I still miss Stylus very much. Since it closed its doors, I've looked for a good second daily review site (besides Pitchfork) to consult about new releases. (n.1) Popmatters is good, and I do read it, but somehow it doesn't do it for me. Into that breach has stepped Dusted Magazine. I think it's great: The writing is straightforward and clear, the reviews are compact and well thought-out, they review a wide variety of releases but don't overstuff themselves with reviews of every greatest-hits disc or new album released.
I haven't seen almost any mention of Dusted on ILM. So I'm curious. Does anyone read it? If so, what do you think of it? _____________________________ (n.1) I have another reliable recommendation source, the fantastic blog 17 Dots, but I'm talking now about the online magazine format only.
― Daniel, Esq., Monday, 18 February 2008 21:42 (5 years ago) Permalink
I'm not into most of the records they review (ie the free improv and punk rock stuff), but I still read it pretty much daily. Especially after they added audio in the reviews.
― Jordan, Monday, 18 February 2008 21:49 (5 years ago) Permalink
Yeah, the audio is a nice touch. They review a lot of reissue stuff -- e.g., Dust-to-Digital's catalogue -- which I love.
― Daniel, Esq., Monday, 18 February 2008 21:52 (5 years ago) Permalink
Hi, Daniel.
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Monday, 18 February 2008 22:36 (5 years ago) Permalink
Uh . . . hi.
That you're magazine? If so, it's v. good.
― Daniel, Esq., Monday, 18 February 2008 22:37 (5 years ago) Permalink
No, I run a different one, but I think you might like us (paperthinwalls.com)
/end plug
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Monday, 18 February 2008 22:40 (5 years ago) Permalink
That all being said, I like Dusted's guest lists a lot.
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Monday, 18 February 2008 22:41 (5 years ago) Permalink
LOL. Yeah, I like PTW a lot. Last year, you did a fantastic track-for-track discussion of the After Dark comp from the Italians Do It Better label. One of the best pieces I read all last year.
(xp)
― Daniel, Esq., Monday, 18 February 2008 22:42 (5 years ago) Permalink
i like paperthinwalls! : )
― M@tt He1ges0n, Monday, 18 February 2008 22:42 (5 years ago) Permalink
Oh sweet, the Dusted xword puzzles are still online. I thought they were gone.
I like the lists also.
― Jordan, Monday, 18 February 2008 22:42 (5 years ago) Permalink
I read this online music magazine.
― W4LTER, Monday, 18 February 2008 22:44 (5 years ago) Permalink
yeah this one is good-- combine this w/ popmatters and you kinda get the indie and pop cross section you had w/ stylus
― J0rdan S., Monday, 18 February 2008 22:46 (5 years ago) Permalink
BTW, WGW, the PTW feature I was thinking of is called "Listening Party," and I just signed up for the RSS feed. As I said, it's a great feature.
― Daniel, Esq., Monday, 18 February 2008 22:49 (5 years ago) Permalink
I never really read Stylus. Worst online mag is easily cokemachineglow.
― W4LTER, Monday, 18 February 2008 23:11 (5 years ago) Permalink
xpost
oh wow... thanks D. Esq!
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Monday, 18 February 2008 23:12 (5 years ago) Permalink
yeah cokemachineglow is insufferable-- but i get the feeling only 15 ppl read it and/or are supposed to understand any of it
― J0rdan S., Monday, 18 February 2008 23:14 (5 years ago) Permalink
don't read dusted every day anymore but they do some good stuff ... the "Destined" articles at the end of every year have put me up on a lotta good bands ... and Mosurock's singles column ...
― dmr, Monday, 18 February 2008 23:14 (5 years ago) Permalink
^Yes the singles column.
― W4LTER, Monday, 18 February 2008 23:15 (5 years ago) Permalink
I'm on board with Dusted.
I gave cokemachineglow a chance for a few weeks, but never again. THE BOOKMARK HAS BEEN DELETED.
― Z S, Monday, 18 February 2008 23:21 (5 years ago) Permalink
I don't always agree with their conclusions, but Dusted's reviews have been especially good lately: well-written, straightforward and interesting.
― Daniel, Esq., Wednesday, 23 September 2009 21:54 (3 years ago) Permalink
Just sayin'.
i like dusted, mostly for their features though
― Ømår Littel (Jordan), Wednesday, 23 September 2009 21:56 (3 years ago) Permalink
I'm impressed they're still around... also that the bottom of every page on their website still says "©2002-2005 Dusted Magazine. All Rights Reserved"
― Jeff LeVine, Wednesday, 23 September 2009 21:59 (3 years ago) Permalink
haha
Yeah, they're usually real good.
― CharlieS, Thursday, 24 September 2009 00:05 (3 years ago) Permalink
Also funny that the Magic Markers circa 2004 or so are still the people you see when you open up the homepage. Part of the reason I like it: they are not trying so hard to maximize page views, just quietly providing rock-solid reviews and occasionally great features etc. (occasional in that they aren't frequent, not in that they are duds).
How many Dusted writers have paying writing gigs elsewhere? It seems like it is largely a site for the love of it, so to speak (being lazy, of coures I could google writers etc., but as so many writers turn up here perhaps there is an insider answer to this?)
― grandavis, Thursday, 7 October 2010 16:07 (2 years ago) Permalink
I am a Dusted stalwart.
― Trip Maker, Thursday, 7 October 2010 16:10 (2 years ago) Permalink
dusted is great. informative, tasteful, no BS.
― tylerw, Thursday, 7 October 2010 16:12 (2 years ago) Permalink
also, unlike so many other music magazines, it doesn't send my browser spiraling towards flash-ad doom.
― tylerw, Thursday, 7 October 2010 16:15 (2 years ago) Permalink
"online music magazines," that is
Perhaps this is why it pops up so infrequently in other threads/heated discussions:
... tasteful, no BS.
Not much to throw into the gristmill when you are being generally honest and tasteful, though Mosurock, Earles, and a few others certainly don't pull any punches when they get worked up about something.
― grandavis, Thursday, 7 October 2010 16:16 (2 years ago) Permalink
yeah, i mainly just meant that they don't have a "news" section like pfork and other sites -- with important stuff like TRACKLISTING REVEALED and so forth.
― tylerw, Thursday, 7 October 2010 16:18 (2 years ago) Permalink
Marginally popular band adds tourdates to the tourdates we posted yesterday.
― grandavis, Thursday, 7 October 2010 16:22 (2 years ago) Permalink
dusted is great . . . except for andrew beckerman. he comes off like the indie snob little brother of scharpling and wurster's "rock, rot, or rule" dude
― kamerad, Thursday, 7 October 2010 17:40 (2 years ago) Permalink
they have an interesting approach to end-of-year lists, too (just individual writers' year-end reviews and best albums/songs, but without rank-ordering their selections (unless they want to, iirc))
― Daniel, Esq., Thursday, 7 October 2010 17:53 (2 years ago) Permalink
that's really neat, actually
― markers, Thursday, 7 October 2010 18:05 (2 years ago) Permalink
I don't usually rank my year-end list, I think it's pointless. I may choose a top ten and a next ten and so forth, but don't see a big point is nit-picking any further than that.
― I'm gonna mention ilxor in everyone of my posts until I get dn'd (ilxor), Thursday, 7 October 2010 18:28 (2 years ago) Permalink
Markers, have you checked that site out? Lots of interesting stuff going on in their archives etc., and their approach may be refreshing to you, as they stay out of a lot of online nonsense and stick mostly to the task at hand, though of course none of us can do that all of the time in this day and age.
― grandavis, Thursday, 7 October 2010 18:29 (2 years ago) Permalink
I too enjoy their approach to year-end lists. But I think it makes sense strictly because the writers at Dusted seem to have such different genre/sub-genre focuses. There are a fair number of jazz reviews, for example, and trying to rank apples and oranges is too confusing.
Pitchfork is trying to be the expert on indie rock and hip hop; so a year-end ranking makes more sense. Same with, say, Resident Advisor's list.
― Indexed, Thursday, 7 October 2010 19:41 (2 years ago) Permalink
Great site. I've been looking in sort of irregularly for a few years now. I also really appreciate Dusted's calm. PF is just too busy for me to begin to look at (and for my very old laptop to handle!).
― Duke, Thursday, 7 October 2010 20:52 (2 years ago) Permalink
the absence of numeric ratings on dusted reviews really calls attention to how distracting they can be on pitchfork reviews, since both sites' reviews are otherwise kind of similar in style. somehow i find it's easier to be interested in what a dusted review can tell me about the record since there's no other way of finding out from the review.
― j., Monday, 11 October 2010 06:01 (2 years ago) Permalink
They have a great jazz writer in Derek Taylor. There's no-one else currently writing about Peter Brötzmann and free improv with such enthusiasm and clarity.
― margana (anagram), Monday, 11 October 2010 08:32 (2 years ago) Permalink
What's up with it?
― Trip Maker, Monday, 1 October 2012 15:03 (8 months ago) Permalink
I don't know, was about to ask the same thing. One of my usual morning review stops.
― HAPPY BDAY TOOTS (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, 1 October 2012 15:03 (8 months ago) Permalink
https://twitter.com/spotieotis/status/252744341829853185
― DJ Mooncup (NickB), Monday, 1 October 2012 15:07 (8 months ago) Permalink
server crash innit
Busted
― buzza, Monday, 1 October 2012 15:09 (8 months ago) Permalink
Just glad that it is only a server issue. Was excited to see Pelt surface on Friday in the "Listed" feature, and to see that they are going to have a new album coming out. My favorite music site by far.
― grandavis, Monday, 1 October 2012 15:13 (8 months ago) Permalink
Loved that Listed! Pelt were in my town maybe four years ago and it was so great. I bought the "A Stone For Angus Maclise" lp. Awesome meditation music.
― Trip Maker, Monday, 1 October 2012 15:17 (8 months ago) Permalink
Got excited by news of that Pelt article so I rushed over to the Dusted site to read it and ah...
― DJ Mooncup (NickB), Monday, 1 October 2012 15:20 (8 months ago) Permalink
lol
― Trip Maker, Monday, 1 October 2012 15:22 (8 months ago) Permalink
Pelt guys are super-nice. If you get a chance to see Mike Gangloff play solo (or with Black Twig Pickers guys in any format) do so, it is great. I live in Virginia, where there is a lot of nonsense passing as old-timey and bluegrass music, but Mike plays a variety of it that is so good! He plays fiddle and banjo tunes in alternate tunings that somehow make the old songs and originals he writes sound so much fuller and more dynamic (helps that he has broad interests beyond old-time and bluegrass music of course). He also goes around rural Virginia and W. Virginia learning them from families/musicians who learned them from others, i.e., tries to go right to the source of the songs. Tells lots of great stories to go along with them too.
― grandavis, Monday, 1 October 2012 15:45 (8 months ago) Permalink
It's back online btw
― grandavis, Monday, 1 October 2012 18:03 (8 months ago) Permalink
it's back! that pelt thing is pretty great.
― tylerw, Monday, 1 October 2012 18:04 (8 months ago) Permalink
what's up with these guys?
― j., Tuesday, 14 May 2013 06:17 (1 month ago) Permalink
yeah, after being one of the more reliably updated sites, they seem to be kinda drifting this year.
― tylerw, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 14:17 (1 month ago) Permalink
This bums me out, and has me a little worried that it is just going to go away. Would be incredibly sad for me. Seems like they had developed a new schedule somewhat, which was maybe more like 6 reviews a week, but not sure there is any pattern at all any more.
― grandavis, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 14:42 (1 month ago) Permalink
yeah would be a bummer...crazy that i've been checking them out pretty much daily for close to a decade now!
― tylerw, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 15:23 (1 month ago) Permalink
love dusted, would hate to see them go
― controversial vegan pregnancy (contenderizer), Tuesday, 14 May 2013 15:41 (1 month ago) Permalink
Yeah, me too (in re a decade or so of excellent reviews/features). I would love to hear the "behind the scenes" story of how that site works, because the writing is almost universally good to great (though a real head scratcher has appeared a few times) but surely no one is getting paid (zero adds etc.) The labor of love aspect must run high there, but still, to have kept up the pace they have with (seemingly) no financial reward and such a high quality is truly something to marvel at. It is just so atypical of the internet generally that I can't believe it is real sometimes.
― grandavis, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 15:52 (1 month ago) Permalink
so any news? the updates seem to be getting further and further apart. going to be sad if this is falling apart after such a good run.
― i kant believe it's not buffon (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Friday, 14 June 2013 14:48 (5 days ago) Permalink
There was a week or two there where there were regular reviews again. Then nothing ....
― grandavis, Friday, 14 June 2013 15:28 (5 days ago) Permalink
Was just wondering this myself. It's been a good source of reviews for some time now, hope this is just a vacation.
― henry s, Friday, 14 June 2013 17:18 (5 days ago) Permalink
Good riddance. I'll miss the Listed feature though.
― Jimmywine Dyspeptic, Friday, 14 June 2013 17:39 (5 days ago) Permalink
?
― high inerja (seandalai), Friday, 14 June 2013 17:42 (5 days ago) Permalink
Any reason?
― grandavis, Friday, 14 June 2013 17:42 (5 days ago) Permalink
Dusted is ace, hope it pulls through.
― high inerja (seandalai), Friday, 14 June 2013 17:48 (5 days ago) Permalink