NME - A brave new future?

NME magazine, which started as New Musical Express in 1952, has been battling falling print sales for years. Once-upon-a-time it had sales well into six figures on a week-by-week basis; now it manages about 15,000 but it remains a weekly publication. Its on-line alter ego was one of the earliest music magazine websites of note and today nme.com announced the biggest shake-up in the history of the whole brand...

You might have expected that the announcement would be that the paper, physical version at least, would be no more but then you might have said that about vinyl records fifteen years ago. What it revealed is that, from September, it is following the model that turned-around the daily London Evening Standard newspaper some years back. It too had seen off much of the competition but still couldn't make the paid-for model work in terms of sales versus market penetration required to support the required advertising revenue.
NME currently retails at £2.40 ($3.80 , €3.40), although subscription prices are considerably lower than this as is standard fare in the existing model.
NME will become free, distributed at railway stations, colleges and wherever ever else the demand is, or is discovered to be, nationally. The print run is expected to be in the region of 300,000 copies.
It has many great writers and, consistently, is not afraid to air opinions that might ruffle feathers - be those of readers, artists or other industry concerns. It is a brave move and I wish it well. It deserves no less.

Latitude - but not as you think I might know it...

This was quite some surprise. That he was quite the ultimate professional, something I had assumed, was still not enough to prepare me for this!

I'm not funny about artists, new or old, but this was something else. The BBC reviewer, to be found there and quoted on Amazon.co.uk, doesn't like "Praise and Blame" (the album) one little bit.
I'm going to differ vehemently and I'm far from the only one I think...  Here is a link to a review of the Latitude performances:  http://www.amazon.co.uk/review/R16N85EJNS9YVV/ref=cm_cr_rdp_perm

The photo is mine, from his Obelisk Stage set on Sunday lunch time in the sunshine, and he is singing John Lee Hooker's 'Burning Hell' as it happens! The denim clad guitarist on the left is in fact Ethan Johns, who produced the album (and also Laura Marling's latest). I was lucky enough to experience both sets in their entirety - the 'Stage In The Woods' on Thursday evening was less favoured in terms of location, weather and acoustics - and about that I agree with the reviewer in almost all respects.

The remarkable caveat is this: It was performed live by all, and only, those artists who appeared on the studio recording (but they are not all in this shot).  It was one of the best live performances of the weekend and that is saying something...

What is more, pigs have learned to fly!   NME carried a review of Praise and Blame that was all the former, an impassioned defence of the concept and execution, married to an 8/10 rating.  I rather think that this would not have happened under the old editorial diktat and all credit to Krissi Murison and her team for putting the relevance back in the magazine in less than a year.