January 25, 2024 | ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT | By Issa Nasatir
Dusk is quickly falling on music journalism’s horizon as outlets are picked off one by one a music review site has just become the latest victim. Last week, its parent company Condé Nast folded the controversial journalism titan into their new men’s magazine, GQ.
This merger included an undisclosed number of layoffs of Pitchfork employees, just two months after Condé Nast laid off 5% of their workforce in November. Most notably, Puja Patel, Pitchfork’s editor-in-chief since 2018 and the successor of founder Ryan Schreiber, was among those abandoned. Media reporter, Maxwell Tani, originally broke the news over X (formally Twitter) with a screenshot of the email sent to employees.
Tani added that in recent years, Patel had “attempted to make Pitchfork more relevant to a larger audience,” diversifying its writers and coverage in a previously indie rock and white male-dominated publication. With Pitchfork’s transition to a men’s magazine, it seems like the progress Patel made will regress.
Pitchfork led its industry in popularity and notoriety, known for dishing out some unwarranted, savagely negative reviews. But as much as it’s known for these ruthless reviews it’s also known for its glowing reviews. Often Pitchfork makes an artist’s first review a nerve-wracking, career-defining moment.
While probably the biggest headline, this is not the first time we’ve seen the public gutting of a music publication recently. Bandcamp, an online music platform renowned for supporting independent artists and record labels, was bought by Songtradr from Epic Games in early October last year, less than two years after Epic Games originally bought it.
Just days after the purchase, Songtradr laid off half of Bandcamp’s staff. Bandcamp is special in the sense that in a world of streaming corporations, which consistently exploit their artists, Bandcamp has always put artists first. On Bandcamp, musicians earn 82% of each purchase made on their page, and fans can choose to make a custom donation attached to their purchase. One of the site’s best features is its editorial aspect. On Bandcamp’s front page, you can find hand-picked music from virtually every genre that was dug out of the thousands of songs uploaded to the site every day. These writers and music enthusiast’s gold panned relentlessly, carefully sifting through the torrent of music they were given – blessing us with their newfound riches delivered right into the palms of our hands.
However, Songtradr is a music-licensing company which sees the fun and creative aspects of Bandcamp as tiny hurdles in the way of maximum profits. With most of the site’s staff now gone, who knows how much amazing music will go undiscovered and how many future stars will be passed over.
As someone who is considering music journalism as a possible profession, seeing these recent changes has been extremely disheartening. The future of music critique looks bleak, and its sustainability is hanging by a string. In recent years, music journalism has been the last line of defense against a fast-growing algorithmic takeover. Public radios and their DJs and tastemakers have nearly gone extinct as younger generations look toward the convenience of podcasts and playlists. Now, music journalism is joining similar extinction as the profession rakes in less and less money and the loving founders of these publications are forced to sell. All we can do is watch as corporations that plan to exclusively use these sites for ad revenue swoop in, lobotomizing the sites until they’re just lifeless billboards.
While radio has always been the easiest way for people who love music to share their taste with others, writing about it has always given music enthusiasts a deeper and richer way to describe music’s beauty and importance. I’ve encountered so many songs that have left me breathless, leaving me to seek out the nearest pen or keyboard to capture what I could not say.
The best part about this has always been the ability to share these beautiful moments and feelings in thoughtful ways. The pulsing hope that my words and feelings will inspire others to seek out these songs or albums and that they might have as big an impact on those people as they did on me has led me to continue to pursue this medium. To watch that magic slowly move away from an art form that connects and transcends every boundary humanity has created is discouraging, but there remains light.
Art always finds a way to survive, and as its razing continues, so I don’t doubt that music journalism will continue. Even if this era of mainstream music journalism has come to an end and may never return to its former prominence, smaller movements always find a way. As Pitchfork and Bandcamp sprouted from their humble roots, so will future outlets of artistic expression. Even if relentless corporate concrete is laid on its shoulders every day, journalism will slither through cracks and create its own openings, forever breathing and forever blossoming.