Terry Smith wrote:
> But if you admit that you don't like it mainly
> just because, um, you just don't like it, then that at least acknowledges
> that your judgment may have more to do with your own biases than any flaw
> on the side of the music.
I think we have to get away from the idea that the one is about finding a
"flaw" while the other is just pure bias. It's *all* opinion and
preference.
We might all agree that Shania sucks, for example. But that doesnt mean
it's because of a flaw in her music. If we consider that Shania's
records are a) music to her and people with taste like hers, and b)
majorly backed by big money because they are the perfect room spray that
can disinfect millions of homes (and thus make more big money), then her
music is not flawed at all. In fact, from that point of view, it is
people like Steve Earle and Del McCoury and George Jones who are flawed.
But of course we wouldnt agree.
Getting back to the point Terry was trying to make, though. I think the
issue is that any reviewer who dislikes country music, fiddles, steel
guitars, banjos, mandolins, twangy vocals, &c. &c. is not going to be
able to write anything meaningful about country music except for other
people who also dislike those things. (Just as Jeff Wall, who hates rap,
is not going to be able to say anything meaningful to me, who likes some
and not others.)
The real evil in all this is, as Cheryl Cline has pointed out many times,
that twang-hating reviewers can pretty easily perpetuate their biases for
anyone who wants to read them, and keep the music ghettoized and hidden in
basements, back rooms, off the radio, and out of the house.
Will Miner
Denver, CO
