Theneedledrop

Anthony Fantano (born: )https://www.reddit.com/r/fantanoforever/comments/9s0os6/happy_33rd_birthday_to_mr_fandango/ is an American YouTuber and music critic and self-described as "the internet's busiest music nerd". Fantano is behind The Needle Drop, a web series, blog, and former radio program that analyzes "rock, pop, electronic, metal, hip hop, and experimental music" through video and audio critiques. In the fall of 2007, TNP debuted as a radio show on Connecticut Public Radio (WNPR), and the same year, a blog was also launched. The program was transformed into a YouTube music review series in February 2009, although the original radio program wouldn't completely switch to video reviews and come to an end until Fantano departed WNPR in 2014. A weekly overview of the singles released that week is done together with album reviews on the site.
His reviews occasionally contain brief skits, usually involving his alter ego Cal Chuchesta, a musically oblivious man portrayed as Fantano's roommate. He also runs a second channel simply named fantano where he does track reviews, discusses industry news, and more varied but still music related content, and used to also run the now-terminated thatistheplan, a light-hearted channel where he reviewed and discussed the latest memes and parodied internet culture.
The channel was voted as September 2011's On The Rise contest winner, a program by YouTube.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1n0ifxFsh4 In October 2011, Fantano won the Beyond the Blog award at the MTV O Music Awards.https://consequence.net/2011/10/webcast-mtv-o-music-awards-2/
==Anthony Fantano==
===Early life===
Fantano grew up in Connecticut and spent his teenage years in Wolcott. As a child he had a desire to become a cartoonist, stating he was a fan of The Simpsons and that he still enjoys cartoons from today such as Adventure Time and Regular Show.
Fantano was introduced to independent music in the early 2000s which eventually influenced him to start The Needle Drop. He has said, "I had a friend of mine on Livejournal–lol, I know–back in the early 00s who used to do these long writeups about certain artists and she turned me on to a few that were pretty great. It made me want to do the same, share the musical experience on the internet. It didn’t really turn into "reviews" until I tried doing YouTube in 2009, which I only did as an experiment because my blog and podcast were making much traction at the time."
Fantano attended Southern Connecticut State University where he studied political science and journalism.
===Career===
Fantano started his career in the mid-2000s as a music director for the Southern Connecticut State University college radio station. He stated, "I've always loved music, but working there got me turned into a lot of different styles, and got me pushing my tastes into different areas".
In 2007, Fantano started working at Connecticut Public Radio in which he hosted The Needle Drop. That same year, Fantano also launched The Needle Drop in text reviews, eventually starting as video reviews in 2009. Fantano, at the time, was working on The Needle Drop, at the college radio station, and at a pizza restaurant. In late 2011, Fantano decided to pursue The Needle Drop full-time.
In 2011, Fantano was interviewed at SXSW about the rise of music vlogging, along with Matt Galloway of the Rock It Out! Blog, and Michael Roffman, president and editor-in-chief of Consequence of Sound. In March 2011, he was featured in an article from The Guardian also about the rise of music vlogging.
===The Needle Drop===
The blog The Needle Drop is a spin-off of a WNPR show of the same name.
A recurring character on The Needle Drop is Anthony Fantano's fictional musically oblivious and socially awkward roommate, Cal Chuchesta. Fantano, as Chuchesta, released a comedic mixtape, The New CALassic, on August 18, 2015, as a free digital download. Fantano later reviewed the mixtape on August 19, 2015, and rated it a light 3. At the end of the review Chuchesta took over the show in a fit of anger and claimed that Fantano had agreed to give the mixtape a 10 off camera. However, Fantano's rating still stands.
On his second channel, Fantano will occasionally upload interviews of musicians or notable people in the music industry that would be held live on his Twitch. He has interviewed musicians such as Brockhampton, Rebecca Black, and Oliver Tree.
===thatistheplan===
Created in 2016, thatistheplan was dedicated to all things memes and internet culture. He would interview many online meme figures such as Soph and Sam Hyde. Fantano started this channel as a parody to Behind The Meme. It is in this channel where Meme Review was born.
The channel had a decent run getting the attention of /pol/ until it was deleted in 2017 by Fantano himself after constant demonitization and a hit piece by The Fader describing him as alt-right. He then denounced Soph in 2019 as well as his former editor after his Christchurch comments. Sam Hyde would frequently troll him online afterwards.
==Personal life==
Fantano lives in Middletown, Connecticut. He is three-quarters French Canadian and a quarter Sicilian. Fantano is a vegan, having grown into the diet since becoming vegetarian around 18–19. He has been going through a divorce since 2022.
==Notable reviews and ratings==
===Rating system===
The blog rates albums and tracks on a scale from 0 to 10, with an accompanying adjective – either "light", "decent", or "strong" – for further qualification of its score. Occasionally he will do parody reviews of albums such as I'm Gay (I'm Happy) by Lil B,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwTAPEe6A1A Born This Way by Lady Gaga,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXcbNP9i2jw Unknown Death 2002 by Yung Lean,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNS2lFLHedE Mastermind by Rick Ross,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJF5NhmcWc8 Dark Sky Paradise by Big Sean,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKmbySC3V6U August 26 by Post Malone,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=leVsj_X8yF8 Ether by B.o.B,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2w4wi19KBEE Gold Cobra and Still Sucks by Limp Bizkit,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45xt7d6L538https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PW-SzhsksvE and Sketches of Brunswick East by King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dge1w2xQ-8A For an April Fools joke, he released two separate reviews of All Love's Legal by Planningtorock, one giving it a 0/10https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO_DTx7DOTo and one giving it a 10/10.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7ovkjrJFMI His actual rating for the album is unknown. He also released another April Fools joke review years later for Portals by Melanie Martinez, in which he instead reviewed progressive metal band Tesseract's live album of the same name as if it was Martinez's album.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMdF_4Pw8C0
Discounting parody/joke reviews, Fantano has only given seven perfect 10/10 ratings and five 0/10 ratings in his career so far (seen in the tables below). The rapper Kid Cudi is the only artist to have received both of these ratings from Fantano, having earned a 0/10 on his 2015 album Speedin' Bullet 2 Heaven, followed later by a 10/10 on the 2018 album Kids See Ghosts from the eponymous musical duo comprised of Cudi himself and Kanye West.
In July 2016, a new rating dubbed "Not Good" was introduced, which is not based on a numeric score and is assigned to albums which Fantano does not feel like giving a proper negative review on. The first album to receive the rating was Desiigner's New English.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5lBwkRsID1Q He also did a near-unedited 50-minute "Not Good" review of Angelic 2 the Core by Corey Feldman, in which he dubbed the album the worst of 2016.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3E0kq9YkjA
In February 2021, another new rating dubbed "Not Bad" was introduced. Like the "Not Good" segment, it is not based on a numeric score and is assigned to albums which Fantano feels are underrated but does not want to give a formal review on. Initially suggested by a tweet on Fantano's "Let's Argue" segment on his side channel fantano, the first album to receive the rating was Steven Wilson's The Future Bites.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQpHaXqGlCg
Additionally, Fantano also reviews albums that are considered "classic" music releases. These are reviewed without a rating on during a yearly segment known as Classics Week.https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLP4CSgl7K7or_7JI7RsEsptyS4wfLFGIN
====Modern albums with a perfect rating (10/10)====
Year	Artist 	Album 	Nation
2012	Death Grips 	The Money Store 	United States
2014	Swans 	To Be Kind 	United States
2015	Kendrick Lamar 	To Pimp a Butterfly 	United States
2018	Kids See Ghosts	Kids See Ghosts 	United States
2018	Daughters 	You Won't Get What You Want	United States
2021	Spellling 	The Turning Wheel 	United States
2021	Lingua Ignota 	SINNER GET READY 	United States
2024	Charli XCX 	BRAT 	United Kingdom
====Albums with a score of 0 (not including "NOT GOOD")====
Year	Artist 	Album 	Nation
2015	Kid Cudi 	Speedin' Bullet 2 Heaven	United States
2019	Chance the Rapper	The Big Day 	United States
2020	Green Day 	Father of All... 	United States
2021	Tones and I 	Welcome to the Madhouse 	Australia
2022	Ken Carson 	X 	United States
2024	MGK & Trippie Red	genre : sadboy 	United States
===Awards===
====Album of the Year (2009–)====
Year	Artist 	Album 	Nation
2009	Fever Ray 	Fever Ray 	Sweden
2010	LCD Soundsystem 	This Is Happening 	United States
2011	Fleet Foxes 	Helplessness Blues 	United States
2012	Death Grips 	The Money Store 	United States
2013	Tim Hecker 	Virgins 	Canada
2014	Swans 	To Be Kind 	United States
2015	Kendrick Lamar 	To Pimp a Butterfly 	United States
2016	Danny Brown 	Atrocity Exhibition 	United States
2017	Father John Misty 	Pure Comedy 	United States
2018	Daughters 	You Won't Get What You Want	United States
2019	Charli XCX 	Charli 	United Kingdom
2020	Jessie Ware 	What's Your Pleasure? 	United Kingdom
2021	Spellling 	The Turning Wheel 	United States
2022	Natalia Lafourcade	De Todas las Flores 	Mexico
2023	Jeff Rosenstock 	Hellmode 	United States
====EP of the Year (2010–)====
Year	Artist 	EP 	Nation
2010	The Tallest Man on Earth	Sometimes the Blues Is Just a Passing Bird	Sweden
2011	Nicolas Jaar 	Don't Break My Love 	United States
2012	TNGHT 	TNGHT 	CanadaUnited Kingdom
2013	Milo 	Things That Happen At Day 	United States
2014	Girl Talk and Freeway 	Broken Ankles 	United States
2015	FKA Twigs 	M3LL155X 	United Kingdom
2016	Charli XCX 	Vroom Vroom 	United Kingdom
2017	Rina Sawayama 	RINA 	United KingdomJapan
2018	Aphex Twin 	Collapse 	United Kingdom
2019	Kero Kero Bonito 	Civilization I 	United KingdomJapan
2020	Tkay Maidza 	Last Year Was Weird, Vol. 2 	AustraliaZimbabwe
2021	Rachel Chinouriri 	Fourº in Winter 	United Kingdom
2022	Ginger Root 	Nisemono 	United States
2023	Alice Longyu Gao 	Let's Hope Heteros Learn, Fail and Retire 	China
====Single of the Year (2010–)====
Year	Artist 	Single 	Nation
2010	LCD Soundsystem 	"I Can Change" 	United States
2011	Fleet Foxes 	"Helplessness Blues" 	United States
2012	Death Grips 	"The Fever (Aye Aye)" 	United States
2013	The Knife 	"A Tooth for an Eye" 	Sweden
2014	Liars 	"Mess on a Mission" 	United States
2015	Kendrick Lamar 	"The Blacker the Berry" 	United States
2016	David Bowie 	"Blackstar" 	United Kingdom
2017	Father John Misty	"Pure Comedy" 	United States
2018	Childish Gambino 	"This Is America" 	United States
2019	Alex Cameron 	"Far From Born Again" 	Australia
2020	Mac Miller 	"Good News" 	United States
2021	Little Simz 	"Introvert" 	United Kingdom
2022	Viagra Boys 	"Troglodyte" 	Sweden
2023	Sufjan Stevens 	"Will Anybody Ever Love Me?"	United States
====Worst Album of the Year (2015–)====
Year	Artist 	Album 	Nation
2015	Kid Cudi 	Speedin' Bullet 2 Heaven 	United States
2016	Corey Feldman 	Angelic 2 the Core 	United States
2017	XXXTentacion 	17 	United States
2018	Lil Xan 	Total Xanarchy 	United States
2019	Doug Walker 	Nostalgia Critic's The Wall	United States
2020	Tory Lanez 	Daystar 	Canada
2021	Tones and I 	Welcome to the Madhouse 	Australia
2022	Iced Earth 	A Narrative Soundscape 	United States
2023	Avenged Sevenfold	Life Is But a Dream... 	United States
====Worst Song of the Year (2016–)====
Year	Artist 	Song
2016	Le Tigre 	"I'm With Her"
2017	Hopsin 	"Happy Ending"
2018	Tom MacDonald	"Whiteboy"
2019	Lil Dicky 	"Earth"
2020	Justin Bieber	"Yummy (Country Remix)" (ft. Florida Georgia Line)
2021	Corey Feldman	"Rockin' Revolution"
2022	Leah Kate 	"Twinkle Twinkle Little Bitch"
2023	Jason Aldean 	"Try That in a Small Town"
====Music Video of the Year (2010–2014)====
Year	Artist 	Music Video
2010	HEALTH 	"We Are Water"
2011	Macklemore & Ryan Lewis	"Wing$"
2012	Dinosaur Jr. 	"Watch the Corners"
2013	Arcade Fire 	"Reflektor"
2014	Flying Lotus 	"Ready err Not"
====Album of the Decade (2010-2019)====
Year	Artist 	Album 	Nation
2015	Kendrick Lamar	To Pimp a Butterfly	United States
====Song of the Decade (2010-2019)====
Year	Artist 	Song 	Nation
2012	Death Grips	"Hacker"	United States
====Worst Album of the Decade (2010-2019)====
Year	Artist 	Album 	Nation
2016	Corey Feldman	Angelic 2 the Core	United States
====Worst Song of the Decade (2010–2019)====
Year	Artist	Song
2017	Hopsin	"Happy Ending"
==Quotes==
*"I am Anthony Fantano, the internet's busiest music nerd."
*"Conservatives are not fun, creative, smart, empathetic, or interesting. That's why they don't make great art. Their art sucks ass. Period."https://web.archive.org/web/20211014175531/https://twitter.com/theneedledrop/status/1448709024459989002
*"I can't fap to this. Get this scrawny ass booty out my face." https://youtu.be/K_C4q0NkhJo?si=CwNYkU5Ihgfbp0Em
*"Y'all know this is just my opinion, right?"
*"IT'S ENOUGH SLICES!!!"
*"This new [artist] album...it's not good."
==Trivia==
*In 2021, YouTuber and comedian Sam Hyde, in collaboration with Florida rapper Christ Dillinger, came together to create a diss track on Fantano, titled "F*CK ANTHONY", in response to Fantano dropping Hyde for allegedly being a member of the alt-right and for Fantano getting into a minor beef with Dillinger's fellow collective members on Twitter. Countless personal blows and threats to Fantano were dealt in this track, although it is mostly regarded as an ironic or "troll" diss.
*There are multiple running gags among Fantano's fanbase, which include, but are not limited to;
**Controversial album reviews (most notably him giving a 6/10 to Kanye West's My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy).https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jo4S2qlQGs0 He has put "Y'all know this is just my opinion, right?" in his video descriptions partially due to this.
***The infamous review also started the trend of comments about Fantano being racist to all other people.
**Veganism
**Being portrayed as a Ridge wallet salesman
**Artists dying/being targeted after being given negative scores by Fantano. This has obviously happened with Linkin Park's One More Light, Lil Peep's Come Over When You're Sober, and Mac Miller's Swimming. Due to this, many people joke about how Fantano is behind the deaths of the artists whom he gave negative scores and how he's "the Internet's deadliest music nerd". 
**The Best Teeth in the Game
**His love of Death Grips
**Being neutrally referred to as "Melon" by his fans due to his bald head, though it originated from a scornful reply by UK dubstep artist Zomby, for giving his album "With Love" a 5/10. (Melon is a common curse word in UK English, usually for someone with a "big head" vel sim thickheaded.)
**His comments often over exaggerating his opinions on albums, usually following the format of "Melon, I understand you didn't like the album but did you really have to say ..." followed by an outrageous claim, such as that Japan should be nuked a third time due to Pink Guy's Pink Season.
**"Upworthy link", a misheard phrase in his outro which is meant to say "up or the link".
*He is a fan of Weezer and big fan of their blue album.
*The fact that he refers to himself as the internet's busiest music nerd is often criticized by haters as being a title impossible to calculate and some people refuse to watch his reviews as they think this self-referred title is arrogant and pretentious.
*Anthony Fantano had hair in early 2000s but since then shaved it.
*It is controversial that Anthony Fantano charges his fans money to ask him questions on his opinions on music during livestreams.
*Famous critic Robert Christgau and proponent of musical movements such as hip hop and riot grrrl says he doesn't watch Anthony Fantano's reviews because he doesn't want to watch a video of a guy talking to a camera when he'd rather read text.
*Anthony Fantano thinks is the second best song of 2020.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73Pqpq-Qx1I
*Anthony Fantano says that classical music is the only type of music that he cannot get into.
*Anthony Fantano complimented the vocals of the song "Rick Men North Of Richmond," and called the vocals "good."
*Anthony Fantano had a classmate named Imanol who made fun of him for his eccentric behavior.
*Anthony Fantano said he hates the video game "Space Station 13" for being too complicated. The game is known for being the closest video game experience to a tabletop role-playing game as far as multiplayer roleplaying goes. 
*Anthony Fantano watches "Groundhog Day" on Groundhog Day.
*Anthony Fantano criticized the show Family Ties for having a "lackluster theme song." He also hates the character Alex Keaton, who he calls "Marty" because he is played by the same actor who plays young character "Marty McFly" in the film "Back to the Future." He hates the character Alex Keaton for being conservative despite having hippie parents.
*Anthony Fantano used to be able to recite all the lyrics to "El Scorcho" by Weezer but is no longer able to, due to a lack of practicing.
*Anthony Fantano can play the bass guitar.
==References==
Category:Music YouTubers
Category:Commentary YouTubers
Category:Review YouTubers
Category:Reaction YouTubers
Category:News YouTubers
Category:Vlogging YouTubers
Category:American YouTubers
Category:Users who joined in 2009
Category:One million subscribers
Category:Two million subscribers
Category:One billion views