Posted: April 4, 2011 | Author: georgieflower | Filed under: Comment | Tags: Arts, Bands and Artists, ben gilbert, blog, convergence, Henry Jenkins, Lady Gaga, Music, Music journalism, online music, Skint, Skint Records |
Everyday, all day we have the opportunity to listen to our favourite musicians, watch music videos and read gossip about them online. We are even able to produce our own music straight from our bedrooms. Have the YouTube celebrities and our instant gratification generation ruined the mystique of popular music forever?
Justin Bieber - When he was just a bedroom performer (Image from moviemusereviews.com)
Ben Gilbert is an experienced music journalist who provides editorial music content for Yahoo – today he came to speak to the Skint but Mint team at Westminster University. And he says, “It’s all about innovation. It is phenomenally exciting, you have the opportunity to have a voice – for good or bad!”
During the years that he has worked in the industry Ben has seen a huge amount of change, both with the kind of music available and with the way we consume it. “We’re living in an era of convergence,” Ben says; this is media theorist Henry Jenkins’ concept of old and new media colliding.
Where you used to buy an album and cherish it for months, listening only to those tracks, now we can download music (often for free) in massive quantities. Ben says that this has had a detrimental effect on our appreciation for the music we buy. He says; “The mystique of bands that we know and love has been ruined,” due to gossip and online content, and that the music industry is struggling due to “piracy and illegal downloads.”
One of the most famous, but ridiculous, headlines of all time. (image from benlocker.co.uk)
When Ben began to write for local papers in his early career he was “really attracted by the myths surrounding bands – I would have loved to see the velvet underground play in New York…now Lady Gaga has become the way forward.” These days the music has become less of a focus point for the media, “the creative arts have been over taken by our celebrity obsessed culture – tabloids like the Sun will print anything to sell papers.”
But music lovers, do not despair, Ben also points out that we will never be able to slow the creative train – “you can never stop creativity, we’ve seen that in the recent Dubstep movement across the UK, Hip Hop in the US and amateur garage bands made big.”
His advice to budding music journalists who want to survive in the ‘convergence’ world is, “start doing it now, work out how to promote yourself. Your blog can be an invaluable tool when looking for work.”
Written by Georgina Jarvis and Viktoria Kirkova
The Skint but Mint team with Ben Gilbert
Skint but Mint 
The death of chart music or the dawn of a whole new era?
Posted: April 4, 2011 | Author: georgieflower | Filed under: Comment | Tags: Arts, Bands and Artists, ben gilbert, blog, convergence, Henry Jenkins, Lady Gaga, Music, Music journalism, online music, Skint, Skint Records | Leave a commentEveryday, all day we have the opportunity to listen to our favourite musicians, watch music videos and read gossip about them online. We are even able to produce our own music straight from our bedrooms. Have the YouTube celebrities and our instant gratification generation ruined the mystique of popular music forever?
Justin Bieber - When he was just a bedroom performer (Image from moviemusereviews.com)
Ben Gilbert is an experienced music journalist who provides editorial music content for Yahoo – today he came to speak to the Skint but Mint team at Westminster University. And he says, “It’s all about innovation. It is phenomenally exciting, you have the opportunity to have a voice – for good or bad!”
During the years that he has worked in the industry Ben has seen a huge amount of change, both with the kind of music available and with the way we consume it. “We’re living in an era of convergence,” Ben says; this is media theorist Henry Jenkins’ concept of old and new media colliding.
Where you used to buy an album and cherish it for months, listening only to those tracks, now we can download music (often for free) in massive quantities. Ben says that this has had a detrimental effect on our appreciation for the music we buy. He says; “The mystique of bands that we know and love has been ruined,” due to gossip and online content, and that the music industry is struggling due to “piracy and illegal downloads.”
One of the most famous, but ridiculous, headlines of all time. (image from benlocker.co.uk)
When Ben began to write for local papers in his early career he was “really attracted by the myths surrounding bands – I would have loved to see the velvet underground play in New York…now Lady Gaga has become the way forward.” These days the music has become less of a focus point for the media, “the creative arts have been over taken by our celebrity obsessed culture – tabloids like the Sun will print anything to sell papers.”
But music lovers, do not despair, Ben also points out that we will never be able to slow the creative train – “you can never stop creativity, we’ve seen that in the recent Dubstep movement across the UK, Hip Hop in the US and amateur garage bands made big.”
His advice to budding music journalists who want to survive in the ‘convergence’ world is, “start doing it now, work out how to promote yourself. Your blog can be an invaluable tool when looking for work.”
Written by Georgina Jarvis and Viktoria Kirkova
The Skint but Mint team with Ben Gilbert