Q Magazine goes tits up
- Thread starter IdleRich
- Start date
Leo
Well-known member
couldn't disagree more. perusing a well-stocked magazine stand is a wonderful experience, then spending the following week digging into what you've bought.
william kent
Well-known member
The Guardian are trying to spin them as subversive for covering classic rock:
"Q went where other titles were too cool to tread, championing old icons of pop and rock."
"Q went where other titles were too cool to tread, championing old icons of pop and rock."
Leo
Well-known member
well that's the thing...young people don't buy print newspapers and magazines, so the actual readership will eventually die off. it's not like vinyl, which a fair number of younger people embrace for whatever reasons. go out and spend $5 on a magazine that you read once and throw away? and are unable to share articles on social media from? what's the point?
part of my affinity for print magazines is because I'm an old bastard who grew up with them, but I also love cool graphic design and photography. looking at an article on yr phone or 11-inch computer screen does not compare with a great magazine spread.
part of my affinity for print magazines is because I'm an old bastard who grew up with them, but I also love cool graphic design and photography. looking at an article on yr phone or 11-inch computer screen does not compare with a great magazine spread.
IdleRich
IdleRich
That is... a bit of a stretch to say the least.
Leo
Well-known member
When it comes good magazine shops with broad selections, London seemed to have more compared to NYC, where they have been gradually disappearing over the past 10-15 years. I wonder if Americans who still read print copies just tend to subscribe and get them delivered by mail, whereas perhaps English people prefer not to subscribe and enjoy picking up copies each week or month.
IdleRich
IdleRich
I dunno, personally with things such as, say, Private Eye, I always thought it was a good thing to read if I had like a long bus journey or train journey etc I kinda liked to buy it just before one of those, probably would be one roughly every two weeks and I enjoyed the serendipity of reading it that way. Always buy it at the airport whenever I go back to the UK>
what would you want from a print music magazine in 2020?
graphic design, fair enough.
reviews: why bother? twenty years ago you needed reviews to find out what was worth spending money on. Now you can listen to everything via youtube and spotify and bandcamp. If a review isn't entertaining and stimulating and provocative in itself then it's basically just a buyer's guide which is pointless when the sums of money involved are so minimal for spending on new music.
interviews: new acts don't ned to go via journalism to connect with fans. Whether curated or natural, they can do it via social media. The older heritage acts end up in the Simon Hattenstone long interviews in G2 either way.
news: hahahaha.
graphic design, fair enough.
reviews: why bother? twenty years ago you needed reviews to find out what was worth spending money on. Now you can listen to everything via youtube and spotify and bandcamp. If a review isn't entertaining and stimulating and provocative in itself then it's basically just a buyer's guide which is pointless when the sums of money involved are so minimal for spending on new music.
interviews: new acts don't ned to go via journalism to connect with fans. Whether curated or natural, they can do it via social media. The older heritage acts end up in the Simon Hattenstone long interviews in G2 either way.
news: hahahaha.
in the 90s and early 00s a general multi-taste magazine made sense because everything was consumed together. Top Of The Pops and The Chart Show and The Box were how I got to see music videos and mimed performances, and if I wanted to see the video for "Let Me Be Your Fantasy" I also had to sit through a Take That performance and Oasis. Everything came in bundles and you couldn't easily access one without the other. So you were exposed to everything and it was easy to become a dilletante.
in 2020 I don't have to take the good with the bad. I've never knowingly heard a full Adele or Ed Sheeran song, I don't need to. I can flick to another music channel, edit the playlist and game the algorithm on Spotify, hit skip on Youtube when it starts the next song. Nobody needs Q magazine to help them filter through music content, they can easily manage themselves. Specialist magazines will survive a lot longer because now experts are much more useful.
in 2020 I don't have to take the good with the bad. I've never knowingly heard a full Adele or Ed Sheeran song, I don't need to. I can flick to another music channel, edit the playlist and game the algorithm on Spotify, hit skip on Youtube when it starts the next song. Nobody needs Q magazine to help them filter through music content, they can easily manage themselves. Specialist magazines will survive a lot longer because now experts are much more useful.