I was forwarded a story by Patrick Goldstein from the LA Times about the possible end of the critic. Let’s be more specific here. Goldstein is referring to entertainment critics and how over the years, specifically since the Internet changed our information consumption habits, the single voice of a critic – respected or not – is being drowned out by the voice of the community. Makes sense. A chorus of viewpoints is often more powerful than a single exclamation. Of course, it’s not solely the community voice that’s to blame for weakening the foundation of the Ivory Tower upon which most critics at the top of the food chain sit and pontificate downwards. There’s a myriad of reasons. Some more complicated – in an anthropological sense – than others. The simple reason, as Goldstein points out, is trust.

Trust is valued more than anything when it comes to making entertainment decisions. We can agree on that. I’m more likely to buy a CD (or music, since the CD concept dates me) on a recommendation from a friend than a single review of the same CD in a magazine; usually this recommendation comes with discourse and a listening session, so the sole recommendation isn’t the factor but a factor in my decision-making process. This isn’t a grand revelation, however. I can’t recall ever being swayed by a single review or article that I should or shouldn’t purchase a CD, go to a movie, or visit a museum or an art exhibit. Maybe my generation, labeled Generation X by some smartass back in ‘65, was the first to not blindly follow or believe in everything presented to us by the media. My mom, for example, takes the evening news as gospel whereas I see it as one side of a many-sided story. There might be a grain of truth to my assumptions. The point is, at least in my pea-brain, critics were never meant to be the be-all, end-all authority on anything. Though if you ask me about Opeth, bring dinner. Sure, some have stature, superior language skills, and can yarn more verbosely than the late Robert Jordan, but very few (I don’t remember names, actually) were the single voice, the wizard behind the curtain compelling me to make choices. Critics were/are merely guides. Personal preference, bias, and opinion are all part of those guides. Whether I agreed or disagreed was my choice. That choice helped shape my decisions.

So to say the power critics wield is lessening or they’re entering a Cretaceous–Tertiary period of sorts, I think, misses the mark. Critics have never had real power or sway. It’s more suggestive. Sure, major media outlets like newspapers, magazines, radio, and television are diminishing the capacity of the critic, focusing instead on gossip, paparazzi-styled stories, as a way to adapt to what presently is a “me/you”-media era of which they have little control. That’s another discussion entirely. The number of expensive leather chairs at the top of the Ivory Tower might be fewer these days, but there will always be entertainment critics where there’s entertainment. Critics might be, as Goldstein alludes, in a selection period. I truly think when the community voice stumbles, falters, or is flat-out wrong – it inevitably will on all accounts –, individuals, distrusting of the community voice or vehicle(s), will then turn to the singular voice of the critic. The more things change the more they stay the same. Good thing I’m a critic.

Click here to Goldstein’s story.