SOMETIMES I WONDER...

Current mood: TIME MOVES SO SLOWLY BY...
Category: TIME MOVES SO SLOWLY BY... Music

why so few free review cds and records plop through my fishy little letterbox..

I mean here I am, one of the leading music writers of any era and fewer than a cats handful of free discs have arrived on the island all year?!?


It’s wierd...

I mean you’d think such a classy gentleman as PG£, who’s more than accurate at picking out HIGH quality music for his loyal, loving and ever growing readership, would be completely inundated with free gifts and hefty bribes to such a degree he’d have to employ a fleet of specially trained dogs to open and then stack the envelopes...

But no so...


Well, I guess the part of the reason for this, is that I’m utterly crap at reviewing things as per RELEASE DATES, and there’s nothing record company folk like more than to have things done ON TIME AND IN LINE WITH THEIR CAMPAIGN!!!

Now, I can see the thinking with this, but it’s never really made much sense to my view of how music really works..

I mean if you’re trying to promote something, a stary eyed review popping up weeks, months or years after all the others have been forgotten, can only be a good thing.

If it’s written well, the least such a review can do is to shift one or two of the unsold copies that are cluttering the distributors and the best it can achieve is to affirm and further enhance an acts growing reputation..

But I’ve found that if you don’t mention something you’ve recieved gratis, QUICK SHARP SMART, you soon get deleted off the list and forgotten. Yes boss, the business end of things, is all about time and immediacy, and I find that to be a shame because good music is all about timelessness...


This short termist outlook perhaps illustrates the reason why the music business and music press turns up so many duds and why music writers are most normally awful at saying anything even slightly interesting....

The whole game works on 78rpm.

Reviewers are given a CD and expected to know whether it’s good or not inside a few weeks or even days. There’s very little time for reflection, research or comparrison, and precious little time for any kind of a creative response or the kind of pot brewing that makes for good quality wordsmithing...


Of course sometimes, it’s very possible to hear and see something immediately as being superb and write about it straightaway because you’re so goddamn inspired by it!!! But more often than not, the muscial taste of the day is decided on chitter chatter and ’OOh look they’ve said it’s good, so I’d better say the same!!’ and before you know what’s happening, Snow Patrol are selling millions of soon to be charity shop CDs...


But surely the best thing about quality music is that it’s timeless - that it always sounds fresh and new no matter what date it spins on the deck...

You can listen to a Sun Ra record now and if you like that kind of thing, it’ll blow your mind just as well, if not better, than the day it was made...

And that timeless longevity is surely what the essence of quality music is all about...


AKA

RECORD COMPANIES & PROMO PEOPLE - SEND ME ALL YOUR ACE RECORDS AND ONE DAY I MIGHT REVIEW THEM!!!!

Currently listening : Space Is the Place By Sun Ra and His Astro Intergalactic Infinity Arkestra Release date: By 10 March, 1998

04:39 - 19 Comments - 10 Kudos - Add Comment - Edit - Remove -

	Clinker	Well we've given you our new album for FREE. [IMG]http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc195/Clinker123/albumcoversmall.jpg[/IMG] Posted by Clinker on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 12:54 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	Yes you have... I find individual artists are far more generous than the record companies with these things... I'll be reporting on your latest shortly.. Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 19:56 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	Clinker	http://s218.photobucket.com/albums/cc195/Clinker123/?action=view&current=albumcoversmall.jpg maybe this'll work haha Posted by Clinker on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 12:55 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	Almost.... Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 19:58 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	Clinker	Posted by Clinker on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 12:56 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	BRAVO!!! Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 20:00 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	Dave Kelso-Mitchell	Sun Ra is the daddy! Posted by Dave Kelso-Mitchell on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 13:01 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	Space is the place!! Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 20:08 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	Christopher Nosnibor	I'm with you on this... I'm planning to do my 'best albums of 2007' blog sometime in July or maybe even August (that's this year, 2008) - partly because I was too busy at the end of 2007, partly because there are too many articles like that flying around in November (absurd! There's a huge chubnk of year left!) and december and mostly because it takes time and repeat listening to decide the real merits of an album... does it still hold up when you've done playing the grooves off if in the first 3 weeks? has it dated horribly 6 months later? etc. That's what I call reviewing! Back-catalogue freebies would be fine with me... Posted by Christopher Nosnibor on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 16:36 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	Yeah.. I prefer to try and take all the time out of it... And just say good album or bad album as soon as I have a strong idea as to which.. Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 20:10 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	Nonstop Everything	hold your horses. there's more coming... Posted by Nonstop Everything on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 19:36 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	As per above. I get most of the decent stuff from people who are knocking their own stuff out.. The difficulty I have with record companies and promo companies is that a) With few exceptions they tend to send out too much crap. Only 1 in 5 or 6 records are even worth talking about.. b) I take too long to do this talking - they then loose patients.. Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 20:24 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	The Van Allen Belt	we, on the other hand, will make you wait... Posted by The Van Allen Belt on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 20:05 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	BASTARDS!!!! Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Thursday, March 27, 2008 at 20:24 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	Brigid Power-Ryce	im recording on monday whatever comes of it ill give you it free of course! Ill add a drawing with it too Posted by Brigid Power-Ryce on Friday, March 28, 2008 at 15:11 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	ACE!!! Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Friday, March 28, 2008 at 15:23 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	Version Steve	Same here. Working in radio had me spoiled, and I loved it but never really grasped how hard it would be to keep up the same relationship with labels after I leave radio. The promos are considerably slim nowadays. Posted by Version Steve on Friday, March 28, 2008 at 15:48 [Remove] [Reply to this]

	: THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI :	As an individual it seems you are expected to review everything you get sent.. As a magazine this isn't quite the same.. I think the key is to build particular relationships direct with a bunch of good artists and go for quality rather than quantity.. Posted by : THE FUTUREPROOF MUSIC BLOG BY PIOUS GIOVANNI : on Friday, March 28, 2008 at 16:13 [Remove] [Reply to this]

simon

Well as you gave me the last freebie cd but one that I got, Nonstop Everythings Smoke Stack I can say it has just made it onto the cd player and it's far to soon to know if its any good!! I regularly go back to records I thought were crap when I got them and 15 years later they sound great, I've grown into them or they've grown into my brain.. The whole schedule for reviews is just trying to spread the word wuickly when music actually seems to spread really slowly and gradually.... Posted by simon on Friday, March 28, 2008 at 20:34 [Remove] [Reply to this]