you may have noticed that the stream of reviews for album in the last few months has totally dried up on ireallylovemusic, for which i can only apologise.
however, there’s a simple reason you are not getting my thoughts and opinions on the latest and greatest.
bar a couple of crackers i’m holding back on (the black dog, yppah, and, when in the mood, the new album by majiker on gaymonkey records), there are no new albums that are currently hitting the spot, and nor is the blogs postal department being inundated with stereo system pleasing parcels.
you see, there was a time when the letterbox rattled every day bringing pleasure and pain in equal measures, but, such times are clearly over.
firstly, i suspect that quite rightly, labels are now being a lot tighter in these cash starved times and realising that sending out hundreds of copies of the latest and greatest is no longer a fruitful exercise, and, secondly, the blog has i suspect fallen off every promo list out there (bar a handful).
while this may sound to be a negative posting, nothing could be further from the truth.
this newfound freedom has given me the time and space to reconnect with music i love, as opposed to following the inbox, real and virtual, in the vain hope that this would lead to a reduction in blog-stress once the album had been "processed".
so, while the blog-n-pop world is buzzing with critically loved new releases by the horrors, little boots, la roux etc, albums that would probably do me good things, i am not in a position to spread the love.
this may be due to the fact that there seems to have been a drive to review albums via mp3 distribution.
from time to time, i do indeed succumb to such whizzy bang modern methods of distribution, but, truth be told, i am still not a big fan, underlined by a recent situation i found myself in.
a few months ago, one kind pr agent who was looking for some blog love from ireallylovemusic provided me access to the whole world of new techno releases that are discussed and reviewed over on resident advisor.
i thought i had found the end of the rainbow and grabbed the pot of gold with a passion.
the music available was often great (ben klock’s album being of particular excellence), but something didn’t feel right.
very quickly i came to realise the process was indeed like eating sweets : "hmm yum that’s nice, now for the next one".
in other words, i would listen to an album once (if that) and then move onto the next one.
there was no emotional involvement from my side, meaning i felt no need to review and tell all about the album.
where’s the fun and pleasure in that ?
whereas with a cd, there is a relationship formed via the artwork, the packaging, the associated emails etc.
old school values this may be, but i am finding such feelings are hard to shake.
perversely though, for singles/remixes etc, the mp3 promo is a perfect quick taster, and has become an excellent teaser, but i’m still out for the count when it comes to the full length album format.
sorry, but i thought i should just throw a little light onto the reasons why this dusty corner isn’t following the same path as so many others in 2009.
mark e
ireallylovemusic