) and the stringing for the Economist... oh yes, I saw you on St James Plaza last night Luke! I've got your number!

Back to the accent thing -- FUCK, people in the office are looking at me cos I'm giggling so much! -- oh, this cracks me up! Anyway, if I was gonna talk like the black kids that live round my way, I'd have a broad Yorkshire accent. And when I spat it would be in Punjabi. We don't all live in Islington geezer!

I have to say that I am extremely regretful of my short-temperedness towards other bloggers of late. I offer no excuses for this - only sincere and profound apologies. I have no wish to turn into the Peter Sellers whom Roger Lewis describes in his biography.

All I can say at the moment is that something has happened to me in recent weeks - something pretty terrible - which has unduly influenced my state of mind. I don't feel the need to burden the "community" with this particular problem, but if anyone wants to email me I'll talk about it with them in confidence (nb: that includes you matthew, though I would appreciate it if anything I say does stay confidential - it's not something I want broadcast at the moment. OK? Thanks)

Paul, whereabouts in yorkshire are you?

Respekt to Marcello. Thanks for knocking it on the head mate. Sorry to hear you're having a bad time.

Gareth, I'm in Sheffield, the most beautiful and most weird city in Britain, as Gutterbreaksz knows.

Big up Marcello. It's one thing to have the courage to be nice to people all the time, but it's a lot more courageous to come back and make up with people. Respect.

I love it when matt does the sleeves thing

oh how i want to return to sheffield....

Gareth, Paul, Ambrose.

(grins) Yeah you cunts! Fuck off up North!

The show's over in this comments box!