Pop philosopher John Maus has apologized after comments made about record stores in an interview with Pitchfork.

When quizzed about his favourite record stores, Maus, who just released a new album titled We Must Become the Pitiless Censors of Ourselves, replied: “You don’t know how happy it makes me that the days of the record store are coming to an end. $20 for an LP? Do you remember going to the record store and not getting what you want because there was no other place to get it? Now we can get it all for free, and I think that’s wonderful.

“There was always something really depressing to me about record stores and music equipment stores. There’s something oppressive about them, like the guy who looks you up and down and looks at what you’re buying. You’re bound up in exchange with the snobby clerk. So I’m glad they all have little “closed” signs on their doors now.”

Predictably this got The People of The Internet worked into a sweat, leading to various fans waving their real-life pitchforks on Twitter (one reaction, brought to our attention by Dummy, read “if john maus fell down a flight of stairs, i would drive 700 miles just to point and laugh at his stupid bleelding [sic] skull”).

Maus has since verified his statement, though he didn’t take the time to use any paragraph breaks which is pretty poor form for an academic:

I wish everyone who is (rightfully) upset about my Pitchfork “guest list” would grant me the benefit of the doubt, but I suppose that is too much to ask seeing as how I did come off so incredibly mean. I can’t understand why anyone would think I was referring to the small DIY record shops of the world (the only type that would carry my records in the first place, and many of which I have played in) and not the Megastores of the world, but I guess I didn’t make that clear enough. For whatever it is worth now, the only reason I didn’t make that clear enough was because I foolishly supposed anyone reading the “guest list” would grant that I was referring to the latter and not the former. I mean, what could anyone possibly have against the small DIY record stores of the world (unless they worked for one of the big ones)? If anything, by saying “I’m glad to see [big] record stores closing down” I imagined I was speaking on behalf of small DIY record stores everywhere! What I’d ask anyone who is (rightfully) upset to remember is that the “guest list” was torn unrecognizably from its context as a telephone call. The interviewer asked me what my favorite record store was, and I jokingly responded “torrents.com” or something like that, laughing about how wonderful it is that music and movies are becoming easier and easier to get for free. I then explained to him that where I grew up we had none of these little DIY type stores but only the big chains, and that I once worked in a Megastore and it was very unpleasant. Finally, I began to go on about the experience, which I cannot imagine I am alone in having, of being looked up-and-down by a snobby clerk when purchasing a record, or of not having enough money to get all the records one wants. I thought all of this would get laughs of identification, not accusations of my wanting small record store owners to die penniless! (Why would anyone, especially a musician, want this?) I hope those little store owners would grant me that I wasn’t talking about them. But perhaps the damage is done. Finally, I just want anyone who is (rightfully) upset to know, that whenever I get up on the “platforms” offered in interviews and so on, I always try to imagine a world emancipated from interested exchange and the extortion of surplus. Even if it is a little too naive or too utopian of me, I don’t see what is wrong with trying imagine a world where we share everything with each other for free. I always joke with the promoters and the labels about the contradictions involved in doing this from our standpoint, and I guess I just thought I could do it with the record stores as well. If what I said came across as anything other than this desire then I can only assure you that that was not my intent. The fact that anyone would react to anything I say is still a novelty to me, and I’m afraid I’ve made a terrible use of that novelty.

So yes, we know John Maus doesn’t really hate record stores, and he also didn’t really apologize. But it makes for a good title.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 4th, 2011 at 12:02 pm and is filed under Latest, News and tagged with John Maus. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.