I’m not suggesting bloggers deserve special treatment, but if you’re trying to embrace a new publicity model it might pay to consider perhaps altering one’s methods to suit.

I think the main point here is don’t send stuff to people who quite obviously aren’t going to like it.. I didn’t know the PR company had! So maybe it is ultimately my responsibility!! Still we live in a harsh world – I love that Hunter S Thomson Quote..

“The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There’s also a negative side.”

So – you are right – if you cant hack the criticism – don’t get involved…

I actually wrote the message that prompted this article to say that some of the supposition in the following comments after Toads initial (anonymous)article were inaccurate.. that was all. I actually agreed with his statements…!

One sacked PR company later…..

The Hoosiers, on the other hand, had it coming…

WTF does that mean anyway?

(personally, if I ever use that phrase, it means “this band is shite” just tellin ya…not that we are in the spot of working any bands we dislike…)

You know, I’ve gotten really mean feedback from musicians for my negative comments, and it seems publicists always take criticism much more nicely than the musicians themselves. And I feel like it’s those insanely nice publicists who contribute to all the sucking up on blogs these days – I feel awful writing a negative review if an incredibly kind publicist has sent me an album and talked about how hard the artist worked on it, and how much I’ll “absolutely love” it. It’s hard to criticize people you don’t want to personally attack, isn’t it? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve looked up reviews on albums I’ve received and hated, only to find that bloggers (who personally communicate with publicists) tend to look for the good and write neutral or positive commentary, while writers at official publications (who don’t personally interact because their editors do) are more likely to be blunt and critical. I say every blogger hires an intern-as-middle man to solve the problem.

And I know TotP has finished, not that I ever watched it anyway. It was used more as a figure of speech. How does ‘When you get into Q Magazine’ work?

Yet, even with the understanding that if one “puts it out there” to be judged by one’s fellows, it seems that with anonymous posts, comment sections and the like, it would discourage anyone with an ounce of sensitivity (let alone self-respect) to play the game these days. This is why, for the most part, I tend to gravitate to blogs who don’t seem to egg on the “mean vibe.”

While your site is amusing in its bluntness, I never sense a “mean vibe” in your commentary. I feel you are a Toad with very particular tastes, which would be clear to any publicist who took the time to actually fucking read the sites they pitch their shit to.

…and I, as a publicist-type, am offended by the signal-to-noise ratio that has overtaken blogs of late, making them less useful (and interesting to me) as they are bombed with promo of all sorts, rendering the blogger unable to enjoy what I send out.

I can’t say I blame anyone these days for preferring silence.