The power of the music websites

[Welsh Rich]

Quite an interesting article about the new found power of music websites, especially Pitchfork...

 

There was a time, hard though it might be to believe, when the only place you could read music reviews was between sheets of inky newspaper, and the first thing any band wanted was a review in the NME or Melody Maker. But the internet has spawned a new breed of reviewers, whose reach is worldwide, and who are at the forefront of breaking new bands.

 

For instance, have you heard about what has become known in the US as "the Pitchfork effect", after the website Pitchforkmedia.com? Jof Owen hadn't, until it changed his life. His band, the Boy Least Likely To, had made their debut album, The Best Party Ever, in a bedroom in Wendover, Buckinghamshire, in 2005. Without a publicist or manager, they scrawled some names on to Jiffy bags and popped some CDs into the village postbox. Owen had a few emails from sympathetic listeners, until one mind-boggling morning that April. "I opened my account to 180 messages, all from American record shops and journalists, all asking for copies. They were all talking about the review they'd read on Pitchfork." The site had got hold of the album and given it an impressive 8.5 out of 10. In the wake of the interest generated, the band signed to pop svengali Simon Fuller's 19 Entertainment, and are now able to sell out 1,000-seat venues across America.

 

That is what Pitchfork can do. In the 10 years since its editor, Ryan Schreiber, started the site in his parents' home in Chicago, fresh out of high school and working at night to raise money for phone bills, it has become the first port of call for new music - for journalists, A&R scouts and record shops, as well as fans. In its first year it aimed to get 300 readers a day; now it has 170,000, drawn to a daily menu of five new album reviews, plus news, features and track reviews.

"You'll see a real spike in sales if Pitchfork gives something [a rating of] best new music," Josh Madell, co-owner of the New York record store Other Music, told the Washington Post earlier this year. He said a Pitchfork review was now as important to shoppers in his store as one in the New York Times.

 

Why has this happened? Schreiber, now 30, says websites are providing something the traditional press can't or won't - not only direct access to music through web links, but an unfettered perspective on, and passion for, new music. "The music press now is another world. They're not even trying to discover new music. They're waiting for it to become popular through other channels and then covering it once it breaks. And that's a massive disservice. Publications used to take more chances on artists, putting bands on the cover that they thought deserved to be there. That's been sadly disregarded."

 

But websites flourish precisely because they don't have to worry who to put on their covers, a factor that still makes or breaks magazine sales. They feel more fearless in the face of the music industry because they're not part of the system, says Schreiber. "Publications obviously seem to feel they need to watch their step and not alienate the label or the artist or the publicist or the advertising department, but that means sacrificing a lot of how you wind up feeling about a lot of the records you have to cover. We don't have to do that."

 

Colin Meloy, leader of the Oregon folk-pop band the Decemberists, championed by Pitchfork from the start of their career, values Schreiber's position. "The print media is pretty slow trying to help new bands. Pitchfork and bloggers were on our side from the start," he says. "It's because they're not answerable to anyone. They can cover instantly bands that they like, and do what they do on their own terms. And Ryan Schreiber's not in it to make a million pounds."

 

Neither were Sarah Zupko or Todd Burns. Zupko founded the award-winning Popmatters.com in 1999, as a magazine-style offshoot of her academic resource site Popcultures.com. Zupko ran the site in her spare time until a year ago, when advertising revenue finally let her give up the day job. Burns founded Stylusmagazine.com in 2002 "after I realised I had tons of time on my hands in college and had no real inclination to become an alcoholic". The thing that sets websites apart isn't just freedom, according to Burns, it's costs. "The amount of money that we have to spend to get many of the same sorts of results is far less, and certainly the fact that we're free helps as well."

 

Most websites only pay a few members of staff. Zupko pays three, and Burns only pays himself, although both would like that to change. Pitchfork's writers have recently started to get cheques in the mail from Chicago, but most internet critics get nothing for their chin-stroking pursuits. They put fingers to keyboard in exchange for the warm glow they receive when their names appear on a screen.

 

You've got to have enthusiasm in spades to write for free, so it's no surprise that personality-driven journalism thrives on these sites. Pitchfork's writers in particular have been criticised for their purple prose and a habit of approaching reviews conceptually. Classic Pitchfork moments include a "10.0/0.0" review of a Robert Pollard album; the line "I've even done the I'm-not-going-to-do-a-concept-review-anymore concept review", in Brent DiCrescenzo's appraisal of Franz Ferdinand's debut; and an unusual treatment of Jet's last album, Shine On, which sacrificed a numerical rating for a YouTube video of a chimp urinating into its own mouth. Some bloggers call it Bitchfork, but Schreiber is unrepentant. "I really do love over-the-top, bombastic, sensationalist style of reviewing, and we are cynical. But hopefully our readers respect us more for being honest critics - calling out shit records and rallying behind great ones." And the site's honesty has a commercial impact, as Travis Morrison found out to his cost. His band, the Dismemberment Plan, made one of Pitchfork's albums of 1999, the 9.6-rated Emergency and I. Five years later, his solo debut, Travistan, got 0.0. Shops stopped stocking his records, and his career squealed to a halt. "Up until the day of the review I'd play a solo show and people would be like, 'That's our boy, our eccentric boy'. Literally, the view changed overnight. I could tell people were trying to figure out if they were supposed to be there or not. It was pretty severe, how the mood changed," Morrison told an interviewer earlier this year.

 

But that's how music journalism should be, says Brendan Canning from Broken Social Scene, who were just a little Canadian indie band until Pitchfork started raving about their second album, You Forgot It in People. "They're entitled to write what they want, and they're pretty much right. It's kind of tragic for Morrison, but if you get a bad review, you know, hey, that's showbiz. I guess until a writer is dragged out of their favourite diner or knifed in an alleyway, everyone's going to have their own agenda, which is the way it should be," he says.

 

Canning also believes websites provide weighty alternatives to the big corporations that monopolise mainstream musical consumption. "Sites like Pitchfork are a great answer to ClearChannel, who buy up all the ticket agencies and radio stations, and try to package new music as 'edge rock' or 'music for secretaries'. On Pitchfork you get a much bigger, less categorized range of medication. And kids like getting that tablet every day. It's a romance for them."

 

So is the UK music industry waking up to the Pitchfork effect? Definitely, says Geoff Travis, the founder of Rough Trade Records and a long-time champion of new music. He signed the greatest beneficiaries of a Pitchfork rave review, the Arcade Fire. After the site gave their album Funeral a rating of 9.7, the band's US record label, Merge, was unable to keep up with demand for more copies. "It's massively influential at this level," says Travis. "It's like GCSE crib notes on new music. I think it's telling that America's never had an instant musical culture like we have over here with our weekly press, and Pitchfork's creating its own."

 

Travis buys plenty of albums from Pitchfork's recommendations, because he believes its reviews. "I trust them because Pitchfork has more independence. It's like the NME used to be, back in the day. These days it has more of an agenda. Like when Conor [McNicholas, editor of the NME] said on national TV that the NME wouldn't put Antony [of Antony and the Johnsons] on the cover after he'd won the Mercury Music Prize - because he was 'too weird'. It's staggering to hear that."

 

Surely the NME should feel threatened by Pitchfork's power if it can cover who it wants to? Krissi Murison, acting deputy editor of the NME, isn't convinced. "Pitchfork's success is just another indicator of how people are devouring music everywhere, in print, on radio, and online. There's a revived passion for new music. We sometimes cover 60 new bands every week in our Radar section, just like the websites do. And people trust us talking about them more because we've got a heritage." Murison also thinks websites give mixed messages. "They can be really confusing, and there's no quality control. If you're trying to work out what's good, the NME's already done the job for you. We're a filter for everyone."

 

One music review site has taken its passion for music to the logical extreme. Sean Adams set up the London-based webzine Drowned in Sound six years ago. It now has three full-time staff, a dedicated new music section, DiScover, and only 30,000 readers a day fewer than Pitchfork. It also has something Pitchfork doesn't - a record label, with Martha Wainwright and Metric on the books.

 

"We put our balls on the line for bands we believe in," says Adams. "These can be popular bands as well as unknown ones - we're much less band-spottery than Pitchfork." And Adams, unlike Pitchfork, opens his site's reviews to comment from readers. "I think it's very brave to get a writer to review a record and then be open straightaway to a reader saying, you're wrong. It gives the review an extra dimension." His voice lifts determinedly. "We encourage readers to reply because music's not just about the journalists - it's about the fans, too."

 

Which is where we started. For the webzine revolution was down to fans in the first place - the people who sat up in the first place, in their teenage bedrooms and college dorms, and gave up their free time for Freespace.

[m_thomp]

Honesty is the best policy. As the NME will sadly find out soon.

 

Geoff Travis was absolutely spot on, and picked up on the exact same Mercury Music Prize/Antony & The Johnsons demographic debacle that I highlighted at the time. There's something puzzling and very desperate about NME's current agenda. It certainly doesn't sparkle with wit and sincerity like it used to.

[lizish]

It's because they're not answerable to anyone. They can cover instantly bands that they like' date=' and do what they do on their own terms. And Ryan Schreiber's not in it to make a million pounds."[/quote']

 

wtf? why is someone from Montana and Portland using 'pounds' when commenting about someone from Chicago?

 

Pretentious nit.

[Beltmann]

wtf? why is someone from Montana and Portland using 'pounds' when commenting about someone from Chicago?

 

Pretentious nit.

Perhaps he simply adjusted for the fact that he was talking to a British publication.

[lizish]

Perhaps he simply adjusted for the fact that he was talking to a British publication.

 

I guess you're right, but still....

[Wendy]

Yes, Lizish, that one made me stop and think for a second until I realized this article is in the British press. I also thought it could be possible that Meloy said "bucks" or "dollars" and the writer himself edited it to "pounds" to defer to his British readership.

 

Perhaps I owe Colin an Apology Song for allowing that thought to even materialize?

 

"I'm really sorry Colin ... "

[owl]

Interesting article. Lots of good points made

[Griddles]

This article about Stars kind of serves as a rebuttal to the first post. I would recommend reading all the links, the initial review and the response.

http://music.aol.ca/article/Stars-side/149/

[DAngerer09]

I know a lot of people here don't like Pitchfork, but it is so true about the "Pitchfork Effect." They'll review something and give it a high score and all the sudden it starts getting a lot of pub and hype around the internet (blogs, torrent communities, last.fm, etc). I've found a lot of great music from that site that I would have otherwise never heard of.

[pnêyu]

I can picture the entire hard-hitting investigative series:

 

--"MP3s: Do I Need to Get the MP1s and MP2s First?"

--"MySpace: Yes, You Can Listen to Stuff in Between Friending Fake Sluts"

--"iPods: But That's What They Said About the 8-Track and Look Where That Got Me!"