Archive for September 2nd, 2007

if you’re gonna sell out, why not to Rick Rubin?

Feature article in today’s NYT magazine on legendary music producer, Rick Rubin. It gives an insightful view of his brilliant history at the cutting-edge of the music industry. Yet, the author betrays her lack of musical knowledge in the very first line, when she says “Rick Rubin is listening. A song by a new band called the Gossip is playing.” “new”? - WTF? The Gossip released their first EP in 1999, on a real record label, K records. The author of this article clearly is biased towards capitalist major labels. It’s a sign of uncritical journalism that the author does not note the irony of the Gossip having SOLD OUT to Rubin’s label, Columbia Records, after leaving the label that helped build their reputation, Kill Rock Stars. Rick Rubin is still a genius, but he’s lost his edge (possibly from all of the new-agey spiritualist BS he’s into), and it saddens me that The Gossip might now lose their edge too.