The people behind DiS launch theQuietus.com
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Hello. The people behind DrownedinSound.com are very pleased, proud and excited to announce the full launch of theQuietus.com, a new music site with a cast of contributors that reads like the greatest hits of modern music journalism.
Is it for you? "If you don’t actually believe that Jack Peñate is the best thing since Nirvana but you’re still not ready to slump into yet another feature on _Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, then we could be the thing you’re waiting for,"_ says Quietus editor John Doran.
Earlier this year we started trying to get beyond our frustrations with the mainstream music press and that yearning for the kind of personality-driven writing that once violently engaged the reader. E-mails were fired off, a blog was formed and theQuietus.com spent the first half of the year pulling together an impressive cast of journalists.
Contributors include: legendary ex-NME scribe Steven Wells; esteemed travel and music writer Andrew Mueller; author and musician Chris Roberts; Gold Blade frontman and writer John Robb; Independent On Sunday _music critic and author Simon Price; ex-enfant terrible Taylor Parkes; the Editor of _Terrorizer Joe Stannard; the Editor of_ Plan B_ Louis Pattison; the Reviews Editor of The Wire, Derek Walmsley; Mr Popjustice Peter Robinson; and arguably the best music writer of the last 20 years, Simon Reynolds. As well as the sites editor John Doran, who has contributed to The Wire_, Stool Pigeon, Plan B, Metal Hammer _and DrownedinSound.com, and many more national magazine titles and newspapers.
With the emphasis first and foremost on quality writing, recent features have included The Rebirth of Disco (Simon Price); Glastonbury: Aryan Folk Festival (Swells); The Cult of Chris Needham (Taylor Parkes), Ringo P. Stacey’s interview with Public Enemy and Tommy Udo’s startling North Of Purgatory: A Coma Diary.
A concise reviewing policy sees only the very best of the latest releases covered with astute assessments on albums from artists as diverse as Donna Summer and Wild Beasts to My Bloody Valentine and U2 currently on site.
The site will also be offering fantastic, exclusive audio/visual content such as the podcast preview of Supersonic festival, a gallery of Steve Gullick’s photography and a film about British Sea Power playing live in the Natural History Museum.
You can also expect a wealth of guest writers including Jarvis Cocker on the seminal Sheffield post-punk unit Artery and Aidan Moffat’s sex advice column.
Does this all sound familiar? You may remember the site received considerable media attention worldwide after hosting a preview of the forthcoming Metallica album only to asked to remove it by the band's management. After the site refused Metallica themselves responded, apologising for their management's actions and published a link to the ‘offending’ article themselves. The outcome to all this? theQuietus.com has secured an exclusive interview with Metallica about their new album and their relationship with the internet.
Anyway, that's enough of our press release-like babble. Take a moment and check the site out and we hope you like it.
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DiS meets Frightened Rabbit
Tweet This
Share on Facebookthe new site looks nice
I like the layout and all that.
Oops
Your link is broken at the bottom, goes to http://www.theQuietus.com"/
More relaunches than that Longview album!
I like the site though.
It works fine.
There was some naughty stray code.
I didn't know that John Robb fronted Goldblade
I'll never be able to listen to Strictly Hardcore in the same way again.
it went online
as a blog, like a magazine/tv show has a pilot. now it has launched. no relaunches 'ere.
I stand corrected?
Is the reprise of Mr Agreeable going to be a regular feature?
I feel 15 again, best music press feature ever!
Just saying
I like the site anyhoo, good stuff :)
yep
i believe so
So I was sceptical of this
but I quite like the new look stuff. The features could be the shining light for this site, whereas I feel that DiS has a much more deeply integrated community.
Will we hear of the Lipster and Thrash Hits launches too? Or are they all read launchinged?
scepticism is healthy but glad you like it
theLipster's relaunching in a week or two. http://www.thelipster.com
ThrashHits' full site is still being designed but running as a blog for now http://www.thrashhits.com
:D
Excellent
I've not read all the text above
so maybe a stupid question, but why couldn't the features/reviews from quietus be stuck on this here site instead of making a new one?
So is DiS being replaced?
I don't really understand this. DiS is great, has decent interviews, news stories, but no (or not many) real feature articles. Is that the only big difference?
because
it's a different site, with a different focus, aimed at a slightly different, slightly older audience. dis is what it is and has its own set of rules and expectations from the half a million people who log-on each month. there's no way a piece on u2 would go down as well or fit as naturally, on here, for example. there's only so much you can fit onto DiS before the site becomes unwieldy and lacking in focus.
It's DiS for the 25-40 crowd
Basically, if DiS is the grime night at Ritzy'z in the town centre, The Quietus is the singles dance at the hotel on the edge of town.
fear not
DiS is remaining, however we're refining the formula a little and working on a nice new design, most of which will improve the hugely popular community. Expect new features and a site which will allow us to recommend, push and enthuse a little more about the things we love.
or
DiS is excitably running around Reading, ATP and Brixton Academy, whereas theQuietus is more likely caught supping an ale at Glastonbury, Meltdown and Wembley Stadium. There is crossover, obviously but most of the records they hold dear were released before me and mike were even born.
Yes, that's a lot better...
Like the new layout of it.
Hurhur
http://wordpress.thequietus.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/robb11.jpg
But yeah looks good,
Looks like there might be a few unyieldy links in there.
But good work...
Run by talentless 'critics' who assume they've got
some sort of authority because they SHOCK large groups of people with their scathing critiques on universally-acclaimed bands and their superliberal attitudes to modern music.
I can't wait to read their TakeNoPrisoners review of Oasis' upcoming album. I bet they go where other critics wouldn't even DARE to dream of going, and say something controversial about the fanbase of Oasis being racist football hooligans.
Good luck trying to rip-off Pitchfork, you slags.
...
This seems to me more Mojo than Pitchfork. Though I see why this might be confusing to you since both concerns agree that Oasis are shit and their fans are twats.
Sounds intriguing.
Is this Last.fm compatbility you were talking about?
taylor parkes
god among men.
That explanation
has really put me off...
It reads like taste in music declines with age.
But maybe its my own issue being the grand old age of 27! That statement encapsulates my fears of ageing: will i one day wake to find that ive turned into a cunt with a mondeo and all my records have turned into noise.
site looks good though. Ha!
not about changing taste
More about having an appreciation and love of music which spans a longer period of time, with different reference points than DiS' current core readership. As much as we can relive punk and the 80s through books and documentaries, this is a site for people who lived through it.
Hope that makes more sense.
You can't...
...get ale at Wembley, Sean. Of course as the Quietus turns up in a Ford Mondeo, we obviously wouldn't be drinking.
but...
you have an incredibly narrow, highly capitalist-conditioned and immature interest in music. Anyone trying to defend Oasis as a musical act unarguably requires a serious IQ boost.
I appreciate music on its merits, as opposed to its 'diversity'
or 'individualism'.
But again, the cycle comes back around with your "all Oasis fans are idiots" open-mindedness.
so
it's a nostalgia site? i'm confused.
Does your brain not work?
I'm pretty sure their cover stars tend to prettymuch always be classic bands like The Who, The Beatles, Led Zep, The Band, Dylan, Sex Pistols etc.
See, I dont like the design
Times New Roman makes it look a bit amateurish. Too white as well.
what's the logic then
if i loved def' maybe and even now i listen to it fondly, and am yet to see an oasis show where the crowd get particularly excited about anything post-what's the story... does this mean i'm one of those lager-loving idiots or just someone who hasn't quite grown out of idiocy?
Wow, a million times better looking than the blog it was
but if it's all the same I'm gonna hang with ye youngsters...here. Good luck Quietus folk.
What's wrong with being "unwieldy and lacking in focus"?
"unwieldy and lacking in focus" is an ageist remark.
You're not a hooligan.
I can't imagine you at a football match.
It looks nice and all that...
...but I can't stop myself thinking that there's no reason that the content couldn't very happily be integrated into DiS. Except, perhaps, separate site = separate revenue stream/more advertising positions to carry AdWords and more targeted campaigns.
Not that there's anything wrong with that; but the whole 'it's a different site for a different audience which, er, crosses over with the DiS audience' doesn't quite make sense to me
It looks lovely
like an old favourite website, rather than something shiny and new. I'm not sure what it is about it though - considering the content, it's the kind of thing I'd rather read as a magazine. I tend to use the internet for quicker reads. Good stuff though! (and better than the Lipster - what's happening there now Jude Rogers has left?)
How can you imagine me at all?
We've never met.
Hey guys
Really like the content. But the site design doesn't fit on my monitor. Like, horizontally.
I have to use the horizontal scrollbar all the time. That's a bit of a web no-no, especially given that my monitor res is an-old-fashioned-but-by-no-means-unheard-of 1024x768 (48% of 'net users according to here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Display_resolution#Current_standards)
yeah you can....
...or at least you should try.
why sholdn't people here read about 'mainstream' acts. good music is good music regardless of how much it sells, maybe some people on this site are a little "emperor's new clothes" about their music taste but i think you underestimate the open minds of some of us here - i for one love those first 3 U2 Albums -they're amazing - and don't sound anything like what U2 do now.....and if people don't know about them, then maybe they should, they don't have to like them but it'll be interesting either way...
...why not just expand this site and some peoples musical taste.
truly interesting music magazines discuss all music from Wolves In The Throne Room to Madonna To Tv On The Radio from time to time, shouldn't DiS be like this? i for one would love it.
i really don't understand the need for new sites, it reminds me of what people in telly do - make loads of new channels for smaller markets.
telly is not as good as it used to be.
I like it...
it does have a somewhat Observer Music Monthly feel to it mind. Not a bad thing though, looking forward to some good reading.
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