“Spin” Has No Time For Photoshop, Scarlett Johansson

And now it’s time for another installment of Rock-Critically Correct, in which the most recent issues of Rolling Stone, Blender, Vibe, and Spin are given a once-over by an anonymous writer who’s contributed to several of those titles–or maybe even all of them! After the click-through, he/she examines the most recent issue of Spin:

Hey, Spin! You know how Blender calls itself “your music buddy”? When are you gonna dub yourself “the music rag that doesn’t retouch photographs?”

In last month’s Spin column, YC noted that one of Terry Richardson’s’ photos of Amy Winehouse featured her prominently snaggly teeth. This month, the mag’s cover makes it clear that Interpol frontman Paul Banks does not have what you might call an alabaster complexion. As YC’s face resembles a lunar surface, he does not wish to sneer at Banks: those may not be zits and acne scars that dot his face, but birthmarks. It’s just that YC reckons that most publications would want to represent Interpol as louche vampires, and here’s Spin, zigging where everyone else zags.

The premise of writer David Peisner’s profile is that Interpol is now signed to Capitol Records, and thus must now involve themselves with such non-urbane matters as radio festivals (presided over by Morning Zoo hosts Schmucky and Fuckface and their ilk) and fans that (gasp) wear t-shirts and shorts to their concerts. Peisner diplomatically notes that Carlos D. has “traded his severe Teutonic coif for a for a lighter, fluffier model with mustache and a soul patch,” whereas he could’ve written “traded his Hitler-ian coif for the Western look lately favored by that twerp Brandon Flowers.”

In a rock mag meme that we noted last time, Peisner also writes that the band are not, shall we say, “bros.” “We’ve got it to a point where everything should be handled with respect,” Banks says. “We’re only staying in it because we’re being sufficiently expressed as individuals. We’re able to subvert our egos because there’s something we admire about each other,” and so on. What do you wanna bet that some guy like Phil Towle, the quasi-therapist/”performance coach” known for wearing the ugliest sweaters in the history of the world in Some Kind Of Monster, got a hold of Interpol?

Then there’s the truly odd “They Came From Hollywood,” a jeremiad in which music editor Charles Aaron takes offense at actors moonlighting in music. Step forward for your caning, Juliette Lewis, Jared Leto, Minnie Driver, Keanu Reeves, and Billy Bob Thornton! Aaron details the history of such crossover efforts (Mitchum! Shatner!) and its more recent iterations (he describes the indignity of Girls Against Boys backing up Gina Gershon, which makes me wonder if that band looks at Interpol and says “that shoulda been us”).

Since there’s no evidence or any reporting detailing that a critical mass of Hollywood A-listers is releasing records at a significantly greater rate than any other time in the past 20 years, it’s hard to fathom what necessitated this defensive essay. Maybe it was Scarlett Johansson’s turn at the mic for “Just Like Honey” with the Jesus and Mary Chain at Coachella, which is teased on the cover and with which Aaron seems particularly annoyed. But clearly it was JaMC’s call, and, pasty-white pantywaists the Reid brothers may be, they’re likely just as hypnotized by world-class sweater meat as the next guy.

The clue as to why, perhaps, this article appears towards its conclusion: Aaron posits that “if you’re a true fan, especially when you’re young and maddeningly confused, music is so powerful that it can call your entire existence into question. And when you’re deeply moved for the first time by a band–and exclaim, ‘fuck yeah,’ this is it’–well, you can spend the rest of your life aching to recapture that feeling. Maybe that’s why people detach from music as they get older–they decide that it’ll never feel as transcendent as it did in the beginning and to experience a lesser version is too painful to endure.” Then he ties it into how such people want committed music from committed musicians, not dallying actors, and concludes that he feels bad about Spin putting Jimmy Fallon on the cover several years ago.

Now, what that passage describes would be a slam-bang subject for a several thousand word essay, folks. Most people over 30 experience the moment Aaron describes, which is why, when you or someone you know says that the shit these days ain’t like the Stones or Springsteen or Public Enemy or what have you, you or they are really saying that you or they are no longer 16 years old (never mind that “true” music fans can remain enthusiastic beyond their hormonal prime). It would thus resonate with many of Spin‘s readers. But sitting incongruously in an article that inveighs against moonlighting movie stars, Aaron’s words may reveal more about his own level of enthusiasm, as a person who has worked for a music magazine for a pretty long time, than he intends.

The article is followed by a deeply reported story about an issue in the popular music diaspora that by contrast is a real problem: namely, albums leaking early. Writer Douglas Wolk’s “Days of the Leak” is so comprehensive that the only thing YC is left curious about is how leaking affects parts of the music industry that Spin doesn’t cover. Idolator readers know about the fate of the latest albums from the White Stripes and the Shins, but, for instance, would Music Row be roiled were Toby Keith’s latest record to be leaked?

Finally, YC would only like to add the following to Assistant Editor Kyle Anderson’s spirited defense of the singularity of R. Kelly in the back-page essay the Hidden Track: If conscientious people begin to say that they cannot enjoy artists because of what is very likely abominable behavior on the part of the artists, then conscientious people will have no choice but to listen only to the Indigo Girls for the rest of their colorless lives.