Wanted to share two interesting takes on the music journalism business, one from the present and one delivering a case study from the past:
PopMatters is one of my favorite music sites1) Jason Gross' "The Best Music Scribing Awards 2009" from PopMatters, which takes a deep dive into widespread changes in the music journalism business for print and online publications big and small. It's a good read for music fans and journalists alike. Key graf:
"The same way that a Net/tech savvy writer will keep plugging away in all kinds of online forums, magazines and publications themselves need to keep doing the same. I’m still convinced that there’s no such thing as easy, long-term solutions to how magazines and publications will survive and thrive, but once they get into the mindset that this is a slippery realm that they’ll have to keep adapting to in different ways, they stand a much better chance of swimming rather than sinking."
Option magazine was published 1985-19982) Johnny Mnemonic's "Music Journalism 101" blog on Blurt, the magazine reborn in the ashes of Harp. After two print issues, I'm still not sure what Blurt is trying to be. But the website has an interesting mix of bloggers like Mnemonic, whose last two posts focus on the late Option magazine. Part 1 takes us back to a lame 1991 editorial decision that lays the groundwork for Part 2, an escalation of the snobbery and refusal to listen to its customers that led to Option's downfall:
"For all Option's so-called championing of the music underground, Amerindie and otherwise, it "overlooked" (or conveniently ignored) anything that didn't quite measure up to the editors' rarified notions of what was hip."
Sad, but all too common. If only Jason Gross had been around to whisper in their ear.