Breaking Wavves

About a month ago, singer Nathan Williams of Wavves flamed-out on stage during a concert in Barcelona. What was interesting was how brutally voyeuristic the coverage was following the incident, culminating in Pitchfork Editor Ryan Schrieber's blow-by-blow, shameless account of the breakdown of a band whose premature prominence his website largely promoted.

Williams is just 22 years old, a standard age for an aborning pop music phenomenon, but usually far too young to have accrued any sense of self-esteem, world-awareness (although touring will probably help), and the professionalism needed to give a paying public a quality show. He has released two full-lengths in two years, and travelled extensively, but at day's end, a kid's still a kid.

For this, he's earned my sympathies. His drug-induced flakiness is on par with his age group, and a self-medicating response to his sudden notoriety and acclaim. In interviews, he's come off as humbled and apologetic, but also impressively nonchalant. Whether the music is worthy is beyond the point, since Pitchfork taste makers have so deemed it.

I've no doubt the hype machine would rather Nathan succeed than fail, since it's always better for a music critic's tastes to validated than dismissed. Nevertheless, it was sadly peculiar how insensitive initial reports were to his emotional distress, as though built up to be knocked down.

In their unyielding quest to discover and promote independent artists, Pitchfork has become a hugely influential juggernaut. It's this same rabid desire to debut the new that has led them to occasionally overreach, snagging the emotional infants from the cradles of creativity.