CHICAGO — Ravenous music fan Terry Manns feels a wistful sense of melancholy for the days when music publication Pitchfork.com would take an absolute shit on any band he held dear, sympathetic friends reported.
“I remember logging onto Pitchfork only to see my favorite albums like Thursday’s ‘Full Collapse’ get utterly eviscerated; I yearn for those days,” mused Manns, who admits to watching MTV constantly for the near-zero possibility of catching a music video. “Nowadays, everything from banal pop to iconoclastic experimental albums gets a 7.7. The reviewers are polite and actually talk about the music in reviews. Gen Z isn’t going to know the embarrassment of loving an amazing band like Rainer Maria, then watching Pitchfork give them the school grade equivalent of an F-. I wish they could feel it…”
Anonymous sources from within Pitchfork’s offices confirmed that the brand’s strategy has explicitly shifted in recent years.
“It’s a numbers game and you attract more flies with sugar. We get more clicks when we let Ian Cohen out of the janitor’s closet to give some aging emo band a 7.7 than we do actually criticizing lazy songwriting,” said the source, a Pitchfork reviewer who also asked us to redact the fact that they were clearly listening to Sum 41 during our call. “Ever since Condé Nast bought Pitchfork in 2015, our primary purpose is to show full-page Absolut vodka ads. Also, we’re terrified of angering Taylor Swift or Beyoncé’s fanbases. Yeasayer and Pixies fans were too stoned to really give a shit, so we could go pretty rough on them.”
Many of the artists who were slighted by Pitchfork in their nastier early years are reportedly enjoying watching the site fade from musical discourse.
“Well well well, looks like the world is finally realizing that good ol’ Condé Nastfork is full of shit,” stated The Dismemberment Plan frontman Travis Morrison, whose solo debut “Travistan” was given a devastating 0.0 by the website in 2004. “Can’t say I feel too bad after they nullified any chance I had of a solo career. Their relevance is fading; Anthony Fantano is the only dude out there willing to call mediocre albums bad. Meanwhile, people are finally starting to critically reevaluate ‘Travistan,’ which is at least a 3.2.”
The anonymous source confirmed that Pitchfork is also considering replacing their review number system altogether with different GIFs of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.