Is SPIN really circling the drain?

six months from now: whiney instates a new "full issue reviews only" policy

yeah but will more people buy Spin because of it? Or is it all about online clicks now?

maybe whiney could attest otherwise but i think most magazines are trying to think about how to survive beyond the quickly ending 'paper circulation era' and these changes are all about that

like maybe they'd like to keep readership of the physical magazine from dropping more quickly to make the transition easier and more gradual, but nobody can possibly expect the number of sales/subscribers to ever go up again

I will always prefer print mags myself but if everyone does go online eventually I really hope it's not in a half-arsed way like nme.com.
Mags like Spin,Rolling Stone,NME etc have a fantastic archive of old reviews and articles that I all hope end up online, and if they do that along with the same amount of reviews Pitchfork puts up each day, then they could have the best sites on the internet. No doubt if that were to happen they would want some silly amount of subscription money though :(

isn't the full Spin archive on Google Books? or was that only for a minute

It's still there. Yesterday I was nosing around the 1998 issue with Natalie Imbruglia on the cover.

its the gift that keeps on giving:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2012/01/12/spin_magazine_to_review_albums_on_twitter_is_this_the_death_of_music_criticism_.html

"but such responses can largely be blamed on Spin senior editor and avowed troll Christopher Weingarten."

hi forrest wickman, didn't know you read ilx

"Weingarten aims to be the watchdog of music criticdom, but his fierce contrarianism and bullshit-calling seem better suited for a freelancer or a voice on Twitter than a senior editor writing on the behalf of a major magazine"

trololo

wow, that slate piece COMPLETELY misses the point

you can just post that every day and reliably be right more often than wrong

I don't do display names but I hope somebody takes "you got us again, Weingarten!" while it's still hot

like maybe they'd like to keep readership of the physical magazine from dropping more quickly to make the transition easier and more gradual, but nobody can possibly expect the number of sales/subscribers to ever go up again

― Jean-Luc Gohard (some dude), Friday, January 13, 2012 4:40 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i have to say the look/feel/attitude of new bimonthly print edition is pretty fucking #swag and unique, and, i'm not nastradamus or anything, but I'd like to believe that we could ultimately improve our sub base with it

was having this discussion with robin today and we both determined we'd be willing to buy an issue to see what it looks like
but after that if i'm not on a comp sub i'm gonna be MIGHTY BUTTHURT

two year sub is like 15 bones u cheapskate

When does Issue #1 of the WGW Era hit newsstands?

god whiney don't u know PAYING FOR THINGS is for people NOT IN THE INDUSTRY no wonder slate hates u

lol @ the WGW era

the first bimonthly ish hits stands in late Feb

i wish music mags would publish essays instead of reviews

otm

or that 'reviews' were less consumer guide oriented at any rate

Maybe pick up the next issue of spin #justsayin

haha i will, if only as a show of support for team_ilx, but 500 words isnt really an essay. i mean i dont know how broad an interest there is in like nyrb style essays about the peaking lights remix album or rick ross mixtape but i think longer essays that are freer range than simply 'talk about this album' or 100x better than 'record reviews' & s.thing i would pay money for on the reg

like i think my platonic ideal of music mag writing is alex ross' stuff for the new yorker, where hes given space to put a single artist in context or flesh out a personal take on avant-rock thats more than just an infograph or w/e

i wish music mags would publish essays instead of reviews

Here you go. Hope you like out-jazz and/or underground metal.

I dont know if I can say too much atm lampy, but what were gonna be doing in the mag is gonna be diff than the online reviews

musicians are going to review their own albums

aren't there plenty of places online where that can/does happen lamp? like the problem is in monetizing longform essays not in distributing them. the new yorker/nyrb can bank on their brand for longer than most places but in the long-term that's all they are. xp

i watched your speech posted upthread, and i feel that i was with you up until the last few minutes. i mean, i am not a fan of fleet foxes, but your criticism boils down to some lazy slag at young white people or something. lol indie. which i actually can totally relate, to, but the way that you're communicating that complaint is sorta lazy imo.

i remember your review of salem, which i thought was properly devastating.

could you do that in a twitter format? no fucking way. or could you sell me on some artist that you think is worthy of my time in that small a space? i think that you're underestimating the voice of the critic. the individual voice. i mean, read back on old ilm threads. people are all like "yeah, christgau (and granted he was pithy in his own way, but...) meltzer, bangs, etc."... the question of WHY people pay attention to music criticism is too complex to be summed up in an ilx post, much less a 140-character tweet. i feel like you're giving in. if you like music, engaging with it, engaging with people who are similarly enthusiastic or not even so, and writing about it, then why compromise? as i see it, you're giving in to the economic aspects, as you perceive that to be at this time. ffs, twitter might not exist in six months' time. why patronize something unless you fundamentally believe in it?

but then i've never understood twitter from the get-go. /grandpa

i think lamp is looking for good longform essays

i was trying to address whiney.

@iatee im sure there are! but how many of them are any good blah blah blah every cultural products in the digital age debate ever (mood: livejournal)

i mean the problems with monetizing longform criticism and i guess implicitly the lack of demand for same is that it does make distribution difficult? i kindof cant really parse your post tbh but if i get yr drift is that publications as physical objects are doomed? i guess i can agree with that, or least s.thing like a national music mag. i publish a quarterly zine that loses small amounts of money for fun but ive 'sold out' of my last few issues, so demand for this stuff as a niche product will probably 'always' exist...

i want to read a lamp zine! pretty sure my entire household would appreciate.

i don't know where you can buy these, but they look interesting. it's semi-academic. but i would buy one.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jpms.2011.23.issue-2/issuetoc

ya that's my general take, magazine biz not significantly different than newspaper biz in the long-term, maybe in a slightly better place cause a magazine can be uh, tableticized pretty well and there are lots of established brands that people are more attached to than their local paper. but in the long-term

a. there is an enormous quantity of free magazine-esque longform stuff out there online. also lots of great magazines haven't gated their online stuff.
b. paper magazines can be like vinyl records - not 'useless' but not mainstream. sometimes an expensive niche object like your zine. but not the normal form of distribution for longform prose. are they even today? idk what the numbers are or how you'd compare # of magazine articles read in America to # of long blog posts read.

i only know about it cuzza the EMP connection:

http://iaspm-us.net/journal-of-popular-music-studies/

i always wish that the oxford american music issue thing was a semi-monthly thing. would subscribe.

i will buy spin when i see it though. i think chris can make it cooler/better. it used to be cool a long time ago. it could be cool again. spin needs a firebrand. a matt taibbi. embrace the #occupy. its been so long since it was relevant to...anything at all. when i would see 2000's era spins i got that schizo who the hell is our audience vibe. grasping at straws. but the wrong straws.

is there any major magazine that's more relevant today than it was 10 years ago?

playboy (via lohan)

some mags hold their own. i actually think rolling stone is better than it was 10 years ago. i'm glad people got the blender-isms out of their system. hated that magazine.

blender also the worst misuse of talent in history. glad some people got paid for a while, but other than that...

your criticism boils down to some lazy slag at young white people or something. lol indie. which i actually can totally relate, to, but the way that you're communicating that complaint is sorta lazy imo.

the amount of skin whiney has in this particular game is kinda his most pronounced weakness & is why "editor" seems like a weird job for him to seek imo

skin?

think he meant 'thin' skin

we've been over this - most people don't spend half their lives actively engaging the music/culture they hate and getting wound up about it, but it's kind of a big part of your character as a critic - which is kind of good in a critic, some quixotic windmill to be tilting against (death to false metal) but in an editor is like...look man. I can't stand Fleet Foxes. I know them to be swell dudes personally but that music just ughs me out. But if I'm the editor of a non-niche music mag, then Fleet Foxes sell enough records & fill big enough rooms that they merit the cover stories they tend to get, but it's difficult for me to imagine you seeing things that way, because again a big big part of what you do as a critic is to stand vociferously against stuff you don't like. skin in the game = you have bands & styles whose success you actively oppose

Skin in the game like stake in gambling

Wait did Whiney make Spin bimonthly or has it been for a bit?