Review of David Drake’s Pitchfork Review
Words by: Joel Mora
Researching information about the new Sade album, I came across the Pitchfork review and was amazed. I was amazed that a review can make me not want to buy an album I’ve been waiting nine years for. How can a review from a band that has so much face-twisting-like-something-smells-bad soul be so empty? Don’t get me wrong there are a lot of pretty words in this review:
Around this motif, and its unrelenting-yet-damaged steps, a song is gradually carved: a sensuous sculpture that refuses to congeal, an effect not unlike making out an uncertain shape by touch in total darkness.
This man gave me all that crap instead of just saying sex. SEX. All he had to say was the album sounds like the kind of sex that would bring your mother shame. What makes this review painful is that you can tell that he was more interested in his review than in the album. Now, I don’t know David Drake. He might hate writing reviews and wants to get bigger assignments, so he tries to show off his writing skills in his reviews. I can understand that. We’ve all been there. But if this is how you write, you’re never going to get a real assignment. This is what we call overwriting, which is a nice way of saying frilly filler.
This is a perfect example of someone who took the advice in writing class about painting a picture and put a lot of paint on a canvas with creating a picture. It also hurts when you create a series in a sentence that is just too long:
The crackling moments of sudden intensity that beset our travelers – snapping martial snares, handclaps, guitars grinding in dirt one moment, quivering synthesizers the next, hints of flamenco guitar, sudden guitar distortion, a trumpet’s clarion cutting above it all – tease risk, sexuality, and relief from the groove’s uncompromising continuity.”
What is he saying? Where is the sentence?
This is just another textbook example of a Pitchfork review. Although the reviewer loves the album, if I were in Sade I wouldn’t publicize the review. It’s heartbreaking to think that such an influential band is now tarnished by words from a person who cared more about his words than the album.
