Visitation- Rites

It’s a blog eat blog world. That said, one of the dominating music blogs on the internet is no doubt, Pitchfork. But if you’re anything into indie music, you probably reaped over the discontinuation of Altered Zones. Altered Zones branched off of Pitchfork, featuring the most underground music. Basically, the ones that weren’t big enough to make it onto the main site. Fans were loyal to Altered Zones and their logo empowered the lives of many. Some hipsters even tattooed the design onto their skins.

Now, the grievance of Altered Zones can now be rejoiced because founding members, Emilie Friedlander and Ric Leichtung have started a new project called Ad Hoc. With the same elements of their previous blog, here is their purpose ” a collective of ten tastemaking music blogs from all over the world, Ad Hoc is a daily destination for MP3s, videos, mixes, interviews, artist’s writings, and cultural commentary– curated for quality, and with an emphasis on emerging artists and musical movements that best exemplify the new grassroots, Internet-fueled DIY.”.

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Last year, Pitchfork joined in CMJ festivities by throwing their own free one-day music showcase in the form of the #Offline festival. And while Kanye may not make a surprise appearance in their 2011 parties, the online music magazine will at least entertain two boroughs with some amazing bands.

So if you can’t wait till the new festival Pitchfork Presents : Forms in February, then check out Pitchfork’s TWO contributions this Saturday, October 22:

Pitchfork Presents
Performances by Dom and Unknown Mortal Orchestra
DJ set from Neon Indian
2pm to 6pm
Aloft Hotel
216 Duffield Street, Brooklyn
FREE with RSVP to rsvp@pitchfork.com

Altered Zones
Performances by AraabMuzik / Eric Copeland / Grimes / Xeno & Oaklander / Trash Talk / Light Asylum / Prince Rama / FORMA / Dive / Teengirl Fantasy
DJ sets from Awesome Tapes From Africa / Weird Magic / Todd Pendu / Main Attrakionz / Ayshay
7:30pm
New Museum Theater, Lobby and Sky Room
235 Bowery, New York
$20 Members / $25 Non-Members

Before today there were 11 albums that received at 10.0 rating on Pitchfork. Now, add Kanye’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. Believe me, I want to give credit where credit is due, and I do like Kanye West, but I have a hard time believing that Kanye released the best album since Yankee Hotel Foxtrot came out eight years ago.

Maybe it’s petty to weight the opinions of a music review site so heavily, but this is the internet, so let’s get petty! Here’s the list of all the previous perfect scores.

…And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead – Source Tags & Codes

12 Rods – Gay? (EP)

Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy – I See a Darkness

Bob Dylan – The Bootleg Series Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live 1966, The “Royal Albert Hall” Concert

The Flaming Lips – The Soft Bulletin

Robert Pollard – Relaxation of the Asshole (In the review, this album received rating of (1)0.0, giving it a dual rating of 10.0 and 0.0.)

Radiohead – Kid A & OK Computer

Amon Tobin – Bricolage

Walt Mink – El Producto

Wilco – Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

So what records that came out in the past eight years do you think are better than My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy? Or was this justified?

A little after 2am Sunday morning, as sweaty, drunk, and all but tired hipsters danced and partied to one band after another at Pichfork’s #Offline Festival at Brooklyn Bowl, guests got a big surprise. Glammed out in bling, an excited, energetic, and oh so entertaining Kanye West took the stage. Backed by DJ A-Trak, he performed five of his newest hits: “So Appalled”, “Monster”, “Devil in a New Dress”, “Power”, and “Runaway”. He was electric, charismatic, and on top of his game. It looked like he was having a good time. As an added bonus, GZA took the stage after Kanye, and performed “Liquid Swords”. Its been a great week for live music in NYC. As the impending CMJ/Pitchfork rivalry grows into a feud, the the spoils of war may be ours to reap in the form of good shows.

Watch it here.

Raekwan’s on now, but here’s the rest of Saturday’s schedule:

5:15 The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion

6:15 Wolf Parade

7:25 Panda Bear

8:30 LCD Soundsystem

And Sunday:

1:00   Allá

1:45   Cass McCombs

2:30   Girls

3:20   Beach House

4:15   Lightning Bolt

5:15   St. Vincent

6:15   Major Lazer

7:25   Big Boi

8:30   Pavement

As of a few minutes ago, Pitchfork has finally created an actual music blogger monopoly. The initial announcement of Altered Zones, Pitchfork’s “new sister site that will focus on leftfield pop, experimental, and home-recorded sounds”, didn’t get a reaction from me that was quite so personal, but I was pretty bummed to see some of my favorite music bloggers falling proudly to their knees in front of the man.

Ok, so maybe it’s not that serious. I just checked out the site, and I’m liking what I see– Oberhofer, Tennis, Sun Araw, Games, and so on. Again, a bunch of people with good taste are pooling their content into one (Pitchfork monitored/edited?) place, but doesn’t my Google Reader already do that for me?

The regular posting schedule starts Monday, where you’ll be able to find recommendations from Visitation Rites, Friendship Bracelet, Chocolate Bobka, Gorilla vs. Bear, and Yours Truly– not us truly, luckily/sadly, but the capital Y, capital T. Obviously our feelings are mixed, but as long as the content doesn’t suffer then I guess we don’t actually care that Pitchfork may have gone the route of Standard Oil, at least they’re not BPing it! Amirite!?