My wildest dreams at one point was to own a Ford Focus. I literally had a poster of one on my bedroom wall. Not kidding. But I tell you, once I started getting free CDs in the mail, and my name on guest lists, like, I guess that was living the dream. Of course, until it became 20 CDs a day, and invites to dance / R&B shows by lazy PR folk who just bought shitty music blogger lists.

But I first got into music blogging back in 2001. I had just stopped playing shows because I got married and all that, so I thought, why not write about music?! I literally started a music site because I didn’t see other sites at the time writing about the bands that I liked, and that was bands that I liked, at least in the north east PA region. Bands like Mewithout You and such. So I started Buzzgrinder.com back in 2001 and never looked back. I had no grand agendas or plans, but it certainly led to some neat stuff.

I never groveled, mostly because I’ve always been “grounded” around rock stars and people in music. I grew up in a family of musicians. Literally, my grandmother had a country and square-dance band, and my mom and two uncles played in that band. One uncle eventually put out a record in 1980 or so, I was always at venues and gigs with my dad in later years. So really, I don’t know, for me I don’t really remember groveling. I’ve done some premieres and interviews that I shouldn’t have done, mostly because I was just chasing numbers, but live and learn.

My favorite is probably podcasting, but I don’t do enough of it, which I’ll explain in a second. Writing for the nightly emails is super rewarding since I know for certain X amount of people will read it every night. It’s not 1000s, but it’s a solid core of smart, sharp readers that I love. My least favorite these days is the blog format, which has been on the decline for me since 2010 or so. It’s the whole, “wow, work a whole lot on this one piece for hours, plan, scheme, get photos, spell check, fact check” and then you publish it and like three minutes later it’s old news, and I hate that.

But the day to day stuff? WHEW. I’m doing email marketing stuff, Cost-per-click advertising management, social media management for clients, website updates, reporting, Google Analytics – I stay sane by having everything planned out for me in OmniFocus. When I find myself in one of those many, “uhhhh… what do I do next?” moments, I just open OmniFocus and that keeps me… focused. Either that, or shut my laptop and go for a walk. I also have some great writers who help me out with Skull Toaster. And really, my days are so packed, that the mental horsepower required to do podcasting after all THAT stuff… it’s just like… like, you can fake a blog post. An unpaid college intern can write a blog post. With enough base knowledge they’d know how to put enough keywords into for SEO purposes, write a catchy headline, Tweet it in such a way that it gets picked up and read, and hell, you can pay for the link to get pushed across Facebook and anywhere else.

But you can’t fake a podcast. I mean, you can, but people are going to hear in your voice that you’re tired, or distracted, or exhausted. With a podcast you’re in someones ear canal – hard to get any more intimate than that. In a blog post you’re on the same screen as Facebook messages, and YouTube videos, and BuzzFark headlines. So that’s why I don’t do more podcasting. My brains is flexed to the max from all the different things I’m doing, for several different clients, including Skull Toaster, that it’s hard to get in front of a mic and be all, “HI, I’M SETH.” Hopefully someday I can get back to it.

Gender equality. I have a handful of amazing women helping me with Skull Toaster – Amy Sciarretto is the best editor because most of the time she’s probably seen, worked with, or interviewed any of the bands that I’m asking about with my metal trivia. Then I have Kelsey, Lindsey, Laura who know their metal, and have experiences and knowledge above me. So like, it’s real easy for me to work with just dude writers, and heck, it’s easy to ask questions about white dude metal bands all the time, too, but I’m working on it. That’s important to me, because like, look at those shitty ads at the bottom of a handful of metal blogs, with the swim suit and yoga pants images. I don’t want anyone looking at Skull Toaster and just see white dude, white dude, white dude, or think, WOAH, this is just for the bros! Metal has SO many women working behind the scenes helping a lot of bands sell lots of records, and play giant shows, and so I hope in a small way I change the perception in the writing world, I guess.

Claim to be? WANNA FIGHT? Just kidding. I grew up with dirt bikes, so then lots of BMX and mountain bikes, too. I moved to NYC in 2004 and kept biking. I biked pretty hardcore, like 100+ miles a week leading up until about 2011 when I suffered some nerve damage that kept me off the bike for awhile. My favorite two bikes; a single speed NYC Bikes I owned for a few years. Aluminum frame, carbon forks. The thing was a dream. I sold it and bought a Brompton folding bike, which was dreamy, too. Dorky, sure, but there was nothing like stepping off an Amtrak train, or a city bus, unfolding the bike, and riding off. I loved both of those bikes.

Stickiest? Like sticky situation? Probably when I thought catching a midnight Megabus in downtown Atlanta, GA was a good idea. I had someone approach me to carry their bag onto the bus. That was shady as heck.

I think it says “leave me alone,” which is pretty awesome. When I get on a bus or train the seat next to me typically stays empty. But there are some dudes that don’t get the message, and they approach me for tips on growing a beard. Or I sometimes get beard cat-calls. Dude bros that like yelling, “killer dude, bro” or “I dig the beard, man.” It’s just weird, you know? Some dudes are discreet about, and they are lovely. The subtle nod, the eye contact. But some dudes just don’t get it.

My biggest slogan is “objects in motion stay in motion,” ole Newton’s 1st law of thermodynamics, I think. Movement to me is positive, and to stay positive I just need to keep moving. And the means being around positive people, too. I mean, life can be pretty negative. There is lots to be negative about, and it’s super easy to spiral into that muck. So for me, it’s sort of like, be the change you want to see. I don’t like sitting around whining about everything, talking trash, being a negative nancy. I used to do that. It got me nowhere. When at AOL Music I had more than one person pull me aside and tell me how hard I was to work with because I was so negative. I was so negative that when I interviewed for a job at Google Music I bombed it because negativity just coursed through my veins. So really, I just try to talk about the good stuff. Promote good stuff, and stop giving so much energy to the negative in life.

Well, I feel the days of “write a bunch of stuff and sell ads against it” are coming to end, what with ad-blockers, the saturation of social media, and declining banner ad rates. That said, I feel you need to get as close to the music as possible. Like, “anyone” can download a leaked album and write 300 words about it. There is no shortage of that online. But not everyone can get on the phone or do a good in-person interview, and that’s what I think you need to do. Do things that other people aren’t doing. I’ve been reading Seth Godin books for years, and he always talks about the edges. Like, starting a music blog and writing about news and doing CD reviews, well, that’s not an edge. That’s “everything.” Sure, doing a metal news and CD reviews is a bit more niche, but there’s no shortage of metal sites out there doing that. I had a friend of mine who wanted to do a hair metal blog – like, literally talk to band members about their hair. There is so much good hair in metal! They really liked fashion and all that, and I think if they would have done it, like from eight years ago, who knows where they’d be? They could have been the #1 metal fashion blogger on the internet, you know? Interviewing band members about their hair, and then all the kids who want to be hair stylists would read it, and it’d be this super niche thing. Perfect for selling hair care products and equipment, you know? Visiting rad salons like Hair Metal in Brooklyn, or other shops, and interviewing stylists. And think of the potential to work with awesome photographers, too!

So yea – that’s my advice. Ask the questions that other sites aren’t. Stop reviewing CDs, start reviewing videos. Or solos. Life is too short to write about everything. Broad strokes are over, especially on the internet. It’s why I didn’t start another metal blog after I stepped down from Noise Creep in 2011 – there were enough metal blogs out there. Niche down, be the expert on some crazy micro-niche. Appeal to just a small bunch of people, rather than “everyone,” and you’ll be fine.