Well, his music taste could not be any worse- especially because it's so hypocritical. It's not like Arcade Fire are a particularly subtle and punk sounding band. Long before Grimes was drawing on huge, almost U2-like '90s pop/rock sounds on parts of this album, Arcade Fire was already doing that on Neon Bible, The Suburbs and Reflektor. Actually Funeral was a really cheesy poppy album too in a way. I mean, I'm not saying it's a bad album (although I find the lyrics to be more moving than the bland music, at this point), but it's poppy in the bigness of it- and by the time you get to all those synth-rock filler songs in the middle of Reflektor, it's pretty much the exact same style of songs and production as the rockier/country songs on this album, only with FAR more simplistic, dumbed-down lyrics (which seem to be aiming at an eight year old audience) and with equally slick and poppy but much less artistically inspired production.

Arcade Fire cannot act like they are some pure entity untainted by contemporary pop sounds- crazy. They actually paved the way for the Montreal DIY scene to be so open to pop sounds, like girl groups and French ye-ye pop and a touch of disco and plenty of unfashionable '80s arena rock (all of these sounds were an influence on Arcade Fire) and then eventually (as younger more radical musicians like Grimes andher friends superseded Arcade Fire, who went on to bigger things outside Montreal) the scene developed into R&B dance pop infatuation and pop punk (D'Eon made an entire full length album "classical" piano suite based on a Blink 182 song- and it's amazing) but this is directly a result of Arcade Fire because before them, the Montreal DIY scene wasn't poppy at all, it was all these dark, hyper politicized post rock bands on Constellation records like Godspeed with 20 minute metal/classical drone epics. It was (and sometimes even still is) good stuff but sure as hell not as poppy as Wake Up (or Rebellion Lies, the best song on Funeral and a song that is thematically very similar to this new Grimes album). Arcade Fire pulled the post rock thing in a poppier, rock direction and that allowed for outright pop acts later on to emerge and thrive in the Lab Synthese and Arbutus scenes before going mainstream. So it's funny that Arcade Fire (whose own music was probably seen as too cheesy and poppy by Godspeed band members, though they helped them find the studio resources to make Funeral) are now acting like Grimes is violating some rule of good taste. And the production of AF even at its best is so much weaker because it shares the same "flaw" of pop (Arcade Fire has no dynamic range or subtlety to their production even on Funeral- it is hyper-compressed) yet lacks the strengths of pop (the banging rhythms- Arcade Fire rhythms, apart from a couple of their better songs- like Reflektor title track and Month of May- are so slack, weak in comparison to this album or Visions for that matter).

That said- as a WRITER, judging by this review, I would say he is an honest reviewer, talking about what he feels without trying to say it invalidates Grimes as an artist. This is much better than even a positive review that is impersonal, where the reviewer pretends they are an objective authority on Grimes and have any idea what she's doing. Will Butler has no idea, and admits his confusion. That's not going to get him any points for being cool or having taste, it makes him look like the out of touch old man he is, but it's also admirable in a way that he was not claiming to understand, he was admitting it's over his head, and admitting his genre prejudices. Very few music writers today have the honesty to do that- if they don't like something hot, they will pretend to. Will Butler even admits he didn't like Prince or Bob Dylan until he forced himself, so he is really asking for criticism!! But at the same time, don't we all have certain things we are "supposed" to like that we don't, even if we love Prince or Bob Dylan or Grimes? The honesty is admirable. I'm sure Grimes herself wouldn't be at all offended by reading this review, compared to a typical review like Pitchfork that seems "positive," claims to understand what she is doing and totally misrepresents the depth of her ideas and her work.

Also just in terms of writing style, Will Butler is more interesting to read (even tho he is totally wrong in not loving Art Angels) than the reviewers who dissed him. Tom Breihan at Stereogum is an extremely shitty writer (and a very dishonest one- he always writes as if he is carefully weighing what he is "supposed" to feel based on what is currently hot and fashionable in the indie scene) and probably the single worst critic with influence today (saying a lot, considering all the hacks at 'Fork). So I imagine Butler might take it as an honor to be called out for his allegedly shitty writing style by Breihan. It is not Butler's writing that sucks- that is kind of interesting. His opinions about music are what suck. But in his favor, he always presents them as his own opinions. So I don't take any offense to this at all- I just wish him luck in overcoming his childhood musical prejudices (implicitly classist and racist and sexist, of course) and developing a more post-genre way of listening, as most millennials have. Listening like Butler is a mark of oldness but also immaturity. There should be no particular sound that in itself, automatically invalidates a work. It depends what is being expressed and how the sound is used. Radiohead and other rock bands were more advanced than Arcade Fire in that regard, I guess. I didn't realize members of Arcade Fire would have a stigma against a sound in itself, not taking into account the ideas and feelings Grimes expresses with the sound/lyrics dialectic.