Welcome to Music Is The Answer
10 years since it all started
Welcome to Music Is The Answer by me, Marcus Barnes.
I plan to use this newsletter as an archive for things I’ve written that are no longer available online, along with stories from my 10-year career in music writing, up-to-date news, reviews, opinions and so forth. Occasionally I’ll conduct follow-up interviews with subjects from the past to reflect on our original chat and see what thoughts and feelings come up.
From 2011 to 2015 I had a blog with The Independent, through which I published tons of interviews with a long list of electronic music artists. A year after the Indie blog met its demise I launched my own platform Don’t Lose The Magic. Sadly, they’re both no longer available, except via Wayback Machine. It’s a shame to let all that hard work disappear forever, so every fortnight I’ll be adding to this archive, with an accompaniment of bits and pieces I’ve gathered up or written during that time.
I hope you enjoy what’s on offer here and please spread the word if you feel inclined to do so.
Has it really been 10 years?!
Back in 2010 I was working at The Sun newspaper as a ‘Showbiz Reporter’. So much has changed since then but one thing that has remained constant is my love of music, which has been with me since I was a kid. No clichés about playing the violin from the age of three here though, my appreciation of music has never really been participatory besides stomping, whooping and clapping on the dance floor.
Though my motivation at The Sun job was mostly driven by cashflow, it ended up sparking the first feint flickers of the blazing fire that became my music journalism career. I didn’t like it there. My background and outlook were not conducive to being a ‘Sun Man’ but my boss Carl Stroud (who once worked at Mixmag himself) was great. He spotted my passion for music and gave me the freedom to focus on it above the usual daily showbiz drudgery.
I’d already been writing professionally for seven years but consciously avoided music journalism, worried that I’d become one of those jaded old music hacks. Of course, Carl’s nudge towards music reporting had the opposite effect and I threw myself into the newly-opened avenue. I was out nearly every night, Notting Hill Arts Club, The Forum, Shepherd’s Bush Empire, The Bedford, The Queen of Hoxton and so many more gig venues. I covered pop and indie, electronic music, grime, rap and dubstep.
I was an avid follower of SBTV. Through the channel I discovered Ed Sheeran, who was already picking up a lot of steam among SBTV’s young audience and industry heads, too. His A64 blew me away, so I got in touch and went to a few of his gigs, met his mum (who looked after his merchandise stall at shows), wrote about him as often as I could and hung out with him a bunch of times. In the end I gave him his first piece of national print press when I got him on the Bizarre page in The Sun newspaper.
In the (very unflattering) photo below, he’d just been throwing up in the toilets, as he always did before a show. Nervous energy overwhelmed him before every performance. This was at RWD Magazine’s 100th issue party in Brick Lane. When the party finished I was milling around outside with a few friends when I bumped into an old workmate of mine who’d also been at the event. We worked together at GAP Kids on Regent Street around 1998/1999, and he was from the same area as me, too. His name is Dumi Oburota and he was with an artist he was managing called Tinie Tempah… ‘Pass Out’ had just sent him into the stratosphere. I was amazed to see that Dumi was enjoying such a high level of success, which continues to this day. Here’s a video of that party.
I was sent to cover the MOBOs in Liverpool, Magnetic Man at Earl’s Court, Jessie J and Emeli Sande when they were just getting started, Wretch 32, V Festival, The Prodigy’s Warrior’s Dance mega one-dayer at the Milton Keynes Bowl… I even went to see Dolly Parton at the O2, one of the best concerts I’ve been to. She didn’t drop a note all night, played several different instruments and dropped some bars from a film she’d done with Queen Latifah.
I interviewed Skream and ended up covering his progress with Benga and Artwork as Magnetic Man, breaking the exclusive story that Prince Harry was a dubstep fan, among several other hilarious stories via Artwork. I interviewed Roll Deep, Skepta, Tinchy Stryder, Tim Westwood, Gareth Gates (!) and even Mr. T. It was a gruelling time - boozy late nights and painful early mornings all through the week - minimal sleep, but I was still in my twenties (just) and full of enthusiasm.
During this period I signed up to Blogspot, craving a space of my own to write about music whenever I wanted to. That space was called Music Is The Answer and it lasted around 18 months. I had zero audience but enjoyed the process of sharing music and my experiences anytime I wanted.
A couple of months after I launched the blog I went to Ibiza for the first time, spending a week getting stuck in to the closing parties (oi oi!). I was already starting to dream about full-time music journalism but that trip well and truly sealed the deal. I came back broken but totally head over heels in love with house and techno, more than I ‘d ever been. Seth Troxler back-to-back with Guy Gerber at Space was insane. When Seth played ‘Plastic Dreams’ by Jaydee, I stopped dead in my tracks totally stunned - I’d never heard it played in a club before and hearing it on that system was mindblowing. That moment sent me head first into writing about music as soon as I got home. This is what I wrote on Music Is The Answer a couple of weeks later, once I’d gaffer-taped my brain back together.
By early 2011 I’d interviewed Seth for the first time, been to Miami WMC, got made redundant by The Sun (news of which reached me when I was at Miami airport on my way home), went straight to Snowbombing in a Sun-branded car even though I didn’t work for them anymore, worked at the dreaded MailOnline for a while and eventually left to go freelance full-time landing a blog with The Independent…
It feels great to be resurrecting Music Is The Answer as a newsletter, that little blog was such a key part of my early forays into music writing. I get such a strange feeling looking at the blog now, reading my posts and thinking about all the life experiences I’ve been through since then.
There’s so much more to tell, but this feels like a good place to end for the time being...
Indie Blog Archive 001: Mike Huckaby
In memory of Mike Huckaby, who passed away earlier this month, I thought the first archived interview should be the one I did with him back in 2011.
I remember this well because I got the time difference wrong between London and Berlin, calling Mike an hour later than scheduled. He was a bit frosty with me at first, understandably, but we got there in the end.
Read my interview with Mike.
Techno Reviews: May 2020
Since Mixmag have suspended their print edition until August I don’t have anywhere to publish the reviews I write for them. In an effort to provide continued support to artists, labels and PRs who send me music I’m posting them on this newsletter until the magazine returns. You can also listen to the monthly mix I create using the same bunch of tunes I’ve reviewed.
Read my reviews and listen to the mix.
Mixes from Soundcloud’s algorithm
I left Soundcloud on all morning one day last week, letting the related mixes play out one after another. I never usually do this, I’m not a fan of passive, algorithm-driven listening but just this once I let Soundcloud’s AI serve me up some tuneage. Here are a few of the mixes I enjoyed from that selection…
Some reading
A few bits that I’ve enjoyed over the past few weeks.
I tried to delete myself from the internet. Here's what I learned
The Russian Family That Cut Itself Off From Civilization for More Than 40 Years
And this book is a tough read but worth the effort
Tune of the day
If you follow me on Instagram you may have noticed my Tune Of The Day posts. To accompany the series I’ve made a YouTube playlist of the 100+ tunes I’ve posted so far.
Until next time…
I’ll leave you with this.
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