It makes me sad that Paste is doing this. It makes me sad because their death is inevitable. In the immortal words of my father, "The economics just aren't there." They can do what they want, but they can't win this war. I'm glad artists are pitching and in and throwing out cool songs and all, but there's something admirable about facing your death with dignity and humility. It's sad when people try to cheat death.
I was around when two guys started Paste. Back then it was an interesting magazine. They weren't another indie magazine. They were more of a fanzine. They had a record company, online music store, etc. I didn't always like what they liked, but they kept my interest.
I think the two original guys sold the company. Now they're hardly distinct from other indie 'zines. They're kinda the Caribou Coffee to Pitchfork's Starbucks. They ain't no Brady's Cafe, that's for sure.
So, I probably shouldn't rain on your blog, Ben, and you can bitch me out if you need to, but I only feel bad about Paste not really living up to the potential it had. Because having a truly disparate alternative to Pitchfork, et al, would be a welcome breath of fresh air.
Good luck Paste, you make me dream of what could have been...
Oh, and by the way, when did Indiedom start feeling so much like Suburbia?
okay, i'm admittedly playing devil's advocate here, but a few points to consider:
1. first off, i'm not sure it's in the nature of a large business that functions nationally both print and online to suddenly just decide en masse one day, because the numbers aren't there like they used to be, that they're going to close up shop and disappear off the face of the earth, if there is potentially a new, better way to make money and stay afloat...which leads me to my second point...
2. i'll acknowledge that paste is sending mixed messages with the combination of "SAVE PASTE!" and "no, seriously, we'll be fine, we're just having a rough month" in the same message; however, it's not as if they're plugging away stupidly trying to fill holes in a massive, idiotic dyke the way that, say, the RIAA is wrt CDs. they have a pretty hip, up-to-date online presence and as per their letter, they're obviously trying to address new type(s) of business model(s) to suit not only a changing economic climate but also a new sort of readership/economic model. i don't see this to be a darwinian-style extinction as much as a magazine having a tough time because of a generally bad economy and trying to make the best of it using new tactics. whether that works or not is of course dependent on the equanimity of its readership, apparently.
3. it's funny that you mention pitchfork, because i actually got into paste in an effort to avoid reading pitchfork. i find stereogum and paste specifically to be the opposite of pitchfork in a lot of ways. the writing is better (re: not intentionally pretentious or judgmental), and more importantly, paste doesn't write about trends, or hipness, but instead about the quality of actual music. of course, they write A LOT about music that's popular with zephyr-kid-type crowds, but that's a lot different than writing about culture and your own narrow views on whose sticker you should put on your guitar case before slipping into your skinny jeans and putting on your manscara under the guise of writing about music. i mean, this is obviously just a case of agreeing to disagree on taste here, but while paste may cater to the masses in terms of subject, i don't think they cater to the masses in terms of content on that subject. they still write, and write well, about the music and not all the bullshit surrounding it.
4. what's so bad about being popular, anyway? i mean, granted, i'm sure there's something to be said for 2-guys-at-a-typewriter-in-a-barn paste and its interest in indie music, but at the same time, there are all kinds of blogs, and zines, and publications written about local music scenes and/or written by one or two really insightful people not under the sway of a huge corporation or the interests of having to support an infrastructure like new-paste has to. and i'm happy about that; i love the independent voice just as much as anyone. but i wonder often about this whole "it's big so it must be bad" attitude in the sense that, sure, something is lost when a publication has to start considering writing for a larger audience and keeping that readership coming back. but at the same time, if a "big" publication is doing a good job, why complain? i mean, i'm sure paste has changed a lot over the years, but as far as "mainstream" music mags go, it's one of the more open-minded...sure, you can go to indie publications for all your news, but you're not going to get the breadth, or the scope, of something like paste from any of those. you're not going to get easy facebook, twitter, RSS, etc updates and the ability to digg, embed, reddit, etc. news stories that always break on the day of the story with indie sites (at least, not very often). you're not going to get the quality of the physical magazine product (nice paper, well-constructed binding, free sampler CD monthly) or the fact that you can get it anywhere in the country that you get with paste with indie mags, because they just don't have the type of infrastructure to support those kinds of things.
i, as much as anyone, understand the desire to get all your news (esp. art news) from genuine dudes who publish each issue out of their own back pocket and who have something to prove, but there are upsides to "mainstream" too...ask springsteen. i suspect if i had been aware of paste "back in the day", seeing them in this gargantuan, staggering, bleeding behemoth state might be a little more sad for me, but as it is, i see them as one of the truly decent choices in the mainstream music writing market. if someone has to carry the mainstream flag, i would rather it be them than pitchfork or rolling stone...and if mainstream collapses entirely under the weight of an old business model, well then so be it; but that's hardly paste's fault in its entirety and i'd like to hope that they could at least have a chance to adapt into something 21st-century useful.
haha... touche. I feel like a brought a knife to a gun fight. :)
My opinion about the quality of Paste is a bit like the opinion of old Phish fans about new Phish. So, you're right, I don't do my homework.
What I'm saying about economics is that I don't think Paste has ever had a viable business. And I don't really have any research to back that opinion up, but I feel that way and always have. There's something about Paste that just doesn't make sense to me as a business. And in the current form, they just don't compete well enough with Pitchfork, et al.
That's not to say that I'm a fan of Pitchfork, Rolling Stone, etc. Hardly. And I guess if I felt that there was an apples to oranges difference between Paste and Pitchfork, etc., I'd be all over them like white on rice. My feeling is that the difference between them is like the difference between Fuji and Granny Smith or Cortland and Winesap. It's all apples.
And I'm glad that Paste is the best of the apples. But what I'm really wanting for is an orange.
I don't care about big or small companies. I understand, even if I don't always like it, that growth involves encompassing more viewpoints. But that's not the problem for me. For me the problem is that I don't think their alternative is much of an alternative, and sadly, given that, they don't have much of a chance against Pitchfork, Inc.
Plus, I feel like they changed their dress style so they could be a part of the cool kids, which, having tried that myself back in middle school, I feel is a waste.
It humors me that of all the things to have sharp opinions about, this is the one we've most vocally disagreed about.
once again, i think some of our difference of opinion can probably be attributed to personal taste. and i'm not going to argue that paste hasn't started trying to dress up like the cool kid at school, because i think in a way they have. i guess i'm just struggling with the question of how much of that is just posturing, and how much of it is an actual business necessity dictated by a growing user base and the growing "print is dead" mentality (the trueness of that belief is something else we could probably argue about for a year). if i can believe that they're dressing up fancy in order to stay in business, then somehow that's more palatable to me. i think the indie-becomes-suburbia problem is probably a lot bigger than paste. i don't know how to kill it. i wish i did.
i guess the main thing i was trying to comment on in my insanely verbose post last night was that by virtue of a lot of things (a lot by, i personally believe, internet and mp3s, specifically) there is a sort of middle class breaking up the feudal system of music nowadays. there isn't just radio music and "underground" music anymore...there's an entire new strata made up of music you'd never hear on the radio (except maybe college radio) and yet millions of people read websites like pitchfork to hear specifically about this kind of music and they go out in buy it in numbers approaching that of top 40 music sales. yet there's a supposed ethos behind this music that it's supposed to be unique and hard-to-find, because in the same way that "organic" food has recently just become the USDA's way of marketing food rather than a way of actually identifying naturally-made foods, "indie" seems like it's a way to make people feel better about listening to pop music simply by virtue of the fact that it's not on the radio, which makes it "easier" to find.
the fact that a magazine that once wrote articles like the dylan one i just sent you has now turned to reporting on this kind of music is sad to me, but at the same time i want to get my news regarding this type of music from SOMEWHERE. i personally want to at least have a vague idea of what goes on in the middle class of music, and, as much as i hate to admit it, most of my favorite bands (phish, wilco, ryan adams) probably fall into this strata. and i guess paste is, in my opinion, the best source for this info. i'd go 14 million other places to get solid, well-written reviews by people (who write their own blogs or who publish in small real-indie mags), but to rely on one magazine to give an overview of a scene (even if it's a suburban-ish scene), i think paste is probably my best bet.
and again, i have to admit that i found the whole "donate to save us!" thing a little pathetic, but then the reality of the fact that i could literally donate a dollar if i wanted and get 70 free music tracks hit me. it seems sort of refreshing that they are facing up to the fact that maybe the best way to get extra cash is by giving people a good deal on good music, and so i'm going to be equally capitalist and take them up on it.
also, i like arguing about this stuff with you because we can argue without killing each other.
I really love it when someone takes my personal-opinions-presented-as-truth and pulls the curtain back. It's a great reminder to stop believing yourself and get back to actually trying to understand something without killing it first. :)
Anyway, I've been kind of checking out Paste now, because you made me realize that I needed to go back and re-evalutate, and I think I'm starting to understand why I'm not a fan.
1. "Signs of Life" - whether it's music or movies or whatever, I've always had a queasy this-is-too-namby-pamby-to-do-anybody-any-good feeling about it. I'm not even sure what "signs of life" means. Are you looking for a pulse? Because every artist has one. How valuable is that? It's too vacuous a concept to lead.
2. Recently, in my occasional reading of paste articles, I felt like they were no different in substance than Pitchfork or who-have-you. And how many listicles can one magazine propagate?? It just seemed to lack soul, but it sure had "indie" dress.
3. When they started, they were a small enough outfit that the personality of the people involved came through, which gave me enough interest to keep trying, even if I didn't jive with their zeitgeist. As they got larger, that disappeared. And it just somehow seemed that they were chasing the money while trying to appear that they weren't chasing the money. Either do a better cover-up, or stop thinking you have to hide it. I know you're a business, I'm okay with that, are you?
In all, maybe it just boils down to the fact that I don't feel they have a standard of any kind. It's kind of like they're saying, "Oh, hey, man, I've got this, uh, can here, and you know, well, actually the label has come off, and I'm not entirely sure what's inside, but would you be interested in that? Actually, I've got an entire warehouse of cans just like this, and, you know, maybe...I mean...would that interest you?"
I guess is all goes back to their zeitgeist: Signs of Life.
The CCO people would talk about "finding God in..." and it always drove me nuts. What does that mean? Would you talk about "finding Mike Prewett in..."?? Does that even make sense? If you find God in the trash, are you suddenly going to declare it Glorious Trash? Should we put a crown on it, give it a cracker, put it on a pedestal?
I feel the same way about Signs of Life. What exactly is Life? Does Jake Trombetta count? Is he a sign of life in the Akron music scene? What about Joey from GMV? Or the Black Keys? Or Phish? Or Red Wanting Blue? Or Picadilly Circus? Or Mike Prewett? Or Alan Madej? Do any of these qualify? Why or why not?
Anyway, I guess I've always felt like saying, "Come back when you have something concrete for me."
Newsflash - Apparently, Susan's closed!?!? Mike "Always the Last to Know" Prewett
It makes me sad that Paste is doing this. It makes me sad because their death is inevitable. In the immortal words of my father, "The economics just aren't there." They can do what they want, but they can't win this war. I'm glad artists are pitching and in and throwing out cool songs and all, but there's something admirable about facing your death with dignity and humility. It's sad when people try to cheat death.
ReplyDeleteI was around when two guys started Paste. Back then it was an interesting magazine. They weren't another indie magazine. They were more of a fanzine. They had a record company, online music store, etc. I didn't always like what they liked, but they kept my interest.
I think the two original guys sold the company. Now they're hardly distinct from other indie 'zines. They're kinda the Caribou Coffee to Pitchfork's Starbucks. They ain't no Brady's Cafe, that's for sure.
So, I probably shouldn't rain on your blog, Ben, and you can bitch me out if you need to, but I only feel bad about Paste not really living up to the potential it had. Because having a truly disparate alternative to Pitchfork, et al, would be a welcome breath of fresh air.
Good luck Paste, you make me dream of what could have been...
Oh, and by the way, when did Indiedom start feeling so much like Suburbia?
okay, i'm admittedly playing devil's advocate here, but a few points to consider:
ReplyDelete1. first off, i'm not sure it's in the nature of a large business that functions nationally both print and online to suddenly just decide en masse one day, because the numbers aren't there like they used to be, that they're going to close up shop and disappear off the face of the earth, if there is potentially a new, better way to make money and stay afloat...which leads me to my second point...
2. i'll acknowledge that paste is sending mixed messages with the combination of "SAVE PASTE!" and "no, seriously, we'll be fine, we're just having a rough month" in the same message; however, it's not as if they're plugging away stupidly trying to fill holes in a massive, idiotic dyke the way that, say, the RIAA is wrt CDs. they have a pretty hip, up-to-date online presence and as per their letter, they're obviously trying to address new type(s) of business model(s) to suit not only a changing economic climate but also a new sort of readership/economic model. i don't see this to be a darwinian-style extinction as much as a magazine having a tough time because of a generally bad economy and trying to make the best of it using new tactics. whether that works or not is of course dependent on the equanimity of its readership, apparently.
3. it's funny that you mention pitchfork, because i actually got into paste in an effort to avoid reading pitchfork. i find stereogum and paste specifically to be the opposite of pitchfork in a lot of ways. the writing is better (re: not intentionally pretentious or judgmental), and more importantly, paste doesn't write about trends, or hipness, but instead about the quality of actual music. of course, they write A LOT about music that's popular with zephyr-kid-type crowds, but that's a lot different than writing about culture and your own narrow views on whose sticker you should put on your guitar case before slipping into your skinny jeans and putting on your manscara under the guise of writing about music. i mean, this is obviously just a case of agreeing to disagree on taste here, but while paste may cater to the masses in terms of subject, i don't think they cater to the masses in terms of content on that subject. they still write, and write well, about the music and not all the bullshit surrounding it.
4. what's so bad about being popular, anyway? i mean, granted, i'm sure there's something to be said for 2-guys-at-a-typewriter-in-a-barn paste and its interest in indie music, but at the same time, there are all kinds of blogs, and zines, and publications written about local music scenes and/or written by one or two really insightful people not under the sway of a huge corporation or the interests of having to support an infrastructure like new-paste has to. and i'm happy about that; i love the independent voice just as much as anyone. but i wonder often about this whole "it's big so it must be bad" attitude in the sense that, sure, something is lost when a publication has to start considering writing for a larger audience and keeping that readership coming back. but at the same time, if a "big" publication is doing a good job, why complain? i mean, i'm sure paste has changed a lot over the years, but as far as "mainstream" music mags go, it's one of the more open-minded...sure, you can go to indie publications for all your news, but you're not going to get the breadth, or the scope, of something like paste from any of those. you're not going to get easy facebook, twitter, RSS, etc updates and the ability to digg, embed, reddit, etc. news stories that always break on the day of the story with indie sites (at least, not very often). you're not going to get the quality of the physical magazine product (nice paper, well-constructed binding, free sampler CD monthly) or the fact that you can get it anywhere in the country that you get with paste with indie mags, because they just don't have the type of infrastructure to support those kinds of things.
i, as much as anyone, understand the desire to get all your news (esp. art news) from genuine dudes who publish each issue out of their own back pocket and who have something to prove, but there are upsides to "mainstream" too...ask springsteen. i suspect if i had been aware of paste "back in the day", seeing them in this gargantuan, staggering, bleeding behemoth state might be a little more sad for me, but as it is, i see them as one of the truly decent choices in the mainstream music writing market. if someone has to carry the mainstream flag, i would rather it be them than pitchfork or rolling stone...and if mainstream collapses entirely under the weight of an old business model, well then so be it; but that's hardly paste's fault in its entirety and i'd like to hope that they could at least have a chance to adapt into something 21st-century useful.
haha... touche. I feel like a brought a knife to a gun fight. :)
ReplyDeleteMy opinion about the quality of Paste is a bit like the opinion of old Phish fans about new Phish. So, you're right, I don't do my homework.
What I'm saying about economics is that I don't think Paste has ever had a viable business. And I don't really have any research to back that opinion up, but I feel that way and always have. There's something about Paste that just doesn't make sense to me as a business. And in the current form, they just don't compete well enough with Pitchfork, et al.
That's not to say that I'm a fan of Pitchfork, Rolling Stone, etc. Hardly. And I guess if I felt that there was an apples to oranges difference between Paste and Pitchfork, etc., I'd be all over them like white on rice. My feeling is that the difference between them is like the difference between Fuji and Granny Smith or Cortland and Winesap. It's all apples.
And I'm glad that Paste is the best of the apples. But what I'm really wanting for is an orange.
I don't care about big or small companies. I understand, even if I don't always like it, that growth involves encompassing more viewpoints. But that's not the problem for me. For me the problem is that I don't think their alternative is much of an alternative, and sadly, given that, they don't have much of a chance against Pitchfork, Inc.
Plus, I feel like they changed their dress style so they could be a part of the cool kids, which, having tried that myself back in middle school, I feel is a waste.
It humors me that of all the things to have sharp opinions about, this is the one we've most vocally disagreed about.
Cheers!
once again, i think some of our difference of opinion can probably be attributed to personal taste. and i'm not going to argue that paste hasn't started trying to dress up like the cool kid at school, because i think in a way they have. i guess i'm just struggling with the question of how much of that is just posturing, and how much of it is an actual business necessity dictated by a growing user base and the growing "print is dead" mentality (the trueness of that belief is something else we could probably argue about for a year). if i can believe that they're dressing up fancy in order to stay in business, then somehow that's more palatable to me. i think the indie-becomes-suburbia problem is probably a lot bigger than paste. i don't know how to kill it. i wish i did.
ReplyDeletei guess the main thing i was trying to comment on in my insanely verbose post last night was that by virtue of a lot of things (a lot by, i personally believe, internet and mp3s, specifically) there is a sort of middle class breaking up the feudal system of music nowadays. there isn't just radio music and "underground" music anymore...there's an entire new strata made up of music you'd never hear on the radio (except maybe college radio) and yet millions of people read websites like pitchfork to hear specifically about this kind of music and they go out in buy it in numbers approaching that of top 40 music sales. yet there's a supposed ethos behind this music that it's supposed to be unique and hard-to-find, because in the same way that "organic" food has recently just become the USDA's way of marketing food rather than a way of actually identifying naturally-made foods, "indie" seems like it's a way to make people feel better about listening to pop music simply by virtue of the fact that it's not on the radio, which makes it "easier" to find.
the fact that a magazine that once wrote articles like the dylan one i just sent you has now turned to reporting on this kind of music is sad to me, but at the same time i want to get my news regarding this type of music from SOMEWHERE. i personally want to at least have a vague idea of what goes on in the middle class of music, and, as much as i hate to admit it, most of my favorite bands (phish, wilco, ryan adams) probably fall into this strata. and i guess paste is, in my opinion, the best source for this info. i'd go 14 million other places to get solid, well-written reviews by people (who write their own blogs or who publish in small real-indie mags), but to rely on one magazine to give an overview of a scene (even if it's a suburban-ish scene), i think paste is probably my best bet.
and again, i have to admit that i found the whole "donate to save us!" thing a little pathetic, but then the reality of the fact that i could literally donate a dollar if i wanted and get 70 free music tracks hit me. it seems sort of refreshing that they are facing up to the fact that maybe the best way to get extra cash is by giving people a good deal on good music, and so i'm going to be equally capitalist and take them up on it.
also, i like arguing about this stuff with you because we can argue without killing each other.
flame on! :)
Well, agreed on the personal taste thing.
ReplyDeleteI really love it when someone takes my personal-opinions-presented-as-truth and pulls the curtain back. It's a great reminder to stop believing yourself and get back to actually trying to understand something without killing it first. :)
Anyway, I've been kind of checking out Paste now, because you made me realize that I needed to go back and re-evalutate, and I think I'm starting to understand why I'm not a fan.
1. "Signs of Life" - whether it's music or movies or whatever, I've always had a queasy this-is-too-namby-pamby-to-do-anybody-any-good feeling about it. I'm not even sure what "signs of life" means. Are you looking for a pulse? Because every artist has one. How valuable is that? It's too vacuous a concept to lead.
2. Recently, in my occasional reading of paste articles, I felt like they were no different in substance than Pitchfork or who-have-you. And how many listicles can one magazine propagate?? It just seemed to lack soul, but it sure had "indie" dress.
3. When they started, they were a small enough outfit that the personality of the people involved came through, which gave me enough interest to keep trying, even if I didn't jive with their zeitgeist. As they got larger, that disappeared. And it just somehow seemed that they were chasing the money while trying to appear that they weren't chasing the money. Either do a better cover-up, or stop thinking you have to hide it. I know you're a business, I'm okay with that, are you?
In all, maybe it just boils down to the fact that I don't feel they have a standard of any kind. It's kind of like they're saying, "Oh, hey, man, I've got this, uh, can here, and you know, well, actually the label has come off, and I'm not entirely sure what's inside, but would you be interested in that? Actually, I've got an entire warehouse of cans just like this, and, you know, maybe...I mean...would that interest you?"
I guess is all goes back to their zeitgeist: Signs of Life.
The CCO people would talk about "finding God in..." and it always drove me nuts. What does that mean? Would you talk about "finding Mike Prewett in..."?? Does that even make sense? If you find God in the trash, are you suddenly going to declare it Glorious Trash? Should we put a crown on it, give it a cracker, put it on a pedestal?
I feel the same way about Signs of Life. What exactly is Life? Does Jake Trombetta count? Is he a sign of life in the Akron music scene? What about Joey from GMV? Or the Black Keys? Or Phish? Or Red Wanting Blue? Or Picadilly Circus? Or Mike Prewett? Or Alan Madej? Do any of these qualify? Why or why not?
Anyway, I guess I've always felt like saying, "Come back when you have something concrete for me."
Newsflash - Apparently, Susan's closed!?!? Mike "Always the Last to Know" Prewett