“THE DEVIL WEARS SUNGLASSES WHEN SHE LAYS YOU OFF!”

Predictions of journalism’s death – and worse for Your Humble Narrator, *music* journalism – have been rife since the mid ‘00s. All those predictions came true the last few weeks. What now?

Workers for The Austin American-Statesman striking last summer, for many of the reasons you are about to read herein. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

It was a relatively good day today, as it was yesterday. I didn’t wake to the news of another magazine, newspaper or website boarding up its doors, attaching a chain and padlock, and walking away. Especially one with a musical/cultural bias.

There have been strikes, certainly. That’s a sign there’s some fight left in the ol’ beast. But honestly, if we don’t watch it, my chosen profession – music journalism – is about to be as common as brand new 8-track tapes or 78 RPM records. (Although, as noted in a sidebar to my big 2013 Austin Chronicle cover story on the cassette revival, there’s still a market for 8-tracks. A mom-and-pop operation in Arlington, KTS Productions, produces new 8-tracks, and even did one for Cheap Trick!)

You just have to thumb through the news to get the picture. At the end of last year, Yahoo laid off significant chunks of its staff, including music editor Lyndsey Parker, at the tech giant since the mid-’90s. 

Then Wednesday, January 17th, Condé Nast’s Chief Content Officer Anna Wintour, the legendary Global Editorial Director of Vogue, issued a company-wide memo: The top-heavy media conglomerate was merging indie-centric ‘00s-era music news-and-reviews website Pitchfork, a 2015 purchase, into men’s fashion magazine GQ. Large chunks of its staff were laid off in the process, including Editor-In-Chief Puja Patel. 

This news was met with a remarkable degree of schadenfreude from many colleagues and musicians. Understandable. As Lina Lecaro put it in a remarkable post-mortem of all these media bloodlettings, “Pitchfork has been known for some brutal band reviews, pretentiously hip prose and overall snobbery, often by white male scribes, since it launched back in 1996.” But she equally noted that Patel and Features Editor Jill Mapes had gone a long way towards reforming the site's snarky indie-bro culture. It became a little less white, a little less male, taking in hip-hop, neoclassical, pop, metal, jazz and dance with the same gusto they used to greet anything containing the words “Sufjan” and “Stevens.”  

But did Anna Wintour have to keep on her trademark dark glasses – which she admitted were “armor” to 60 Minutes in 2009 – as she informed Pitchfork employees they were about to lose their jobs? (And yes, this led to the title of this piece, derived from a protest sign spotted in pics of the picket lines in front of Conde Nast’s HQ at NYC’s 1 World Trade Center!)

Then just a few days ago, in the midst of news of 350 journalists protesting upcoming layoffs at the Los Angeles Times, came this social media post by the Times’ Pop Music Editor, Craig Marks:

If you, dear member of the Napalm Nation, are questioning why I — or, perhaps more importantly, you — should care about all this? Well, I know some of the people affected, including Parker (whom I worked under at Launch/Yahoo Music for a time) and Marks. These are more than bylines to me. They are people and friends, even if they are not close ones. They are also colleagues. Let me remind you that I don’t scribble all this stuff daily for fun, as some sorta hobby. This is my career, and the industry in which I toil.

Writing about punk/rock ‘n’ roll/gutbucket electric blues/ancient country music, plus books and movies on occasion, is how I have basically paid my rent since I was 19. I repeat: This is my career. Don’t believe me? Check my author’s pages at Alternative Press (where I toiled since 1989) and The Austin Chronicle (1991 was my starting date there). True, for a lot of that time, I had to retain various part-time jobs, mostly in the retail or phone professional (i.e. – call center) sector. But since 2013, it has been my primary means of support. 

Yes, being freelance — especially in as niche a field as music journalism, and being primarily sub-niched in punk rock journalism — has required having multiple outlets/income streams, and a side-hustle or two to cobble together some semblance of a living. Yes, times have been more lean than flush across that period. But you keep at it, because it’s what you do. You have a passion for this. It’s been an honor and privilege to live a creative life, one that I have never taken for granted. 

So guess what? I got downsized at two of my major outlets, one just a few weeks ago. One I wrote straight news about Texas politics for, the other employed me as their unofficially-official “punk scribe” for much of my career. I was cut by both for all the reasons you hopefully see in the links I provided above: Budget cuts, layoffs, page counts slashed. My work apparently contributed to the red ink on these entities’ ledgers.

Yeah, my career just got destroyed, too.

I entered 2024 optimistic, if a little skittish about recent trends in our industry. I was about to finish one book and start another (and still am), and saw significant amounts of Substack subscribers either upgrade to or flat out purchase paid subscriptions. Which is the lifeblood this thing subsists on. Yes, I lost a number of free subscribers as I pushed the special discount rate that ends today. But I figured they either don’t like the idea of having to pay for what they read, or simply don’t like The ‘Stack. So they are free to go, in that case. I might be more upset if they were paying readers who canceled, or if they hadn’t been replaced by full patrons in every case. I had just lost the straight news job, and thought maybe I was on the path to finally making a go of Substack.

Then the other aforementioned shoe dropped.

Some of you are probably asking what are the reasons everything’s falling apart, besides this economy that no leader wants to come out and admit is in a full-blown recession. There are all kindsa theories going around, from this to that. Honestly, to understand why music journalism is about to become extinct, you have to examine the rot eating journalism journalism from the inside-out. 

First of all, there’s the internet. It’s a wonderful tool. It places a wealth of knowledge and information in the palm of your hand. But large numbers of people do not want to pay for anything, thanks to other parts of the ‘net. Or they can’t afford it. And no media ever properly figured out how to monetize the internet. And if people see a paywall, they just won’t look at it. That’s fine. It’s their choice. But if not you, then who?

I think we also need to acknowledge another damaging force: Fox News. No, I will not back down from that one! Fox News made large numbers of people believe that news reporting is supposed to reflect what their opinions of current events are. And that’s not what the job is. It is to present the bald, pure facts, unadulterated by editorializing. As my journalism advisor in college indoctrinated into my class of future journalists, the job of the press is not to be a lap dog. It is to be a watchdog. If you need to bite the hand that feeds you in the name of truth, do so. You’re not supposed to be Sean Hannity spreading his lipstick all over Greg Abbott’s backside on national TV, as he puffs up his chest about how he’s gonna defy President Biden in order to defend our border. Rather, you should be Hunter S. Thompson challenging Gov. Asshole to an arm wrestling match.

I can hear some out there complaining that everything I write is opinionated as hell, therefore deeming me a hypocrite. Yes, I am opinionated. I am a critic. I am paid for my opinion and analysis of records. But when I am writing straight news, that is what you will get: The news, unvarnished by my goddamned opinion. But if you wanna buy me a cup of coffee, I will gladly tell you why Greg Abbott is possibly the worst goddamned governor in the entirety of Texas history.

So no, the news is not a marketplace, where you buy the info that fits your tastes or viewpoint. It is the truth. And no, I don’t mean the “truth” in quotation marks, which Alex fucking Jones will sell you along with a side of some of his water filters. The truth is the truth. It’s immutable. That’s why it hurts.

And I’m afraid the truth is that music journalism might go before journalism journalism. It’s on life support right now. People don’t need music news/criticism like they need news news, and they don’t seem to want real news. They’d rather we all just shut up and sing.

No, I’m not about to start pitching MOJO or anyone right now. But I am interviewing for a part-time job later today, back in the call centers. And as Lina mentions in her wonderful essay, there’s Substack and writing books, both of which I am doing. But as my dear friend and avid reader of this ‘Stack Cary Baker put it recently, Substack is like taking your guitar out on the street corner, opening your guitar case, and playing for tips. Sure, some people may throw in a quarter here, a dollar there. But most people find you an annoyance, and will walk past, as briskly as possible, pretending to be oblivious.

Or as Fat Mike put it last year, when talking about fundraising for The Punk Rock Museum, most people don’t like it when you ask for money.

So, what keeps me doing it? That one person like new paying subscriber Scott Stevens, who wrote this very kind note accompanying his $40:

"You are an excellent writer. You recreate a moment wonderfully...you make the reader feel as if they are there in the midst of things. I have come to realize that you are a quiet soul in person. Thanks for doing what you do. You have turned me on to bands that I was unaware of. I like your work. I like your work. Period."

Thank you, Scott. Mission accomplished. Thank you to my core group of subscribers who read these entries several times over. Thanks to all of you who now read these posts, sometimes over 1000 unique views, whether you are a free subscriber or a fully-paid patron. Thank you for the kind words of encouragement, like Scott’s beautifully-worded, heartfelt message. You all are why I will keep doing this, as long as you let me. 

Now let me let you in on something, Dear Reader. Today is the last day of the Holiday Subscription Special: 20% off both monthly and annual subs. And that will be your rate for life, every time you renew. It will never increase – it remains your rate for life. At the moment, I have 98 paying subscribers. It would be wonderful to close this month out with 100 paying subscribers. That would be 100 patrons of The Tim “Napalm” Stegall Substack. 100 readers with full access to The Tim “Napalm” Stegall Substack Interviews, to the serialized chapters of my first novel Every Father Kills His Son, and to the forthcoming revival of my “Radio Napalm” podcast. If you have it to spare, please at least sign up for the monthly four dollar subscription, though the annual forty dollar renewal is the better bargain. I would love to be able to share the happy news that the Napalm Nation is two more stronger than yesterday, an even 100 fully-paid members. If you can do it, please surprise me with such joyful news when I wake up later today. Thank you.  

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