Underneath The Waves

Every week - no, every day I my email inbox fills up with marketing companies and record labels pimping new music to me. I'll be honest with you, about nine out of ten of these bands are worth me 'letting you in on the secret'. And I do, because the bands deserve a chance. Sometimes I post about the crappy ones, too, and don't really give an opinion either way.

When I was a teenager, I was really big on OPTION magazine (defunct) and Alternative Press magazine (not the same anymore). Both featured lots and lots of reviews of new records. But the big thing for me was that their reviews didn't feature opinion. Don't get me wrong, I love reading what David Fricke (music editor for Rolling Stone) or Robert Christgau (music writer for the Village Voice) have to say about a band because their opinions are very informed. However, if you take the emotion out of it, and just talk about the music itself, you can get a better picture. Alternative Press used a rating system, and the reviews were very light on emotion and opinion. OPTION didn't even have ratings, just good in-depth reviews lacking much actual opinion. The emphasis was an actual description of the record, and I appreciated that. It takes a lot for a music writer to gain my trust, so it's hard for me to read those kinds of reviews.

OPTION is gone and AP has turned into a glossy mag with the latest black-eyelinered boy band on the cover. The owner (of AP) is a friend of a friend, and I get it, I understand he's just doing what he needs to do to make money, but I don't like the mag so much anymore.

And, like him, I've found that music reviews with opinion are more entertaining and engaging. Reading OPTION was like reading about classical music, it was quite technical. That's not what sells. I'm not selling anything (least of all my soul) here, but if the reviews get you to check out a good new band that deserves a chance, so be it. And in the meantime I hope you check out the non-music stuff that I post on occasion.