Column: Son Of Dave
Music magazines are agonisingly boring things to read
The only way I get around town is on public transportation. Cabs are expensive and I don’t own a car because I like drinking too much. It’s nice to see the city and all its freaks from the window of a bus. If I have to take the underground, to get to a soundcheck on time, for instance, I’ll read a book. But never a music magazine. If you’re reading this, you are an optimistic sonofabitch, but I think you’re looking for knowledge in the wrong place, my friend. Let me tell you why.
The band interview: The worst place to look for good information. In the unlikely event that the musicians in the band might have something interesting to say about politics, or art, or automobile sabotage, it still won’t make it to print because the journalist wants to write about music. On and on they will blather about music; how they came to make music; how they made music; how to make music; why some music is better or worse than other music… If people see you reading this vacant trash in the office, they’ll think you’re simple.
The album review: If you want to find out which records to buy to make life more bearable, you will never be able to choose by reading record reviews. It is the journalist’s job to review records accurately, but it is their fear that they will get it wrong. Fear will always win. Therefore, they will never stick their neck out to say something is great until they’ve read it somewhere else five or six times. And they won’t have the courage to say something is crap for fear that they missed the point. So they will take easy shots at weak albums and champion the safest middle-of-the-road poop until told to do otherwise.
The feature: This is a strange thing where the journalist reprints the band’s press release and biography. It will say what the record company wants to appear in the magazine. Sometimes the journalist will add things or subtract things, but not often.
The live review: This is very interesting to the musicians who are being reviewed. Hopefully the live review will say what they wish to hear — that they rocked, or crooned, or sweated, or swooned. And possibly they did. There may actually be some truth in these reviews: they took to the stage, the sound was awesome, people loved it. But it’s dull as the wrong end of a nail to read about.
The ads: They all say “OUT NOW” somewhere in the ad. I want to murder them.
The photography: A hefty amount of money, energy and hair gel is wasted on photo shoots for these magazines. Firstly, the band already has thousands of photographs of itself which could be used, but because the magazine prides itself on a job well done and wants exclusivity, they will spend up to £20,000 hiring a photographer, stylist fag, wardrobe bitch, make-up chick (who always gets laid), and catering to make the band look… exhausted. You can cut out a sexy photo of your favourite junky and put it in your briefcase while people on the bus point and laugh at you.
The classified ads: This is the only bit worth reading. Very funny.
And finally it must be said that the sheer number of bands being examined is staggering. How are you to sift through all that shit without feeling ashamed of yourself?
Many years ago, on the way to a photo shoot for Rolling Stone magazine (I believe this is irony, but I’m not sure), I was stuck in the back of a van with a band, in gridlock, somewhere in Midtown Manhattan. The heat was relentless, as was the noise of car horns and sirens. It was one of my first visits to that place. I was observing everything.
I could see little things happening all around us. On the right sidewalk, two old buggers had their sofa put right against a chain-link fence in the middle of this insanity and they were just sitting and chewing the fat.
On the opposite sidewalk, there was this rich urban bitch with her dog, looking in a window at something, paying no attention to the SIRENS, which were putting pressure on all of us from behind. Still gridlock. Almost no motion. Our manager’s assistant, who had been complaining of a hangover from the Russian samovar-flavoured vodka the night before, suddenly barfed into a plastic bag. She wasn’t done and ran into a Chinese restaurant to continue. The van edged toward the curb to let fire engines pass. We had to wait for an old Chinaman to push his wheelie bag across the road. He parked it outside a corner store and went in.
The old guys were still talking above the noise and gazing at the fancy dog, which was taking a dump on the sidewalk opposite them. The owner began the ungodly process of picking up the turd with some newspaper, of course. We were late for our important photo shoot. Traffic moved a few feet forward. The sirens were deafening.
The woman with the dog and the turd in the paper looked around for a garbage can to put it into. Under the stress of the heat and noise and traffic, she mistook the Chinaman’s wheelie bag for a garbage bin. In went the turd, and off she went.
The old sages on the sofa looked on as the Chinaman came out and discovered a stinking shit in his trolley. He screamed into the day. I inhaled deeply on a customised Camel cigarette and, as the manager’s assistant climbed back in the van, we found an open lane of traffic to swing into.
I was high on the moment. This was living! I turned to the drummer and asked him if he saw any of what just happened. But he had been reading a MUSIC MAGAZINE and had missed it all.
We got our photo in Rolling Stone and there was a little paragraph underneath that said something from our press release. I cut out an ad in the back of the magazine offering an item which could turn a harmonica into a midi-synthesizer.
So you see, not only is it a waste of time to read music magazines, but they will seriously stifle your ability to observe the fascinating world around you. And indirectly, that Chinaman’s outrage was caused by gridlock, which was caused by so many people going off to be in unnecessary magazine photo shoots in Manhattan so that optimistic sonsofbitches like you can read endless interviews with bands that don’t bloody matter.
