I’m always looking for music to write about. Which is not my ‘job’. But it is my ‘role’. Something I selected for myself a long time ago, long before I was ever published or paid. Music started speaking to me on the level where I felt I had to speak back to it – and about it – when I was 13. Music and writing have been connected for me since then. I was listening to music a lot earlier, obsessed since six or seven I would say. But since I was 13 years old, since I had an electric typewriter, since I armed myself with a copy of Leonard Cohen’s tome, Stranger Music (lyrics and poems), since I started typing out my favourite lyrics, writing my own poems, keeping diaries, listing the albums I bought, listing the albums I listened to – it’s been on.
One long, strange trip.
From there through protracted study – with far too many breaks – I have ended up in some pretty funny, surreal situations. One day I’m in a radio studio with Steve Gadd, the legendary drummer for Paul Simon, Steely Dan and Rickie Lee Jones (among so many others) and while I am there, in that moment I am also thinking back to when I booked my own meeting with a community paper to see if I could get a column about music. To that meeting I took a wee briefcase and inside it, a pad and pen, a couple of CDs and a banana.
From student journalism to writing regularly for Wellington’s newspaper, on TV doing reviews as part of the Good Morning show, having my ugly mug on a national news website for just under a decade – opinions galore. About music. Every weekday.
And it’s nearly been a decade now of posting all sorts of writing on my site.
That’s a short version of over 20 years of plugging away. Always as a side-gig, sometimes a paid side-hustle, more often the labour of love. And with the hope, I suppose that it would lead somewhere. It’s always taken me to the music. That’s been the focus.
I’ve just made the decision to no longer appear on RNZ. Something I chose. Usually, you outstay your welcome and the producer or editor or manager of a media organisation gives you a shove, or the publication or show ends, shuts down. Or you’re replaced by someone that was nipping at your heels.
It’s all so unceremonious. You slog away. And you are replaced. You are outmoded. You have a platform one day. And then you don’t.
On RNZ – or Radio New Zealand as it was best known and still is by some – I have been a regular across the last seven years or so. And I have been on air in some capacity for 
even longer. The main thing was reviewing albums once a month or so and providing a bigger ‘feature’ also. Looking in-depth at a catalogue, era, or trend. I absolutely loved putting together those features.
But it’s time to give that a rest. Time to free up some bandwidth. Time to seek value in return for work offered. And to feel valued – not just the financial reward.
Another way of saying this, I guess, is that I have de-platformed myself. I am no longer a music journalist. Some would say I never was – but they would only say that because I one time said their favourite band was a bit shit. The truth is, I’ve been wanting to shake the tag ‘music journalist’ for years. From titling a book of poems The Death of Music Journalism (and, well, writing a book of poetry…) to starting a podcast, blogging about parenting, writing about books and films, writing about feelings and my life, sharing so much – the music has always been in there. A soundtrack pretty much. But I became a music journalist by mistake. By default. I don’t regret it. But I’m definitely keen to move on from it. The title in itself is outmoded. The role redundant. The pay non-existent.
The good news is this is all very liberating. And I can consider myself just A Writer – which is all I’ve ever hoped to be. A writer. Some days I’m sure I am. Other days I worry I’ve bitten off far too much. And that’s exactly how it should be.
But writers write with music. And about music. They share tips. And favourites. They are free to write about, well, whatever.
So I’ll still be writing about music. Because I can’t help it. I am concentrating on different things in the reviews now – I haven’t been trying to ‘keep up’ for quite a while now. I’m interested in specific genres and styles and that’s what I’ll be writing about. I’ll also write more about ‘old’ music – but then I always have. Old music that is brand new to me. Or newly back in the fold. Old music that speaks to me in new ways.
But new music too. Always new music. Something always catches my ear.
It’s nice to not feel ‘at work’ with this every day though. I have other actual work. And that needs to be the focus.
Writing is something you do. It’s also something you are. You are a writer as much as you’re ever someone who does writing. I have always known this, I think. I’m about to find out a bit more about that. At least, I hope so.
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