Masaryk University in Brno

MASARYK UNIVERSITY IN BRNO

FACULTY OF EDUCATION

Department of English Language and Literature

Rock Journalism

The Language of Music Reviews

Diploma Thesis

Brno 2014

Supervisor: doc. Mgr. Olga Dontcheva-Navrátilová, Ph.D. Author: Markéta Hubková

Bibliographical Record

HUBKOVÁ, Markéta. Rock Journalism: The Language of Music Reviews. Brno: Masaryk University, Faculty of Education, Department of English Language and Literature, 2014. Supervisor: doc. Mgr. Olga Dontcheva-Navrátilová, Ph.D.

Annotation

This thesis deals with the language of Rock Journalism, specifically, it offers a summative characterization of the genre and its development since the 1960s. It focuses on an analysis of the language of music reviews in the most prominent Anglo-American music press, studying them both from diachronic and synchronic point of view. The main aim of the thesis is to describe the main linguistic and stylistic features of music reviews.

Based on the established research on media language in general, the methods of linguistic analysis would be applied on samples of archived music magazine articles. The research should survey the progress from the uncritical fan approach of the British Invasion era writers through the more literary-ambitious style of rock star journalists in the 70s, as influenced by the New Journalism, to the various difficult periods of major music publications whose authority is challenged by ‘indie’ fanzines, MTV and the Internet. The thesis would discuss mainly the most dominant and longest running periodicals, the British New Musical Express, Melody Maker, Sounds, and Record Mirror, as well as the American Rolling Stone, Creem, and Billboard.

The intended result is a concise presentation of the roles of objectivity, expertise in the music field, literary flair, and personal approach in music journalism which may serve as a basis for a thorough definition of what can be defined as music media style today.

Keywords

Art criticism, formality, language of the news, linguistic analysis, linguistic features, music magazines, music reviews, objectivity, rhetorical strategies, rock journalism.

Prohlášení

Prohlašuji, že jsem práci vypracovala samostatně s použitím uvedené literatury a zdrojů informací.

30. listopadu 2014 ……………………………. Markéta Hubková

Declaration

I hereby declare that this thesis is my own work, that I wrote independently, and that I used the sources listed in the list of references.

November 30, 2014 ……………………………. Markéta Hubková

Acknowledgments

I would like to hereby express my sincerest gratitude to doc. Mgr. Olga Dontcheva- Navrátilová, Ph.D. for her patient guidance, insightful comments and overall invaluable assistance in supervising this thesis.

Contents

1. Introduction ……………………………………………………………………. 6 2. History of Rock Journalism ……………………………………………………. 7 2.1 The Sixties ……………………………………………………………. 7 2.2 Weeklies ……………………………………………………………………. 7 2.3 Role of the National Press ……………………………………………. 8 2.4 Legitimization ……………………………………………………………. 8 2.5 Rise of Rock Journalism ……………………………………………. 9 2.6 The Rolling Stone in 1970s ……………………………………………. 9 2.7 New Journalism …………………………………………………………… 9 2.8 British Press in the 1970s …………………………………………… 10 2.9 Punk Fanzines …………………………………………………………… 10 2.10 The Eighties and Commercialization ……………………………. 11 2.11 1990s and Commercial Struggles ……………………………………. 12 2.12 2000s and webzines ……………………………………………………. 12 2.13 Rock Journalism: Controversial Issues ……………………………. 13 2.13.1 Issue: Commercialism ……………………………………. 13 2.13.2 Issues: Elitism ……………………………………………. 13 2.13.3 Issues: Nostalgia ……………………………………………. 14 2.13.4 Issue: Authenticity …………………………………………….. 14 3. Literature Review ……………………………………………………………. 15 4. Research Aims ……………………………………………………………………. 19 5. Methodology …………………………………………………………………… 21 6. Description of the Sampled Texts ………………………………………………… 25 7. Results of the Analysis …………………………………………………………… 27 7.1 Modern Reviews …………………………………………………………… 27 7.2 Classic Reviews ………………………………………………………….... 31 7.3 The Use of Adjectives in Music Reviews ……………………………. 36 8. Results Commentary and Discussion …………………………………………… 38 9. Conclusion …………………………………………………………………... 43 10. References …………………………………………………………………… 44 11. Appendix …………………………………………………………………… 47

1. Introduction The present thesis deals with the relatively new genre of popular music journalism. In general, music journalism includes various types of music coverage in a range of publications, from specialised music magazines to music columns in general newspapers and life-style magazines, as well as music “biographies, histories and genre studies”. The music magazines and newspapers could themselves be further classified into mainstream music magazines, trade papers, “record collector magazines, fanzines,” etc. (Shuker, 2001, p. 83-84). This discourse has been established to follow “certain stylistic conventions” (Hill, 2006, p. 190). The modern music journalism directly follows or derives from the tradition of popular music reporting which started to develop in the 1960s.

Popular music and its media coverage gradually evolved from the early British Invasion-era articles on pop celebrities in teen magazines to a more serious analyses in specialised press. What some may consider the golden age of pop music reporting started to appear in late 1960s and early 70s, when numerous journalists on both sides of the Atlantic looked for inspiration to the New Journalism of Tom Wolfe and Truman Capote. These so-called “personality writers” would follow the New Journalism techniques of incorporating literary strategies into their reports. This new style of music criticism formed a blueprint for rock journalists for years to come.

In the late 1970s, with the emergence of a new genre in rock, punk, its fans would take to creating their own music magazines. Punk fanzines, with their photocopied pages and handwritten text, set the standard that we commonly associate with the genre of music fanzines today. In the 1980s, an opposite trend started to manifest itself, and rock journalism started to shift increasingly more towards commercialization and focus on lifestyle topics. The 1990s saw the publishing industry falling into a financial crisis that lead to cancellation of several major music magazines (Forde, 2006, p. 286-287). Nevertheless, new opportunities appeared thanks to the internet, and nowadays internet reviewers and webzines can enjoy similar cult popularity mainstream magazines like the Rolling Stone had in their prime.

Music journalism, though mostly ignored by linguists, is a vital genre that is not only a “cultural artefact” of its time, but also presents interesting opportunities for discourse analysis, as it is highly focused, yet individualistic, quickly evolving genre, that can be used to “investigate the norms and values of the intended readership,” namely the respective generations of teenagers (Basturkmen, 2009, p.68).

The focus of this thesis is to examine the genre of popular music journalism and to discuss some of its most prominent characteristic linguistic and stylistic features. The practical analysis in this study is devoted specifically to music reviews and analyses articles from a range of pop music magazines and newspapers from the UK and the USA.

2. History of Rock Journalism This chapter describes the evolution of Rock Journalism from 1960s up to date and defines some of the most common issues associated with the genre.

2.1 The Sixties What is today most commonly understood as rock journalism started to form in 1960s, following the emergence of new teenage culture and music. The press media that would cover popular music included articles and columns in national press, music publications devoted to other genres (particularly jazz magazines), teen and fan club magazines, trade magazines, and underground and alternative press.

2.2 Weeklies In the 1960s, popular music was still considered “light” entertainment (Inglis: 2010), and the early pop and rock journalism largely reflected that with its somewhat shallow reports and a noticeable lack of significant and thorough music analysis. Especially in the early years of the decade, music reporting seemed to thrive on gossipy short pieces that aimed mainly at the newly forming youth culture.

In the UK of 1960s, jazz-focused music weeklies gradually started including articles on rhythm and blues and rock ‘n’ roll music (Brennan: 2006). Among them, the front-runners were the New Musical Express and Melody Maker. Melody Maker, one of the longest-running pop music publications of the twentieth century, was established in 1926. By the early 1960s, it was still remaining loyal to its original jazz focus and would generally disapprove of and disdain the modern pop and beat music. This musical eclecticism however backfired as it enabled the paper’s younger rivals, Record Mirror and New Musical Express, to target the unclaimed readership. Eventually, even Melody Maker had to cave in and by mid-sixties it would also engage with the pop and beat trend (“Melody Maker.”).

The New Musical Express (NME) was first published in 1952. As rock journalist Nick Kent (2010) reminiscences, in its earliest incarnation the New Musical Express of the 1950s reported on “fifties crooners and light entertainment”. However, with the “explosion of Elvis Presley’s popularity”, the paper started targeting younger readers. In the early to mid-1960s, the paper held its finger on the pulse of commercial success of pop musicians with its singles chart and annual NME Poll (also discussed in Frith: 1983). The New Musical Express eventually “found its niche as a youth-oriented”, especially focusing on the young beat fans. The Express also seemed to be very close to the pop stars it documented, as their resident interviewer, Keith Altham, had an instant access to some of the most popular bands of the time, particularly the Rolling Stones (“New Musical Express.”). With an immense popularity among the Beatles fandom, the New Musical Express become one of the “country’s pre-eminent pop sheet” at the height of Beatlemania (Kent: 2010).

Content-wise, the weeklies of early 1960s would still concentrated mainly on the pop stars rather than the music itself, as Shuker (2001) complains. Shuker distinguishes the four leading British weeklies as “quickies” (Record Mirror and Disc) and “inkies” (eventually, New Musical

Express and Melody Maker), which he considers “more serious”. Despite that, initially, at least, all the weeklies shared a similar characteristics in their music coverage. The music articles had a highly promotional orientation and would often “read like press releases”. In general, they would include mostly gossip and photographs of pop stars, thus “reinforcing the star aspect of pop consumption” (Shuker, 2001: p. 84). Subsequently, these pieces would lack the analytical depth and profundity of serious music criticism. As Inglis explains when he describes the weeklies’ shortcomings, “they created a critically bland, but commercially attractive, form of specialist journalism” (2010, p. 550). More than that, Inglis further criticizes the music weeklies for their “descriptive” approach, where they should instead attempt “interpretative and evaluative elements” to give the music an “analytical commentary” (2010, p. 557-558).

2.3 Role of the National Press In the early to mid-sixties, it was actually still the national press that provided the most sophisticated music reporting. Inglis (2010), for instance, illustrates the difference between the brief, shallow description that would appear in the music magazines of the time and the more thoughtful, elaborate reviews that would run in the national press on the examples of early Beatlamania coverage: “New Musical Express’s review (…) ran to just six words: ‘on which George Martin plays piano’ (…) (and) Record Mirror displayed equal brevity: ‘John singing a dual- tracked lead’. (…) The Times, however, gave it a much more detailed consideration: ‘One gets the impression that they think simultaneously of harmony and melody, so firmly are the major tonic sevenths and ninths built into their tunes, and the flat submediant key switches, so natural is the Aeolian cadence at the end of (song), the chord progression which ends Mahler’s Song of the Earth.’” (p. 557)

Impressed by the above-mentioned William Mann’s reviews of the Beatles for the Times, Inglis subsequently points out the fact that such unprecedented, refined critical attention paid to a pop band by a conservative national paper strengthened the burgeoning “realization that popular music could lend itself to this sort of attention” (2010: p. 557-558). Other authors (Gendron: 2002, Brennan: 2006) agree that during the transitional period of rock journalism, the national press played a significant role in establishing rock music and its criticism.

2.4 Legitimization Even though thus far only the more commercial tendencies of sixties’ rock journalism have been discussed, it is important to note that, at the same time, there was a strong effort to try to “legitimize” the new genre and its criticism, and to achieve “recognition” as a genuine art form (Plasketes, p. 138-139). Initially, rock music was “dismissed … as simplistic, vulgar and crassly commercial youth music” (Brennan, 2006: 267). Some of the researchers argue that in order to liberate it from this preconception, the rock journalists followed the example of jazz music and its media coverage. According to Lindberg et al. (2005) the emerging rock journalism adapted from jazz journalism its “criteria”, “journalistic standards and musical knowledge”, the attitude about “individual musical skills” and the goal of legitimizing the music as “serious” (qtd. in Brennan, 2006: 277). Essentially, they developed a “discourse that helped elevate the genre beyond its initial ‘lowbrow’ status” (Schmutz et al, 2010: p. 503). In the second half of the sixties, rock press would turn more towards serious journalism.

2.5 Rise of Rock Journalism In the second half of the sixties, pop music was going through a serious transformation. The music genre itself grew in popular estimation, its stars enjoyed social and cultural prestige, and the teenyboppers of mid-sixties gave way to more radical hippie and/or left-wing audience. Pop journalism also evolved, shifting towards more literary-ambitious and sophisticated style of reporting. Moreover, the change in music reporting was also influenced by changes in music trends themselves, as on the turn of the decade, rock moved from singles to rock albums and later concept albums, which would inspire lengthier, more elaborate music reviews. Eventually, a “new kind of music magazine” emerged, which viewed rock music not as simply “music but as the voice of a generation” (Wald: 2009, p. 238). The most influential among these new rock magazines was the American Rolling Stone.

2.6 The Rolling Stone in 1970s With its original headquarters in San Francisco, the Rolling Stone magazine was established by Jann Wenner in 1967 with the intention to replace, in Wenner’s words, the “‘inaccurate and irrelevant’ trade papers and fan magazines, which (he) viewed as ‘an anachronism, fashioned in the old mould of myth and nonsense’” (Shuker: 2001, p. 92). As a result of being centred in the hippie capital, the Rolling Stone initially focused on “the city’s underground movement … (and) counter culture” as much as on the music (“Rolling Stone.”). What set the Rolling Stone apart from its predecessors was its insistence on following “high journalistic standards” (Henke, p. 102). The magazine was envisioned as a rock-music-oriented version of “a news magazine, such as … Time”, as Brennan mentions, and Wenner would even recruit “Newsweek correspondents” to be his editors (Brennan: 2006, p. 277). The magazine had a traditional layout, its “record reviews were studious and well-argued, while the interview section became a byword for lengthy, detailed examinations of musicians” that would not shy away from “controversial subjects” (“Rolling Stone.”). It could pride itself in its “in-depth features, and investigative pieces” (Pompper et al: 2009, p. 276) and it had a diligent “fact-checking department” (Henke, p. 102). Despite its initial reputation as an alternative, independent publication, Rolling Stone enjoyed a strong financial support from the record industry (discussed in Frith: 1983 and Forde: 2006). According to Shuker, its consequent “dependence on the concerns of the music industry” led to the magazine’s abandonment of its radicalism and turning into a “general interest magazine” (2001, p. 92). Nevertheless, it was the Rolling Stone that gave rise to the new style of music reporting, that became highly influential for the following decades and which was heavily inspired by New Journalism.

2.7 New Journalism In early 1970s a new generation of rock journalist appeared, with a deep appreciation for the New Journalism of Tom Wolfe and Truman Capote. The main feature of New Journalism was the high involvement of the authors with the subject of their articles. The articles themselves would employ literary stylistic strategies, listed by Strachan and Leonard (2003) as “scene construction, third person point of view, recording of everyday detail and the inclusion of the persona of the journalist within the text” (qtd. in Hill: 2006, p. 191). Nick Kent, for instance, admits his admiration for Capote’s intimate “celebrity profiles” as well as “Wolfe’s dandified

9 upper-echelon hipspeak prose style” (2010: p. 42). For him, the fundamental core of New Journalism is the journalists’ immediate immersion in the ‘field’, so to speak, “as wilful participants soaking up the essence and then channelling it into an art form of their own” as opposed to “blandly observing their subjects from a respectful distance” (p. 77). The comment about journalists creating their own “art” is telling, as many of the New Journalism-inspired writers seemed to adopt a rock star persona in their own right. This new type of rock journalism is still celebrated as a “golden age (…) (of) British rock journalism”, when journalists wrote in a “sharp but open-minded way” that was “humane, informed, optimistic” (Taylor: 2010, p. 42- 43). However, there is a strong tendency to over-rate and “romanticize” the period and its style of writing, as many of its participants “have a tendency to view that era through decidedly rose- tinted spectacles” (Hill: 2006, p. 192). New Journalism strived in the USA, represented by Hunter S. Thompson and Lester Bangs, but it soon made its way over to the UK.

2.8 British Press in the 1970s A certain shift in the style of rock journalism in the UK at the end of 1960s and in early 1970s was again informed by the changing trends in rock music itself. As Shuker (2001) points out, the growing popularity of progressive rock, which attracted more introspective audience, combined with the dominance of American music journalism (Rolling Stone, Creem) demanded a more sophisticated music coverage. Of the two most prominent British music papers, Melody Maker was the one who seemed to adapt more quickly to the changing demographics. Possibly motivated by the desire not to repeat its past mistakes and miss out on a new popular trend, Melody Maker fully embraced the prog-rock genre and reaped the benefits, quickly reaching top sales (Kent: 2010, p. 133).

The New Musical Express, on the other hand, clung more onto the “mainstream pop” music, losing the more radical alternative readership (“New Musical Express”). Eventually in 1972, faced with possible dissolution, the paper completely changed direction and assembled a new staff. Several of the most prominent underground writers in London thus joined the NME and started a new era for the publication (Shuker: 2001). Among the new faces of the music paper were the “intellectual” editor Ian MacDonald, the “iconoclastic”, unscrupulous Charles Shaar Murray (Taylor: 2010, p. 42) and the young up-and-comer, Nick Kent. Kent remembers that, in the state of desperation the paper was in, the editors were ready to go “unorthodox extremes” and they “never tried to rein (the newcomers in”. In fact, they “were given carte blanche … (and) whatever (they) scribbled would be printed unedited” (2010, p. 137). The resulting “biting ‘new journalist’ prose” of the new NME came to define the British music journalism of mid- 1970s (Shuker: 2001). Nevertheless, in the latter half of the seventies, a new musical genre appeared – punk rock – and it would again attract its own characteristic style of reporting.

2.9 Punk Fanzines To put it simply, fanzines, as the word implies, are music magazines written and produced by music fans. There were several popular fanzines in the 1960s, most notably Crawdaddy and ZigZag, which later evolved into a full-fledged music magazine. The late 1970s, then, saw a renewed popularity of fanzines inspired by the DIY attitude associated with punk rock music. According to Atton (2010):

“Fanzines typically exist to cater to the particular enthusiasms of their writers and readers, presenting either the work of a specific artist or group (and related endeavours) or the activity within a specific genre or local ‘scene.’“ (p. 524)

As Simonelli (2002) describes, punk fanzines were started as “alternative music magazines” by fans who were “disgusted with the lack of coverage of their favourite bands in the censored national press” (p. 136-137). The established music press in Britain initially rejected punk rock as a gimmick, and punk in return defined itself against the music royalty and hero worship these magazines purported. Interestingly, Reddington (2012) concludes that this early distaste for punk was fuelled by the “discomfort (of) the hippy generation (with) the realization that they had now become the establishment” (p. 52). Reddington further quotes Caroline Coon, Melody Maker’s designated punk specialist, and her comments on the “difficulties she had in persuading her colleagues” about the merits of punk: “… not only I was a woman (and therefore they weren’t taking me seriously), but I was telling them there was something quite threatening occurring. I thought this was going to be the new defining counterculture, which was coming after hippies; it was the cultural dialectic, the reaction against the perceived failure of hippiedom.” (p. 52)

Eventually, the press gave in and opened up to punk. The NME, relatively recently rejuvenated, was the most inclined to accept punk and famously advertised for “two young gunslingers” who would be the paper’s punk correspondents, thereby attracting Tony Parsons and Julie Burchill into joining their ranks (“New Musical Express.”). As Reddington (2012) observes, other “papers followed suit”, and eventually, Melody Maker and Sounds would also start to cover punk frequently (p. 174).

In the meantime, a range of fanzines dedicated to punk had a chance to bloom, characterised by a stripped-down, blunt, and unadorned style of writing and layout. Atton (2010) argues that this stylistic simplicity was a “reaction against professionalism and a refusal to accord to the conventions of magazine layout and design.” Atton then lists the typical features of a fanzine: “the use of stenciled lettering or Letraset type for headlines; primitive cut-and-paste page layouts based on typewritten (not typeset) copy; articles photocopied from newspapers and magazines; photocopied photographs (rather than half-tone reproductions); and the use of handwritten copy among a variety of typefaces” (p. 518)

This visual mayhem can be seen as symptomatic of the writers’ “fervour” and almost “religious” passion for the music, as Shuker (2001) characterises it. The writing has an “energy”, he says, that “reflected the vitality of live performances” (p. 89). The most important feature of punk music and punk fanzines was the importance placed on “community, especially in the fans’ oneness with musicians” (Simonelli: 2002, p. 136-137). Essentially, everyone was encouraged to join in. This idea was supported, for instance, by one of the most notable punk fanzines, the London-based Sniffin’ Glue, written by Mark Perry. The magazines were kept simple enough that anyone could try to create their own.

2.10 The Eighties and Commercialization Post-punk era brings another change in music industry at the beginning of 1980s. The British music magazines, Shuker (2001) explains, started to gradually concentrate more on the general 11 lifestyle and “cultural phenomena” surrounding music (p. 93). Shuker next illustrates in more detail how several of the magazines, newly formed in the 1980s, conformed to this trend. Firstly, there were style magazines, such as the popular eighties magazine The Face (now defunct). Secondly, there were various types of “glossy magazines”, as Shuker calls them. Launched in 1986, Q magazine is a glossy magazine aimed mainly at middle-aged men with interest in mainstream and classic rock. Its success lies, according to Reynolds (1990), in its very equable, “non-confrontational” style, as contrasted with the “critic-as-star … self- indulgence” of the NME (in Shuker: 2001). Other than that, there were the “teen glossies”, such as Smash Hits, targeting teenage readers. Similarly to teen magazines of the 1960s, the content of teen glossies would also be devoted to features on pop stars, with abundance of photographs and posters. The popularity of Heavy Metal in the 1980s resulted in an emergence of a number of Metal-oriented magazines, most notably amongst these the Kerrang! and Metal Hammer. Shuker actually goes on to compare some of these Heavy Metal glossies to a boys’ version of teen glossies, taking into consideration its “emphasis upon the performer(s) and their pictorial representation” (p. 90-93).

Faced with this competition, many of the established music magazines seemed to struggle financially. The former British frontrunners, Melody Maker and the NME responded by focusing mostly on the indie music (“Melody Maker.”), with NME still cultivating its roster of “personality” journalists, such as “quirky” Paul Morley and “obdurate(ly) incoheren(t)” Ian Penman (“New Musical Express.”). The American Rolling Stone grew to include more film and fashion-related content in the 1980s (“Rolling Stone.”). In general, this incorporation of “lifestyle”-oriented features in music magazines is seen as a symptom of a certain commercialization of the music press, which seemingly escalated in 1980s and increased the “’corporate … conservatism’ in the British music press” (Forde: 2001, Hill: 2006). These commercial issues carried over to the following decade.

2.11 1990s and Commercial Struggles These trend further intensified in the 1990s, as the quick spread of the internet, critics argue, pushed the publishing industry into a crisis and multiple music publications, particularly genre- oriented, were discontinued (Forde: 2006, p. 286-287). Melody Maker, for example, spent the decade slowly declining and eventually “merging with the New Musical Express” (“Melody Maker.”). The NME continued building its position as the premium indie paper. It also reconstructed its format to resemble the glossy papers to an extent (“New Musical Express.”). By the 1990s, the public perception of the Rolling Stone magazine turned around. Once a trendsetter of youth culture, it eventually ended up being viewed as a conservative “aging rock bible” (Pompper et al: 2009, 276), catering to middle-aged classic rock fans.

2.12 2000s and webzines However vilified, the internet also provides a new opportunity for the next revolution in rock music reporting in platforms such as reviews blogs and webzines. For instance, the indie webzine Pitchfork has become a household name in the recent years. In her article, Mahoney (2009) describes the positives of Pitchfork:

“a daily internet publication known primarily for its reviews of albums from independent artists, which combine intensely well-informed music critiques, a blizzard of obscure pop-cultural references and a blunt writing style that remains unhindered by the rules governing print journalism. It is not, in other words, your parents' music magazine”

With a rather wide reach for a ‘zine’, the Pitchfork today seems to command more influence over its readership than the former industry front runner, the Rolling Stone magazine, which has been gradually falling into irrelevance.

2.13 Rock Journalism: Controversial Issues Throughout the historical development of rock journalism, there has been recurring issues that the various publications have been criticized for.

2.13.1 Issue: Commercialism There seems to be a debate on how objective and critical rock journalism really is, or if its prevailing role is to serve as a promotion tool to the featured artists (and the company that stands behind them). As Forde (2006) notes, “the music press is directly economically-dependent upon the music industry through advertising, free review material and press junkets” which gives the industry the superior role (p. 287). As Powers (2011) explains, journalism’s and music industry’s financial successes started escalating simultaneously and would reinforce each other. Subsequently, large companies would become more interested in the music industry, and eventually the market would grow so competitive that “only colossal success could buoy the investments sunk in unsuccessful recordings”. This would propel the industry players’ willingness to feed the media hype over their clients and to try to manipulate the press in their favour (p. 205-206). Both the journalists and the record labels have a financial interest and motivation to cooperate with one another.

2.13.2 Issues: Elitism Another traditional issue of rock journalism is its tendency towards music elitism and extreme eclecticism. One of the roles of rock critics, Shuker (2001) claims, is to act as “gatekeepers and arbiters of taste” (p. 83), and the whole genre of rock journalism serves to: “defin(e) the reference points, the highs and lows in the development of ‘rock’ and other styles of popular music. (Journalists) imbue particular performers, genres, and recordings with meaning and value, and even their internecine arguments strengthen an artist or record’s claim to being part of a selective tradition. (p. 97-98)

Frith (1996) further explains that the music critics not only influence the music and musicians, but also their readership. Their aim, Frith says, is to form a “knowing community” of readers/music fans, “superior to the mainstream culture” (qtd. in Shepherd: 2011, p. 4). Or, as he explains more succinctly, “criticism … is not just producing a version of the music for the reader but also a version of the listener for the music” (qtd. in Hill: 2006, p. 191). This tendency to groom audiences is reflected in the frequent use of abstract literary language, specialist

13 terminology and obscure references, which can collectively make the reviews difficult to comprehend, the theorists agree.

2.13.3 Issues: Nostalgia It has been frequently suggested that music magazines are biased towards the white male baby- boomer music view, with classic rock of the 1960s and 70s being promoted as the pop music peek. Shepherd (2011), for instance, convincingly argues that mainstream music journalism uses this bias to prevent being rendered obsolete by new genres/styles and to “create hierarchies (of music genres)” and “maintain (its) belief in (its) supremacy over all other constituent genres of popular music” (p. 2-4). Shepherd lists the following nostalgic strategies as being the most prominent: “propagating a fixation with canonical rock music”, over-reliance on the related “narrative tropes of nostalgia and authenticity”, using genre terminology to “categorize musical styles”, preferring “new ‘retro’ sounding rock music” and defining new music as derivative of “canonical music”. On top of that, she mentions the tendency of main rock magazines to compile “countless ‘best-of’ critics and readers’ polls, all of which overwhelmingly valorise pre-1980s rock music” (p. 2-4). Bannister (2006) supports this claim, explaining that: Lists of the ‘top’ albums, singles, singers or artists were increasingly common in … rock media (NME, Rolling Stone, Q, Mojo). They are also examples of connoisseurship and canonism. … Western canonism is often critiqued as representing a ‘privileged, elite group of white male critics’ (…) (Childers and Hentzi, 1995, p. 37). Canon-related practices such as archivalism are not simply a cataloguing of the past – they are political and selective. … canon provides a means of proving intellectual superiority. (p. 127)

2.13.4 Issue: Authenticity One of the most elusive issues when it comes to correctly expressing its nature, authenticity is one of the most highly valued qualities in music reviews. It is also highly subjective, and therefore its ascription to individual artist seems often biased. Overall, the genre’s preoccupation with it is on itself biased, as it may seem as an arbitrary quality. Weisethaunet (2010) implies that this obsession with authenticity was inherited by rock journalism from the folk movement (where it revolved, among other conflicting ideas, around Bob Dylan’s “betrayal of folk”) and the disputes over commercialism in jazz music circles (p. 470). Whatever the source, authenticity seems to be a mainstay of rock music criticism.

3. Literature Review There is a range of resources to form a basis for a study on music journalism, including theory books, journals and encyclopaedias. However, most of these works tend to rather focus on music history, sociology and cultural studies-oriented questions, or on music theory and interpretation. The research into the linguistic aspects and analysis of music press is not as readily available.

Among the most crucial studies of music interpretation theory are Keith Negus’s Popular Music in Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996), as well as Simon Frith’s important work Sound Effects (New York: Pantheon Books, 1983) and Roy Shuker’s Understanding Popular Music (London: Routledge, 2001), all of which engage in music analysis from socio-cultural perspective. Shuker also authored the equally informative Key Concepts in Popular Music (London: Routledge, 1998), for which he compiled an extensive list of bibliography that can be used as a comprehensive guide into the research of music journalism.

One of the most reliable sources for academic discussions on popular music is the journal Popular Music and Society, which was founded in 1971 by R. Serge Denisoff (formerly of Rolling Stone magazine) and Ray Browne. It offers a collection of reviews, opinions and scholarly essays and research (Plasketes, p. 136-137). Out of the articles published in the journal, Weisethaunet and Lindberg’s “Authenticity Revisited” (2010) deals with the issue of the ambiguity and arbitrariness of the popular music journalist concept, “authenticity”, and thus informed the interest in detecting bias in music articles in this thesis. Laing’s “The World's Best Rock Read” (2010) then describes the situation of music magazines between the late 1970s and 1990s, and helps the reader understand some of the reasons behind the issue of commercialism in music journalism. “The British Press and the Beatles” by Ian Inglis explains the state of music coverage in the early 1960s and the birth of specialised pop music magazines. Powers wrote an interesting peace on media manipulation, commercialised tendencies and the related phenomenon of “hype-building” in “Bruce Springsteen, Rock Criticism, and the Music Business: Towards a Theory and History of Hype” (2011). Atton’s “Popular Music Fanzines” (2010) naturally offered some background on the genre of fanzines and its characteristics. The collective essay by Schmutz et al about the “Change and Continuity in Newspaper Coverage of Popular Music since 1955” (2010) also provided some valuable information about the importance and social/cultural impact of rock music reporting. Finally, B. Lee Cooper’s “Rock Journalists and Music Critics” (2010) is yet another helpful bibliography collection.

Several contributions to the Popular Music History journal were also consulted to form a background knowledge for this thesis. Hill’s “Narratives of consumption in the UK music press in the 1980s” (2006) gives some insights into music journalism theory and overview of the research and arguments in that area. Forde’s “Conflict and collaboration” (2006) is another discussion of the effects of commercialization of the press in 1990s. “Down beats and rolling stones” by Matt Brennan (2006) explains in detail the influence of jazz magazines on popular music press, in particular the Rolling Stone magazine, as well as the history behind the foundation of the Rolling Stone.

Furthermore, James Henke also characterizes the Rolling Stone magazine and its inner workings in the Journal of Popular Music Studies. In the same journal, Brooks’ “Popular Music Studies in the New Millennium” gives an overview of some of the notable music critics’ style and of the critical approaches to music analysis. A debate on punk representation in media can be found in Simonelli’s “Anarchy, Pop and Violence” (Contemporary British History, 2002). Pompper et al (2009) focus on some of the problematic issues and controversies in the genre of music magazines, with a particular focus on the Rolling Stone, in “Nearly Four Decades of Gender and Ethnicity on the Cover of the Rolling Stone Magazine” (Journal of Popular Culture). Shepherd’s article “Rock Critics as ‘Mouldy Modernists’” in the PORTAL Journal of Multidisciplinary International Studies (2011) is a great inspiration to focus on the issue of nostalgia bias in the music reviews. Lastly, Taylor’s short article for New Statesman (2010) illustrates further some facts about several of the most notable music critics and their writing style. Among the sources that helped to inform the overview of the evolution of rock journalism is also the comprehensive guide on pop music and culture, Roy Shuker’s Understanding Popular Music (2001). In particular, the chapter ‘On the cover of the Rolling Stone,’ which focuses on rock journalism, provides a valuable summative overview of the history of the genre and a relatively detailed discussion on some of its sub-genres. The autobiography of Nick Kent, one of the most prominent and influential rock critics on the 1970s, titled Apathy for the Devil (2010), offered not only a great insight into the world of rock journalism, but also some useful details concerning the inner workings of music press, as well as an understanding of the given era of the evolution of rock music and journalism from a contemporary witness. Elijah Wald’s “alternative” look at pop music history, How the Beatles Destroyed Rock ‘n’ roll (2009) also provided some helpful information on the culture surrounding rock music and rock journalism, particularly in the USA. Helen Reddington’s work on the role of women in rock music, The Lost Women of Rock Music (2012) contains some interesting information on the state of the music press at the time punk music exploded in popularity in the late 1970s, and it also explains some of the issues the mainstream publications had with the genre, when discussing the portrayal of women in music media. Lastly, the encyclopaedic entries on the specific rock music publications available at Oxford Music Online website include some incredibly helpful and concise information on the history of rock journalism. These provided some crucial information that enabled an understanding of the specific characteristic features of some of the individual prominent publications, particularly the Melody Maker, Rolling Stone and New Musical Express.

The basic foundation of the research for this study was the critical work on the language of the media in general. Among the literature on the genre of journalism, the most useful for framing the focus of this study were Stuart Allan’s News Culture (2010) and Roger Fowler’s Language in the News (1991). In News Culture, it was particularly Allan’s definition of the “formalized” set of “distinctive elements” which characterize news items that influenced the formation of the framework for the present study. Among these features, Allan lists the “regular usage of certain types of stylistic devices, including metaphors, jargon, euphemisms, puns and clichés” and he continues to explain the preference of tabloid journalism to use “colloquial … vocabulary and emotive … judgement

(often to the point of being sensational in tone)” (p. 101). This study will therefore observe whether music magazine tend to adhere more to tabloid style of vocabulary use. Allan also describes the use of various types of “address” in articles in order to “refer to, or identify, different news actors” and how it can “indicate a range of important features, including varying degrees of formality (…), the status or power to be attributed to the actor (…) or the presumed relationship between the actor and the implied reader” (p. 101-102). As a result, this study also discusses the ways of addressing the reader in the music reviews. Furthermore, Allan also comments on the issue of commercial influences in journalism, mentioning its “institutional bias” and the influence of “political and corporate” industry players, as well as advertising (p. 19 – 20). This analysis lead to the present study also considering (to a certain point) the extent of commercialism in music journalism. Lastly, Allan also explains the phenomenon of “tabloidization” in journalism, namely the “privileging of scandal, gossip, celebrity and sports over and above politics and economics” (p. 260). Applying these findings on music journalism, this study will also observe if the reviews use any of these “populist strategies” and turn more towards celebrity and lifestyle focus content instead of strictly devoting itself to music.

Moving on to Fowler, his Language in the News (1991) provides a useful run-down of “news values” that helped establish some of the research aims of this study. In particular, this study was influenced by Fowler’s interpretation of the “culture-bound” values in news, i.e. “references to elite nations, elite people, persons, and to something negative” as “prejudicial cultural stereotype”. Fowler claims that the media’s focus on certain subjects essentially prescribes the readers’ opinions (what they should be interested in and with whom should they “identify”). Fowler also implies the use of personal pronouns as means of manipulating readers’ beliefs and attitudes, which is also one of the studied features of this thesis (p. 14-17).

The linguistic analysis of the language of music reviews in this study was largely based on the collection of studies on the so-called review genres, Academic Evaluation (Hyland, Diani: 2009). Focusing exclusively on the academic setting, Academic Evaluation nevertheless provides a general definition of evaluation as “the expression of personal opinions and assessments” that presents “a ubiquitous feature of human interaction” (p. 1). Hyland and Diani, in their introduction, describe the possible realizations of evaluation, which would inform this this study to also concern itself with the issue, specifically the use of special lexis, adjectives, and adverbs to express evaluation and whether this appraisal was “inscribed” or “evoked” (p. 5-6). Moreover, the analysis of evaluative adjectives in music reviews carried out in this study directly follows Giannoni’s study in Academic Evaluation, particularly the classification of the polarity of adjectives and how it is ascribed (p. 20-21). The present study also shares similar goals with Thompson’s study in Academic Evaluation, and similarly also observes the “patterns” in which specific parts of speech “in the corpus appear” in order to discover the “distinctive” features and “ rhetorical strategies” of the genre (p. 50). The present analysis also studies the rhetorical organization of reviews into individual “moves”, similarly to Gea-Valor and Ros’s study in Academic Evaluation, whose work also helped to focus the analysis in this study.

Even more critical for this study was the analysis of “the rhetorical structure” and its “communicative goal” of reviews by Motta-Roth in “Discourse Analysis and Academic Book Reviews” (1998). Motta-Roth identifies four “rhetorical moves” in book reviews and describes their respective “sub-functions” (p. 29-35). It was inferred that music reviews would follow a corresponding rhetorical organization. This thesis would therefore observe if the rhetorical moves in music reviews serve similar communicative functions.

4. Research Aims The aim of this study is to outline a general overview of the language of music journalism. More specifically, the main objective is to explore the characteristic features of the genre and their historical development through a language analysis of its sub-genre, music reviews. In that respect, the overall aim is to describe the most prominent linguistic features of music reviews and how these evolved since the 1960s. The desired outcomes of the analysis, on those grounds, would be a summative characterization of the language of music reviews and a general commentary on some of its stylistic and rhetorical features (including formality, objectivity, and language of fiction).

The present study is focused on music reviews selected from some of the most notable Anglo- American music papers and magazines. The chief research aims of the music reviews analysis itself are: to assess the rhetorical organization of music reviews; to carry out a linguistic analysis of the interpretative language (figurative language, formal/informal language, and music slang), the language of evaluation (its realization in adjectives); and to examine the presence of various biases in music reviews.

A music review usually tends to follow a set structure of rhetorical moves, generally in accordance with the traditional conventions of an art critique. Inglis describes an art critique as a sequence of three basic moves, starting with the “descriptive” one, in which the subject is introduced and given the “context of the current cultural zeitgeist”, the “interpretative,” where the content is explained to the audience, and the “evaluative,” in which “the reviewer makes a recommendation about the work, or at least enables readers to make a judgement” (Inglis: 2010, p. 557). The sub-aims then are to observe whether the reviews follow this proposed pattern of moves and if they adhere to the characteristics given by researchers. Additionally, when focusing on the individual rhetorical moves, the aim is to investigate their complexity and level of detail as well as to determine which moves are prevalent in the text as a whole.

Considering the descriptive move, the aim is to discover what type of information is revealed in music reviews and how extensive it is. The assumption is that a predominance of informative facts in reviews is more typical of older style of music reviewing while modern reviews should focus more on interpretation and evaluation. With regard to the interpretative move, the aim is to discover what type of interpretative language reviewers tend to prefer and if there is a common framework of reference the journalists use. Another aim was to find out to what extent is the figurative language is present in music reviews. The tendency to incorporate literary language is related to the issues of objectivity, elitism, and influence of New Journalism in music journalism that researchers often discuss. Regarding formality of the language, another aim is to study the presence and frequency of highly formal as well as highly informal language in music reviews. As for the evaluative move, the aim is to establish how evaluation is realized in music reviews. Specifically, it is intended to observe the use of adjectives in the evaluative aspects of music reviews and how the evaluative value in adjectives is achieved.

The research on rock journalism suggests that there are several problematic issues present in music reviews, related mostly to various forms of bias. The basic aim is to identify these issues in the texts and to demonstrate their historical progress.

Firstly, it is the issue of commercialism. While a reviewer usually seems to be expected to provide an objective critique of the record, the researchers proved that there is a strong tie between music press and music industry and journalists may therefore have personal interest in promoting the artists and their work (as in Forde: 2006, Powers: 2011). Secondly, the analysis will consider the issue of music elitism. Authors, such as Frith (1983) and Hill (2006), have discussed the tendency of music critics to use certain strategies (e.g. abstract literary language, specialist terminology and obscure references) that only dedicated readers and music fans can fully understand and that make the reviews basically “incomprehensible” to outsiders. Due to those two issues, one of the aims of this analysis is also to study the strategies that can influence the readers’ opinion – whether these might be motivated by the audience-grooming tendencies of critics (as gatekeepers of taste) or by commercial interests.

The third main controversial issue is what Shepherd calls “nostalgia rhetoric” (2011). Nostalgic bias is usually understood as an inclination by the reviewers to view the music of their adolescence as the pop music golden age, the greatness of which the modern musicians cannot reach. According to Shepherd, the following strategies are used to enforce the nostalgic bias: - “catchy terminology and genre titles to describe and categorise the sound of (…) (new) music,” - “making frequent reference to canonical music in their descriptive commentary” As a result, the last aim is to record the presence and frequency of references to “canonical” artists and of music genre terminology. The dominance of their use would imply nostalgic bias and an intent by the reviewers to frame the up-and-coming artists as derivative of, and therefore inferior to canonical musicians.

5. Methodology

For the purposes of this study, an overall corpus of eighty popular music reviews was sampled. Firstly, a sample set of recent music reviews was selected from twenty-eight currently active American and British music publications, with each country represented evenly. The aim was provide a variety in the type of a magazine, ranging from major mainstream publications to genre-specialised and independent ones. To achieve a certain unity and to streamline the set of texts, only album reviews were considered in the analysis. For that reason, single reviews, live reviews, DVD reviews and non-music reviews that usually appear in music magazines were excluded from the analysis. The total number of modern reviews collected for this study was forty, with some of the magazines being represented twice. The reviews differ in length (ranging from 70 words per article to 1080 words, with 282 words per article on average) and, to an extent, in style, as specific music genre-specialised magazines employ somewhat different strategies, i.e. the music genre influences the style of writing to a degree. A certain attempt to include a variety of artists of differing status, fame and recognition was also made, however it is difficult to judge the issue objectively. The material was assembled from magazines’ websites, in those cases where online review archives are available. For a few magazines that do not offer the online versions, scanned copies of reviews were found. The majority of reviews is consequently of a relatively recent date.

Secondly, another sample set was assembled, this time from past issues of famous Anglo- American music newspapers and magazines, dating between the years 1963 and 1997, with both countries again being represented equally. Overall, forty ‘classic’ music reviews were analysed in this second sample set, distributed evenly among the four respective decades. With this sample, as opposed to the modern reviews sample, it was attempted to rather choose the most significant and possibly the most-read music publications rather than to attempt a variety in genre. Therefore, this corpus was put together from twenty-six different publications in total, out of which some of the most influential and long-running were used multiple times. With the classic reviews, the choice of reviewed artists was intuitively targeted on the most popular artists that defined each decade, although, as the sources were more limited, some compromises had to be made. As with the modern music articles, only album reviews were included in the analysis. These reviews also vary in length, with the shortest rounding up to 50 words per article and the longest reaching 900 words. When the reviews are categorized and compared with regard to the individual decades, the articles from 1960s differ from the rest as noticeably shorter in length, averaging at 135 (214) words per article, while the other decades are characterized by reviews of approximately 380-420 words per article. The copies of the reviews were obtained from various online archives and fan-sites of individual artists (scanned copies) and from the popular collective archive of rock music journalism, Rock’s Backpages.

To put it briefly, the general research methodology applied in this study is a comparative content analysis of the sampled list of reviews. To accomplish the study aims, the text elements and components of each review were broadly distributed among the three moves of the description, interpretation and evaluation. Common characteristics and recurring features within these moves were then compiled into sub-categories. The results were then compared and contrasted

21 with regard to the publication dates (time periods the reviews date back from) in order to draw some conclusions about the historical development of the selected characteristic features.

The overall full analysis consisted of three main steps – the analysis of modern music reviews, the analysis of classic music reviews and the analysis of adjectives and adverbs in music reviews in relation to evaluation. The individual analysis of the former two sample sets followed the same structure of sub-steps, intended to provide a general overview of the genre and to enable eventual comparison of the results. Informed by the various linguistic (and socio- cultural) studies on the genre of reviews (Martin and Jacobus: 1997, Allen: 2005, Inglis: 2010) and their structure, the analysed sample texts were assumed to follow a general schema of three rhetorical moves, that the authors call “descriptive”, “interpretative” and “evaluative”. These individual moves were subsequently explored in detail with the purpose of finding common characteristic linguistic features and communicative strategies. It was decided to analyse the sampled material manually, as many of the observed features seem to be identifiable only from context (the identification depending on individualistic approach) or can be expressed in too many possible variations that it seemed too demanding to draw up the method for computerized analysis.

In case of both the classic and the modern music reviews analysis, then, the linguistic examination of the texts started by looking closer at the descriptive move. The main objective was to find what type of information (and how detailed in its extent) is presented to the reader in order to introduce the artist and to inform the reader. The information offered in descriptive move can be used to frame and form the basis for the interpretation and evaluation of the record. The extent of informative detail is said to change over time, therefore any factual or technical information provided about the artist in question or about the reviewed record album was recorded and later categorised.

After that, as the second sub-step, the interpretative move, wherein the author interprets the music and describes the content of the reviewed album to the reader, was examined. As the move involves a translation of abstract concepts and perceptions into the text of the article, traditional literary techniques were searched for in this sub-section of the analysis. Any use of figurative language, such as metaphors, similes, personification, alliteration, etc., was registered in the analysis. Additionally, the formality of the language used was observed, specifically with regard to its being marked as either formal or informal/vulgar. On top of that, the main parts of speech - that is adverbs, adjectives, nouns and verbs - were also examined. In this sub-section, only those instances of the listed parts of speech that seemed to carry interpretative connotations were selected for consideration. Each of these word classes were recorded for both presence and frequency in the sampled texts. Where connections seemed to form, the respective parts of speech were grouped according to their semantic similarity with the aim to illustrate the most common forms of interpretative language used to describe music are.

Moreover, inspired by Shepherd’s study (2011), a close attention was paid to the use of music genre terminology and to the technique of referencing other musicians in reviews in order to categorize the reviewed artists and/or records. Both genre terminology and musician references

22 were recorded for presence and a list of all genres/musicians mentioned in the reviews was compiled, with the aim to demonstrate their presumed prevalence in the text. Related to this issue is the extent of the occurrence of music slang and terminology. The use of slang in the reviews was also recorded for presence and compiled into a list. On similar note, pop-culture references and topical allusions, which may also tend to obscure the comprehensibility of the texts, were recorded as well.

The final sub-step in the general music reviews analysis was the close examination of the evaluative move. The evaluative move involves strategies of giving appraisal (positive or negative) and of giving recommendation. Owing to that, the analysis focused on the issue of objectivity or bias in music reviews and on the effect these strategies might have on the reader. Regarding the effect on the reader, the strategies observed might be classified as manipulative, interactive and prescriptive.

First of all, attention was paid to the presence of personal pronouns and their use to refer to the author/reader of the text, which could be classified as either an interactive, manipulative or prescriptive strategy. Considering the use of first person singular (pronoun ‘I’), the assumption was that it serves to promote personal opinion and may even serve to insert the reviewer’s persona into the text (the issue of objectivity), strengthening the reviewer’s authoritative voice and thus more likely influence the reader’s opinions. Other presumption was that the use of first person plural (pronoun ‘we’) may be seen as manipulative as it imposes an opinion onto the reader, as it implies the reader shares the opinion or attitude being expressed. The use of second person (pronoun ‘you’) was then assumed, especially when used to directly address the reader, to be a manipulative strategy of targeting the audience, or to be prescribing the reader’s opinions and attitudes. In the same respect, the use of the imperative to address the reader was also noted.

Among the interactive strategies which could be used to target the audience and promote the reviewed content could also be categorized the use of exclamations and questions, the presence of which was also detected in the reviews analysis. The most obvious of the prescriptive techniques might be the use of imperatives. In the sampled texts, the use of imperatives when giving the readers instructions (on how to listen to, interpret and evaluate the record) was also counted. Several other manipulative techniques were also noted for presence, such as the use of emotionally loaded vocabulary (inherently implying affection or dislike (author’s personal opinions) for the artist/music) that also tends to impose the attitude/emotional bond onto the reader. Another such technique is the hyperbolic language, used to exaggerate the emotional impact of author’s evaluation. Finally, one more manipulative strategy, closely related to the issue of commercialism in music journalism, is the use of advertising language. What is understood as advertising language in this analysis is the use of slogans and catchphrases and other short, high-impact ‘sound-bites’ that could be equally used in the artist’s promotional campaign. Negatively charged instances of this strategy were also included in this analysis, as on the whole they have the same highly-charged impact.

Regarding the issue of objectivity and bias, some strategies that could be characterized as lacking objectivity are the tendency to make deductions about the artists’ inner motivation and

23 feelings, and the tendency to make predictions about the artists’ future or the records’ commercial success, i.e. about the behaviour of the audience, in fact. The issue of bias in music reviews was analysed with regard to the controversial issues of music journalism pointed out in previous research into the genre, as discussed in chapter on music journalism history and evolution in this study. Hence, any comments relating to ‘authenticity’, ‘anti-trendiness’, ‘mysticism’, ‘ageism’, nostalgia and ‘historical significance’ were considered as bias markers. By the term ‘authenticity’ is understood any comment implying that the artist and/or his music is real, genuine (in contrast to those who are fake, artificial and affected). Any negative references towards modern, popular trends was considered as ‘anti-trendiness’ bias. ‘Mysticism’ is used as an overall term for all the instances where musicians or music are described in terms of religion or the supernatural. Any implications that musicians are dated or too old were regarded as ‘ageism’ bias. Nostalgia bias is the tendency to over-rate the music of the past and to view modern music negatively in comparison. The term ‘historical significance’ bias is then used describe all references and comments that over-exaggerate the historical importance of the given music event or moment. All these issues are closely related and all stem from the issue of bias and music snobbism.

Following the analysis of modern and classic music reviews, the final main step was to observe the use of adjectives and adverbs as means of evaluation. Adverbs carrying evaluative connotations were briefly analysed from syntactic point of view. A set of prominent evaluative adverbs was assembled from the selected reviews and analysed according to their function as modifiers and to their position the sentence structure. The results of the use of adverbs in classic and modern reviews were then compared.

Shifting focus to adjectives, their use was examined with respect to their communicative function in the evaluative part of the reviews. The analysis of adjectives relies heavily on Giannoni’s research of evaluative acts in review genres (in Hyland, Diani: 2009). Firstly, highly-prominent adjectives with evaluative connotations were selected from the sample corpus and subsequently classified, closely following Giannoni’s schema of distribution, as either “positive”, “negative”, or “comparative” in their polarity. As a follow-up step, positively- marked adjectives were organized into groups according to their semantic connotations (what quality they seemed to praise) and transparency of their positive polarity (if the positive meaning was implied from context or not). Similarly to Giannoni, negative adjectives were discussed according to the way their polarity was achieved – either “additively” (i.e. something has bad qualities) or “detractively” (i.e. something does not have good qualities). With comparative adjectives, the question was whether they implied positive or negative polarity.

6. Description of the Sampled Texts The sampled texts collected for this thesis include a set of eighty music reviews, distributed evenly into two sub-sets, titled ‘classic’ reviews (1960s – 1990s) and ‘modern reviews’. The reviews were selected so that they would adhere to the criteria that they are specifically album reviews (excluded were singles reviews, film reviews, books reviews, etc.), they were published in American and British music papers and magazines, and they are of an adequate length (though some of the texts in the collected sample vary somewhat in length, an effort was made to choose texts that would be of similar and extremely lengthy articles were excluded). The two countries, the UK and the USA, are represented evenly in each sub-set, but several prominent publications are represented more than once.

The forty ‘classic’ music reviews were sampled from twenty-six publications altogether, with the oldest dating to 1963 and the newest coming from 1997. Each decade was represented by ten reviews, and it included ten different publications. Only two periodicals were represented in each decade (New Musical Express (UK) and Rolling Stone (US)), followed closely by two more prominent papers (Melody Maker (UK) and Billboard (US)), each being represented in three of the decades. The publications were chosen to represent the mainstream music media of the time.

Considering the articles from 1960s alone, what they have in common is their relatively short length (approximately 150-200 words per review) and the tendency to focus primarily on the basic description and evaluation of the reviewed record. As the previous research on the language of the music press implied, the interpretative move of a review was mostly insignificant. The publications sampled include British music weeklies (Melody Maker, NME, Record Mirror, and Disc), youth-oriented pop magazines (Beat Instrumental (UK) and Hit Parader (US)), and the American rock journalism front-runner, Rolling Stone, as well as a trade magazine staple, Billboard. Standing out from the rest are Jopling and Jones’ review of the Rolling Stones in a 1964 issue of the Record Mirror, which is much more detailed, describing each track on the record individually, and provides a more thorough analysis of the album than is the norm in the other reviews, and Ed Ward’s review of The Stooges’ album in the Rolling Stone (1969). Ward’s review is distinctive for its strong authoritative voice, heavy use of interactive as well as informal and vulgar language, and frequently expressed personal opinions and impressions.

The reviews from the seventies magazines are noticeably lengthier than their predecessors and they use more interpretative language on the whole. Personal opinions and attitudes are often expressed and the authors’ presence in the texts is strong in several cases. On top of that, there are also some predominantly negative reviews in this set. The set again includes British weeklies, Melody Maker, NME and Record Mirror as well as the American Rolling Stone. It also includes Rolling Stone’s American rivals, Circus, Creem and Phonograph Record. This set also includes popular British seventies’ papers, Let It Rock and the Sounds. Several prominent names of rock journalism appear in this set, including Dave Marsh, Nick Kent and Vivien Goldman.

The reviews collected from eighties’ magazines continue in most of these trends, though the authors seem slightly less invested in the texts. Despite that, the authorial voice is still strong in some of these texts, most notably in Morthland’s review of UB40 in the American Creem, Sigerson’s ode on Madonna in Rolling Stone and Savage’s highly poetic review of PIL in the British style magazine The Face. Apart from the Billboard, Melody Maker and NME, this set also includes the American Relix and New York-based Spin, as well as the newly formed British glossies, the heavy metal Kerrang! and teen mag Smash Hits.

The nineties set of music reviews includes the most balanced and uniform set of writing. The reviews generally follow the three-move rhetorical structure. There are some instances where the author’s voice seems to overwhelm the review as well, in this case notably in regards to nostalgia/ageist-related bias, most prominently in Tom Graves’ highly negative review of Paul McCartney’s Unplugged album for the American magazine, Rock & Roll Disc. Included in this set are also some of the (at the time) newly formed prominent magazines, such as the American R&B and hip hop-focused Vibe and the British Mojo, Uncut and The Wire.

The second main sub-set includes forty ‘modern’ music reviews, sampled from a range of Anglo-American music magazines. This set includes some of the mainstream music publications that feature in the ‘classic’ reviews sample set, such as the American Spin, Vibe and Rolling Stone and British Kerrang! (which is by now more of a general music magazine), Mojo, NME, Q and Uncut. To achieve a broader view of the current state of music press, some of the more specialised magazines were also sampled. This includes genre-focused publications, such as jazz/blues, roots and world music-oriented magazines Downbeat (US), Elmore Magazine (US), Offbeat (US), Blues and Soul (UK), and Songlines (UK); hip hop- centred American magazine Respect; the British Mixmag, which focuses on electronica; metal magazines, like the American Revolver and British Metal Forces and Terrorizer; and indie music-centred publications, such as Artrocker (UK), Black Velvet (UK), Under the Radar (US) and the webzine Pitchfork (US). On top of that, British style magazines Clash and Fused, and the American trade paper Music Connection are also included. Finally, some of US underground and alternative magazines are also represented, specifically Alarm, Alternative Press and Filter.

7. Results of the Analysis

As described in the Methodology chapter, forty ‘classic’ and forty modern music reviews were analysed for this study. Based on the previous research into the language of reviews, the rhetorical structure of the texts was split into three basic strategic moves: descriptive, interpretative and evaluative. Each move was subsequently examined for its characteristic textual and language features.

7.1 Modern Reviews

Firstly, the results of the analysis of forty modern music reviews were put together. Within the descriptive move, attention was first paid to the nature of the informative content (facts about the artist and the record) given in the review. It was found that the absolute majority of modern music magazines offers a general informative overview at the top of the review text. All of the reviews selected mention at least two pieces of information – the artist’s name and the record title. A vast majority of the texts (92.5%) would accompany that information with the image of the reviewed album’s cover, while 12.5 per cent run the artists’ photo alongside the text. A large number (75%) of the reviews list the record label in the informational spot. The release date is mentioned in 35 per cent of the review texts, and 12.5 per cent add information about the records’ format. The records’ producer is specified in five per cent of the reviews and 2.5 per cent provide a download link or audio sample.

Heading All Classic Modern 60s 70s 80s 90s Artist 100 100 100 100 100 100 Album name 97,5 90 100 100 100 100

Album cover 32,5 30 -- 20 20 92,5 Label 65 80 60 70 50 75 Producer 5 -- -- 10 10 5 Release date ------35 Artist photo 10 20 20 10 12,5 Format 5 10 -- -- 10 12,5 Download ------2,5 links Matrix 22,5 30 20 20 20 -- number Tracks list 7,5 30 ------Figure 1. Information listed in review’s heading (per cent)

Additional information about the artist is revealed throughout the text of the review. Quite often, the article states the artists’ nationality, native country or city (found in 62.5% of the reviews). Sometimes, the number of band members is specifically cited (in 30% of the reviews) and their actual names might be listed (in 48% of the reviews). A few reviews (10%) may quote the artist at some point in the text. Many reviews also tend to sum up the artists’ career in a brief overview

27 or they pinpoint some notable moments in the artists’ career trajectory. Most often, the artists’ previous work is recalled (in 32.5% of the reviews). Other than that, the reviews may detail the artists’ collaborations with other musicians and side projects (in 25% of the reviews) – e.g. ‘(band), his past collaboration with…’ or ‘anyone familiar with (artist)’s work in (band) knows that…’ - or they may comment upon their popularity or critical reception (20% of the reviews). Some of the reviews indicate the length of the artists’ career (17.5%) – e.g. ‘with a career spanning more than two decades’ - while a few hint towards their career break-through moments (12.5%) – e.g. ‘he landed a gig as one of (famous artist)’s backup singers’ - or music career beginnings (10% of the reviews) – e.g. ‘having spent his childhood on the road singing gospel music with his mother’. Several of the reviews quote a well-known fact about the artists (the artists’ trademark of sorts; noted in 12.5% of the reviews) – e.g. ‘their signature customised grits and gravy’ and ‘attributes they are known for’ - or a lesser known fun-fact (5%) – e.g. ‘(song) is the band’s tribute to … promoter … who gave them their first break’. In a few instances, the reviews make hints or add gossipy comments reminiscent of tabloid-style journalism (12.5%) – e.g. ‘(artist) became a dad … breaking up with his partner almost a year later’, ‘I will spare you with the whole “Is he singing to (artist’s girlfriend)???’ and ‘She dated rapper (name) and is currently seeing Lakers’ basketball player (name)’.

Concerning the descriptive information about the reviewed album itself, almost half of the reviews (47.5%) introduce the album by indicating its numeral position in the artists’ release history. Equally as many take note of the instruments used on the record (47.5%). The musician guest appearances featuring on the album are noted in 32.5 per cent of the reviews. Some of the reviews (22.5%) provide further details about the creative process behind the albums’ conception on top of that – e.g. ‘a tune that came about whilst consulting and engaging with their fans on Facebook’ and ‘(artist) listened to (other musician) repeatedly in the writing period prior to the recording’. While only 12.5 per cent of the texts records the overall number of tracks on the record, the majority (52.5%) mentions at least some of the songs by their title. Several texts then incorporate a quotation of some of the lyrics in the review (22.5%). Only a few reviews give the information about the length of the songs (15%), usually only when it is considered excessive or otherwise negative, and just one review of the sampled forty cites the album’s overall run time. Some of the reviews try to introduce the artist and/or the record by categorising them into a genre, either by simply stating or describing the genre (30% of the reviews), by referring to other artists (10%), by referring to a place (7.5%), by creating an atmosphere (5%) or by referring to some expected past knowledge (2.5%). Another possibility is to define the genre contrasting it with another genre/musician (2.5% of the reviews). The overall majority of the reviews assign the record a score or rating (67.5%). The two equally popular rating techniques are either a scale from 1 to 10 points (used in 32.5% of the reviews), or the 1-to-5 rating scale (in 32.5%). One publication favours a 1-to-10-points scale with decimal system scores. Lastly, some reviewers prefer to end or to frame their articles with some extra additional pieces of information: quite often it is a particular song recommendation (22.5% of the reviews), a song sample or download link (17.5%), or another (similar) artist recommendation (7.5% of the texts).

The analysis subsequently shifted to the interpretative move in music reviews wherein the presence of literary techniques and other stylistic features was scored. First focusing on the use of figurative language, most reviews (70%) were found to employ metaphors, sometimes verging on conceits, as well as common idioms to translate the reviewed music to readers (with approximately 2 metaphors per review). There is also some use of comparisons and similes (12.5%) – e.g. ‘howlin’ … like a Dixie bloodhound moaning at the moon’ and ‘(song) sounds like a school bus falling into a ravine’ – personification (12.5%), alliteration and rhyme (15%) – e.g. ‘wacked out warbling whopping … track’, ‘platter full of strut and swagger’ and ‘pop’s most privileged princesses’ - and puns (2.5%) – e.g. ‘focused less on history, more on his story’. In addition, some music critics tend to turn the song lyrics into a narrative, turning the album into a story about the music artist (in 10% of the reviews). There is a relatively high frequency of poetic and formal language (in 42.5%, 1.1 item per review) – e.g. ‘précis’, ‘onerous’, and ‘bespoke’ - being mixed with vulgar or informal language and popular slang (in 50% of the reviews, 1.2 item per review) – e.g. ‘swagger’, ‘mind fuck’, and ‘twerkability’.

As part of the interpretative move analysis, some attention was also focused on the use of adverbs, noun phrases, adjectives and verbs. In seventy-five per cent of the reviews, adverbs appear quite prominently (2.8 items per review). Verbs achieve similar numbers in frequency, with 67.5 per cent of the texts using verbs in a somewhat lyrical or poetic way (3.2 items per review). Music is ascribed the qualities of liquids (e.g. music ‘washes over you’, you ‘immerse’ yourself in music), of movement (e.g. album ‘meanders’, songs ‘lurk’, and things are ‘riding into guitar hell’), or is described as ‘raging’, or given other human emotions. Most reviews (95%) use more or less complex noun phrases while interpreting the artists’ music (7.8 items per review). Music is often described as a blend (e.g. a ‘mishmash’, a ‘collage’, a ‘confluence’, a ‘merger’ and a ‘synthesis’), but can also be characterized in terms of classical music (e.g. an ‘ode’, a ‘symphony’ and an ‘anthem’), in literary forms (e.g. a ‘commentary’, a ‘critique’ and an ‘epic’) and art (e.g. a ‘portrait’). It can be compared to a journey (e.g. an ‘odyssey’ and an ‘adventure’) or even as an attack on the listener (e.g. a ‘guitar attack’, a ‘threat to listener’s aural health’ and a ‘sonic assault’). In music reviews, music can also have ‘texture’, ‘depth’, ‘surfaces’ and ‘edges’. Finally, the use of adjectives is understandably the most prevalent, as all the sampled reviews use adjectives as means of interpretation quite prominently (100%, 16 items per review). There is a tendency to interpret music in terms of sexuality or attractiveness (e.g. ‘seductive bass lines’ and ‘hot trumpet’), taste (e.g. ‘flavourful brass sections’), human qualities (e.g. ‘defiant guitar’, ‘sensitive music’, and ‘moody song’), surface (e.g. ‘polished sound’, ‘silky falsetto’, ‘smooth jazz’, ‘sparkly on top’ song, and ‘shimmering chasm’ of song), and horror (e.g. ‘fearsome tracks’, ‘sinister melodies’, ‘disturbing beauty’ and ‘scary and sadistic’ song).

A very common method of describing and interpreting music in music magazines is via references to other artists. Of the sampled texts, 82.5 per cent use such references in the review (3.6 items per review). These references function to either simply define the artist and their music by pointing out their similarity to other artists (with phrases such as, ‘sounds like…’, ‘is reminiscent of…’, ‘recalls…’, ‘resembling…’, and ‘captures the (quality) of…’). Sometimes, the references seem to imply that the artist was influenced by the other musician (using phrases

29 as ‘influenced by…’, ‘(artist)-inspired song’, ‘indebted to…’, and ‘a nod/tribute/shout out to…’). Sometimes, the referenced artists’ names are turned into modifiers or proper adjectives, by adding suffixes like ‘the (artist)-ish…’, ‘(artist)-style…’, ‘(artist)y…’, ‘(artist)-esque…’, and ‘(artist)-like’, or using phrases such as ‘in a (artist) type fashion’ or ‘with the (artist) feel’. Quite often, it would be implied that the reviewed artist mixes several influences together, using phrases as ‘fuse (artist) with (artist)’, ‘it is (artist) meets (artist)’, ‘a sound part (artist), part (artist)’ and ‘morphing a (artist) snarl into tender (artist) croon’. In a few instances, a more elaborate comparisons are drawn, with phrases like ‘tracks that would make (artist) proud’, ‘they head into (artist) territory’, and ‘it belongs on (artist’s album)’. Altogether, such comparative references are used in 77.5 per cent of the sampled reviews (2.7 items per review). In some cases, other musicians, who collaborated with the reviewed artist, seem to be name- checked mostly to raise the reviewed artist pedigree in readers’ eyes (essentially “namedropping” other musicians) so that they would earn respectability and credibility by association. Such artist references are observed in twenty-five per cent of the reviews (0.9 item per review). Overall, at least 117 individual musicians or bands are referenced in the sampled texts (3 items per review). Moreover, musicians are also often identified and categorised using an elaborate vocabulary of music genres and their combinations. In the forty music reviews sampled, eighty different music genres are mentioned (2.8 items per review). On top of that, music reviewers sometimes use specialised music slang and expert terminology - e.g. ‘riffs’, ‘licks’, and ‘grooves’ - and relatively obscure music references. In the analysis, thirty-three slang terms were found (1.2 items per review). Lastly, references to popular culture and social issues – e.g. ‘Glastonbury’, ‘financial crisis’ and ‘soccer hooligans’ - were detected in the selected corpus in thirty per cent of the texts.

The last step of the modern reviews analysis was centred on the evaluative move in music reviews. The focus was placed on some aspects of reader manipulation found in the reviewers’ appraisal and recommendation of the record at the end of the review. The use of personal pronouns to refer to the author of the text and to the reader were first considered among the techniques that can be used to influence the readers’ opinions and behaviour. Only ten per cent of the reviews were found to use the pronoun ‘I’ to give personal opinions – e.g. ‘my favourite tracks being…’ and ‘personally, if I were (band) I’d have opted for…’ – and another fifteen per cent feature first-person plural sentences, implying the inclusion of the reader in the opinion expressed – e.g. ‘we had high hopes you (artist) could…’ and ‘as we all know’. There is a slightly higher frequency of using the pronoun ‘you’ to refer to the reader (27.5%). It could be argued that approximately twenty-four percent of those are more or less impersonal (e.g. ‘(it is) disjointed from what you hear at the beginning’), but twenty-one per cent seem more manipulative, ascribing the opinion to the reader (e.g. ‘(it) will leave a cheeky smile on your face’ and ‘you will be unable to ignore…’). A direct addressing of the reader is found in thirty- four per cent of the reviews (e.g. ‘as you can tell I’m … bowled over, you will be too’) and twenty-one per cent use imperative sentences (e.g. ‘let this one shake the house’ and ‘just listen to her previous work’).

Other forms of interactive language are the uses of exclamations (in 5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘that must be a first!’ and ‘amen on that…’) and of questions (in 12.5% of the texts, e.g. ‘what

30 do (genres) have in common?’, ‘can you decipher…?’ and ‘a perfect sample of … zeitgeist or an artist flailing around…?’). Some reviews seemingly tend to draw conclusions and deductions about the artists’ feelings and attitudes (in 10% of the texts, e.g. ‘it’s obvious that (she) was trying to appeal to wider audience’), or make predictions about the artists’ or the albums’ future (in 10% of the reviews, e.g. ‘these boys have a bespoke future ahead of them’), or they give instructions how to listen to the record (in 5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘forgo the headphones’). Other strategies that might sway the readers’ opinions are the use of quite emotionally loaded vocabulary, imposing an affection on the reader (in 7.5% of the reviews, e.g. using ‘these boys’ to refer to the musicians), the use of hyperbolic language and exaggeration (in 15% of the texts, e.g. ‘it is a huge album’ and ‘it shows a touch of magic’) and, most predominantly, the use of advertising-style phrasings and slogan-like statements, which might be the most ostentatious method of endorsement in music reviews (in 60% of the reviews, e.g. ‘(artist) is the cure for … country hangover’, ‘(album) could be exactly what’s missing in your life’, ‘buy it: it’ll brighten up your winter no end’ and ‘Prepare to fall in love all over again’).

As far as bias in the music reviews is concerned, there were a few instances of comments presumably biased towards the over-insistence on “authenticity” of the music/musician (10% of the reviews, e.g. ‘it’s so real that it’s painful’), as well as a few dismissive references towards popular trends (10% of the texts, e.g. ‘the clichéd disco trend’ and ‘(artists’) name might make one worry about the pop-culture trend of Z-suffixed band names’). A few overstated comments bordering on “mysticism” (15% of the texts, e.g. ‘this is a beast’ and ‘super god (musician)’) and manufacturing historical importance (5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘his Big Pop Moment’) were noted in the analysis. Only a few quotes though could be objectively considered as a nostalgic bias (7.5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘modern death metal has a long, long way to go before it occupies the same planet … as the masters who made it their own decades ago’).

7.2 Classic Reviews

Apart from the forty contemporary music reviews analysed, forty classic music reviews, dated between 1963 and 1997, were sampled for the study as the second main step of the analysis. As with the analysis of the modern articles, the linguistic analysis of classic music reviews was built on the three-part sequence of the descriptive, interpretative and evaluative moves in a review structure. The descriptive move serves to introduce the reviewed artist and the record, and to provide the reader with some background knowledge. As mentioned above, the basic overview is usually listed in the heading of the review, followed by a sub-heading or an informative paragraph or table. All the sampled reviews, understandably, open with the artists’ name and, with one exception, they also state the records’ title (97.5% of the reviews). In comparison to contemporary reviews the presence of an illustrative image is much less frequent. Only 32.5 per cent of the reviews feature the photo of the artist or the album cover. It was however found that sixty-five per cent of the reviews complete this informative section by naming the record label by which the record was released. Furthermore, the album matrix number is recorded in 22.5 per cent of the reviews and 7.5 per cent offer a full tracks list (all of

31 them are 1960s-era reviews). Only two reviews mention the producer (5% of the texts) and another two include the album format (5% of the reviews).

Some other information about the artists is offered throughout the actual text of the review. For instance, the artists’ native country or city is referenced in 42.5 per cent of the reviews (a smaller number compared to modern reviews’ 62.5%). Only twenty-nine per cent of the texts mention the number of band members, but 96.8 per cent give (at least some of) their names and thirty- five per cent identify them according to the instrument they play or their role in the band. Just four reviews (10%) embellish the text with a quote from the artist – a tendency apparently more frequent in 1990s, as three of these are from that decade. Music reviews also usually incorporate some sort of a career overview of the reviewed artist into the text. Six reviews allude to the artists’ beginnings in the music industry (15% of the reviews, e.g. ‘(artist) emerged … from the mire of mid-'60s British psychedelic music’ and ‘being signed to EMI from the age of 14’), seven point out a break-through moment in their careers (17.5% of the texts, e.g. ‘they began to attract an enormous following through their US tours’ and ‘a lowbrow dance album that becomes an international hit’) and three touch upon the length of artists’ career (7.5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘a decade-old band’ and ‘(album) is only (artists)' fifth album in 12 years’). Nine reviews discuss artists’ musical collaborations and other projects (22.5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘more listenable than the solo albums recorded by (artists)’). The most frequently mentioned facts are those referring to artists’ previous work, which appear in 60 per cent of the reviews, e.g. ‘the lyrical expertise he has demonstrated in (album) and earlier albums’ and ‘they haven’t added anything substantial to the idea since the last song on (third album)’). On top of that, music reviews also tend to comment on the public perception of the artist. In fact, forty per cent of the sampled reviews describe artists’ popularity (e.g. ‘she’s a national icon’ and ‘in America (artist) is a big star’) and in 12.5 per cent there are mentions of the critical reception of the artists’ work (e.g. ‘(song had) strong press and well-received live shows’). Among the sampled texts, forty per cent also point out some well-known facts about or characteristic features of the artist (e.g. ‘in their customary opaque way’ and ‘the wry detachment of (artist)’s singing remains a constant’), while 7.5 per cent offer some lesser known facts and trivia (e.g. ‘group whose name derives from the code on British unemployment cards’). With twenty per cent of the reviews, the nature of the extra information and personal detail shifts almost towards gossipy sensationalism (e.g. ‘his politics may not have shifted any closer to liberalism’ and ‘(artist) marries Sean Penn’).

Additional information on the record itself most commonly include the instruments used on the record (listed in 57.5% of the reviews, which is slightly more than in contemporary music reviews), the author/original performer of the song (cited in 47.5% of the reviews), and the album’s placing in the artists’ discography (in 37.5% of the reviews). Only fifteen per cent of the reviews specifically state the number of tracks on the record (which is still a little more than with the contemporary reviews, of which only 12.5% count the tracks), but 92.5 per cent identify at least some by their title in the review (which is a significantly higher number than the 52.5% of the modern reviews), though the most frequent tendency is to name at least five tracks (21.6% of the reviews, 20% of the reviews overall). Similarly to the contemporary music reviews, only three reviews point out specifically the length of the tracks (7.5%, even less than

32 contemporary reviews which add up to 15%), although unlike the contemporary reviews sampled, these mentions seem positive in their connotation. Only one review mentions the total album run time (2.5%). A relatively high number of reviews quotes some of the lyrics (55% of the reviews, even more so than with the contemporary reviews, of which 22.5% quotes the lyrics). A few reviews describe the production process behind the creation of the record (22.5% of the reviews, the same frequency as the contemporary reviews’ score). Some offer even more behind-the-scene details by listing the music guests featured on the record (12.5%).

As was found in the modern music reviews analysis, music reviews tend to define artists according to genre categorization. Of the sampled reviews, sixty-five per cent identify the genre straightforwardly by simply naming it (much higher percentage than the contemporary reviews’ 30%). Another twenty per cent imply it by referring to another artist, 12.5 per cent do so by referring to some assumed previous knowledge, 12.5 per cent by referring to a time period, ten per cent by referring to a place, five per cent by creating an atmosphere and five per cent by using contrast. While assigning a score or a rating to the reviewed record is a popular trend in modern music reviews, only 7.5 per cent of the classic reviews uses rating (two reviews use 1- 5 scale for scoring, and one uses 1-10 scale). Only fifteen per cent of the reviews recommend specific tracks to readers.

The analysis then again moved on to the interpretative move in the strategic structure of reviews. The interpretative move involves various strategies employed by the author to critically translate or characterize the record for the reader in order to enable the reader to form an opinion on the record’s content. In the analysis, the use of figurative language and literary techniques was observed. According to the results, the use of metaphors and idiomatic language is particularly frequent as ninety per cent of the reviews employ them at least to some extent (exceeding even the 70% presence in contemporary reviews) – e.g. ‘(song is) a full blooded pageant of rape and carnage’ and ‘track … is a wicked step-sister of (song)’. In regards to the differences among the time periods, 1960s reviews statistically use 2.6 instances of metaphorical language per review on average, making it the least metaphor-reliant decade. The 1970s reviews use the most metaphorical language, with 5.4 instances per review. In comparison, 1980s and 1990s reach slightly lower numbers, with 4 and 4.3 items per review respectively. Comparisons and similes are used in 27.5 per cent of the reviews, with 1970s reviews again reaching the highest percentage in presence (45% of reviews with comparisons/similes presence), e.g. ‘they play rock n’ roll like sluts’, ‘their live shows are as rare as dragon’s teeth’, and ‘(artist) is tight as a mosquito’s ass’. Personification appears in 32.5 per cent of the reviews (e.g. ‘(album) falls down with a resounding thud’ and ‘the breaths, the whoops, the groin-clutches are back and proud’), alliteration and rhyme are detectable in 12.5 per cent of the reviews (e.g. ‘clubland’s cult-crazy cognoscenti’, ‘pet poodle producers’ and ‘marriage of man and machine’) and puns occur in 22.5 per cent of the reviews (e.g. ‘album comparable to (artists’) incomparable (album)’ and ‘The words ‘club’ and ‘house’ appear on the credits about 59 times. When did golf become so hip?’). In 12.5 per cent of the reviews, the authors transform lyrics into a plot/storyline to “narrate” the album to the reader. Poetic and formal language is also prominent in the interpretative parts of music reviews – a list of 365 phrases that could characterised as poetic/formal was assembled from the forty reviews, e.g.

‘aeons’, ‘Byzantine’, and ‘paean’. The 1960s reviews appear to employ the highly marked language the least frequently, with only four instances (0.4 per review). In contrast, there are sixty-nine instances in the 1970s reviews (6.9 per review), 172 instances in 1980s (17.2 per review) and 135 instances of poetic language being used in an interpretative way in 1990s reviews (13.5 per review). The highly formal language seems often to appear contrasted with informal and vulgar language in the reviews, of which 179 instances were collected from the sample, e.g. ‘a fiver’, ‘lemme tell ya’, ‘they suck’ and ‘(artist is) a wet dream’. Informal phrases and terms appear in sixteen instances in the 1960s reviews (1.6 per review). In 1970s reviews they feature in thirty-eight instances (3.8 per review), while 1980s reviews contain sixty-eight instances of informal language (6.8 per review) and sixty-two phrases appear in 1990s reviews (6.2 per review).

The use of adjectives, adverbs, noun phrases and verbs within the interpretative and evaluative move was also analysed. Twenty-two reviews use adverbs noticeably in the interpretative move (55%), e.g. ‘album is full of frothingly pissed-off … rock’, ‘(song is) dizzyingly seductive’ and ‘(artist) solemnly tells us’. Amongst those, the 1990s reviews rate as having the highest frequency (30 instances, 3 adverbs per review). There are 268 instances of verbs being used in a noteworthy manner in music reviews (in both interpretative and evaluative moves). Often, music is discussed in terms of fire or explosion, for instance, songs are said to ‘ignite’ and notes to ‘burst out of thin air’. Guitars are described as ‘burning’ or ‘exploding’. Other times, instruments or musical elements are characterised as moving through air, as in examples such as ‘guitar skitters off’, ‘drums bounce’, ‘voice (climbs) from the floor to the ceiling’ or ‘voices slide’. Some of the synonyms for the verb ‘sing’ are to ‘spit’, ‘howl’, ‘cry’, ‘croon’, ‘drawl’ and ‘whoop and swoop’. The 1960s reviews appear to employ verbs in a poetic/descriptive way quite sparingly with only eleven instances (1.1 per review). The other decades achieve much higher numbers with eighty-nine instances in the 1970s (8.9 per review), ninety-nine instances in 1980s (9.9 per review) and sixty-nine instances of Interpretative verbs in 1990s reviews (6.9 per review). Noun phrases of varying complexity appear in 420 instances in an interpretative/evaluative function. The 1960s reviews again achieve dramatically lower counts with only 20 instances of noun phrases (2 per review). The presence of noun phrases increases gradually though – there are 72 instances in the 1970s reviews (7.2 per review), 157 in the 1980s reviews (15.7 per review) and 171 prominent noun phrases in the 1990s reviews (17.1 per review). Naturally, adjectives are used the most frequently, with 709 marked instances appearing overall. Songs are rather often described in terms of violence and evilness, e.g. ‘vicious, ‘furious’, ‘sinister’, ‘savage’ and ‘malevolent’. On the other hand, music is often characterized for its melancholia, as ‘moody’, ‘haunting’, ‘reflective’ and ‘mournful’. Other times, it is metaphorically ascribed human conditions, for instance when it is called ‘arthritic’, ‘anaemic’, ‘hysterical’ and ‘afraid of women’, as well as human qualities, e.g. when it is said to be ‘compassionate’, ‘affectionate’ and ‘sly’. When comparing the decades, the 1960s reviews contain 107 instances (10.7 items per review), ranking last of the time periods once more. The presence of noun phrases again escalates with each decade. There are 153 distinct noun phrases in 1970s reviews (15.3 per review), the 1980s reviews include 212 instances (21.2 per review) and there are 237 instances of interpretative/evaluative noun phrases featuring in the 1990s reviews (23.7 per review).

Lastly, when focusing on the evaluative move, wherein the author provides recommendation and gives evaluative judgement, some of the issues of manipulative language were observed. While making evaluative statements, the journalists may use different pronouns to refer to the author. In thirty-five per cent of the reviews, the pronoun ‘we’ is used at least once, out of which seven reviews arguably use the pronoun in a markedly manipulative manner (e.g. ‘we know this is not the boys’ next great album’ and ‘for that we all have cause to be grateful’). Even more reviews (42.5%) use the first-person singular statement at least once, either in order to express personal opinions (e.g. ‘I kind of like it’ and ‘I think the (artists) probably really believe it’) or to insert the author’s persona into the text (e.g. ‘I have a mental image of (artist) that I carry in my heart like a mother's locket. … After listening to it, I feel as though (artist) has stabbed me in that soft spot I had for him.’) and/or to narrate the process of review-writing (e.g. ‘this is actually my third attempt at writing this review’). Furthermore, sixty per cent of the reviews contain references towards the reader, predominantly by using the pronoun ‘you’, at least once. Twenty-two reviews use, it could be claimed, the pronoun generally in an impersonal way (e.g. ‘you can hear their road manager … on piano’ or ‘not your everyday sort of album’), but six reviews use direct address towards the reader (e.g. ‘I'd advise you to spend your nigh-on-a-fiver elsewhere’ and ‘ladies and gentlemen, I give you’) and 8 reviews use imperative to instruct the reader (e.g. ‘listen to last year's (album)’ and ‘rest assured he knows…’). Exclamations (used in 10% of the reviews, e.g. ‘it’s out this week!’) and questions (in 25% of reviews, e.g. ‘where has their sense of rock and roll gone?’ or ‘is there mileage in (artist) still?’) may also inadvertently lead to reader manipulation. Furthermore, emotionally loaded phrases (in 27.5% of the reviews, e.g. referring to the band as ‘the boys’, ‘the lads’ or ‘this corpse’), hyperbolic statements (in 32.5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘set the standard for a zillion future … groups’ and ‘his best single in aeons’), and advertising language (in 30% of the reviews, e.g. ‘Not your everyday sort of album, but an album for every day.’) may serve to influence the reader. Some reviewers’ use of deductions about the artists’ feelings and attitudes (in 60% of the reviews, e.g. ‘I think the (artists) probably really believe it’ and ‘I think they’ve grown tired, blasé’) and predictions (in 55% of the reviews, e.g. ‘The Beatles have proved that they are here to stay for a long, long time.’) may be seen as leading language. In some reviews, even less objective language may be used, such as instructions how to listen to the record (in 20% of the reviews, e.g. ‘listen very closely to the ending’) and direct commercial appeals to the reader (in 10% of the reviews, e.g. ‘a must for your collection’ and ‘everyone should own it’).

One of the characteristics of music reviews that is often criticized as biased is the tendency to define artists by referring to other artists. Overall, 109 artists are referenced in the forty sampled music reviews. Twenty-nine reviews (72.5%) use artist references to interpret new music, implying similarity or influence. Out of these, five are 1960s reviews (22 references in 5 reviews), six are 1970s reviews (containing 29 references), nine are 1980s reviews (39 references in 9 reviews) and nine are 1990s reviews (including 42 references). Twelve reviews further use references towards other musicians as means of adding credibility or prestige to the reviewed artist. Other technique sometimes perceived as inherently biased is using a rather complex terminology of music genres. The forty classic music reviews sampled cite forty-seven separate genres. The use of genre terminology increases gradually, with 1960s reviews collecting only ten genre mentions, while the 1970s reviews include nineteen genre mentions,

35 the 1980s articles contain twenty-nine genre mentions and finally the 1990s reviews’ genre mentions add up to thirty-eight. The fact that the forty modern music reviews use eighty different music genres implies that the trend has escalated further over time. Other strategies that may cause to obscure the transparency and comprehensibility of the reviews is the use of music slang (152 slang terms overall, used twenty-two times in the 1960s reviews, thirty-eight times in the 1970s reviews, fifty-nine times in the 1980s, eighty-seven times in the 1990s reviews) and popular culture references (45% of the reviews, e.g. to a football match between Scotland and Peru or to Ronald Reagan’s politics). Other instances of possibly biased evaluative language include: insistence on ‘authenticity’ (40% of the reviews, e.g. ‘a group which made it purely by staying on their own scene with no compromising’), criticism of the assumed lack of ‘authenticity’ (35% of the reviews, e.g. ‘this album is definitely a travesty of the spirit of rock and roll … (which) is one of vibrancy, excitement, as opposed to wimpy white covers of gutsy R&B’), accusations of amateurism/music snobism (12.5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘instrumentalists sound like they’ve been playing … for two months and playing together for one’ and ‘the (artists) are barely competent’), anti-trendiness (25% of the texts, e.g. ‘live albums became as common as turds from the White House’ and ‘(song is) just the latest examples of rappers’ using cheap catchphrases to get a quick hit’), mysticism (22.5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘I treasured (artist)’ autograph with the zeal of a Lourdes’ pilgrim’ and ‘(artist is) a sexy messiah reborn’), insistence on historical importance (7.5%), personal beliefs and attitudes (30% of the reviews, e.g. ‘they’re still my favourite group’ and ‘I’ve never been into guitar heroes’), ageism (17.5% of the reviews, e.g. ‘this sounded like a lot of old men ambling through an arthritic set’) and nostalgia (15% of the reviews, e.g. ‘(album is not) a return to past glories’).

7.3 The Use of Adjectives in Music Reviews

As the third and final main step in the language analysis of the music reviews, a closer attention was paid to adverbs and adjectives. Adverbs were analysed grammatically/syntactically, focusing on their syntactic position. There were 129 prominent adverbs collected from the forty classic music reviews. The majority of these (54.3%) are modifying adjectives, most predominantly appearing before the modified adjective (in only one instance is the adverb in a post-position). The second most frequent function of adverbs in classic reviews is that of modifying verbs (39.5%), out of which fifty-four per cent are postponed. Approximately 4.7 per cent of the adverbs function as disjuncts. The remaining 1.5 per cent modify other sentence elements. Analysing the forty modern music reviews, a list of 112 most prominent adverbs was compiled. Similarly to the classic reviews, most modern reviews (61.6%) use adverbs to modify adjectives, typically in the first position, preceding the adjective (only two adverbs are found to occur in a post-position). Other 30.4 per cent are used as verb modifiers, out of which forty- seven per cent appear in a post-position. The function of disjunct is served by 6.25 per cent of the adverbs collected. The rest of the adverbs (1.8%) are used to modify other sentence elements. When compared, the classic and the modern music reviews use adverbs in the same functions with a relatively similar distribution of frequency among the specific functions. The modern reviews seem to have a more obvious preference for modifying adjectives, considering the thirty per cent difference between adverbs used as adjective modifiers and as verb modifiers (as opposed to the 14 per cent difference between the two in the classic reviews analysis). On

36 the other hand, classic reviews seem to prefer to postpone verb modifying adverbs more than the modern reviews (54% to 47%).

The use of adjectives in music reviews was analysed according to their communicative purpose/rhetorical function, specifically their use as evaluators in reviews. Inspired by Giannoni’s study on evaluation in review genres in Academic Evaluation (Hyland, Diani: 2009), evaluative adjectives were located in the sampled review texts and distributed into three groups according to their polarity: either positive, negative, or comparative.

Among the forty classic reviews, the majority of adjectives are used as positive evaluators (59.6%), followed by 23.8 per cent of negative adjectives and 16.6 per cent of adjectives with comparative polarity. Of the positive evaluative adjectives, the positive value is implied or can be assumed from the context in approximately 35.3 per cent of the instances (e.g. infectious, simple, haunting, raw). The remaining 64.7 per cent are inherently positive in polarity and can be further divided into groups of synonyms or words of similar semantic meaning, such as adjectives of ‘having goodness’ (e.g. great, fine, superb, excellent), ‘causing emotion’ (e.g. exciting, compulsive, thrilling, dazzling), ‘having strength’ (e.g. strong, solid, big, potent), ‘standing out’ (e.g. outstanding, original, unique, distinctive), ‘being popular’ (e.g. long- awaited, much anticipated), or ‘having good qualities’ (e.g. pleasant, clever, attractive, impressive). Considering the negative evaluative adjectives, the negative value is achieved detractively (e.g. not the next great album, neither are memorable) in 10.8 per cent of the instances, with the remaining adjectives assuming the negative polarity based on their inherent or implied negative meaning (e.g. boring, sloppy, awful, cheap). Finally, out of the comparative adjectives, the majority (91.5%) implies a positive polarity (e.g. more powerful, far better, fiercer, the most original) and only 8.5 per cent imply a negative polarity (e.g. flatter, less involved, less stimulating, more conventional).

Correspondingly, the vast majority of adjectives in modern music reviews are positive in polarity (75.1%), while only 16.1 per cent are used in negative evaluation and 8.8 per cent have comparative polarity. Among the positive evaluative adjectives approximately 35.5 per cent of the adjectives has an implied positive polarity (e.g. real, hot, defiant, varied). The rest of the positive adjectives can also be categorized into rather broad groups of synonyms or words of similar semantic meaning, including adjectives of ‘having goodness’ (e.g. great, fantastic, first rate, terrific), ‘causing emotion’ (e.g. exciting, compelling, thrilling, intriguing), ‘having strength’ (e.g. strong, heavy, big, intimidating), ‘standing out’ (e.g. original, off-kilter, unique, distinctive), ‘being popular’ (e.g. legendary), or ‘having good qualities’ (e.g. beautiful, sophisticated, graceful, vibrant). Out of the negative reviews, it is twenty per cent that ascribe the negative polarity detractively (e.g. not evocative, not heavy, not ground-breaking), whereas the remaining eighty per cent are given the negative value additively (e.g. lacklustre, clichéd, pedestrian, slight). Lastly, regarding the comparatively polarized adjectives, largely positive value is present in ninety-five per cent of the instances (e.g. the most genuine, sweeter, more purposeful) while there are only a few instances of negatively oriented comparative adjectives (e.g. more insipid than incendiary).

8. Results Commentary and Discussion

This study was designed to give a brief overview of the language of reviews in music magazines, and to discover some regularities in their structure and common characteristic features. Drawing on the data acquired from the content analysis of the selected corpus of music reviews, some broad characteristics of the genre can be derived. Music reviews are, naturally, a type of written communication that is addressed to a specific target audience (certain knowledge and interests are expected). The communicative purpose is, of course, to inform the reader and offer recommendation, but there is also the desire to evoke an emotional reaction in them. Although the writing style is varied across individual music critics (some are more personal, objective, or blunt than others), but most follow the general textual conventions of the three general rhetorical moves of an art critique (description, interpretation, evaluation), as described more thoroughly in previous chapters.

The first specific step in the analysis of music reviews was to ascertain the nature and extent of the informative content within the descriptive move of music reviews. Firstly considering the information presented in the heading/informative paragraph, the most common information was found to be the reviewed artists’ name, the records’ title and the record label, i.e. the most general information needed to identify a record. An album cover is featured very frequently in modern reviews, in contrast to the classic reviews. Modern reviews overall, in fact, pack more information into the heading than classic reviews. The reason for this, however, might lie in the fact that some of the sampled reviews were collected from Rock’s Backpages, an online vault which does not preserve the original layout of the articles in its online copies (which contain the text and headline), which might have resulted in some of the statistics being skewed. Despite that, there are some types of information that the classic reviews certainly do not record at all that however do tend to appear in modern reviews, such as the album release date and download links. Both of these might actually be influenced by the dominance of internet since the turn of the century. Linking to websites of course could not be used before the emergence and spread of the popularity of internet. But I would also argue that the relatively frequent inclusion of the album release date (35%) is the sign of commercial advertising, aimed to assuage young people’s perceived impatience and to fight the problem of internet piracy. Classic reviews, on the other hand, include some facts not noticed in modern reviews - that is, the matrix number (the mention of which might be related to record collecting) and the trend (of specifically 1960s music journalism) of listing all the tracks on the reviewed album, which from a current perspective seems redundant. When comparing the classic reviews by decade, the sixties and nineties offered the most varied set of information in the heading.

In the very text of the review, the artist would be most frequently identified by nationality, especially in modern reviews where it is mentioned in majority of the texts (62.5%, i.e. 20% more than in classic reviews). Modern reviews also more often include information on the length of the artists’ career (10% more than in classic reviews), though it is not information that appears predominantly on the whole (only 17% of the modern reviews). More frequently, actually, the reviews identify the number of band members (30%), their names (48%) and the artists’ past work (32.5%) as well as their side projects (25%). Overall, classic reviews seem to

38 provide more information on the artist – while the number of band members is listed almost as frequently as in the modern reviews (29%), they are named in an overwhelming 96.8 per cent of the reviews, while 60 per cent mention the past work, 40 per cent refer to artists’ popularity, and 40 per cent point to some well-known facts and artist trademarks. This result seems to give evidence to the claim that classic reviews used to focus more on the descriptive move than the other two moves. Yet, the presence of the informative facts seemingly escalates over the span of the four decades in approximately half of the categories (of artist information) and the nineties have the highest presence in most categories. This discrepancy might be caused by the choice of articles, a possible shift in the rhetorical strategies between 1990s and 2010s, or an inconsistency in the analysis.

Most commonly mentioned facts about the record itself include information on the albums’ chronological position in artists’ discography, the instruments used on the record and the titles of some of the tracks. Modern album reviews noticeably outnumber the classic ones when it comes to awarding ratings to records on a scale (60% difference, which however, once again might be influenced by Rock’s Backpages not preserving the full layout of reviews). Modern reviewers were also found to more often give readers recommendations – on which songs are the album’s highlights (22.5% to 15% of classic reviews) and which artists are similar to the reviewed ones (7.5% to 0%). Classic reviews again seem to have higher presence in more categories of album description, nevertheless, between the decades, the occurrence of informative facts increases over time with the nineties achieving the highest presence count of informative items in most categories. In addition, it is also interesting to point out that modern reviews more often (20% difference) mention the guests that appear on the album. One of the possible interpretations of this result is the tendency of modern reviewers to compare artists and discuss them in reference to others while classic rock stars were generally viewed as independent by music journalists. On the other hand, classic texts often quote lyrics in the review (30% difference between classic and modern reviews). The decline of this trend might also be influenced by modern media and internet, as lyrics are more readily available to fans these days.

Considering the extent of information provided on the whole, it can be said that a rather low number of categories of informative content occur with a prevalence in the sample sets. Only eight categories of information (band members’ names, past work, instruments used, tracks’ titles, quoted lyrics, genre, nationality of artists, and ratings) appear in majority of the reviews (at least 50%). Which leads me to conclude that the descriptive move is not the most dominant rhetorical move in music reviews.

It could be argued that the interpretative and evaluative moves seem to take precedence over the informative aspects, as the analysis seems to demonstrate. Moving on to the results of interpretive move analysis, the first concern was to examine the use of interpretative language. The data collected from the figurative language analysis revealed that the most distinctive preference is the use of metaphorical language (of varying complexity) which appears in majority of both classic and modern reviews (in 90% and 70%, respectively). None of the other forms of figurative language reaches twenty per cent in modern reviews, though there is a

39 slightly more frequent use of alliteration and rhyme in comparison to classic reviews (15% to 12.5%).

Classic reviews reach relatively higher scores of presence in other figurative language categories, however none constitute a majority of the reviews. As to metaphors, the most common form of figurative language is personification (which relates closely to metaphor), followed by similes and puns. The act of turning lyrics into a narrative is present relatively equally, in both classic and modern music reviews it is a rather rare technique (12.5% and 10%, respectively). When comparing individual decades within the classic reviews set, it is apparent that the seventies employ both metaphors and similes in a noticeably higher numbers. This correlates to the discussed characteristics of 1970s’ journalism, as described by music journalism theorists, i.e. highly inspired by New Journalism and frequently sporting very individualistic, fiction-inspired language.

Lastly, the formality of language was also observed. In both classic and modern reviews, use of highly formal language is quite prevalent, as is the use of informal or vulgar language. In classic reviews, formal and poetic language exceed the use of vulgar language, while the modern reviews show the opposite results. A logical conclusion would then be to assume that there might be certain trend towards vulgarization. However, the presence of informal and vulgar language in modern reviews is altogether lower than that in classic reviews. Due to this result, I would actually argue that while the biting sarcasm, that the informal language often expresses, might be a more lasting trend than the lofty aspirations of poetic language, as modern reviewers seem to employ a blunter, terser style of writing.

Regarding the representation of interpretative, metaphorical language according to parts of speech, the most frequently used parts of speech are naturally adjectives, followed by noun phrases. Unlike classic reviews, in modern reviews, the interpretative language is more often realized by adverbs than the verbs they modify. When looking at classic reviews with respect to the individual decades, the use of marked language turns more prominent over time, reaching the highest number of frequency in the nineties in most categories. The most common metaphors to describe music are those traditionally related to movement (through water/air), violence, attractiveness, personified human qualities and emotions, etc.

Finally, to address the evaluative move in music reviews, the use of adjectives to assign appraisal was analysed. The results imply that reviewers tend to use adjectives more frequently to give positive evaluation, both in classic and modern reviews. The distinction between the adjectives the polarity of which is implied in context and those with polarity realized lexically yields similar results in both classic and modern reviews. It is, however, significant, I would claim, to note that modern reviews use positive adjectives more predominantly than classic reviews, and the difference between the number of positive and negative adjectives is also rather dramatic – compare 59.6 per cent of positive adjectives to 23.8 per cent of negative adjectives in classic reviews with 75.1 per cent of positive to 16.1 per cent of negative adjectives in modern reviews. Moreover, when only negative adjectives are concerned, modern reviews are found to ascribe the negative polarity to adjectives detractively more often (20%) than the classic

40 reviews do (10%). In my opinion, it would therefore not be too far-fetched to argue that modern reviews tend to hesitate more to give the record a negative evaluation.

Shifting focus to the reader-manipulative strategies of music reviews, the results of the analysis show that the use of personal pronouns is more common in classic reviews than in modern reviews, however in both the presence of second person statements exceeds the presence of first person statements. The use of the pronoun ‘you’ is in both classic and modern reviews more or less equally divided between impersonal and marked use (direct address and imperatives). Of the four decades of classic reviews, the most frequent use of the personal pronoun ‘I’ is in the seventies’ reviews - which supports the presumptions that the so-called celebrity/personality writers tend to insert themselves into the articles and include their personal opinion more freely. A quick look at the results shows a sharp contrast in use of firs-person singular between the sixties and seventies, and then gradual decline of the frequency of its presence.

Of the three interactive strategies of reader manipulation – questions, exclamations and instructions - the most prominent one is the use of questions. The sampled classic reviews use all three strategies more frequently than modern reviews, nevertheless they could not be identified as dominant strategies in music reviews. Indeed, some other manipulative techniques are much more prevalent. In classic reviews, the most notable strategy of reader manipulation is the tendency to make deductions about the artists (their attitudes, feelings, motivation), followed closely by the tendency to make predictions (about the artists’ future, i.e. the audience’s future behaviour). While the presence of both deductions and predictions is remarkably lower in modern reviews, their use in classic reviews seem to escalate over time, peaking in the nineties. Slightly less frequent strategies in classic reviews are the use of hyperbolic or emotionally loaded language. Despite the fact that their presence also seem to rise over time, their presence in modern reviews is rather insignificant. In contrast, a very common strategy of modern reviews, decidedly more dominant than in classic reviews, is the use of advertising language. Its presence in classic reviews also gradually grows higher, which altogether supports the claim that between 1980s and 1990s music journalism took a turn towards commercialism and life-style-magazine-like strategies.

Finally, the last step is to comment on the presence of bias in music reviews. In general, the results show that the presence of various biases is once again higher in classic reviews, but at least in some categories the differences are not as striking. The most common bias in modern reviews is towards ‘mysticism’ while in classic reviews it is bias towards ‘authenticity’. When focusing on individual decades, the authenticity bias is most prominent in the seventies and nineties, mysticism is the most frequent tendency in the seventies (totally overshadowing the other decades) while nostalgia is, as expected, most common in the nineties. While modern reviews did not register that much overt nostalgia in the analysis, the nostalgia manifests itself in terms of musician referencing and genre terminology where modern reviews usually outnumber the classics. Modern reviews use a slightly longer catalogue of musical references, and references to other artists to imply influence or comparison appear more frequently in modern reviews than in classic reviews (where its presence again escalated towards the 1990s). Classic reviews, on the other hand, use slightly more musician references to imply credibility.

In terms of genres used to categorize music, modern reviews use a list of genres almost double the size of that used by classic reviews (80 genres compared to 47). The use of genre terminology also increased over time in classic reviews). Due to this fact, I would argue that the nostalgic bias was proved as increasingly pervading the genre of music reviews. This feature is also tied to the issue of music elitism, as readers are expected to understand these demanding references, as is the notable frequency of poetic language and literary techniques, which can also be used as an argument in the discussion on music elitism.

While in general the analysis confirmed the expectations about the genre, there were some disagreements between the results of the classic and modern reviews analysis. The analyses might have suffered from inconsistency in identification, as the analysis of the classic reviews followed that of modern reviews, and by that time I might have become more diligent and adept at identifying elements and thus swing the statistical results in favour of classic reviews having more presence. The results of comparing classic and modern reviews might therefore need to be reconsidered, however, I believe that as two distinct analyses they can stand on their own and have some sort of predictive value. The fact that the classic reviews analysis considered four decades also serves to outweigh the possibility that the inferences about the historical development of certain features are miscalculated, and can demonstrate on its own how music journalism evolved.

Despite, some of the differences between results may also be due to the choice of materials. The modern reviews analysis made use of a variety of different publications (from mainstream to genre-specific and ‘indie’) which may lead to less transparent results. The classic reviews analysis, on the other hand, relied most heavily on the what Shuker calls ‘inkies’ – the most popular, mainstream music publications, the characteristics of which have been most often analysed by music theorists – that possess a more unified, traditional music journalism style that could be expected from research, and would subsequently lead to more obvious and cohesive results.

9. Conclusion

The main goal of this analysis was to provide an overview of the genre of music reviews from a linguistic point of view and to examine its most prominent features, with particular attention on rhetorical structure, formality, objectivity and figurative language.

Based on the results of the language analysis, it could be argued that music reviews tend to identify their subject by providing information on the artists’ name, nationality and past work, to introduce the reviewed album by stating its music genre, to mention some of the instruments used on the record, reference some of its tracks by their title, and occasionally quote some of its lyrics, and finally to award the record an evaluation in the form of a rating.

More important than the description and informative value seems to be the interpretation of the music itself. The language of the reviews is highly metaphorical and employs a range of abstract concepts, frequently realized by modifying adjectives and complex noun phrases, to present the music to the readers. There is a strong tendency to mix highly poetic, formal language with colloquialism and vulgarisms to create a highly readable, dynamic text.

As one of the functions of a review is to provide appraisal, evaluative language is also prominent in music reviews. The results of the analysis of the use of adjectives show that there is a tendency to use mostly positive evaluation and may use some mitigating strategies to soften the criticism. However, it may also imply that they tend to realize negative evaluation by different lexical means.

Regarding the objectivity in music reviews, the analysis demonstrates that there is not much overt bias present in music reviews. Despite that, there are other strategies that purport the nostalgia bias in music journalism, particularly the use of allusions to canonical musicians and extensive genre terminology. I would argue that this trend would further increase in the future.

Even though there might be some issues with the consistency of the analysis, and subsequent discrepancies in the results, I would claim that this thesis mostly managed to reach its aims. Though some predictions did not turn out to be accurate, particularly in the area of bias the expected results were much more dramatic, overall the analysis confirmed the expectations and the established characterization of the genre of music journalism.

To conclude, the benefit of this thesis aims to be to provide a basis for further study of the genre of music journalism, as there are many other interesting issues to analyse. I would suggest, for instance, the question of sexism in music reviews, as some of the sampled texts in this thesis imply there could be a large corpus of material to analyse in this respect.

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11. Appendix

List of sampled music review articles:

1960s 1) Beat Instrumental (UK) Gell, David. “The Beatles: Please, Please Me” May 1963

2) Billboard (US) “Sonny & Cher: Look At Us” 21 Aug 1965

3) Cashbox (US) “The Beatles: Meet The Beatles” 25 Jan 1964

4) Disc and Music Echo (UK) Farmer, Bob. “Pink Floyd: The Piper At The Gates of Dawn” 2 Sep 1967

5) Hit Parader (US) “The Beatles: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” October 1967

6) KRLA Beat (US) “The Mama’s and Papa’s: Deliver” 25 March 1967

7) Melody Maker (UK) Welch, Chris. “The Who: Tommy” May 1969

8) NME (UK) Evans, Allen. “Sonny and Cher: Look at Us” 1 Oct 1965

9) Record Mirror (UK) Jopling, Norman and Jones, Paul. “Great New L-P From Stones” 18 April 1964

10) Rolling Stone (US) Ward, Ed. “The Stooges: The Stooges” 18 Oct 1969

1970s 11) Circus (US) “David Bowie: Ziggy Stardust” July 1972

12) Creem (US) Marsh, Dave. “Rod Stewart/Faces: Coast to Coast” Apr 1974

13) Hit Parader (US) “The Runaways: The Runaways” Dec 1976

14) Let It Rock (UK) Gold, Mick. “Lou Reed: Rock N Roll Animal” May 1974

15) Melody Maker (UK) Doherty, Harry. “Lynyrd Skynyrd: Gimme Back My Bullets (MCA 2744)” January 1976

16) New Musical Express (UK) Kent, Nick. “Welcome to the Fabulous Seventies” 25 Aug 1973

17) Phonograph Record (US) Mendelsohn, John. “Queen: Sheer Heart Attack” March 1975

18) Record Mirror (UK) Russell, Rosalind. “‘Girls’ need the kiss (OF LIFE!)” 10 June 1978

19) Rolling Stone (US) Grossman, Loyd. “Pink Floyd: The Dark Side Of The Moon” May 1973

20) Sounds (UK) Goldman, Vivien. “Bryan Ferry: The Bride Stripped Bare” September 1978

1980s 21) Billboard (US) “U2: October” 31 Oct 1981

22) Creem (US) Morthland, John. “UB40: 1980-83” December 1983 (514)

23) The Face (UK) Savage, Jon. “Public Image Limited: The Flowers Of Romance (Virgin)” April 1981

24) Kerrang! (UK) Dickson, Dave. “A Rush of Old Age” 23 Sep 1982

25) Melody Maker (UK) Lester, Paul. “Fine Young Cannibals: The Raw and the Cooked” 1989

26) New Musical Express (UK) McCready, John. “Kate Bush: The Whole Story” November 1986

27) Relix (US) Davis, Michael. “Blondie: The Hunter” Aug 1982

28) Rolling Stone (US) Sigerson, Davitt. “Madonna: True Blue” July 1986

29) Smash Hits (UK) Tennant, Neil. “Prince and the Revolution: Purple Rain” 1984

30) Spin (US) Grass, Randall F. “Fishbone: Fishbone” July 1985

1990s 31) Billboard (US) Verna, Paul (ed.). “Butthole Surfers: Electriclarryland” 1996

32) Mojo (UK) Thompson, Ben. “The Black Crowes: Amorica” December 1994

33) New Musical Express (UK) Quantick, David. “The Jesus And Mary Chain: Stoned and Dethroned (Blanco y Negro)” August 1994

34) Q (UK) Shaar Murray, Charles. “The Pretenders: Packed” June 1990

35) Rock & Roll Disc (US) Graves, Tom. “Paul McCartney: Unplugged (The Official Bootleg)” July 1991

36) Rolling Stone (US) Hoskyns, Barney. “Prodigy: The Fat Of The Land” August 1997

37) Spin (US) Nordlie, Tom. “Bad Religion: No Control” May 1990

38) Uncut (UK) Roberts, Chris. “Michael Jackson: Blood On The Dance Floor” July 1997

39) Vibe (US) Duncan, Nikkei. “Backstreet Boys: Backstreet Boys” Aug 1997

40) The Wire (UK) Blackford, Chris. “Frank Zappa: The Yellow Shark” Feb 1994

Modern 41) Elmore Magazine Caruso, Melisa. “Curtis Harding: Soul Power” May 2014

42) Elmore Magazine Uricheck, Mark. “Whiskey Myers: Early Morning Shakes” April 2014

43) Music Connection Kimpel, Dan. “Ray Lamontagne: Supernova” May 2014

44) Music Connection Pace, Jessica. “Lewis Watson: Some Songs With Some Friends” April 2014

45) Alarm Eddy, Lincoln. “Boyfrndz: Breeder” January 2014

46) Alarm Eddy, Lincoln. “Matt Stevens: Lucid” January 2014

47) Blues and Soul Baird, Emrys. “Horndogz: #Wooof” March 2014

48) Blues and Soul Baird, Emrys. “The New Mastersounds: Therapy” March 2014

49) Black Velvet Angell, Pete. “This Is Freedom: Welcome Home”

50) Black Velvet Webb, Emma. “Therapy?: A Brief Crack of Light”

51) Rolling Stone Dolan, Jon. “Kaiser Chiefs: Education, Education, Education & War” April 2014

52) Rolling Stone Sheffield, Rob. “EMA: The Future’s Void” April 2014

53) Uncut Thomson, Graeme. “Primal Scream: More Light”

54) Uncut Robinson, John. “Arctic Monkeys: AM”

55) Q Mongredien, Phil. “Sonic Youth: The Eternal”

56) Q McLean, Craig. “Red Hot Chilli Peppers: I’m with You” October 2011

57) Mixmag Worthy, Stephen. “Debukas: I am Machinery” December 2013

58) Mixmag Griffithe, Sean. “Illum Sphere: Ghosts of Then and Now” December 2013

59) Songlines May, Julian. “Will Pound: A Cut Above” January 2014

60) Songlines Petropoulos, Alexandra. “Jason Freeman-Fox: The Opposite of Everything” March 2014

61) Mojo Elan, Priya. “Pharrell: Girl” March 2014

62) Mojo Baker, Sonny. “Future Islands: Singles” March 2014 63) Pitchfork Deusner, Stephen M. “Jessica Lea Mayfield: Make My Head Sing…” April 2014

64) NME Sheffield, Hazel. “Avey Tare’s Slasher Flicks: Enter the Slasher House” April 2014

65) NME Renshaw, David. “Ramona Lisa: Arcadia” April 2014

66) Kerrang! Brannigan, Paul. “The Gaslight Anthem: American Slang” 2010

67) Spin Benson, Stephanie. “Lily Allen: Sheezus” May 2014

68) Vibe Murphy, Keith. “Justin Bieber: All That Matters” October 2013

69) Metal Forces Arnold, Neil. “Engulfed in Blackness: Ceremonial Equinox”

70) Under the Radar Hamilton, Billy. “Paws: Youth Culture Forever” May 2014

71) Revolver Chichester, Sammi. “Menace: Impact Velocity” March 2014

72) Respect Schiewe, Jessie. “Iggy Azalea: The New Classic” April 2014

73) Offbeat McDermott, Tom. “Charlie Dennard: From Brazil to New Orleans” May 2014

74) Filter Amorosi, A. D. “Leon Russell: Life Journey” April 2014

75) Downbeat Reed, Bobby. “Ted Rosenthal Trio: Rhapsody in Gershwin”

76) Alternative Press Kraus, Brian. “Brigades: Crocodile Tears EP” May 2014

77) Terrorizer Consterdine, John. “Cultura Tres: Rezando Al Miedo” June 2013

78) Clash Harper, Simon. “The Black Keys: Turn Blue” April 2014

79) Fused Owens, Dan. “Dead Rider: Chills on Glass” March 2014

80) Artrocker McCleary, Rob. “Eternal Summers: The Drop Beneath” March 2014