October 2012
1 post
Music as art; fans as patrons
Musicians moaning about paltry Spotify payments is nothing new (see: latest furore surrounding Grizzly Bear). Much of the discussion to this point has boiled down to sheer economics - ‘we’re not getting paid enough; this is not a substitute for sales’.
Baltimore indie rockers Lower Dens have similar gripes with streaming services:
won’t use spotify. not for anything...
September 2012
1 post
Solving the Obscurity Problem
Current thinking suggests that being an independent artist ‘sucks’ - paltry payouts from streaming services, your music as a loss leader, decline of album sales, EVERYTHING.
In a conversation between Arial Hyatt and Seth Godin, the bespectacled marketing guru sees things through a far more optimistic lens. He believes this is the best time ever for indies.
The biggest challenge for...
August 2012
1 post
Discovering Musical Lineage
I recently read the excellent How To Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon. Kleon introduces, amongst a bunch of brilliant ideas, the concept of ‘creative lineage’.
In short: when you’re feeling creatively stifled, go deep into one particular artist who tickles your fancy - as opposed to the gargantuan task of seeking inspiration from ALL THE ART EVER. Then create a ‘family...
July 2012
1 post
“There is still so much left to build in music discovery, there is plenty of room...”
– Steven Phillips, Founder / CTO of We Are Hunted, Hypebot
June 2012
2 posts
I signed up for your newsletter and... RAGE...
Still basking in the warmth of yesterday’s post about the recorded music industry (see: The record labels I never knew I loved), I wanted to parlay the goodwill into a day of ‘giving back’.
After years of ‘borrowing’ music from record labels, I felt like the least I could do - aside from spending money - was to gift them each with my precious email address. After...
The record labels I never knew I loved
To my detriment, I’ve paid scant attention to the importance of record labels in my life of music fandom. For all intents and purposes, I’ve not given two shits as to whom released my favourite records; just that they were released. What an ungrateful shit I am.
If you asked me with gun-to-head about my favourite-ever labels, I’d be hard-pressed to go beyond Domino (whom I loved...
May 2012
2 posts
The trouble with having good taste in music
It’s a good day in the history of the internets for my countrymen: Spotify just launched in Australia. Funnily, it was only last night that I tried explaining Spotify to my 15-year-old sister in Melbourne. The best I could manage:
It’s like having all the songs in the world, but you don’t need to download them!
Note: She seemed excited.
My first inclination that the...
Your fans could work for you (literally)
Of late, I’ve been devoting an inordinate amount of time looking at the digital presence of bands big and small - especially official sites. From Katy Perry to Justin Beiber, and Bon Iver to Arcade Fire, the litany of online offences grows longer with each click:
Splash pages
Flash-heavy sites
Autoplay audio
E-commerce as an afterthought
Impossibly hidden / nonexistent email signup
...
April 2012
1 post
1 tag
Where to next for music bloggers?
After reading a fantastic interview with Drowned In Sound founder Sean Adams, in which he laments the ‘death of mp3 blogging’, it got me thinking: where to next for these one-time tastemakers?
Bloggers were at one point, the backbone of music discovery. Hell, Pitchfork was once just a humble blog run by a high school grad in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Before the birth of Napster,...
March 2012
2 posts
SXSW 2012: Well, that was a shitshow
Highlights 1. Bear In Heaven For the longest time, Nick Curran from You Can Be A Wesley has urged me to see Bear In Heaven. After seeing them twice in Austin, I now understand why. Endlessly catchy indie pop, replete with seriously smooth dance moves by singer John Philipot had the Tumblr/Barbarian party and SXSW Official Showcase moving in unison. 2. HAIM Rumor has it HAIM couldn’t turn a...
Time to slow the buzz cycle
Remember that awesome band from last year? They were a three-piece from Brooklyn; lots of jangly guitars. They had a great look; lots of washed out denim. Their on-stage presence was a mix between moody, disinterested and smug. I think Pitchfork gave them a good write up.
Beach Fossils? Real Estate? The Drums? Cloud Nothings? Wild Nothing? It’s all of them.
The buzz cycle is now moving at...
December 2011
1 post
Best of 2011: 5 albums, 2 EPs and 2 mixtapes
Albums
PJ Harvey - Let England Shake
PJ’s tenth album stands head-and-shoulders above all others in 2011. Haunting and beautiful in equal measure, Let England Shake is almost faultless. The ultimate soundtrack to the disquiet and anger of the Occupy movement.
Wild Beasts - Smother
A band very much marching to the beat of their own beautiful and unique drum. Wild Beasts have somehow...
November 2011
2 posts
How to discover your new favorite band
Finding new music is oftentimes confusing, exhausting and exhilarating (see: story of my life).
With seemingly a zillion songs at our disposal, recommended by a zillion music services, countless indie blogs and my Facebook feed blowing up with notifications of high school friends spinning the latest John Mayer record *stabs self in ear*, how does someone remain rightfully sane on the hunt for new...
Party like an album superfan
My first July 4th in the US was mind-blowing: interstate road tripping with 10 legends, firing shotguns, purchasing bullets from Walmart, watching friends endanger their lives with cheap fireworks and eating Maryland crab.
Of all the weekend’s activities, there was a moment (read: 68 mins, 1 sec) that stood above all - the communal lunacy incited by spinning Dr Dre 2001.
There I was -...
October 2011
1 post
“Work on the relationship with your fans first. Whether it is exposing them to...”
– From the wonderful Miguel Senquiz, Head of Digital Strategy for Ghostly International.
(via Digital Music News)
September 2011
3 posts
No Apple in Zuckerbro's garden
WOW. What a mind-blowing showcase by Facebook at their annual f8 Developer’s Conference. Two major releases have huge implications for music fans:
1. ‘Timeline’ will replace your traditional profile to showcase all your content from THE FUCKING DAWN OF TIME. Yep, say hello to: photos of you pouting circa-Zoolander and a chilling reminder of your obsession with electroclash.
2....
I love your taste in music
Thursday’s airing of an exclusive mix by Thom Yorke on Mary Anne Hobbs’ Xfm show was a nostalgic moment for me. Here was a radio event. An actual radio event. Just like the ones I used to know.
In the hour leading up to the mix, Mary Anne sounded unwittingly close to orgasm, breathlessly reading out ‘tweets from the blogosphere’ one after the other. And then the...
Computers don't recommend music, people do
After a recent tete-a-tete with Wesley Verhoeve, two things have kept coming back into mind:
1. There’s currently no elegant, seamless music recommendations engine.
2. There might not be a need for one.
The latter came from an earlier comment of Wesley’s that in essence said: I don’t believe in algorithms to recommend music, I believe in people to recommend music.
At the...
August 2011
4 posts
Curation is Spotify's biggest opportunity (read:...
For years, my British contemporaries had rubbed my Australian nose in being geoblocked from Spotify. It was then with great excitement that I received my invite on the US day of launch (now being NYC-based).
Eagerly accepting my invite from Klout, I hastily downloaded the much-lauded client and signed up. Moments later, I was about to embark on my virginal foray into the Great Wide World Of...
Is music 'losing its meaning' [via Carles'...
Reading back through some posts from earlier this year, it’s clear that my fanboydom for Carles of Hipster Runoff had hastily descended into to plagiarism. Now realizing that I’d started to put ‘everything’ ‘in’ ‘inverted commas’, I promised myself to ‘take a break’ and ‘discover my own voice’. FUCK, CAN’T STOP DOING...
Reward your biggest fans (read: me)
I’m a FUCKING MASSIVE Radiohead fan. In fact, I’d argue that I listen to more Radiohead than any of my friends. It’s something I love to brag about, but how can I prove it?
There’s always stats from Last.fm or iTunes, but what if I need something more granular. How can I prove that:
I’ve listened to ‘Kings Of Limbs’ from start to finish x amount of...
How to make Last.fm 100x better
New music discovery is passion/obsession/sick habit of mine. I’m that guy who tries his best to ‘hear that dubstep collaboration remix b-side’ before you. It’s a sickness.
I first became afflicted with this disorder around the time my father passed away. He died with not much in his pockets, but he did leave behind an incredible CD collection. He was a huge fan of classic...
June 2011
1 post
'Paranoid Android' is the gift that keeps on...
14 years since its release, I still never tire of hearing ‘Paranoid Android’.
Am I holding on to my teen years? Or it simply true pop genius? Am I completely clouded by my well-documented fanboydom for Thom Yorke? (NB. I’ve said on many occasions, Radiohead could put out a record comprised entirely of fart noises, and I’d blindly acclaim it ‘genius’.) Answer:...
May 2011
3 posts
What song are you listening to right now?
One of my dumbest (read: most beloved) ideas is to design a pair of headphones with a built-in LCD display that scrolls the name of the song you’re listening to. And then, as you approach someone with similar tastes, you get an alert - like an IRL Last.fm.
In practicality, it would make walking down somewhere like Bedford Ave nigh on impossible. ‘Oh wait, you’re also listening...
Electro makes me feel old
When I’m not completely overawed by the minutia of living in a ‘big city’ as part of ‘modern society’, I spend any fleeting moment of lightness daydreaming of being a 23-year-old for the REST OF MY LIFE.
Getting older seems to have its perks, not that I can quite reel them off right now - I think ‘sense of purpose’ might be one of them - so I’d...
The great gig (website) in the sky
So often, I’ve bemoaned my inability to remember that shows are going on sale - and in a place like NYC, that shit is fatal.
I blame this largely on the concept of ‘implied pressure’ - y’know, ‘that feeling’ you get when you’re stressing about being stressed, despite the fact that with good planning, there’d be no stress at all? WELCOME TO MY FUCKEN...
April 2011
1 post
Memories of a one-time radio announcer
While flirting with a radio career on a truly remarkable Sydney indie station FBi Radio, “Fools” by The Dodos from their 2008 record “Visiter” seemed to be a part of every graveyard shift I pulled. It was the perfect song to play at 5am: uplifting harmonies and constant beating of snare rim stopped me from falling head-first onto a panel full of knobs and faders.
It was...
