Every two years, Americans are asked to choose the people who will sling rhetoric, red-bait, and loiter for them in Congress. More important, once a year the fourth estate steps down from its ivory tower to give the unwashed millions a chance to voice their opinions. That's right, readers' polls. The last bastion of democracy.
In the end, John Cleese summed up the only reaction people can have to these things this way: "What's the bloody point?!" (OK, he was actually referring to the People's Front of Judea's stance that men should have the right to have babies in The Life Of Brian, but there's precious few quotables about readers' polls.) What, indeed, is the point? What do these things tell you? What do we learn?
Basically, it comes down to this: readers' polls are a succinct summation of what some of a magazine's readers think about music in the month the poll is run. These polls do not analyze the year in music 1994, they show what people thought about rock in November/early December. The hype machine grabs the voters who, though they might have been more influenced by an album that came out January 1, still vote for bands nestling in the buzz bin come Thanksgiving.
Because of the obsession with "product," bands who influence the music world in ways other than via records (concerts, readings) are excluded. To put it another way, if you ain't released anything this year, you ain't shit.
Unless, of course, someone dies. How else would you explain Nirvana's winning Rolling Stone's Artist of the Year award and Kurt Cobain tieing with Trent Reznor in the Spin honors. Maybe I'm ignorant, but what exactly did Nirvana do this year to earn the award? Toured a bit, recorded an acoustic CD, sparked Meat Puppet-mania, and lost a frontman to his own demons. Event-filled, OK. Tragic, yeah, but does Cobain's death mean they were the best artists of the year? If that's the case, why didn't Mia Zapata's rape and murder net the Gits best-artist honors last year?
What's that? Oh, the reason Kurt and Co. won and the Gits didn't is because the Aberdeen Three were more popular. Well then, why didn't Ace of Base win?
So, polls aren't an accurate measure of quality, yet magazines keep doing them. Basically, polls serve four purposes. They reinforce previously held notions (Green Day sells one bazillion albums, people vote that they like Green Day. Shocker.); they provide the impression that the magazines care what its readers think; they give a kick in the butt to people who don't already own at least one copy of Bake Sale, Whip-Smart, or Mighty Joe Moon (on newly re-hip vinyl, natch); but most importantly, they fill space with product!. These year-end issues are the perfect hook for advertisers, since a lot of people hang on to them long after they've left the shelf, and use the polls as a purchasing guide.
Because none of these polls lets on how many (or how few) responses they get, there's no way of telling what we're supposed to learn from them. There's also no way of knowing if the winners really won, since it's childishly easy to fudge the data. That is, there's no poll oversight committee stopping magazines from giving awards to bands with bigger ad budgets, better drugs, cuter members, or catchier names.
Before we get further into the polls, let's check out what America actually bought in 1994. Take a look at Billboard's year-end issue (December 24), which picks "winners" based on actual album sales. At least, I think it's based on purchases. I can't be too sure, since the explanation of how the charts were compiled reads like the instruction manual for an F-14. To whit: "Rankings for the Hot 100 and Hot R&B Airplay charts are determined by accumulating the total number of gross impressions registered during each week that a title is on the chart. For the Country, Album Rock, and Modern Rock singles charts, rankings are based on accumulated detections during each title's chart weeks." Then subtract the net result of lines 7a through 7m from line 12, and the resulting amount is your net deduction for 1994. Oh, I'm sorry, I think I got distracted just then.
"Gross impressions" aside, Billboard proves what most people know already: Ace of Base is eerily popular. The Swedes sold 6 million copies of The Sign, netted the best artist, album, single, and group awards, and became only the second non-English speaking band to have the top single. Not bad for a band most people I know hate. Other winners in Billboard's eyes included Mariah Carey, R. Kelly, the Stone Temple Pilots, and Collective Soul.
If the Billboard figures are correct, one would expect Ace of Base to rule the readers' polls, too. One would be wrong. If any band could be said to have "won" the polls, it would be Green Day.
Polls in Rolling Stone and Spin, which for some reason are the two most popular general-interest music magazines in the U.S., are very similar. In the intro, the RS staff congratulate us in-bred, mouth-breathing readers for finally agreeing with their holy critics. They also mention that we "did a much better job voting here than...in the congressional elections." Glad you fucking approve.
In both cases, the readers chose safe, middlebrow, well-known artists (Harry Connick, Jr., as best jazz artist and Kurt Cobain as best songwriter) while the Rolling Stone critics opted for safe, acceptably hip choices (Joshua Redman and Freedy Johnston, respectively). Of course, the real revelation here is that a lot of Spin readers thought Kurt Cobain's suicide was the best thing to happen last year and a large proportion of Rolling Stone readers consider US3 to be jazz and Kiss My Ass to be a reissue.
According to the introduction, Spin's poll proves that its readers hate rap ("none" came in second behind the Beastie Boys in the best rap category), hate Ace of Base, and love Green Day. OK, Spin's readers are close-minded, white, and in thrall to whatever fad is pumped out this week. The best tidbit in Spin's poll is a roundup of stupid answers they received. One guy said the death of John Goodman (Goodman, not Candy) was the worst thing to happen last year, another joker named Van Gogh best artist, and yet another said Threesome was best thing to happen in 1994. Perfect for the person whose favorite part of magazines is the staff's responses to letters to the editor.
Both mags attempt "hip" questions: Spin asks who should be caned and what's the "big new trend," while Rolling Stone wants our input on hype of the year and biggest poseur. (Oo la la, we are using le spelling Francaise, eh. Magnifique! Tres pompous. Je remembre when le mot pour such cretins was "poser." Vraiment! Il est plus de valley girl pour 1995, though.)
Unfortunately, the critics don't get to vote on such pressing issues as the best-dressed rocker or favorite Real World character (Puck won, mainly because the voters don't live with him). I for one would love to know what Greil Marcus (who didn't vote this year) has to say about the "eating peanut butter right out of the jar" scandal. Critics also can't vote on the best radio station, always a contentious category. Though I have yet to hear of any band asking its fans to vote for them (if I do, there's gonna be hell to pay), it's not uncommon for radio stations to cravenly beg their listeners for votes.
The artists' picks are the best thing about the Rolling Stone poll. For the most part, they are pretty blah, too (is anyone surprised to hear that Nanci Griffith likes Counting Crows and the Indigo Girls or that the Offspring's Noodles likes Rancid?), but it's fun to chart the logrolling. Lessee, Liz Phair and Kristen Hersh like the Beasties, but Mike D. has better things to listen to. Likewise, Coolio and TLC rave about the Notorious B.I.G., but Mr. B.I.G. instead prefers to sing the praises of...himself. Ouch. Guess who's not getting Christmas cards from Coolio this year.
As blah as these polls are, they could be worse. They could be Option's. Option prides itself on its differences, and though it has to some extent been tarred with the "sell-out" brush, the magazine still reviews a dizzying array of albums that fly below the radar of mainstream mags. When it started its alternate year-end readers'/writers' polls, Option again wanted to be unique. And it is -- the readers' poll (in the January/February issue) is by far the worst of the lot.
In a brave move away from coherence, the editors decided that they would narrow down to only the top "five." The top four were: 1. Hole and Liz Phair, 2. Sebadoh, Guided By Voices, and Pavement, 3. Nine Inch Nails, Kristin Hersh, Sugar, and Beck, 4. Aphex Twin, the Wedding Present, and Sonic Youth. Five was the stellar cop-out "a baker's dozen -- from Archers of Loaf to John Zorn (no kidding!)." Well, I for one would have thought you were completely serious if you'd just printed the damn band names.
Instead of attempting to do something with the data, Option decided it would be better to just reprint 20 readers' top five picks (the writer smugly pointed out that "the range of picks was generally as eclectic as this magazine's coverage." Hooray! We passed!).
Hmmm. Gee, you know, I was just wondering who Ralph Cabit of Mansfield, Conn. thought recorded the best albums of '94 (William S. Burroughs, Billy Tipton Memorial Sax Quintet, Caveman Shoestore, Ginger Baker/Bill Frisell/Charlie Haden, Mo Boma). A couple of friends and I met over coffee the other day to wonder whether Douglas Harwood of Buffalo, NY has uncovered the mystery behind Liz Phair's sex appeal (nope, he just knows she's sexy). I can't count the number of times I've wished Steve Dolphyn of Lawrenceville, Ga. could be here to tell me what effect The Downward Spiral has had on his life (one word: seizures). Get the picture? No offense, Option, but exactly why should I care what Greg Steele, Craig Michaels, "International Fun Boy," or Yoonie Helbig thinks about anything. The 20 "various used to spot trends or reach conclusions, we can curl up with real, warm 'n' fuzzy personal preferences. Option even borrowed a tip from the Village Voice's famed Pazz and Jop poll, which gives voters a chance to justify their choices. While the poll itself, a survey of 500 critics, isn't radically different from Spin or Rolling Stone's, what sets it apart is pages and pages of comments.
Option's feature also points out the ridiculousness of these polls. Here we have at least 20 people who have taken minutes/hours/days out of their too-short lives to craft a list of the top five albums. And what makes these people's opinions less important than, say the Digable Planets' Butterfly?
Well, to begin with, a significant number of people presumably care about what Noodles creates and so would be interested to hear what he listens to. Option's poll seems to hew to a punk/DIY-inspired theory that every listener's opinion is as important as another's. Fine. I can deal with that. Actually, after reading Butterfly's choices, I'm inclined to think maybe artists are less qualified to judge.
Option's intro calls this "the reader's poll that almost wasn't," which seems to indicate trouble with a capital "A" and that stands for apathy. Low voter turnout may explain the pathetic state of the boxes where the "best" comments about Kurt Cobain, Courtney Love, old music, the state of the industry, etc., were reprinted. DC's Dan Weiss was quoted three times and four other voters were quoted twice. Granted, not everyone is Dorothy Parker...but then again, neither is Dan Weiss. Low turnout may also explains why only five women voters were included (to be honest, there's also a Pat, a S.L., a V., a J., an Emu, and a Yoonie, but all six would have to be female to make this a representative sample).
Thanks to its mess of unrelated lists, Option stole the "worst poll" award from Details, the early favorite. The music/lifestyle/voice of Gen-X mag also chimed in with a pseudo-poll in its Stephen Dorff-adorned January issue. America's worst-smelling magazine (just what I always wanted: dull, self-involved, know-nothing prose masked by a choking cloud of pheromones) sponsored a cross-country trip to canvas American youth and find out exactly what we think about things. Thank god for the media.
The results? The percentage of Details-type people who own porn is exactly equal to the percentages of people who own dogs and modems combined; a majority wants to legalize pot, even though 73 percent of us prefer booze; buying a Michael Bolton CD is more embarrassing than buying tampons; 52 percent couldn't identify lyrics from "Shaft"; and Details readers offer surprisingly little insight into anything.
You know the drill: the bulk of the article is excerpts from discussion groups covering such scintillating topics as relationships, religion, body piercing (the pet rock of the 90s), sex, Melrose Place, etc. The sad thing is that the Details staffers actually talked to these people but still came back empty-handed. Again, the phrase "who cares" jumps immediately to mind. While I'm sorry Hoyt Hudson is occasionally dissatisfied with his job, in the end I can't get too worked up about it. Have a beer. Relax. Avoid heavily perfumed, hipper-than-thou magazines.
All in all, 1994 was a disappointing year for polls. The magazines filled some space, readers felt important, and winners got an empty award. The outlook isn't totally bleak, though. At the same time these other rags were tabulating Green Day votes, one mag asked just one simple question, and the resulting article is more fun to read than any of its competitors. The mag? Omni.
Yes Omni, that quite laughable psuedoscience journal (for the most part, non-Trekkers need not apply) beat their rock counterparts with one question: "What would you say to an alien?" The magazine asked an indeterminate number of world leaders, comedians, scientists, creative types, and American politicians what they'd say to a visiting space alien. While they didn't reveal the exact number of people polled, Omni did at least point out who they targeted.
The results of their polling are 26 responses from such glitterati as Jane Alexander, George Carlin, Arthur Miller, Bernard Shaw, and of course Leonard Nimoy ("I have...handed the assignment to my friend, Spock, who is highly skilled in nonverbal diplomacy." OK Leonard, it's going to be all right. Hand over that phaser, and no one gets hurt). Dave Barry contributes the shortest ("Do you guys have cable?") while Steve Allen spews out a rambling rant (someone get this guy an editor) that still manages to not be funny. Puerto Rican governor Pedro Rossello plans to pitch a tourist-advertising blitz, while Mystery Science Theater 3000's Tom Servo would lead off with a simple request, "Can I touch your butt?" Unctuous TV guy Robin Leach takes the cake with an incoherent rant in which he berates the aliens for being late, offers them caviar, and then presses them about whether they've seen E.T. OK Robbie, no more champagne for you.
Leach's muddled monologue aside, Omni's poll manages to be more amusing than any of the others. Maybe because all of the respondents were quasi-interesting (or at least funny). Still, it would be nice to know what Arthur Miller thinks about Green Day...