http://jamesonjournals.blogspot.com/2005/04/andrew-mcniece-interview-part-1.html

Andrew McNiece Interview Part 1

SJ: "Hi Andrew, I am so glad you could talk with me today. I apologize for the
delay but you know how real life is. I hope you are well today."

AM: "Very well, thanks Sarah. I'm the king of delays-nothing ever goes to plan,
so no worries."

SJ: "Let's start with the easy questions shall we? I promise to make this as
painless as possible. You run the Melodic Rock website. How long have you been
running it?"

AM: "I started the site in late 1996-seems so long ago now. It was a very small
and simple site and a true fan site. A few early changes were made, not to
mention streamlining what I was doing and in 1998 it changed to a set domain
name, MelodicRock.com."

SJ: "What made you get into this line of work? When did you say, this is what I
want to do?"

AM: "I am a born and bred obsessed fan of the music. I think I was relatively
late getting into music, I was 13 or 14, but by 15 I was hooked big time and
have been collecting ever since. I always had an obsession for looking outside
what was presented to me as available in shops and mainstream magazines, which
funnily enough is a major reason melodicrock.com is so popular today so many
other people thinking the same thing.

Anyway, I always wanted to work in music but just wasn't sure how or what
aspect. Where I live, there is little or no music industry jobs and anyone
interested must move interstate if they really want to work at it full time.

I always had friends for an audience (talking music) and began importing
collectors items and CD's from overseas and thought perhaps I would open a store
or mail order company. That provided to be cost prohibitive and I worked in a
retail CD store for several years, which is where I met my wife.

I really still had no idea how I'd ever work music full time and through another
contact got talking to a UK melodic rock fanzine and was invited to start
writing for them.

That was great fun for awhile but I began to think of ways I could continue
writing but on my own terms. I was really enjoying that aspect but still didn't
consider the possibility of it ever being a full time thing as I am not formally
trained in journalism or anything for that matter. The website design is
self-taught HTML and it's content is from the heart.

I concluded that forming and running a magazine would once again be close to
impossible from my location and at the same time a buddy of mine was heavily
into computers. This was in 1996 a time when the Internet was only just breaking
out and the majority of info was contained in newsgroups and chat pages. We were
hanging out one night browsing the numerous topics and I realized the majority
of posts were questions about bands I had been dealing with on a small scale
with the magazine writing or at least the whereabouts of.

At that moment I knew that was my answer, a way of writing without costs and a
way to reach a far bigger potential audience. It was only over time as the site
grew that I ever thought it could be a full time thing. I have only been full
time at this gig for 3 years now. Previously, I worked a full time day job as
well."

SJ: "Being a music critic is sure to have it's advantages, so what are some of
them besides getting to review some of the best selling albums out there?"

AM: "The 2 best things is being able to interact with childhood heroes and
people you have respected over the years. Some of the artists I grew up loving
are every bit as fabulous as I had hoped and deserve every bit of success they
have achieved. I still feel privileged to be able to deal with them on a one on
one basis.

The second best thing is getting albums in advance of their release date, which
continues to be something I always look forward to. The labels and artists
themselves are always sending new material as soon as it's ready and I'm honored
to be included in that way. "

SJ: "Do you ever get positive or negative feedback from the bands you review?
Aside from the obvious I mean."

AM: "Oh, you better believe it! Reviews are the heart and soul of the site and I
put more work into them than I do anything else. Most importantly, the reviews
must be accurate, whether an album is great or not so great, and whether I love
the artist or have no particular personal like for them.

Everything must be given the same effort and attention and the reaction I get is
fabulous. I get so much great feedback regarding the reviews. Even from those
that don't always agree. I do all the reviews myself and always have, as it
creates continuity and people reading my site can get to know my style for
writing and my tastes and that gives them a base to make their own judgments.

The artists themselves write in too, sometimes to disagree and sometimes to
thank me. It's cool. I've had a few nasty e-mails following bad reviews but
that's part of the territory. The site has a lot of people reading it, plus
artists themeselves, labels and management so I get flack from them sometimes,
as no one likes to see a negative review, especially when there is money and
sales on the line.

But I will always call out a release I don't think meets expectations or matches
the quality of an artists previous work. If I'm not honest in that regard, no
one would believe the positive reviews and my time writing them would be
wasted."

SJ: "What do you find is the worst part of your job?"

AM: "The very worst is directly related to the best aspect. Sometimes one has to
accept that some of the artists I have adored and respected for years aren't the
people you expected, nor hoped they would be. A few I have encountered have a
big rock star attitude, a few have been overly arrogant and a couple have just
been plain difficult but that's fine.

Sometimes fans wonder why an artist isn't still a #1 seller and I believe in
some cases it's the artist themselves that has killed their own career. Some
people are just too hard to deal with! I'm happy to report that the vast
majority are a great pleasure to deal with and some are true superstars."

SJ: "To break away from this for a moment, if I may say so you kind of remind me
of Simon Cowellon American Idol. I don't know if you get that show but Simon is
a judge of people who want to become famous singers and he's brutally honest if
nothing else. He's the main reason I watch that show. He tells it like it is and
isn't afraid to tell someone when they're bad."

AM: "When in a position such as that or on a smaller scale with myself, you have
to be honest. I understand your point but believe Cowell is there with set job
to do and does it well.

My role is different, I like to approach everything with a more positive slant,
looking for the good in things but sometimes you have to make a hard decision
based on what you are hearing. I believe a good majority of my reviews and site
comments are positive but not everything. There must be balance.

SJ: "Do you find that you're like him when you do your reviews?"

AM: "Probably answered that above but not really. I go into far more detail to
explain my judgment. I don't just cast a comment without explanation."

SJ: "Do you think you base your reviews on what you think alone or do you try to
judge them based on what the public wants to hear from the album?"

AM: "That's a very good question. I view myself as an average member of the
public that has been buying CD's for years and therefore, it has to impress me
first.

My reviews are done initially by instinct alone. My first reaction is do I like
this album? Does it impress me and how does it compare to my favorite albums
from that artist or in the case of a new artist, how does it compare to my
favorites from a similar artist.

I have played a hell of a lot of albums over the years, I have bought a hell of
a lot of CD's and there are bands I own every album/CD they have ever made, plus
all the side/solo projects, etc. So I go into an album with an open mind and the
thought, it does match their best work and if it does, why and if not, why
again?"

I write the review from that perspective and try and describe the sound as best
I can so others will know exactly how it relates to their personal preferences
for that artist and that in turn is covering the angle of what the public wants
to hear. So yes, both bases are covered."

SJ: "If you could go back and start over, would you choose a different line of
work, in other words, do you have any regrets about what you do?"

AM: "No way, this is great. There is a huge amount of stress that sometimes
comes with it. If I report a story incorrectly or I upset an artist with a bad
review or whatever but at the end of the day, I adore the music and the feedback
I get is fantastic, so I couldn't imagine not doing it. The workload sometimes
gets me down as does chasing sponsers but the rest is all great."

SJ: "Andrew, now I would like to take a moment to bring up the main reasons for
the interview. Before I ask you these questions, I want my public to know kind
of what this is all about. I first heard about this on your website actually and
when I read what was going on, I went to DL.com and had to look for myself if
this were really happening. According to what I've read, this started about the
time of release of Def Leppard's new album X."

AM: "Nope, I have had zero conctact with anyone or anything Leppard related
until last year, early 2004. At the time of the X release, I did nothing but
plug the band big time and posted amazing review of X which many thought was too
positive. But I stand behind that review 100% as I still think it was an amazing
album which was criminally under promoted and given the chance, could have
yielded 3 or 4 hit singles."

SJ: "From what I can gather, you were sent a false track listing from the band
themselves and it turns out to be false. This apparantly started some
controversy between you and the band."

AM: "This is the correct bit but nothing to do with X. It was all related to the
cover' s album. Here's the story. As they always are, Leppard were being all
mysterious about what they were working on and what their next album might be.

As in my job, I look into these things and see if anyone I know has any
information about what they are up to and for that matter,what any number of
artists are up to.

Most appreciate the publicity and the maintaining of their name in the public's
eye. As well as printing endless press releases, my job is to spice things up
from time to time with exclusive reports or inside info. Half the time, it's the
band feeing me this info directly, I I just can't say where it came from. That's
half the fun.

So, I had feelers out to see what Leppard were up to and whether or I could shed
any light on it. As it turns out I did.. in February 2004 I printed a news item
stating that the next Leppard album would be an all covers affair. This was the
first mention of such a thing anywhere.

The VERY NEXT DAY an e- mail arrives from a previously unknown person, who
includes what is apparantly the track listing for the CD! I would not normally
print anything from a previously unused source but to back his claim is a link
to defleppard.com and a page that also listed the songs.

They match up and so I print the news but more fool me, the track listing is
false and if you take the first letter from each song listed, it reads
T.H.I.S.I.S.B.U.L.L.S.H.I.T How stupid am I?? And sure enough, the file
disappears from the DL.com site. I made an apology to readers for the misleading
info and felt pretty stupid. I said in my response that the plant was an obvious
set up for trying to dig up news on the band.

Shortly after I get an e-mail from DefLeppard's webmaster asking for details of
the e-mail I was sent and promising to get to the bottom of who it was and how
they got access to the server. It was quite a lengthy e-mail and admitted he
knew who was behind it and among the comments was this quote: "I have to agree
with you, it IS unfair payback. So, if you want to help me out here, I will
promise that, as soon as the band's next album is finished and I have an
advanced copy of it, I will share some of it with you for review purposes."

I replied and declined to help them out and that was the first and last official
contact I ever had with the band. That was early 2004.

SJ: "Some time goes by and suddenly someone sends you a CD they allegedly got
from one of the band members and tells you that they thought you were treated
unfairly by the band and Here's the Covers' CD, maybe you could find a way to
use this to get back at them for sending you the false track listing."

AM: "No, that's speculation to say the least! I didn't post anything just to get
back at the band. My thoughts on the covers CD go way back to when I first
posted the news exclusive. I said then that I thought it was a bad idea and have
maintained that view ever since. Perhaps they did not like me stating the news
and the fact I thought it was a bad idea.

Much later, I got an e-mail from someone I had maybe 2 or 3 e-mails from
previously over a 5 year period. Nothing to do with anything, just contact
e-mails. I had no idea of their Def Leppard connection and perhaps there wasn't
a connection when I originally had contact with them. At any regard, it was a
year or two since I had heard from this person and I get an e-mail out of the
blue asking if I'd like a copy of the CD.

I couldn't believe it but I always had in the back of my mind that I'd like to
correct my previous screw up and post the correct track listing at some point. I
thought by hearing the CD (if it was indeed the cd) I could verify the contents
and report accordingly.

Only after further correspondence did I hear the comment from the source that
they hated what had happened to me with the false track listing incident and
thought the band treated me unfairly."

*Stay tuned for Part 2 coming Next*