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I never would have guessed the power that social media bestows on not just the press, but the general public. Many music writers I follow have between 1,000 and 5,000 followers—some go into five or six digits. Individually, those signals may not register with much of an impact, but collectively, they’re a powerful force. With Facebook commenting and Twitter tracking and Tumblr reblogging, the conversation surrounding pop music reaches out further than ever before. And now that artists and writers can engage each other directly and publicly on Twitter, writers on the Internet are on a more or less equal footing with the artists they’re writing about. Granted, New Yorker pop-music critic Sasha Frere-Jones was the bassist in Ui, but he has slightly more Twitter followers than Prince Paul, who produced one of the greatest albums of all-time.
The other byproduct of social media’s prominence is that, in music writing at least, commentary is promoted at the expense of criticism and reporting. This has its virtues—it forces music writers to constantly rethink, question, and analyze the methods and tone of the pop-music conversation at large. But it’s worth considering whether or not music writing has moved too far away from reporting and description and insight—which is journalism and criticism—and towards an excess of opinions, first-person reflection, promotion, and ad hominem attacks—which is Fox News.
- Queerifications & Ruins
DJ Sprinkles — When Dancefloors Stand Still and Queerifications & Ruins (Mule Musiq)
For some reason people were really into Game of Thrones but not this, even though it’s basically got the same vibe.
Colin Stetson — New History Warfare Vol. 3: To See More Light (Constellation)
