Best Music of the Year Lists: Do Pitchfork, Billboard, NME, Vibe Have A Certain Gender Bias?

• this is fucking stupid. no even smart stupid. just fucking stupid.

• there are people in britain who aren't white. also, there are lots of good album's by girls that should be on these lists. but white guys make the lists so i guess this is what u get.

• I normally like to avoid hyperbole in pointing out things I don�t like, but I find it hard not to mention that this is the most baffling post I�ve ever read on LA Weekly (or perhaps anywhere). For one, I�m not totally sure what point you�re trying to make. Secondly, if the point you�re trying to make is the point I think you�re trying to make, you provided close to zero evidence for it. In fact, you provided evidence for exactly the opposite in a number of cases. To specify: 1. Of the NME�s top five albums, all four bands listed have women in them. The fifth entry is taken by Laura Marling � who is, you might have noticed, a woman. So five out of five are female, or include females, here. (Also, the six LA-based artists that you randomly chose to highlight from further down the list includes a black guy, one female-fronted band and one all-female band, plus Avi Buffalo, which includes females.) (Also, �white people who like electronica� is a pretty accurate description of the young population of Britain, which is exactly the audience NME serves.) 2. Of course Vibe allows for the possibility of not being white � it�s primarily a hip-hop magazine aimed at a black audience. Despite that, 1 and � of their top five is white (which I would think actually counts for diversity in this particular case). 3. Pitchfork�s best new albums list changes every single month, if not quicker (it doesn�t even resemble a �year end� list at all, in spite of your headline), so to pick this one particular entry as a barometer of their gender bias is wildly ridiculous. If you picked a month in which there were more high-profile female releases, you would almost certainly see more women. (Also, the top spot is occupied by a woman. The top. Just sayin�.) 4. Billboard�s list here is even more NOT a year-end list than Pitchfork�s (it�s a weekly chart of social media popularity). I�m not even sure why you brought this up. So you�ve only listed two actual year-end lists in your article about year-end lists. One of those lists completely disproves your theory. The other is a genre-specific one that is pretty diverse considering. And as for these women being �young and hot,� well, that�s all quite relative (do Janelle Monae or Beach House�s Victoria Legrand really rely on their sex appeal??), but I think you�ll find the same holds true for the men � people who are young and hot have better chances at releasing music. In fact, this holds true for all of show-business in general, regardless of gender. What, if anything, are you actually trying to say with this piece? What do you think you�ve proved? I�m honestly curious, because I can�t tell at all.

• I'm confused what convoluted point you're trying to make. Best album lists are a judgment call. There shouldn't be affirmative action for minority groups and women. It's based on the taste of the editors. If they think the most of the best albums of the year are one's made by young white dudes, so be it, it's their opinion. Meanwhile, while you point out the Billboard chart's diversity you fail to factor in that you're talking about 60% and 40% from a sample size of five (FIVE!). Your just trying to stir up s*it to get attention with no real platform to stand on. Congrats on that.

• That's not Pitchfork's Top Ten, it's just the collection of the Best New Music that's come out recently. They do a huge multi-week breakdown of their best albums, usually 100, nearer to the end of the year.

TotalComments: 5