Everything else is public relations
George was right.
Much as it might annoy me, or any journalist, to admit it, he was right. It’s all just public relations, unless you’re publishing something that someone does not want printed. The idea that a journalist might be just another cog in the PR machine is anathema to them. And yet.
The world of music journalism is particularly relevant to that point. What is it to publish something someone does not want printed in the arts? A negative review? A singeing op-ed? Some might say yes, but I’m not so sure. Of course no artist wants a negative review of their work printed, but does that make it ‘journalism’? Or just your opinion?
I came across the original review for DJ Shadow’s Endtroducing that The Wire published in 1996 yesterday. It called the album a “debut of melancholic mediocrity.” It was, apparently, the only bad review it received. Next year the album will turn 20, and if anything it’s proven to be far from what the author of that review claimed it to be. It’s all, of course, subjective in the arts.
A few times I’ve been commissioned to do interviews and found myself faced with someone I disliked. But I’ve never gone through and published a negative profile or interview. Does that mean it’s not real journalism? I don’t think that in the arts it’s that simple. Like it or not, music journalists are an extension of the PR process, simple as that. I did once, a few years after I started, publish negative reviews that led to the subject threatening to withdraw advertising from the mag. This in turn led the editor to pull my reviews, though he only told me after the fact. And that’s the reality of journalism in the arts, it’s always been about the subtle balance between arts and capital, between creativity and money. Again it wasn’t that I was publishing journalism, I was just saying something subjective that the subject happened to disagree with. And he had the strings to the purse.
I stopped reviewing music a few years back. I’d already by this point decided that I couldn’t be bothered reviewing things I didn’t like. I was never able to find the energy to be a dick. I respect people who do it well though, I think there’s a certain art to it. Much like I’ve come to realise that there’s a certain art to taking a historical view and placing things in context, making sense of the giant, ongoing puzzle that is human creativity. And really, the latter is what I enjoy more. I’m happy to leave the op-eds and reviews to those who enjoy writing them. But let’s not delude ourselves in thinking that they’re what George called journalism. They’re subjective.
Today, journalism in the arts is largely supported not by independent publications but by corporations. That makes this whole idea even more tricky to unbundle. Is it automatically not journalism because the money behind it is directly tied to capital? I don’t think it’s that simple, but I don’t think there’s an answer yet either. Like it or not, arts journalism today can, and will, survive because of capital, because of how the media industry is evolving. I don’t think independent platforms are dead yet, but they’re certainly hibernating, in some way. The easiest independent platform to access is the internet, but publishing on the internet only means you’re adding to the noise, and cutting through it will require effort, and most likely capital. Catch 22. Might as well take that check from that company and have the work be seen without you needing to do the work. Not many people today can really afford to hold up lofty ideals of independence. Sooner or later they’ll come to clash with the realities of capital.
George was right. Just admit it, even if only to yourself. It’s largely public relations. Admit it and let it go. Do it because you want to, not because you feel you should.
“Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed: everything else is public relations.”
