Pitchfork gave Liz Phair a 0.0. Her previous album got a 9.0 from them.

Let's run the numbers. Liz Phair, 1993: Exile in Guyville. Pitchfork score: 9.0. Same Liz Phair, 2003: self-titled. Pitchfork score: 0.0. That's a 9-point delta on the same artist in the same publication. The math ain't mathing.

Let's audit the variables. Did her vocal range collapse 90 percent? No. Did she lose 90 percent of her songwriting ability? No. What changed? She signed to Capitol and worked with The Matrix, a major-label production team. That's the only variable. So Pitchfork's scoring rubric appears to read: 'minus 9 points for working with people who get paid.' Which is interesting, because that exact month Pitchfork was published by a company that gets paid.

Here's where the data gets juicy. The reviewer, Matt LeMay, was 23 years old. The review accuses Phair — a 36-year-old mother — of 'career suicide,' as if a man with a clipboard at Pitchfork is the coroner. Meanwhile cross-reference the same era: Pitchfork gave Radiohead's major-label Hail to the Thief an 8.4. Wilco's major-label A Ghost Is Born got a 6.6. Both released by men. The variance between 'major label man' and 'major label woman' in their 2003-2004 dataset is statistically impossible to explain by music alone. The numerator is gender. I checked.

And here's the regression kicker: Pitchfork is now owned by Condé Nast, sells display ads to Capitol Records, and runs a music festival sponsored by Ray-Ban. The publication that scored a woman 0.0 for being 'too commercial' is now a vertical inside the most commercial publishing house on Earth. The math finally checks out — because the math was never the point. The score was the vibe. The vibe was 'how dare she.' Final score for this review: 0.0. For once the numbers add up.