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The Pitchfork 500: Our Guide to the Greatest Songs from Punk to the Present | 
 enlarge | Creators: Scott Plagenhoef, Ryan Schreiber
Publisher: Fireside
Category: Book
List Price: $16.00
Buy New: $9.62
You Save: $6.38 (40%)
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Rating:  6 reviews
Sales Rank: 7582
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 208
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 9 x 8 x 0.6
ISBN: 1416562028
Dewey Decimal Number: 781.6609
EAN: 9781416562023
ASIN: 1416562028
Publication Date: November 11, 2008
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Shipping: International shipping available
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Product Description
FROM THE BRAIN TRUST BEHIND PITCHFORKMEDIA.COM -- THE WEBSITE THE LOS ANGELES TIMES DECLARED "AN ESSENTIAL PART OF THE IPO D GENERATION'S LEXICON, A MUST-READ" -- A FRESH GUIDE TO THE 500 BEST SONGS OF THE PAST THIRTY YEARS.Named the "best site for music criticism on the web" by The New York Times Magazine, Pitchforkmedia.com has become the leading independent resource for music journalism, the place people turn to find out what's happening in new music. Founded in 1995, Pitchfork has developed one of the web's most devoted followings, with more than 1.6 million readers monthly who tune in for daily reviews, news, features, videos, and interviews. In The Pitchfork 500: Our Guide to the Greatest Songs from Punk to the Present, Pitchfork offers up their take on the 500 best songs of the past three decades. Focusing on indie rock (Arcade Fire, the Shins), hiphop (Public Enemy, Jay-Z), electronic (Daft Punk, Boards of Canada), pop (Madonna, Justin Timberlake), metal (Metallica, Boris), and experimental underground music (Suicide, Boredoms), it features all-new essays and reviews written with the sharp wit and insight for which the site is known. Kicking it off in 1977 with the birth of punk and independent music, The Pitchfork 500 runs chronologically, with each chapter representing a distinct period and offering a narrative of how the musical landscape of the day influenced its artists. The book opens with David Bowie, Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, Kraftwerk, and Brian Eno, the "art-rock godfathers" who set the tone and tenor for the next thirty years, and wraps up in the present, when bands connect with new audiences through social networking sites and prime-time TV placements -- and when a single mp3 can turn a niche indie artist into a global sensation. Sidebars like "Yacht Rock," "Runaway Trainwrecks," "Nanofads," and "Career Killers" call out some far-from-classic musical trends and identify the guiltiest offenders. Modernizing the music-guide format, The Pitchfork 500 reflects the way listeners are increasingly processing music -- by song rather than by album. These 500 tracks condense thirty years of essential music into the ultimate chronological playlist, each song advancing the narrative and, by extension, the music itself.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 1 more reviews...
 Pitchfork In Desperate Need of a Hip Replacement December 23, 2008
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
Attention all music lovers - Pitchforkmedia.com is a great online resource for you if:
A. They deem the bands you like worthy of their love and praise
B. The worthy bands you like do not manage to achieve mainstream attention of any kind thus making them unworthy of Pitchfork's love and praise
C. You like the derivative musical stylings of Kanye West, Kelly Clarkson and Justine Timberlake
D. You need someone else to tell you what is good and what isn't
If you fall into any of those categories then you might appreciate Pitchfork's first foray into publishing: The Pitchfork 500
Yes, there are some amazing and pivotal songs listed in the book with entertaining anecdotes and essays about each one. However, Pitchfork's need to remain 'hip' and 'counter' to any and all established critical opinion and/or popular mainstream taste, has resulted in list that is not only short sighted but insulting to anybody who happened to have been around during the short 30 years documented in the book.
For those of us who DO remember 1977 to 2007 - this is for you:
Boomtown Rats - I Don't Like Mondays
The Stranglers - Peaches
X - Los Angeles
Yaz - Only You/Situation/Don't Go
Wall of Voodoo - Back in Flesh
Killing Joke -
The The - This is the Day
Rush - Tom Sawyer
OMD - Enola Gay
Joy Division - Love Will Tear Us Apart
Leftfield - Open Up and anything else from Leftism
Japan - Gentlemen Take Polaroids
Riuyuchi Sakamoto/David Sylvian - Forbidden Colors
Grace Jones - Pull Up To The Bumper
The Cult - She Sells Sanctuary
Big Audio Dynamic - Medicine Show
Jane's Addiction - Jane Says - Mountain
The Police - Roxanne - Don't Stand So Close To Me
Peter Gabriel - Shock The Monkey - In Your Eyes
Eurythmics - Sweet Dreams
Tones on Tail - Go
I could go on and on and on and...
 have you written about 500 songs from the last 40 years?! December 2, 2008
Preface: I am a 40 year old music fan who prefers the "indie" stuff, so I've long been a reader of Pitchfork. Like any review site, however, all ratings are subjective opinion and shouldn't be interpreted as gospel.
That said: This is a great book. I have learned a lot about the back-stories, relevancy, and/or even hidden meanings about some of my favorite songs. Mostly, however, it's turned me on to songs I had never heard. This book doesn't only cover "alternative" or "indie" music, it runs the gamut. (Although, as the years progress, there is more of a slant towards their niche.) For anyone who likes music, this is worth picking up. You'll find yourself re-listening to, no - re-hearing songs for the first time. (How's that for pretentious.) Of course you won't agree with every selection, but it is a worthwhile collection of substantial tunes. Well done.
Finally: It's funny to me that people don't see the irony of giving poor reviews to a book of compiled reviews. It's not the opinion that matters, it's that there are opinions.
6.0?? November 25, 2008
8 out of 11 found this review helpful
How would the smug folks at pitchfork review their own book? I'm giving it a 6.0 in their parlance. But first, a few things that you need to know: 1)the book is songs only, 2)virtually all of the p-fork reviewers contributed to this book (including some non-regulars like Douglas Wolk), 3)the inclusions and exclusions will drive you as crazy as some of their album reviews.
It's interesting that p-fork ever created this title. It's such an odd concept: it's limited to 1977 - present, it's songs only, and it eschews some standard record guide tenets. I half expected the preface to berate me for even buying it! You will find some interesting nuggets and some b-sides you weren't familiar with. The book delivers in that sense. I agree with another reviewer who suggested that it needs an editor (much like this review). There are some odd little two page spreads where a reviewer extends on a particular genre of music. These essays were interesting, but some are intended as humorous (yacht rock?) while most are straightforward. The inconsistency seems sloppy to me. I was hoping that one reviewer-voice would emerge from the website and take hold of this thing. Instead, it feels like a mish-mash.
In the end, I would recommend this to music nerds like myself but not to the general public. On pitchfork's website they have lists of "best albums by decade." Those lists are more useful in the traditional sense, and I would recommend them to most folks.
 Interesting and informative November 17, 2008
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
I found this book to be very insightful and it is a good conversation piece for when friends come over and see it on the table. It has helped a great deal when it comes to making mix CDs for people. I don't agree with all the songs listed in the book but for the most part I do and I have found some interesting tracks from this book.
 Narrow minded, pretentious and self-serving. November 16, 2008
19 out of 39 found this review helpful
The premise of Pitchfork's attempt at a music guide is that the songs of today are just as relevant, exciting and creative as the boomer approved canon of the 50's through early 70's.
To this I answer...no duh.
Misguided and insecure, editors Shreiber and Plagenhoff subsequently claim to offer a bold repudiation of the established cannon but do little more than play it safe offering only well worn staples of the past 30 years. Entire vibrant genres of music (metal, post 70's punk) are relegated to single page featurettes, obnoxious non-factors are legitimized and major musical movements such as house music and rap are either mangled beyond recognition or see their long established classics dug up and exhumed by a writing staff of closed-minded hipsters in way over their heads. While this thankfully prevents the book from falling into the snotty shlock journalism and sensationalism that Pitchfork's online component is best known for, it also makes the book feel like little more than a Rolling Stone guide for the tight jeans and ugly haircut set: a smug canonization of records with little in common apart from being socially acceptable among the slime that inhabits the gentrified neighbourhoods of Williamsburg and Silver Lake rather than the suburbs of middle America. Fantastic songs are ignored, agonizing failed experiments are deified in the name of "indie" and the resulting book is just as ignorant and misunderstanding of black music and non-rock as any "boomer approved" tome (to say nothing of the near total lack of African, Asian and South American music).
Of course, the book isn't all bad. Anywhere from 300 to 400 of these songs are either quite good or flat out spectacular though they're better covered in other more authoritative music guides. I also suppose that if one had to turn a cousin or friend into an obnoxious music snob overnight, this book could also be useful.
In trying desperately to live up to the 60's (I haven't seen anyone this angry at that decade since the Neo-Cons took power), the Pitchfork staff do little to nullify the errors of the previous generations' music writers. Instead they simply erect monuments to their very own Paul McCartneys and Jimmy Pages, the only difference being that the new idols prefer drum machines to guitar solos. While the late 70's through today offers an incredible array of fantastic music, you'll only find a fraction of it covered here...along with a whole lot of garbage and bad writing that serves only to prove the idea that good music is still being made wrong.
I rate this book 1.3 out of 10.
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