Between the Headphones of the Publisher

I’m not sure if you caught it last month, but there was a quote in our article about The Smashing Pumpkins that has rattled around in my head more than I originally thought it would.

Head Pumpkin Billy Corgan told our writer Levi Macy, “My problem with the blogging culture is that it doesn’t really sell a lot of things. I think for every one thing the blog may sell, it hinders the sale of two others.”

I spend a lot of time on music blogs, and the more I thought about that statement the deeper it began to resonate. The remark that I had originally kind of glossed over as being Corgan’s retort to the lumps he’s taken lately for his new vision of the Pumpkins, started to sound more and more like a wise realization. And the more I kept that thought in mind while browsing (the web and my daily surroundings), the more it became blatantly obvious that some folks could care less about reviewing a band, or a show, or an album or anything, because they’re much more concerned about the zingers they can dish in their piece.

Now, I write reviews, too, and I’ve written some fairly tough, if not scathing reviews in my day, and I still stand by them all. But if you’ve noticed — and I hope you have — the majority of what The Marquee publishes, in print or online, is more focused on what you should like, versus what you should hate. A big part of that comes from the fact that I realize, despite having owned a music magazine for almost 10 years, I’m not Lester Bangs. I’m not David Fricke. So who the hell am I to blast someone’s work? But another part of that comes from the simple fact that we at The Marquee aren’t trying to be cynical snobs about what we do. The whole reason I started The Marquee was because I had more than enough time at my desk at my former corporate job to look up all the shows happening in the area and tell my friends what some of the best ones were. That’s still what we do here. We just do it with a louder voice. But the mission is still to get people excited about going out to see music.

The “blog culture” that Corgan was talking about isn’t just online. It’s around us in a lot of ways, and my goal is to make sure that we at The Marquee don’t follow in the same footsteps of crapping on something just because we can.

We’re not the biggest music magazine on the planet, yet, but the fact that we’ve endured this long proves that there are people out there who share our vision, share Corgan’s vision, and share mom’s old adage, that if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.

There will be times here at The Marquee when we don’t make the nicest of comments, but I can assure you this, even our nastiest comments will always be honest, and in a culture rampant with nastinesss, real and raw is better than cheap and fake.

See you at the shows.