A Melbourne music site about music
A while ago, I was contacted by a triumvirate of writing talent, possessed of a wealth of musical acumen. The trio, Andy Crook, Ben Gook and Pat McGrath (names that should be familiar to readers of Farrago in both its Original and Bizarro flavours, as well as to Syn listeners, and I could go on but this aside is long enough), proposed to me an mp3 blog. In response, I pitched to them a URL, melbs.org, and wondered if they could narrow their critical purview, at least most of the time, to the most vibrant and diverse local music scene (per capita!) in the Western world.
The outcome of these discussions was just as the title says: a Melbourne music site about music.
It's breathtakingly simple, but if I might be so bold, I think it's just a little bit revolutionary.
melbs.org is a collaborative blog that reviews individual tracks by Melbourne bands. Read the review, download the mp3, and beg to differ.
There is a launch party coming up soon, but the blokes were handing out flyers at the Laura album launch on Sunday at the Corner, so it sounds like the cat's out of the bag. It's all beta til the launch, naturally, which means you (my darling emdashbedotto-ers) are the guinea pigs. Or pioneers. Wait, you guys are the pioneers.
Also, right now, there's a competition for some schwag (Christ, did I just use that word?): CDs, T-shirts and door passes to Laura gigs. Go on, like I said, you are the first to know about it, so your chances of winning some good shit are startlingly high.
Joseph | | Comments(11)
Copyright © 2006 Joseph Pearson, some rights reserved.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
Comments
natalie buxton
absolutely fantastic! What a wonderful idea, and so very well executed.
Joseph
Thanks Nat—congratulations, btw.
Agent FareEvader
Love it. And that Pat McGrath, what a champion. Good at School, better on the radio.
Robert
It is a beautiful design. Best MP3 blog I’ve seen.
Ned
Rad. Here’s to this thing kicking off. It’s promising to see that the first handful of bands represented don’t betray a too particular generic leaning… although they’d better get some Oompah in there soon, just in case. Or maybe some Hawaiian guitar, Joe?
Now lets go to the Retreat.
Joseph
Thanks guys. Feel free to comment on the actual site too—click on the “Got an opinion?” link to the left of each post.
mark
John Scalzi did something similar with IndieCrit; he didn’t make the mp3s available for download, but he did link to the website of every “artist” he reviewed, 99% of which contained the mp3s he referred to in the review.
Not that, y’know, you aren’t doing it better. ‘Cos you could be. Certainly the design is way cooler…
Jamie
Phew, I thought I was gonna be left alone in my room listening to stolen mixed tapes from 10 years ago, now I just have to find out what an mp3 is…
Nice one Jo, love this set up! Liked the piece on Ash too, I could certainly hear the belly laugh..x
Dan
Am late to comment but congrats, looks great and is very handy.
One question, do you ask any sort of permission from the bands before you post a song? Not that i neccesarily think you should, i’m just curious. I’ve been tempted to post mp3’s of local bands to my site too, but don’t want to piss anyone off.
Joseph
No question that’s the tricky bit. I think the team has written a good, fair policy on the about page tho, right at the end.
It’s a symbiotic relationship, good for both the bands and the site. Whether everyone will see eye-to-eye on that is unclear, but it seems pretty straightforward to us.
Dan
Ah yes, i just read the legal bit on the site. It sounds fair enough to me.