right here we go ...
just incase...this is the nme article
www.nme.com/reviews/the-courteeners/9599and this is the guardian article
music.guardian.co.uk/reviews/story/0,,2270710,00.html
The Guardian and NME magazine have two very different circulations. NME as magazine dedicated to music attracts a regular audience that are interested particularly in music whereas The Guardian is a broadsheet newspaper and therefore might attract a more intellectual audience than that of a tabloid newspaper.
This is clearly represented in the size of the two articles, the Guardian review is a mere 167 word article, whereas NME reaches 779 words. The lack of detail in the Guardian review is because that the audience would have less interest in a music review than of headline news, for example, so they can write less about it because it is not their main point of interest, whereas NME have to put in more detail because music is its main attraction.
This detail is further showed by the number of songs the articles discuss; the Guardian review mentions a total of 2 songs, named “If it wasn’t For Me” and “Kings of the New Road” whereas the NME review mentions a total of 10 songs including both of the two mentioned in NME review, the reasons for this are the same as shown above about article length.
The Guardian and NME further show awareness of their audiences in how much jargon they use, The Guardian, for example, is a fairly easy read, and would be easy to understand with or without a great deal of musical knowledge whereas NME uses a lot more subject specific lexis such as “B-side” and “Kinksian” which a lot of non music fans, particularly the latter, may have trouble understand.
The Guardian seems a lot more prone to judge via stereotypes rather than by the music itself. As the NME article says, the band have gained a reputation for slandering other bands such as “The Enemy” and “Hard- Fi” which fit in nicely with the mouthy northerner stereotype. The lead singer is portrayed as misogynistic by the Guardian review for lyrics quoted as “"You're an average girl with bad teeth," he snarls on If It Wasn't for Me, "I'd like to stick a syringe in your eye."”, which gives the impression that the lead singer is misogynistic. However the lyrics are misquoted and taken heavily out of context here to portray the band in this way to fit in with the northern stereotype. The song is in fact not about violence towards women but about a friend who changes his group of friends for a girl. The reviewer thought that this is what the audience of the Guardian would like to read about a band from the north rather than avoiding the obvious stereotyping.
NME however mentions this reputation they have earned, but realises as a music magazine; its audience wants to see the band from a musical stand point rather than a social stand point and notes they have “publicly apologised” for the altercations with the other bands before reviewing the CD. NME then goes onto mention highs and lows from the albums with a higher degree of detail, for example “If It Wasn’t For Me should probably have been relegated to B-side” as a low and “Yesterday Today and Probably Tomorrow” is the sort of acoustic lament Pete Doherty should of written” as a high.
The Guardians determination to use the stereotype as a negative is further amplified when they criticize a song they admit themselves find good, “Kings of the New Road is effective, it's only because it's so derivative.”. The Guardian uses the comparison to other bands as a negative whereas the NME uses it as a positive, using lexis such as “Smithsian and “Kinksian”. This is due to the Guardian wanting to satisfy its audience by criticizing an album from an outspoken band whereas NME wishes to review the music.
Again this is also shown in the Guardians failure to acknowledge some of the “acoustic laments” the NME mentions, that “bridge the gap between hug and thug”, they continue on the basis of their misquote and dub the lead singer to be “sneering, arrogant and aggressive” whereas NME dub him “more of a sweet and tender hooligan.”, which are two very contrasting opinions on one man. The Guardian chooses not to acknowledge the slower songs and so sticks to its stereotype, whereas NME acknowledges both saying the lead singer does come across as a hooligan but that he is articulate in his song writing.
This stereotyping can also be made true about another musician called Pete Doherty, whose reputation in broadsheet newspapers and tabloids alike is terrible due to drug problems and incidences such as burglary. However they also use this to criticize his music, which is exactly what has happened here with the Courteeners’ where the reviews are suffering because of a bad reputation.
The stereotype is made particularly easy to make with the Courteeners due to several easy similarities with Oasis, also from Manchester, also with a lead singer called Liam, who also has an affinity for depreciating other bands. This is why it is so easy for the Guardian to say that the Courteeners are “derivative”.
The Guardian uses the “3 list rule” when criticizing the lead singer, with “sneering, arrogant and aggressive” which are 3 words from the same negative semantic field, and links back to the stereotype, particularly of lead singers from Manchester called Liam, the reason for this is that the list of 3 is much more effective in conveying the opinion of the reviewer than if just on word had been used.
NME uses much more detail reviewing its individual songs and makes use of many more metaphors and similes, for example, “is like being caught up in a musical hurricane” and it is done so because the images it conjures up are those of large scale chaos which makes the track seem energetic and jumpy to the audience and gives connotations’ of being surrounded by music.
NME is also much more laid back in its use of language than the Guardian review, using many coined words and slang words throughout the article, key examples of this are “Smithsian” and “bloke” compared to the Guardian who use much more advanced lexis such as “troglodytes”. This again links back to audience, a reader of NME might be a casual reader who isn’t worried about the grammar of the magazine but as the Guardian is supposed to cater for an intelligent audience it has to keep the grammar up to a high and flawless standard.
In conclusion, I think that while the Guardian hasn’t necessarily given a review fairly, it has tried to cater to its audience who would like to criticize the stereotype that The Courteeners are being portrayed with. It has tried to please its audience and I’m sure for the most part, the Guardian has succeeded in doing this by criticizing an outspoken band from Manchester who might be about to step out of the “lower class”. However the misquoting of lyrics is a big mistake for the Guardian, whether it was intended as a device to further degrade the band or not. The reviewer probably thought that no-one would notice because of the audience of the Guardian not being overly interested in The Courteeners. This was made apparent as a mistake when the Guardian published a very well written and articulate response from the lead singer of the band. This could be taken as an apology from the Guardian. However on the whole I think the Guardian appeased its audience with the review which is the target for any newspaper.
The NME review, reviewed the music instead of the stereotype, but it did mention the stereotype a lot. But it acknowledged that the bands do not fit into this particular stereotype many times throughout the article. It is able to acknowledge early on that the band have apologised for their outspoken and “arrogant” comments towards other bands before launching into a more detailed review of the music and nothing else. This, like the Guardian, is succeeding in meeting the expectations of the audience because the NME is a magazine dedicated in its entirety to music so for them to give a bad review based on a bands words in the media would be against what the magazine is about. The reviewer mentions his/her surprise at the fact there are “acoustic laments” on the album that show a softer side to the band unseen in releases before and that these do not fit in with the “stereotype”.
The idea for both this products is to please their audience, and both articles will have achieved this with the way it is done. The Guardian for criticizing the band socially, and NME for praising the band, to an extent and objectively, musically.
alot of repetition in there but english language is such im afraid, gotta hit my 1500 words somehow =) enjoy.
lexis = words
semantics= meanings
