After turning 25 this week, we're entering a new era of DiS but first, a bit about Björk...
There's a moment during 'Pagan Poetry' that always hits me. It's as the visionary artist, producer and DiS icon Björk Guðmundsdóttir chants "she loves him, she loves him" that she does something a lot of producers would edit out.
What I'm talking about is when she gasps. Subtly but audibly.
The inclusion of these inhalations and exhalations are the sort of small detail that you feel rather than hear. And years after becoming obsessed with Vespertine (I mean, I love it so much that we made the album released in 2001 our number one album of the first 6 years of DiS, in this Top 66 feature), I started to realise that it was likely a production choice that creates a humanity and an intimacy. It's the sort of decision that took our ears not just into the vocal booth but into the world that Björk has built for us. It started to make me realise how unnatural a lot of records sound where the act of breathing is removed...
For me, this is one of those moments that reveals what happens when an artist is truly at the controls, rather than corporate power (sometimes in the form of a male producer, telling an artist what the record company wants...).
It's this moment of realisation as a fan and a "music critic" when I find myself writing entire paragraphs that can be boiled down to something like 'when an artist has a vision, the humanity is vivid'.
For Björk, from what we know from interviews, that mission with her fourth album was to make an album that's "about the universe inside every person. This time around, I wanted to make sure that the scenery of the songs is not like a mountain or a city or outside, it’s inside, so it’s very internal."
You Got The Music In You
I mention all of this because I got goosebumps revisiting Vespertine this week and thinking about the first time I noticed those little gasps. It also led me to remembering the reason we're called Drowned in "Sound" rather than music or songs or records.
My obsession with the sonic textures of music is usually why some records become moreish, and it is often down to the sounds that we at first perceive rather than hear. I mean things like when the fuzzy bass rumbles in at the start of Turn on the Bright Lights, the wind chimes on The Cure's 'Plainsong', the dirty-misty-ancient layers of film-grain on Grouper's entire catalogue or the warmth of Phoenix's synths of 'Love Like a Sunset'. I could probably have filled this email just listing these little moments...
What I'm trying to say is that listening and feeling and getting swept up in a record like Vespertine is a real pleasure but that a lot of what you hear changes over time. This being lost in the music or found in a world of sound, is not an experience that has dulled over 25 years of running DiS nor the 16 years before that of having an obsessional connection to records and how they sound (even at 4 years old I loved side two of Bowie's Low, as it would calm me down and send me off to sleep...).
And What Else?
Being called Drowned in Sound was for similar reasons to what Chino Moreno from Deftones recently said to Zane Lowe in an interview for Apple Music Radio.
"I feel like we're much more into making sound than we are writing songs. The sounds are what really inspire us... For instance, when we made White Pony, the only idea that we had in going into making that record is we were really, really into DJ Shadow at the time, and a lot of stuff like that. We just wanted drums. We were so into just drums and just low end sub bass, certain little things that we wanted out. Our record didn't turn out sounding like that but this is what inspired us, right? The sound, not so much the song or a lyric or anything like that. All that stuff kind of comes secondary."
What I love about this comment is that it pulled into focus what I love about White Pony, but had never considered before. Much like the gasps on 'Pagan Poetry', realising the processes and choices made as artists, was the sort of epiphany that deepens my relationship with a record that I thought I couldn't love any more and drove me to go back to it for the bajillionth time.
In a time where music journalism is under threat, where context around music can be rare, there is so much we will miss out on if cultural criticism continues to be deprioritised and defunded. As music fans, that lack of insight from artists and fans-as-critics can lessen our understanding of what we feel and perceive. At a time where becoming a super-fan is crucial for the business of music, it baffles me that the role of journalists and the importance of media in enriching music is not a priority for the industry and rarely mentioned in discussions around the challenges to build audiences, especially for grassroots music.
I'm not suggesting that lightning shock thoughts that ricochet through my synapses when reviewing a record are more important than saving venues or investing in artists, but it's not unrelated and could do with similar support and funding.
Being a critic isn't just being a snobby smartarse about music. It's often about unlocking the 'why' alongside the 'woah' about how the music connects with you. It's a process of shepherding thoughts and emotions, to try to ensure some special records become part of the world of the reader. It's also about a passion for music that can be really infectious... and that's how I've discovered so much music from other publications, TikTokkers, and radio shows.
Which is to say, when I'm recommending music it is not just throwing a record your way but to try to impart some wisdom from the universe inside of me to the universe inside of you. This type of listening, thinking, and communicating takes time and so does setting a new course for Drowned in Sound and our new mission-focussed about us that I started writing this newsletter because I wanted to share with you today with some context (relatedly, it took Björk three years to write Vespertine, which is about how long this decision of how to evolve DiS has taken... or perhaps moreso, how long it has taken to express how to define it).
Reviews Aren't Dead, But...
Writing and expressing yourself about music is changing. Reviewing a record after a few listens is something most writers, readers, and certainly the artists don't benefit from. In your timeline right now you will see lots of rushed reviews of and 'hot takes' on billionaire Taylor Swift's latest product launch. This race to publish is nothing new, but in our increasingly fast-paced era, where attention-hacking seems more important than imparting wisdom or forging genuine connections, the speed with which you can type search-engine optimised "copy" or make a quick video of algorithmically pleasing "hot takes" is far more valued by "mainstream media" institutions than the depth of connection you build with the reader.
Pleasing 'algo daddy' (thanks to Jameela Jamil for that) is not our priority and it never will be because we write for you, our fellow music fan. Which is to say that listening to records and trying to get beyond what we hear and into the realm of enriching what we perceive will be as crucial to future of Drowned in Sound, as it was to our past.
It's in this spirit that we enter into our interviews, listening intently to our guests and doing the research to ensure we can create the space for deconstructing, enriching, and working together to build a bridge from their world to yours.
We Hear You
This approach to hearing what is said and feeling what's in the air has helped set the course of where Drowned in Sound is headed. We listened to nearly 400 of you who took a survey earlier this year. We also loved your feedback a few weeks ago to our new mission statement which has now had a big rewrite to ensure DiS becomes what I feel is missing and needed in the world right now.
You told us that record reviews are the top priority and that remains at our core. We're evolving this a little to be critical recommendations rather than traditional reviews. We won't waste your time on mediocre records or nor publish rushed takes (admittedly, my recent Hayley Williams review was quickly turned around but had days of listening and I stand by it). Instead, we'll continue to embrace a slower journalism and celebrate what deserves your attention, cutting through noise to create a clear signal of the music that's worth your time.
We'll also be part of something collective and transformational, that embraces music's power to change the world. We'll be a publication and podcast that goes beyond the intent of a lyric and into the places where the art and the artist is trying to impact. Whether that's an artist's mission to deepen our connection to each other or to nature or to our collective desires to make the world a better place.
Why the shift? I felt like I hadn't been listening to myself and I hadn't been showing up as a full person with Drowned in Sound, and it was one of the reasons I decided to hit pause on publishing back in 2019 as it didn't feel like the purpose and role of DiS made sense, especially when it had become so financially challenging, despite around 3 million people reading.
The realisation that I was compartmentalising parts of myself was a good revelation for me because I'm the organiser who wants to create community resources and the campaigner that urgently wants to address the crises of our time from the climate crisis to misogyny in music coverage. (Our podcast next week will go deep on streaming ethics and your options, for instance)
The majority of the artists I adore are fighting the good fight but they're finding fewer places to go deeper to discuss what they truly care about in a time of quick clicks in toxic timelines.
As artists, as journalists, as fans, and as humans, we don't just want to be listened to, we want to feel heard on a multitude of levels. Music criticism is a deep act listening and feeling, rather than just figuring out the marks out of ten.
I mean, if it wasn't for my skills as a critic, I would never have figured out, beyond a gut feeling, that some of the artists I've championed (from Foals and M83 to Adele and Lizzo) were worth really pushing to the fore. Critical skills also help you as a communicator to translate your passion to the world in a way that resonates.
Surfacing Music's Power For Change
I'll end this second part of my trilogy of newsletters about the future of DiS with this: much like Vespertine, this new about us page, was also about three years in the making. I hope it explains where DiS is headed over the coming months, years, and potentially another quarter century. It's part mission statement about our intent, part map with a few sign posts.
This is our commitment to the music community to be a key part of the ecosystem, to build resources for fans & artists, and to be part of the infrastructure that empowers all of us in a time of billionaires, private equity, and political turmoil around the world. We can't wait to take this forward and we hope you'll join us and support us in our mission.
Sean Adams