Mystique. You can't fake it. You just have it. But in 2010, mystique is a lost art, when it comes to bands and the music business.
It's the instant information age, where everyone has a MySpace page, a Facebook page and a Twitter account. Social media, coupled with that oh-so-outdated mode of communication, known as text messaging, allows for people to reveal their whereabouts, at all times. I use all the aforementioned modes of communicating and my thumbs ache because of them. I check my social networking sites 10 times a day. I tweet constantly. I text more than I dial out and make calls. I email more than I answer my phone at work. I write better than I talk; that's my excuse. But in all seriousness, while addicted to the fact that I am constantly connected and plugged in, I do sometimes yearn for less accessibility. Jesus Christ, I use UberTwitter to send tweets from my Blackberry and the program can show your exact geographical location via satellite if you don't disable the function! You can update people on your location, your thoughts, your scandalous activities at any time. I often ask myself, "Does anyone need to know what I am doing, 24/7?" Is it too much? Are we all too available? Isn't there something sexy about a little mystery? About having to find something out for yourself, without it being handed to you, on a silver platter?
This line of thinking actually applies to bands and the music industry in 2010.
I've had a recent spate of conversations and email exchanges with people about writing about music, which escalated into discussions about how the curtain has been pulled back so much by the bands themselves, that the art of music journalism is almost a dying art. And not just because many magazines are folding at an alarming rate, since ad revenue is down, ad pages are disappearing and therefore, page counts are shrinking and magazines are closing shop. Music journalism used to be the way for a writer to yank back that curtain and expose the reader…the fan… to what goes on backstage, on the tour bus, beyond that velvet rope. A good piece of music journalism made the reader walk away from the article feeling like he or she learned something about their favorite band that they did not know and like they had spent a few days hanging out with the band. Sometimes salacious details would get revealed; sometimes harmless information would be exposed. But regardless of the nature, the band was shown in an expository way and when done right, the article or the piece, often several thousand words in length, would reveal that your favorite singer wore Bart Simpson boxer shorts, called his girlfriend 14 times an hour while on tour or that he read Nietzsche on the bus, as evidenced by the books in his bunk.
Music writers were given full access to bands, oftentimes accompanying them on the road for a few days, shadowing them, scribbling notes furiously, sitting down for two-hour long conversations. The writer got to know the band and vice versa. It was all for the story. It was pulling back the curtain and showing the reader and the fan something they could never possibly see or know without the go-between and the medium, which was the writer.
I have done several of those types of interviews. I have spent the entire day with a band on Ozzfest, following them silently, for an in-depth, "I was there" type piece. I have had a band - Papa Roach, actually - allow me unprecedented access to their tour bus. Jacoby Shaddix handed me his CD wallet at the time and said, "Go ahead, take a look!" I was allowed to look in their bunks, at their books, at their movies, video games, everything. I have always made sure to include color detail – things the fans could not possibly know without me telling them- in my pieces. Journalism, even about music, is revelatory in nature, and it tells a story and investigates and reports the facts, even if it's about hard-partying musicians and not Mafioso dons. Subject matter aside, rock and music journalism isn't about being a hack.
But in 2010, that art is dying, in my opinion, because the bands are flashing their fans, so to speak. There's no mystique anymore, because bands are Twittering away, tweeting every detail of their lives! They are revealing their status and their moods on Facebook and MySpace. All you need is a connection and a keyboard and you can find out whatever you want to know about your favorite band. It's almost like bands are letting it all hang out, leaving nothing to the imagination and leaving nothing left to wonder. And therefore, the mystique is gone.
A colleague and friend, who has deep passion for music, told me that when he went to see Aerosmith at New York's famed Madison Square Garden as a teen, he was dying to know what things were like backstage, but never could get that close. He then mentioned that nowadays, bands release DVDs, with tons of backstage footage that shows everything. So even though the fans aren't physically there, the secrets of the life of a musician are being revealed via DVD. Granted, in the changing and shifting music business model, with CDs being the least profitable revenue stream for a band, bands are forced to release other material to stay viable. But the mystique is wiped away.
Mystique is an intangible quality for a band to have and it certainly adds to the intrigue and interest. Today, there are so many bands out there and tons of them are opening themselves up, fully, to the world. It's one thing to love your fans and want to share yourself with them, but it's another to be almost too accessible. This over-exposure is not only wiping away mystique; it's also wrecking the art of music journalism.
Maybe I am being old-fashioned. Maybe not. But the instant information age has changed the way music is delivered and discussed, and I don't just mean the actual songs. Record labels, managers, publicists and writers all work together to create the profile for and of a band. And for me, there is still something enthralling about "not knowing." Today, we can known everything and know too much. Doesn't that eradicate the thrill of discovering something? The excitement of discovery is unearthing something you didn't know or see before, for yourself. If a band is putting it out there for you to see, without you having to put the effort in to making the discovery, what's special about that?
Something to chew on, no? I'd like to see the mystique brought back. I miss being so revelatory with my pieces, but I've found a way to do it, in albeit a more bite-sized way. And that's by always asking every person I interview to tell me something about them that I don't already know. I'm adapting and evolving, but I still crave discovery. I still love mystique. Maybe you should, too. ~ Amy Sciarretto
It's the instant information age, where everyone has a MySpace page, a Facebook page and a Twitter account. Social media, coupled with that oh-so-outdated mode of communication, known as text messaging, allows for people to reveal their whereabouts, at all times. I use all the aforementioned modes of communicating and my thumbs ache because of them. I check my social networking sites 10 times a day. I tweet constantly. I text more than I dial out and make calls. I email more than I answer my phone at work. I write better than I talk; that's my excuse. But in all seriousness, while addicted to the fact that I am constantly connected and plugged in, I do sometimes yearn for less accessibility. Jesus Christ, I use UberTwitter to send tweets from my Blackberry and the program can show your exact geographical location via satellite if you don't disable the function! You can update people on your location, your thoughts, your scandalous activities at any time. I often ask myself, "Does anyone need to know what I am doing, 24/7?" Is it too much? Are we all too available? Isn't there something sexy about a little mystery? About having to find something out for yourself, without it being handed to you, on a silver platter?
This line of thinking actually applies to bands and the music industry in 2010.
I've had a recent spate of conversations and email exchanges with people about writing about music, which escalated into discussions about how the curtain has been pulled back so much by the bands themselves, that the art of music journalism is almost a dying art. And not just because many magazines are folding at an alarming rate, since ad revenue is down, ad pages are disappearing and therefore, page counts are shrinking and magazines are closing shop. Music journalism used to be the way for a writer to yank back that curtain and expose the reader…the fan… to what goes on backstage, on the tour bus, beyond that velvet rope. A good piece of music journalism made the reader walk away from the article feeling like he or she learned something about their favorite band that they did not know and like they had spent a few days hanging out with the band. Sometimes salacious details would get revealed; sometimes harmless information would be exposed. But regardless of the nature, the band was shown in an expository way and when done right, the article or the piece, often several thousand words in length, would reveal that your favorite singer wore Bart Simpson boxer shorts, called his girlfriend 14 times an hour while on tour or that he read Nietzsche on the bus, as evidenced by the books in his bunk.
Music writers were given full access to bands, oftentimes accompanying them on the road for a few days, shadowing them, scribbling notes furiously, sitting down for two-hour long conversations. The writer got to know the band and vice versa. It was all for the story. It was pulling back the curtain and showing the reader and the fan something they could never possibly see or know without the go-between and the medium, which was the writer.
I have done several of those types of interviews. I have spent the entire day with a band on Ozzfest, following them silently, for an in-depth, "I was there" type piece. I have had a band - Papa Roach, actually - allow me unprecedented access to their tour bus. Jacoby Shaddix handed me his CD wallet at the time and said, "Go ahead, take a look!" I was allowed to look in their bunks, at their books, at their movies, video games, everything. I have always made sure to include color detail – things the fans could not possibly know without me telling them- in my pieces. Journalism, even about music, is revelatory in nature, and it tells a story and investigates and reports the facts, even if it's about hard-partying musicians and not Mafioso dons. Subject matter aside, rock and music journalism isn't about being a hack. But in 2010, that art is dying, in my opinion, because the bands are flashing their fans, so to speak. There's no mystique anymore, because bands are Twittering away, tweeting every detail of their lives! They are revealing their status and their moods on Facebook and MySpace. All you need is a connection and a keyboard and you can find out whatever you want to know about your favorite band. It's almost like bands are letting it all hang out, leaving nothing to the imagination and leaving nothing left to wonder. And therefore, the mystique is gone.
A colleague and friend, who has deep passion for music, told me that when he went to see Aerosmith at New York's famed Madison Square Garden as a teen, he was dying to know what things were like backstage, but never could get that close. He then mentioned that nowadays, bands release DVDs, with tons of backstage footage that shows everything. So even though the fans aren't physically there, the secrets of the life of a musician are being revealed via DVD. Granted, in the changing and shifting music business model, with CDs being the least profitable revenue stream for a band, bands are forced to release other material to stay viable. But the mystique is wiped away.
Mystique is an intangible quality for a band to have and it certainly adds to the intrigue and interest. Today, there are so many bands out there and tons of them are opening themselves up, fully, to the world. It's one thing to love your fans and want to share yourself with them, but it's another to be almost too accessible. This over-exposure is not only wiping away mystique; it's also wrecking the art of music journalism.
Maybe I am being old-fashioned. Maybe not. But the instant information age has changed the way music is delivered and discussed, and I don't just mean the actual songs. Record labels, managers, publicists and writers all work together to create the profile for and of a band. And for me, there is still something enthralling about "not knowing." Today, we can known everything and know too much. Doesn't that eradicate the thrill of discovering something? The excitement of discovery is unearthing something you didn't know or see before, for yourself. If a band is putting it out there for you to see, without you having to put the effort in to making the discovery, what's special about that?
Something to chew on, no? I'd like to see the mystique brought back. I miss being so revelatory with my pieces, but I've found a way to do it, in albeit a more bite-sized way. And that's by always asking every person I interview to tell me something about them that I don't already know. I'm adapting and evolving, but I still crave discovery. I still love mystique. Maybe you should, too. ~ Amy Sciarretto
Matt BjorkeThere are times as a so-called critic that I hear from people around me that I am 'too nice' or 'you could stand to be a little meaner.' So while I agree with these people that I could be a little more 'crusty' in my views on songs, I generally actually LIKE what I hear and if I like something, I am going to 'praise' it. It's that simple. I can like the latest "I'm from the country song," even if I am tired of Read More ...
Amy SciarrettoRight now I'm reading a lot about music. It almost sounds oxymoronic. To read about music, when music is what you listen to. But music, like many of the arts, is something that touches Read More ...
Adam BernardWelcome to your weekly dose of pop world musings. Covering all things pop culture, this week Pop Shots is hitting you with thoughts on everything from Dancing With The Stars finding some hot celebrities willing to test their skills, to a hot new voice for Smurfette, to a famous family getting themselves in some really hot water, and since it's Pop Shots, you know everything is seasoned with a little bit of attitude. Read More ...
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