Longtime power pop listserv Audities is coming to a close. List moderator Michael Coxe announced that he’s closing shop in a couple of weeks. The sudden announcement sent shockwaves through the Power Pop Community, which vows to hold the community together under a new name and leadership group.
As Coxe posted:
Seriously, this list has outlived its usefulness. We’re all so very tired – it so shows in the posts. It has for a long time. All the bickering, core subscribers leaving week by week, disappearing into lurkerdom. I doubt anyone’s heart is really in it anymore. Let’s face it: the keg’s empty, the record player’s broke and the party ended at 3AM, but we haven’t found the sense to pack it in & go home to sleep it off.
So it finally hit me that the solution was to just end it.
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I have decided to end the operation of the Audities-List.
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*********************************************************There… good… I said it. Feels really good (no regrets).
Bravo to Mr. Coxe and good luck to the list’s still-enthusiastic members, of which I no longer count myself after having disappeared into lurkerdom. I think Coxe said he’d been running the list for 11+ years. That’s a hell of a lot of time to maintain a labor of often unrequited lust. That’s a hell of a lot of time to log on 20 times a day, hoping to see some magic, discovery, and fun take root. Personally, as I’ve expressed, I have some reservations with the limitations of the power pop genre. It’s the musical equivalent of a good, greasy diner. I can’t eat there everyday, but it sure can do in a pinch. As a participant, I’d run out of things to say, or things I could say that might bounce back my way in the form of dialog. I met some good people a’plenty, though, when I needed them.
Dating back to Rock Town Hall’s formation as a small Yahoo Groups list, as list which still exists for reasons beyond my complete comprehension and desire to simply flick the switch, we’ve been doing our thing for more than 5 years. The core tastes, obsessions, and quirks of our founding members have given the Hall a fairly consistent tone, but I hope that we keep ourselves open to new voices, new sounds, new points of view, new topics. As always I ask that you feel free to do your part to make your voice heard, and I ask all of us to keep our ears open to the music and musical ponderings that fellow Townspeople set on The Main Stage for your consideration. I can’t imagine how many more shots I can take at The Byrds or you can take at me in another 6 years, but I hope we stay fresh enough to allow for the occasional kicking of dead horses.
This was inevitable after the disastrous and tragic events of Poptastrophe 2007.
I was an Audities member for more than a few years, and I just got tired of reading e-mail after e-mail of “the band I like is better than your band” and “the band you like sucks”… and then after wading through a seemingly endless stream of responses, I was relieved to see that the list was being closed.
I know, I could have always unsubscribed, but I’m goofy.