80hz

Shoot the Messenger

The last 24 hours has seen a minor storm erupt around the idea of doing too many reviews too quickly. As i am currently the main writer on StompMag, my music website, with regard to reviews i feel the need to point out something that people seem to be missing. The claim is that if you do too many reviews in too short a time frame that you cannot be properly listening to the music and it is disrespectful to the artist. I call foul on that.

Normally a review is done at the point of release, just before or maybe just after depending on the reviewer. By then however …NORMALLY, the track has been out there for some time. It will have been played on various radio shows, maybe in clubs around the world numerous times. Sometimes the reviewer in question will have a very solid relationship with the artist and the label and will actually have had a promo copy of the track for sometime. In any case, 9 times out of 10 the reviewer will have lived with the track for some time and listened to it under assorted circumstances before ever sitting down to right the review itself. 

As such a review is not just a spontaneous outpouring of words in an attempt to to find the most outlandish metaphor for music, it normally a considered approach and a filtering of thoughts and emotions that will have swirled around both head and heart for some time. 

My 2 cents.

SF