August 26, 2008

PS: Your “constant stream of music discovery”? It absolutely, positively is because you work in music “journalism,” sweetie. Just saying.

Actually it’s not. I just got into music journalism about a year ago. There are many outlets for discovering music, the easiest I’ve found being MySpace. Most artists put their friends who are also musicians among their “Top Friends” to give them exposure. Another way to find new music includes music blogs. Some of my favorite finds from the past year came from blogs. I particularly like Discodust and BigStereo for dance/electronic based music. However, there are tons of music blogs out there recommending tons of different musicians in similar genres, so it’s not hard to find something new and it absolutely has nothing to do with ones involvement in music journalism. In fact, a music blog is perhaps the complete opposite of music journalism. There are rarely, if ever, deadlines to follow and so many musicians’ albums and EPs that would have normally been discarded due editorial deadline can find exposure online. With that said, I do enjoy the traditional print format for discovering music, as archaic as it might seem. I don’t read Rolling Stone as I can’t particularly relate to it but there are a lot of great underground magazines that stay focused on highlighting more independent artists. Some of my favorites (with a little bias thrown in) off the top of my head include ALARM, Venus Zine (especially for independent female musicians who are, sadly, rarely covered in mainstream magazines and certainly not with the level of respect that male muscians receive), XLR8R, and Death and Taxes.

And besides magazines, I love really good worth of mouth. I happen to be surrounded by a lot of like-minded individuals who are just as eager to discover new music as I am and they have exposed me to different artists in different genres. My friend Dana first introduced me to MGMT back in October of 2007. My friend Arianna introduced me to Giant Drag, Abe Vigoda, and SSION. My friend Barrett introduced me to TONS, but some of the biggies include Private and Sam Sparro. I can thank Alla for Crystal Castles and Connor for Lykke Li (he lived in Sweden recently).

So no, my stream of music is not absolutely, positively because of the fact that I write for music publications. There are a number of ways to get ones music and I think that, if you even read my original post, you would understand the importance in that truth. The music business is changing. Musicians are adapting and record labels are adapting their practices to expand their coverage beyond a video on MTV and an article in a mainstream music mag. Sometimes you have to go after the smaller publications. Sometimes you have to send copies to editors of music blogs. And sometimes you have to get over the fact that MySpace is quite possible “over” and create the sort of buzz that many would only dream of.

Comments (View)

buyhercandy reblogged this from britticisms and added:

Well said, Britt. The reason half of us got/are getting into music “journalism” in the first place is because we love...
britticisms reblogged this from maura and added:

Actually it’s not. I just got into music journalism about a year ago. There are many outlets for discovering music, the...
maura reblogged this from britticisms and added:

Your “constant stream...discovery”? It absolutely, positively
grayandgreen reblogged this from rachelhills and added:

The title is appropriate for her. Congratulations on the recognition, Britt!
soupsoup reblogged this from rachelhills
rachelhills reblogged this from britticisms
britticisms posted this

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P.S. It's weird that you would only focus on that sentence.

BRITTICISMS