No Age: Not Ready For Best New Music?

No Age That’s what Fluxblog argued today in the wake of Pitchfork‘s absurdly high 9.2 (which, in the Fork’s post-YHF no-10.0 era, is basically a 10.0), and he’s right: No Age are a good band, and certainly an effectively loud one, but no volume of noise is enough to cover the band’s underdeveloped songwriting and lack of complexity. Whether the hype will smother them too early, as it pretty obviously did for the Arcade Fire and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah (whose debuts are both way better than Nouns) is too soon to say, but as for his other point, about the band aping late ’80s/early ’90s influences, indeed: Indie music and much of pop culture in general has been doomed to repeat itself during the last few years, latching onto the fashion and musical aesthetic of the ’80s (some, like Dodos and Akron/Family, are reaching back to the ’70s stoner rock era — A-Fam acted like they were auditioning for the Allman Brothers at their show on Friday), and as the 2000s move into the 2k10s, it only makes sense for ’90s nostalgia to rise again. For perhaps the first time ever, I’m with Fluxy here — how ’bout something new? (Full disclosure: I’m currently wearing an American Apparel shirt and track jacket. If you’re not part of the solution…)

No Age – “Eraser”: mp3

Previously: Live: No Age at the Ukrainian Cultural Center