Shfl Update, July 7

Frere-Jones on Krautrock plus new recommendations from Philip Freeman, Alex Riggs, and Jeff Treppel

Reviews

Schoolly D, Wu-Tang Clan, Jeru the Damaja, UGK, LL Cool J and Busta Rhymes from Philip Freeman

Damien Jurado, Wilco, Bon Iver and R.E.M. from Alex Riggs

Jeff Treppel on Down, Sweet, Savatage, Gridlink, Monster Magnet, Andrew W.K. and Circle

Guides

Sasha Frere-Jones on krautrock, don’t miss the big list

Just Some Bullshit

There’s this thing computer folks used to talk about all the time, first loving and then mostly hating on, called skeuomorphism. It’s when some computer thing mimics a real life thing, like a file folder or every single ugly texture and animation on the first iPhone. Remember all that leather? All those flipping pages? That stuff. Mostly it’s all been thrown away in favor of efficiency and speed nowadays and mostly for the better.

Anyway I do that consciously, and if you were ever curious why lists on Shfl only have album covers rather than covers and titles, it is definitely to mimic record stores, where you’d see like an endcap with a bunch of album covers and you’d have to flip them over to find out what the hell it was if the cover grabbed you. It’s also why I have this whole flip through mechanic too, because I just physically remember flipping through a big pile of albums and I wanted to provoke that feeling to the extent that a website can. I also wanted to kinda mimic the feeling of a little signed card in front of an album saying why this one is the one you should take home. Because now going to a store and paying real money for something and taking it home and putting the thing into a machine that can play music has translated into wasting maybe 30 seconds of time online right? Efficiency sucks! But the world is the world and now is now.

So if you were wondering why Shfl is a little annoying its because I made it that way intentionally! It’s not just because I am shitty at UI. The older I get the more I appreciate inefficiency. Sometimes it’s good to get stuck in the mud. Gives you some time to think y’know?