Picture from Mental Floss
I am old enough to remember when MTV was a television channel that showed music videos, the 'M' in MTV would you believe is for 'music', so the full name was 'Music Television'. People my age and older will know this and maybe share my memory, but today's MTV audience who think the channel might always have been about reality shows and vacuous nonsense that even ITV2 and BBC3 between them would refuse to consider would be unaware of this. Not only do I remember this, I remember lots of things that today's youngsters will possibly only know through Buzzfeed lists; queuing up to use a phonebox, dial-up Internet cutting off as soon as the phone rang, MySpace being the best social networking site, BBC1 closing down at night after the weather and a blast of the National Anthem, penny sweets, long summers, snow at Christmas, taking glass bottles back to the shop for a refund, orange juice being a starter in restaurant, making the effort to walk to a shop to rent a film on VHS, schools having one computer to share, and hotels having a television room. I could do a Peter Kay routine apart from it wouldn't be funny, actually it would be just like a Peter Kay routine in that case.
Aside from all these nostalgic memories, I can vaguely recollect a time when the NME was a relevant periodical that dealt with the kind of music that wasn't covered by the likes of Smash Hits or seen on mainstream television. The New Musical Express has existed as a music magazine since 1952 and was the only magazine to give extensive coverage popular music. I personally always wanted to work there during the punk era where I would have been able to hang around with the likes of Danny Baker, Charles Shaar Murray, Johnny Cigarettes, Tony Parsons and others. My interest was further prodded as I made the transition from comics to grown up reading and realised that the NME shared a building with Whizzer and Chips, Buster, and various comics that were a lot cooler than The Beano and The Dandy. Kings Reach Tower is such an iconic address that I made a pilgrimage there in 2012 and made no difference whatsoever.
It always looked from the outside looking in that the NME was more fun to work at than to read, as most of the writers apparently spent most of their time trying to impress each other by slipping in clever references. It has lost readers consistently for a long time and has now decided to become a free sheet, putting a once great publication in the same boat as Metro. Personally I prefer to read physical newspapers and magazines, especially as websites (and the NME is guilty of this as is my local paper) are impossible to read because of all the pop-up adverts that get in the way. Last time I was in London I was surprised to see that Time Out and the Evening Standard were free nowadays. The difference being that a newspaper and a guide to what's happening in London are well placed by tube stations, but the NME needs to be able to reach further afield. NME served a purpose in aiding the cool kids in rural areas by telling them about The Smiths or Wedding Present because they couldn't get this information elsewhere, (it was one of the few places that had information about Kurt Cobain's death in the pre-Internet days, even if you had to wait for it). If the village newsagent didn't stock it then at least it could be ordered, something that won't happen now because they will be piled up in cities and somewhere with a minimal demand won't be served at all.
Making the paper free is a last ditch attempt to salvage something that perhaps doesn't really need salvaging anyway, especially if they are going to expand their interests into film, computer games, television and fashion making it look like every other magazine available. NME Radio kicked the bucket not long after an all singing all dancing launch, the TV channel is no more, and the website as I have already said is a pile of shit. It is my opinion that keeping NME going as a free sheet is as cruel as keeping someone on a life support machine even if they have no quality of life. The days of working for a cool music magazine and being offered gifts of varying degrees of legality just to put a band's picture on the cover are over, as are the days when anyone gave a flying fuck about what the NME had to say about music. The magazine goes free in September, I will give it until Christmas.
The Sunday Alternative #46 is available from here.
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July Housekeeping
Bags and T-Shirts are still available from here. All money goes in the fund. Feel free to browse the shop page while you're there.
If you donate £5 or more, you get to choose a song for me to cover on kazoo for a YouTube video, details here.
Seriously, I am grateful for the donations so if you haven't got round to it yet, I thank you in advance.
steveEoliver@gmail.com
