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Joshua Koneski

Professor Gardiakos

ENC1102

14 November 2023

How does Pitchfork use rhetorical and communicative strategies to write about music and

provide context in their reviews?

Introduction

Pitchfork has been a leading voice in the music reviewing community since its inception in

1995. The self proclaimed “most trusted voice in music” has millions of people that visit their

site every month and they have been credited with launching

the careers of many artists such as Arcade Fire and Bon Iver. What had started as a music

reviewing website for alternative and indie music has turned into a music reviewing website for

any genre as it has grown through the years and is the most popular and successful music

reviewer that was created in the digital age.

This is partly because of the reviewing style that Pitchfork uses to write their reviews. While

there are many similarities to the way that other music reviews are written in Pitchfork’s articles

there are still some differences that set them apart from others such as Rolling Stone and NME.

This paper will look into how Pitchfork is able to incorporate rhetorical and communicative

strategies while also discussing how Pitchfork fits into the genre of music reviews.

The genre of music reviews is one with much history and goes back centuries. The modern

era of reviewing albums was popularized by the Musical Times. This journal began reviewing on

the first of January in 1921 (Ha 2011). Since then, many more journals, books, newspapers,

magazines, and most recently websites have been publishing album music reviews to the public .
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Within the inception of the Internet, websites, such as pitchfork have been able to come through

to the mainstream, and have revolutionized the music reviewing discourse community, as it is

easier for reviews to looked at and read as one can just go on to their computer or phone and read

the reviews of many albums rather than having to buy a newspaper or magazine to be able to

read the reviews.

Research Synthesis

Bias in Pitchfork

Bias is one thing that does come up quite a bit for pitchfork, as there are multiple studies

that have looked into potential bias and pitchfork reviews, as well as a couple instances in which

bias has been pointed out online. A study made by Margaret Murray looks far in depth into the

potential bias that may be present in Pitchfork reviews. She does this by looking into Pitchfork

reviews of Vampire Weekend versus Lil Wayne. She explains how they have very similar

upbringings in the public eye as they started off as underground artists then became more

mainstream in 2008. She explains how Vampire Weekend is praised for moving outside of their

typical genre while Lil Wayne is criticized for moving outside of his typical genre. She explains

that since Vampire Weekend is part of a genre that is mainly white, and Lil Wayne is part of a

genre that is mainly black, Vampire Weekend gets more of a pass to expand their horizons, while

Lil Wayne is criticized when he tries to leave the genre of rap and is not fairly assessed for what

he does outside of rap (Murray 2021). While bias is something that may not be very present in

Music reviews, as most people try to be impartial, there is going to be a bit of bias in reviews as

it is part of human nature, no matter how hard some people may try to seem impartial there will

still be somewhat of an underlying bit of bias.

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On the other hand, a study was done to see if Pitchfork had any visible bias against genres or

artists using a data set that they had developed that had all published Pitchfork reviews searched

to see if there was any bias evident by predicting scores from audio and lyric metadata. They had

come to the conclusion that there is no visible bias in Pitchfork reviews and that the reviews are

just subjective (Pandit 2021).

Music Review Moves

There are many moves in the music review genre that are common to see in a review no

matter where the Music review is from. These moves include background information to the

music, such as the title of the song or album, the artist that made the music, and the record

company that the artist is with. Another move would be the discussion of the music. This entails

discussing parts of the music that are noteworthy to talk about in the reviews. There are other

moves that are part of some music reviews. These moves are reference to genre, which includes

discussing how an artist’s music is able to reflect a certain genre, reference to place, which

includes discussing how an artist reflects a certain place, marketing language, which includes

discussing the business side of the album such as sales, and personal authenticity, which includes

discussing true and personal emotion and facts as well as staying fair (Corciolani 2020).

Pitchfork has also had so much influence on music reviews in the last twenty years that

they have created changes in many other major music reviewers like Rolling Stone. According to

Emily Brasher, as Pitchfork became more popular and got more praise for including more indie

artists, Rolling Stone followed suit which helped themselves become considered more highbrow

again and had viewers see them as more in the know. This shows how Pitchfork was able to

influence music reviews as a genre (Brasher 2013).

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Others have looked into how Pitchfork uses rhetorical strategies in their reviews by, for

example, looking into highbrow versus lowbrow words that have been used in their articles.

They do this by selecting anchor words that fall under opposing poles of two concepts. They

select words for masculine versus feminine, and then they select words for legitimate versus

illegitimate. Using their system, they find usage of the anchor words in the reviews, written on

pitchfork, as well as using the genre of music of the album being reviewed as a base. They find

that as time went on the reviews used language that was more feminine and legitimate rather than

masculine and illegitimate as a whole. They also find that the genre of the album that is being

reviewed changes whether there is more masculine or feminine discourse, and legitimate or

illegitimate discourse. Historically, male dominated genres such as hip-hop/rap have stayed more

masculine in terms of discourse, whereas pop and electronic music have used a more feminine

discourse as of late. Hip-hop/rap has also stayed more in the illegitimate discourse whereas pop

and electronic have come to be more in the legitimate discourse. They had also found that

reviews that garnered a lower score seem to have become more in the legitimate discourse

overtime (Daenekindt 2022) .

Methods

For my methods of research I will be looking into music reviews written on pitchfork and

analyzing the rhetoric behind them, as well as looking into how they write them. After I read the

reviews, I will look over any similarities that I find within the different reviews and also some

contrast that are present. With this data, I will be able to relate pitchfork articles to music reviews

as a whole, and how they have the moves that are present in most reviews.

I picked five Pitchfork reviews of albums that I am fairly familiar to analyze. I chose

Communion by Years & Years as it is my favorite album that Pitchfork has reviewed and it
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provides a great example of a moderately high rated review by Pitchfork. I then chose Divide by

Ed Sheeran as it provides an example of a low rated Pitchfork article. I chose Melodrama by

Lorde as it gives a review of a highly rated review by Pitchfork. I chose The Pinkprint by Nicki

Minaj as it provides an example of a review of another genre as well as correlating to the bias

argument that Murray has made. I also chose Music of the Spheres by Coldplay as it provides a

moderately rated review by Pitchfork.

Results

In the review of communion by the British dance pop band on the pitchfork website, the

reviewer starts out the review with a paragraph that hooks in the reader about what the intrigue is

to this album. They do this by using a complex and positive diction to describe the background to

this album and then ending the paragraph in a question that almost acts like a cliffhanger that

leads the reader into wanting to know the complex answer that is given throughout the rest of the

review on the album. What follows in the next paragraph is highlights from certain songs on the

album that the reviewer is praising, followed by what makes them work on the album and how

they are good tracks overall. The next paragraph spends time discussing a bit about the

reimagining of 80s and 90s club hits and how some artists miss the mark on trying to

successfully re-create the good parts of those songs yet Years & Years don’t dilute the formula,

they distill it. This type of description in this review is very poetic and helps the review flow

better and makes the review fun to read as well as informational, and not trying to just be

informational. They finish up this review with two more paragraphs, discussing the rest of the

highlights, as well as the weak points on this album, doing so, by using metaphors and extremely

descriptive language, that gives the reader a deeper meaning on the album even if one hasn’t
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heard the album before. Although they spent most of the review praising the album, and only a

couple of sentences discussing the downsides, the album only received a 7.5 out of 10.

In the review of Divide, by Ed Sheeran, the whole review seems to be extremely critical of

most of the songs on the album. The reviewer seems to find the way to come up with quips about

many different lyrics and song subject matters that are present on this album relentlessly. Instead

of relying on hoax and poetic writing in this review, what would keep one reading is the comedic

comments made throughout the review that make this review fun to read. This review still

includes the common moves of giving background information on the album, as well as having a

discussion about the album and providing a result of the album, which is the score. This review

is written a little differently than some others, as they don’t spend time discussing the

background of the album or getting into the specifics of the album, instead they open up with a

comedic quip against Ed Sheeran and his oft-mentioned no college experience. They go right

into the song that mentions that and then continue on discussing other tracks on the album and

how they each fail in their eyes. The reviewer almost seems like they are not really wanting to

write a review for an album that they see as horrible and decides to skip past the background, and

just move into the specifics to get it over with as quick as they can. The album received 2.8 out

of 10 which is not odd for a reviewed album of Ed Sheeran’s on pitchfork, as the other albums

that pitchfork has reviewed by Ed Sheeran have fared badly in score with only one reaching over

a five out of 10.

In the review of Melodrama, by Lorde, the reviewer uses the sophisticated diction that

was present in the review of Communion by Years & Years. Every paragraph is spent praising

the album and all of its elements. The reviewer uses imagery such as “We see that bright,

electrode glow of possibility, feel its siren shine on our faces.” to describe the feels of the album.
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They start the review explaining the background to the album and what went into making the

album. They then lead into reviewing specifics of the album, such as lyrics and production of the

album. They also compare Melodrama to her debut album Pure Heroine and discuss how they

are similar in style yet Melodrama is able to convey the album in a way that befits the name.

They continue the review by discussing the album’s tracks in great detail and compare the

sounds of the album to other artists such as Kate Bush. The album received an 8.8 out of 10. This

album also received the best new music on pitchfork at the time of the reviews release. While the

review had not really anything to say negatively about Melodrama, the album only received an

8.8 out of 10 because it is extremely hard to get the coveted 10 out of 10 at time of release, with

only less than 20 albums ever receiving a 10 out of 10 when first reviewed. Although the album

did only receive an 8.8, one could tell that the reviewer did in fact, enjoy the album as they were

able to use the rhetorical strategy of positive diction and imagery to discuss how good the

elements of the album were.

In the review of The Pinkprint by Nicki Minaj, The reviewer begins the review discussing

Nicki Minaj’s career going into this album. They talk a bit about Horizon success and discuss her

first two albums a bit and other songs that she has been on. After this part of the review, they go

into discussing the album that is being reviewed. Like some of the other albums, which reviews

were discussed beforehand, and this paper, they explained the background of the album and

started off with a more ambiguous overview of the album rather than going into specifics right

away. They then go into the specific tracks on the album, while also comparing them to Nicki’s,

other albums and mixtapes, which seems to be common on pitchfork in reviews of artists who

have had previous albums released. They get more into the album by discussing the sounds of

the tracks and detailing if they work or not. They finish off the review, raving about the deluxe
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tracks on the album and doing so in a way that gets one to realize the greatness of these tracks.

This album received a 7.5 out of 10 while seemingly doing so because of the artistic growth that

Nicki Minaj had shown in this album compared to her previous albums that were lower scored.

The rhetorical strategy that was used in this review was written to almost display the review as a

sort of social commentary as they discuss backlash that Nicki Minaj has received, mainly due to

her being a female rapper in what was a heavily male dominated field, and they are able to

discuss how her knowing this helped her write some pieces on this album. Also, another thing

that is present in the review is how she is criticized for her pop leaning tracks and not surely

assessed for the contracts and essentially criticized for not having more hard hitting rap songs on

her first two albums. This relates to how Murray assessed what pitchfork stated about Lil Wayne

and how he was told to stick to rap instead of trying to branch out. So this could be shown as an

example of bias in their arguments.

In the review of Coldplay‘s Music of the Spheres, the review are almost the opposite of the

reviewer for Nicki Minaj’s album, the Pinkprint as this reviewer uses Coldplay’s old music

against them, which works too keep their most recent scores lower as the author is able to

acknowledge the redundant nature of Coldplay’s last few albums in a quip that serves as a

comedic point in the article as well as serving as an overview of the review of the album. “Here

he goes again, looking at the stars, seeing how they shine,” this one sentence serves as a

summary of the review as a whole. It embodies the comedic nature of the review as well as

expresses the disappointment that the author has in Coldplay not being able to change their

subject matter well. It also provides context for the rest of the album as it shows that the album is

redundant and details the subject matter of most of the album. The review starts with background

into Coldplay as an artist and then discusses the history of Coldplay and then they get into how
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they have been unable to match what made their first few albums good and have only seemed to

stay constant and not get better as they make their albums. They spend the next few paragraphs

picking apart specifics in the album and detailing how they fall short lyrically or sonically. They

add in jokes every so often to make the review entertaining and more readable. They then go into

detail of what they call the best song on the album explaining what makes it so good and saying

how if they incorporated more songs like this on the album it would be more of a success. They

then end the review detailing how the album in the end has far too little bright spots and too

many lows. They gave this album a 5.1 out of 10, which seems a little more favorable then how

critical they were in the review. The author does use a lot of metaphors in the article and

comparisons to provide more context to how they feel about this album and to get the reader to

understand more of what they are saying about the album and its elements.

All of these reviews include some of the most common moves that are present in music

reviews, as they all include background information to the music as pitchfork lists the album title

and then under, has the name of the artist, the name of the album, and also the label that the artist

who released the album is under. Another move that is present in all of the reviews is that all of

the reviews include specific parts of elements on the albums and a detailed explanation into what

makes that part of the album good or bad. The review of Communion by Years & Years

discusses another move which is the reference to genre as it mentions the electronic genre that

the album is a part of as well as the reference to the 80s and 90s dance club genre. This is also

present in the review of The Pinkprint of Nicki Minaj as the discussion of rap is a big part of the

review as it takes into consideration her first two albums that had more of a pop sound in a good

amount of songs. Pitchforks reviews of Divide by Ed Sheeran, and Melodrama, by Lorde,

include another move, which is reference to place as the Divide by Ed Sheeran review on
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pitchfork talks about his traveling that had occurred while he was writing the album and

discusses how certain places had lead to the writing of some songs, and in the review of

Melodrama

by Lorde, the reviewer mentions her upbringing in New Zealand and how that is essential to her

music as her music mentions her upbringings at times. Marketing language is present in the

review of Music of the Spheres by Coldplay, as the review discusses how Coldplay has talked

about how since they have had big commercial success in the past, they have realize that they

cannot get bigger, but can only get better and the reviewer discusses that statement as they talk

about how the last album they released before Music of the Spheres was not a commercial

success, and was actually their worst selling album of all time, and instead of trying to get better

in the opinion of the reviewer, they tried to get bigger by having a single on the album featuring

the world famous K-pop band BTS. Personal authenticity is present in most of the reviews, as

there is discussion of real emotions that are felt throughout the albums and the discussions of the

albums are fair and reasonable. The only review that does not seem to really include personal

authenticity is the review of Divide by Ed Sheeran that seems to be more critical in everything

that Ed Sheeran does on this album, rather than being lenient on his album. All in all, Pitchfork

does seem to include moves that are present in most reviews leading to Pitchfork being a great

example of the genre of music reviews.

Discussion and Implications

One of the biggest discoveries that was found by analyzing the reviews is that Pitchfork

seems to take their higher rated reviews much more seriously as their lower rated reviews seem

to have more comedy infused in them in order to have the review stay interesting. This was seen

in the review of Divide and Music of the Spheres as much of their reviews were filled with jokes
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about the choices made on the albums. The other album reviews that were analyzed did not

include many jokes, if any at all, which would lead one to come up with the conclusion that

Pitchfork takes their higher rated reviews much more seriously. Some other rhetorical strategies

that Pitchfork uses in their reviews are the use of metaphors that are present in many of their

reviews. They use them to be able to get one to understand what they mean and give context to

the readers. They also seem to use more artsy positive diction when reviewing albums that are

more pop-oriented that have scored more favorably. This is evident in the reviews of

Communion by Years & Years and Melodrama by Lorde which are described very poetically.

The diction that is used in the review of The Pinkprint by Nicki Minaj is more straightforward,

much like the review as a whole. Also, the potential bias that can be made out from the Nicki

Minaj review can’t be written off as intentional and can be seen as more of a subjective taste that

the reviewer has. Overall, Pitchfork has made a name for themselves as one of the most popular

music reviewers. They have also influenced the genre of music reviews as a whole for the better

and provide great examples of music reviews in accordance to the genre’s moves.
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Works Cited

Anderson, Stacey. “Lorde: Melodrama.” Pitchfork, Pitchfork, 16 June 2017,

pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/lorde-melodrama/.

Brasher, Emily, and Stephanie Craft. “Creating a Culture: Pitchfork Media’s Textual and Cultural

Impact on Rolling Stone Magazine.”

Corciolani, Matteo, et al. “Do more experienced critics review differently?” European Journal of

Marketing, vol. 54, no. 3, 2020, pp. 478–510, https://doi.org/10.1108/ejm-01-2019-0095.

Daenekindt, Stijn, and Julian Schaap. “Using word embedding models to capture Changing

Media Discourses: A Study on the role of legitimacy, gender and genre in 24,000 music

Finney, Tim. “Years & Years: Communion.” Pitchfork, Pitchfork, 16 July 2015,

pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/20831-communion/.

Ha, Fong Wa. (2011). A Diachronic Study of Music Criticism: The Case of Record Reviews.

Murray, Margaret. “Pitchfork’s authenticity problem: The critical reception of Vampire weekend

and Lil Wayne.” Communication, Culture and Critique, vol. 14, no. 2, 2021, pp. 237–251,

https://doi.org/10.1093/ccc/tcab003.

Pandit , Ayush, et al. Is Pitchfork Out of Pitch? Investigating Bias in Pitchfork Album Reviews.

Snapes, Laura. “Ed Sheeran: ÷.” Pitchfork, pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/22960-divide/.

Accessed 18 Nov. 2023.

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