Why would anyone want to be a music journalist RATHER than a musician?

that may not be a good thing.

http://www.negativland.com/albini.html

di and kate- passion can be dull and not fun at all for this reader (and i love fun). it does get in the way of otherwise interesting args as to why x piece of music works. It can get into: 'hey listen to this its really good' type banalities!

so do i, but i'm not doing very well at it here

I want passion to be 'measured'. Writers that can do this are the best ones. I don't want cheerleaders!

Nope, he knows how things work as an artist, a producer, a writer and a business man.

He'd probably call himself an outsider though.

(That exploitation piece wasn't a one off but he has mostly stopped writing now I think, probably learned to control his tongue for the benefit of others and himself)

So there.

But because you have no interest in it, the subject would be dull anyway, even if the writer wasn't writing passionately.

yup. and he dulls me.

''"Passion can be dull" = quote of the century. Why do I just picture Julio reclining on a purple velvet chaise lounge and smoking a cigarette in an elaborately carved holder as he says this?''

thanks for the quote of the century bit.

I still listen to music every day, go to gigs (as long as it finishes by 11pm, of course). Passionate writing is a con bcz you can't be passionate abt things every day of the week. Its a very blind thing.

I want objectivity. even if its 'faked'.

''But because you have no interest in it, the subject would be dull anyway, even if the writer wasn't writing passionately.''

if I haven't heard something and I read abt it and the writer is just excited by this i turn over the page.

that's stupid

Mostly I'm interested in the music, the musicians, reporting of the facts. Passion often manifests itself as the writers opinion on things, which isn't as interesting as the things themselves.

I'd much rather read an interview than a comment piece anout a band, for example.

If it's a band I've never heard of, I'd rather read commentary. I want someone to tell me *why* I should like them, rather than some dull accademic treatise of how they arrived at art I've never heard anyway.

But maybe that's just me...

I think he's great, even if he does say and do some very annoying things.

I think Kates got a point, in the beginning you need someone to tell you why you should like a particular band, to give you reason to hear them, then later on you want more facts/details about/from the band themselves.

Bur over the years there really are very, very few bands I've got into because of what someone's written about them.

It's much more often through friends, or links with other bands or cos I've just happened to hear them somewehere.

I;ve bought stuff before because someone wrote passionately about it and hated it. I've learned my lesson now.

he was passionate but he did give reasons (political ones).

damn it you all he's a good writer (at least when i read him).

''I can't imagine anything I'd like to read *less* in music criticism than researched facts''

it can be (and most of the time it is) but it can lead to some of the best music writing i evah read. research is not just a fact (which is dull), but could be a history too. again, this should be included among opinion, of course.

''if I haven't heard something and I read abt it and the writer is just excited by this i turn over the page.
that's stupid''

Passion does a good job in covering up for a lack of imagination. When i turn over the page, I forget abt it but usually i will get to hear it (not buy it) and i find that music written abt passionately is usually thrash. so it maybe 'stupid' to you but it works for me.

And completely unrelated to that...

One thing I've noticed in my VERY limited experience is a more common appreciation of spiritual/mystical things (aka "bullshit") in musos than in journos, who seem WAY more rooted in truth/fact than the majority of musicians. Maybe the decision of journalism over music made by those who have the choice either way might be rooted in their lacking the naivete found in many musicians. Maybe it's this same naivete/blind optimism that leads those who choose music into believing they will be able to make a career from it.

Or maybe those who choose music journalism just don't have a death wish, I dunno.

Hm...

This post thoroughly proves the Dave Stelfox's point above about how musicians make shit writers. :D

half-arsed ones

I can see what you're getting act, but if you prefer the written word over sound then it seems to me the natural choice would be novelist, or poet, or short story writer. I think they're the literary equivalents of musician.

Why would anyone want to be a writer rather than a musician?
Why would anyone want to be a visual artist rather than a musician?
Why would anyone want to be chef rather than a ballerina?

Whenever I complain about my life, HSA always tells me that you don't neccessarily get to do the things that you want, but you get to do the things that you are GOOD at. HSA says that he wanted to make pop, but he wasn't any good at it, so he made experimental music. But experimental music didn't make any money, so he ended up an artist. I'd *love* to be able to make experimental music or dronerock or something challenging and interesting, but everything that I make comes out pop. People respond to my writing more than my music, so I'm being pushed towards writing rather than pop.

You end up doing what other people think you're good at, rather than what you think you're good at.

Or, erm, something, I think I'm derailing myself right now.

Description from some random website:

During the tour 1987-88 he started writing on a utterly obscene book that finally got its name "The Adventures of Lord Iffy Boatrace"

The book's main character, the fake Scottish count Lord Iffy, is going to, during a weekend, try and trick money of some rich friends. This attempt fails when Lord Iffy’s butler's home-made pelvotron - a automatic fucking machine - goes wild.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0330314440/qid=1055255078/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_0_2/202-7647631-0259845

£15 quid is the cheapest which means Maiden fans are buying it to collect. My friend paid £2.99 as a remainder in Smiths and that was too much.

See! yr still in a band and yr still a musician. I knew it!

still better than the most of the garbage churned out week in, week out by the music press.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! Back to what I said... i f you love music and JOURNALISM repeat JOURNALISM, be a bleeding MUSIC JOURNALIST

runs off tearing out hair....

Aw man.