Artist: Josh Ritter

Album: So Runs the World Away

Reviewer: Jesse Cataldo

Slant, 2010

Writing Disorders: Purple Hemorrhage, Idea Fever








Longest Sentence: 64 words

Most Emo Phrase: “straining for the faded colors of the distant past”

Irony: “ornate surfaces that are largely filled with air”




Jesse, I have a photographic memory, but there’s a line from a review I read last year that stuck out above the rest:

“Mew is not as thoughtful or smart as they think they are”

I couldn’t remember who wrote that stupid phrase or where it appeared, but the words still hibernated until sheer coincidence gave me a name to pair. Now that we’re here together at last, Jesse, I’m going to switch the deck. I’ve got this review of yours so we can test if you’re smart as you think. And save the modesty, son.  You clearly think your brain cooks some brilliant eggs. Otherwise you wouldn’t have written stuff like this:

“The conundrum in assessing a project like this is that there are the two sets of criteria by which it can be approached”

I’ll come back to that breakthrough in musical surgery, but first I want to focus on the writing itself. In any writing class giving grades based on writing, you’d be at the bottom of the curve. The only thing this review really challenged me to do was hold onto subjects long enough to reach the verb. I lost many lives. First things first: I’m going to highlight all the extra crap hedging these sentences:

“But the atmosphere of rough, old conceits scrubbed clean, with just enough dirt left to seem genuine, is ultimately a disquieting one”

“This is unfortunate because Ritter, whose numerous songwriting accolades are trumpeted in the album’s press release, is a more than capable lyricist.”

Jesse, putting the Red Sea between subject and linking verb is…not good. Contrary to popular belief in your field, a two-letter word can indeed collapse under an author’s excess. Imagine those sentences surrounded by others just as hard. That’s your review. Might make for a difficult read, huh?

Thanks to the rating stars and a few rereads, I understand you had mixed feelings about this album. If you’re on the fence about something, fine, but at least spend time looking up words that don’t need silly adverb constructions. Read these phrases:

“the borderline offensive”

“the slightly enthralling aura”

“nearly stuffy compositions”

Dude, how can you be almost offended by something? Slightly enthralled? Nearly stuffed up? Those are all adjectives that describe either/or situations. So…you really need to be on one side of the fence or the other. Sitting with the post up your butt don’t look nothing but ridiculous.

If nothing else, all these modifiers showed me how you avoid brevity like the plague. All music lice suck off other people’s art, but at least some are succinct. Nearly every sentence in your review kicks brevity’s balls. You take the long way round even down to the level of word choice. Let’s return to a previous example:

“This is unfortunate because Ritter, whose numerous songwriting accolades are trumpeted in the album’s press release, is a more than capable lyricist”

Got a couple issues with that sentence, Jesse. First off — when did America fall out of love with the word “many”? I can’t even watch People’s Court these days without hearing someone say his girlfriend cheated on him numerous times. “Numerous” is a clunky modifier and should only end a clause. Second, wouldn’t a more than capable lyricist simply be a very capable lyricist? Readability, Jesse…readability.

There’s even more I could grind here, but I’m just going to run through your musical dissection and end. Take a gander at the criteria you mentioned — you know, the ones binding your assessment of this album:

“The first is the fulfillment of the formula it attempts to emulate, in this case a kind of moody but detached wilderness lyricism, at home with nature but not down-home, smoky Americana crossed with the yellowing allure of old adventure stories.”

“The second is the creation of an individual product, and though World Away scores points for style, it also inevitably appears a little dried out and musty”

Jesse, it’s easy enough calling bullshit on your molecular analysis when you reviewed 10 albums the month of April. Writing a graduate thesis on this guy’s album in three days seems disingenuous to me. But aside from that, it did get me thinking. If anyone reads your review besides me, it’ll be someone who’s never heard the album before. So riddle me this: what’s the point of writing that for a listener curious at best? Is it for his glory…or for yours?

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