As a musician, folks have made me feel like I need to get friends to pre-order our releases. My issue with this is that I like critics. If I pre-order something, I’m saying “f*ck you, I know it’s going to be awesome, take the day off,” to my favorite critics. I don’t like doing that. I like critics to have a job.
Growing up, some critics would come on the radio or even TV, give a brief synopsis of whatever they were critiquing, and then they’d tell you things about it they felt were important. Why deny them that? I think it’s valuable work.
How do you know you will like it if you haven’t heard it?
I can’t afford to buy everything that comes out. Critics not only help me with a solid purchase, they help me save money. I realize not everyone pays for their music but I do. Plenty folks I know do too.
Pre-ordering art is dumb, I’m just going to say it. The way spending money works you will con yourself into liking it just because you invested in it. Never mind it was completed prior to your investing. It’s like gambling. What’s really awful about it to me is it doesn’t even benefit the artist most of the time. It generates for the pre-order vendor. It’s like they’re piggybacking on the artists’ future releases. Why? It doesn’t make sense.
Just because it’s there…
When an artist comes out with a song I like, it’s often I’ve found out about it from critics. If I was torn between a pre-order and sending off to critics, I’d take critics, every time. Every one of them has an audience. The pre-order just goes out to my peeps. Like they need it.
Not every option is a good one. Pre-orders are not good for the customers or the artists. They’re great for distributors and streamers. F*ck them, I say.
back to home.
(enjoy this video of my favorite critics..)
Brief Story:
I often say “Critics give you names.” The reason I say that is my experience. One time, a critic didn’t even like me and he called me a “hoity toity Phillip Seymour Hoffman lookin’ songwriting mother f*cker.” That one name is more to me than all the preorders in the world combined. And he wasn’t even being nice. Take care.
