Writing about music

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Just wrote this on ILM, on a thread called "What do you look for in music writing". It's not an especially good thread, it's mostly people arguing whether reviewers should write about themselves or try to describe the music or whatever. But I was pleased with my post to it. It seems to me answering the question should look at the outcomes of music writing first and then work back to more formal preferences.

What I like in music writing, in rough order of priority:

- brings me to (or back to) the music in question
- shows me something new or richer about that music
- tries to start conversations, not stop them
- makes me think, excites me with its insights and ideas
- a focus on the listener
- avoids recieved wisdoms
- elegant or lively sentences
- unforced humour

It's not *that* hard to tick all these boxes, which makes it irritating that most print music mags fall down on #s 3-6 and most blogs fall down on nearly all of them. (And that I can't hit them all every time I write something). piratemoggy's entry on poptimists yesterday, about Cascada, ticked all eight, for instance.

If I can think of a couple more then I'll have ten, which is the kind of number (sorry dubdobdee that Pitchfork columns are made of.

ADMIN: All 22 LoP tracks received and sent, links to the zips up soon. Intros for Week 11 up tomorrow.

Comments

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

blogs are bad because they have no editors and no self-control

Almost everybody who goes from the blog/ILXosphere into mainstream work comes out with this line! It always strikes me as defensive. 90% of music blogs don't even have writing on them these days - self-indulgence is SO not the problem any more (if it ever was).

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Well no, it IS the problem, but it's not expressed in rampant prolixity which is begging for the STERN yet LOVING SMACK of a FIRM EDITOR.

[justfanoe.livejournal.com]

Heh, my blog is.

I see what Lex is talking about though. The problem is, when you have no outside hand guiding what you do, it DOES get overly self-indulgent. You are only posting about stuff you care about and it's highly unlikely anybody else will care about a majority of the stuff you care about. For only a small percentage of the blogs are posts blatantly too long and rambling, I agree, but I can definitely think of some out there.

wild, unsupported statements

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

I think with a lot of (but by no means all) blogs it's the lack of direction which screams for some higher editorial power. Not that "direction" is a necessity but a lot of people (and by this I would definitely include myself when I first started putting hands-to-keyboard re: music and it almost certainly still holds, I think it might be particularly symptomatic of a teenageish blogger but that's a gross generalisation and by no means do I mean it as a slur against all teenageish bloggers because there are some great ones) have a sort of 'wait what I have no idea what I'm thinking really except I've heard blogging is important to liking music this is cool no it's not' sense of what they're doing, which is all very well but a lot of them seem to have absolutely no idea they're doing it, thus ending up just being rather obnoxious and metaphorically standing there shouting random things.

Not to mention blogs get terribly sycophantic a lot of the time. The great and random editor of the (blech I hate this word) "blogosphere" is whatever's fashionable with whoever's on the link bar, for way too many of them.