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Sometimes you’re so busy that you forget your own birthday. That’s the hope, anyway, as one gets older. Invisible Oranges turned 3 last week. This is a long time in Internet terms. The site is doing well. Readership has more than doubled since this time last year. But the site could always do better. How can it improve?
All suggestions will be considered in the upcoming (and long overdue) site redesign. It has been delayed by my move to Los Angeles. Now that I am settling in, I can hopefully address the redesign soon.
Anthrax’ “Time” is an appropriate soundtrack for this demarcation of time. Calling it “thrash” would be inadequate. Off-kilter rhythms, strange melodies, and a haunting ticking clock make for a towering epic. Not only is Charlie Benante’s drumming technically proficient, it’s also remarkably efficient. He only plays what’s necessary. Each fill and cymbal crash is perfectly timed. Artistic perfection is evident when rearrangement would only cause degradation.
Thank you for reading.
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Happy Birthday!
Improvements? Not really sure. You could try and get listed on something like HypeMachine. It may not improve the site directly but you may pick up some new readers.
essentially, my favourite blog. Not much needs to be done to improve.
Happy birthday.
Personally I'd prefer more posts dealing with HM in-depth and less posts about various fashions surrounding it, but seeing how many comments those get, I realize I might be in the minority on this.
Happy Birthday!
excellent site as is. Keep up the great work.
Happy Birthday! Keep the great posts a comin'.
Three years? Is that all? Feels like a lot longer…
Happy Birtday either way, CL. Still the first place I visit every morning.
Thanks for the kind words, everyone. Chris, Hype Machine rejected Invisible Oranges for inclusion, though that doesn't bother me much.
Congrats Cosmo! I.O. is the best Metal blog out there. You have introduced me to countless things I would have otherwise missed and I thank you for that big time.
Congrats on 1/11 of Jesus age.
Happy birthday, comrade in bloggage. Only thing I'd like to see more often is interviews. I'm sure you've got transcripts sitting around from features you wrote for other publications. Could be an easy way to keep the content flowing and your readers satiated. Also, I like the idea of local reporting — talking to the musicians, promoters, artists, writers and general hangabouts that make up your scene. I'm admittedly sorta biased because I live in your city now but I even enjoy getting a sense of the scenes in other cities from afar. Makes the interwebz feel that much smaller.
Etan – Thanks for the suggestion. Interviews are something I want to feature more here. However, they are definitely not "an easy way to keep the content flowing." Transcribing them takes forever. I have two good interviews in the can and haven't had the 5 or so hours for each needed to transcribe, edit, and lay them out properly.
I have found that local coverage tends to alienate a worldwide audience. Also, because of the Internet, the notion of local "scenes" is rapidly losing strength. There are a few cities with a lot of good bands (SF, NYC, Montreal), but otherwise it's better to focus on the best of the world than to compromise when going local.
My only criticism of IO is that sometimes it seems to avoid discussing mainstream releases purely because they're from the mainstream. If, on the other hand, those releases get missed purely because you're too busy bringing all the stuff you're already covering, then, that's well and good.
I certainly wouldn't want the coverage to direct more focus to mainstream material, but I don't like the idea of excluding anything.
Note: I tried to think of some examples to support my impression, and came up empty. So maybe it's me, not you…
Matt – It's a combination of both. Space and time is limited here, and I don't like to cover things that are covered elsewhere. That's more likely with mainstream releases. Also, the readers here seem to prefer more obscure stuff.
That said, if there's a worthy mainstream release that (a) I'm not covering elsewhere and (b) I can approach with a fresh angle, then I'll certainly write it up.
hey hey hey. don't go getting better. the rest of us can't keep up.
happy bday.
Ahhh, it seems like the 2nd birthday was so recent! Congrats and many happy returns to my favorite blog.
<3