Forked off

Say what you like about Pitchfork - that it has an overinflated sense of its own importance, that the reviews it carries are pointlessly spiteful or pretentiously incomprehensible. Those charges are occasionally valid. But however you feel, its being "folded" into GQ by the corporate overlords at Conde Nast - a process that has apparently necessitated the abrupt dismissal of scores of experienced staff members - is cause not for gloating celebration but for serious concern.

Like the Guardian's Laura Snapes, I could be accused of being a member of the critics' union - but in this piece she makes what should be recognised by any music fan as a powerful case for the website's merits: the fact that the editors are "extraordinarily committed to investing in new critical talent"; the breadth of its coverage, with up to four new album reviews a day; the employment of a whole host of talented female journalists to help to change the male music nerd narrative both at the site itself and in the industry more widely; the opportunities/pleasures it affords to writers and readers in terms of deep dives on obscure records and artists; the ability of its reviewers to frame or reframe an album in a new and insightful way; its vital importance for musicians (whether they acknowledge it or not): "exposing their work to a wider audience, mythologising and storytelling in a way that leaves more of a lasting impression on listeners than marketing has ever managed ... and paying them the respect of a close and fair critical read, even if that assessment is negative".

Declarations of Pitchfork's demise may be premature - as Snapes says, how the new business arrangement will impact on the site is yet to be seen - but we're surely justified in fearing the worst given the lay-offs of so many great writers and editors.

Conde Nast bought the site in 2015, so this sort of manoeuvre - which has the dirty fingerprints of the bean counters all over it - has been on the cards for some time. But the fact that it follows so soon after another pivotal component of the music ecosystem, Bandcamp, fell prey to the corporate vultures makes the news particularly hard to take.

Snapes acknowledges that there are several other broadly comparable sites such as the Quietus, Stereogum and Consequence Of Sound, but, "as the biggest fish, its looming dissolution is comparable to HMV disappearing from the high street: without a leading example to coalesce around, define yourself against, fight about, the notion that specialist music journalism can viably exist at all starts to fade into the margins".