Is SPIN really circling the drain?

I hated Genius Lessons, btw

ahahahahahaha aha ahaaa hahaha aha a aha a ha. ha.

Me too. I think I kind of loved to hate it more than anything, at first I was intimidated 'cause it was all snotty and hip, and then when I got most of the references I was busy sneering back at them, but I kept reading it anyway. Wish I had a copy of the parody Sia Michel article written for our college radio zine, but then, only a college radio staffer would think it was clever or funny.

My favorite SPIN moment, besides the awesome cover story on Hole right when Live Through This came out, is a letters to the editor section from 93 (just found the excerpts I'd stuck on a tape case)..

On Juliana Hatfield:
"Is it because her mother is the fashion editor of the Boston Globe that we must be subjected to endless drivel about her angst-ridden and privileged upbringing? As far as her music goes - "high priestess of mind fuck"? You've got to be kidding! She wears her suburban hang-ups on her sleeve like some kind of corporate logo."

On a Breeders piece by Charles Aaron:
".. anyone who read this snot-nosed, self-obsessed band profile knew it could only have been directed at him. The real icing on the cake comes when Aaron describes the Breeders as 'acting out some postpunk version of a 40s George Cukor bitchfest" starring Katharine Hepburn, Tallulah Bankhead, and Spencer Tracy. Attention SPIN editors: Nobody in your audience got that reference."

i think i became too cool for the magazine once i got into college. i never really came back to it once i got over hipsteritus, but it still remains a reason to go to the magazine rack at any bookstore. i usually flip through, see who is getting reviewed, in the top 20, or in the next 50 hot bands lists. if you're in spin, you've sort of made it in a way. (and that could be a good or bad thing depending on your perspective...) it's a handy way to gauge where a band is.

perhaps for that reason alone, i hope it doesn't go away.
m.

So yes, SPIN is most certainly circling the drain.

Holyshit, they really WERE circling the drain

"Ur criticism of 3 Dors Down was complete Bullsiht..."

In the near future every pop culture magazine will be so short and snarky it really *will* be like reading ILM the magazine.

Spin has been in trouble for a long time, but his hiring will only hasten its demise. It was Ap's second-in-command who did all the heavy lifting. AP has no interest in the international web (or at least he didn't when I worked for him)— if he thinks he can get young uns to add Spin to their diet of MYSpace, he is sorely mistaken.

check this out this interview with Mediabistro…he didn't get it then…

Do you think that the Internet is inhibiting the sale of CDs?
People don't want this stuff for free. There are a few people in colleges and stuff who get a thrill out of downloading stuff illegally, but most people will pay 60 cents for a song they download. It's only 60 cents, and most people are more than happy to pay for it. Before record labels endorsed music licensing, people were downloading music for free because there were no other options. It was a great piece of technology. I mean iTunes is successful, and that seems to be the way things are going, record companies are finally realizing that they can be involved in websites that charge for tunes and still be financially viable. Regardless, the CD will still exist, just in reduced circumstances. It will perhaps be similar to movies. You can experience a movie in a variety of formats—at the cinema, on DVD, or VHS.

http://www.mediabistro.com/articles/cache/a991.asp

I was shocked--shocked--that it went for $5M although given that it's bleeding $3M per year and the subscriber liability noted above, I had no idea things were this bad.

I don't find the Pemberton move at all unpredictable. I wouldn't want to work for him, either--thanks for chiming in Veronica, so I don't have to relay my own stories.

Who else got booted there today from the staff (other than the publisher and EIC yesterday)? I heard some names that were likely to be gone by the end of the week...

I'm sure that he will fire most Spinvolk— I predict he will attempt to staff it with Brits, altho' I doubt the new owners will be willing to spring for multiple green cards. he'll have to staff it with Americans—if they know of his rep, they would have to be masochists or truly desperate, and there sure are a lotta people like the latter these days. the freelance pool will be almost exclusively british.

he does need a consigliere, like Blender's CM, but one who will be loyal and not say to the owners "he does nothing; I do everything, fire him." he has been a consultant since being fired from Blender, so he may very well have learned something, altho I doubt it.

I can only assume that hiring AP is a huge signifier of the short term brand strategy of the new owners. Which is sad, because that mag needs some serious babying and given the long term outlook of music glossies, investors are probably not going to have much patience watching that thing bleed cash.

Is Blender doing 12 issues a year yet?