Have you ever wanted your news feed to be about the bands you love? Are you sick of the entertainment sites and news that are always talking about the same pop artists day after day? Here are some websites and magazines you can subscribe to!
There’s Alternative Press, Absolute Punk, and Kerrang! All of these magazines and website subscriptions provide us with the latest news of bands and artists in the rock genre. News include studio updates, video updates of tours, co-headlining tour announcements, album releases, upcoming bands, hiatuses, album reviews and more! All of these subscriptions provide blogs from their employees that will give you a good insight on what’s going on in the Rock genre of the music industry today. Let’s start with Alternative Press!
Founded in 1985 by Mike Shea, Alternative press is a Rock music magazine based out of Cleveland, Ohio.This magazine provides updates on music charts, album releases and more. Throughout the years, Alternative press has become one of the main and largest music magazines nationally. They provide updates on bands such as All Time Low, Mayday Parade, Three Days Grace, and even small local bands such as Broadside(the band from my past post), and Battleghost. The magazine and website also provides a store that sells their merchandise and other bands’ merchandise, and audio of studio updates and tracks that have been released. There are numerous blogs on every single topic in the industry that can be discussed. An example of a blog from Alternative Press(AP) is The 11 Best Punk Goes Pop Songs blog. This blog gives you an opinionated idea of remixes from pop songs that Rock artists rerecord and put their own spin to the songs.
I believe Alternative Press is by far, one of the most insightful magazines out there in the industry. Their album reviews are the least biased and give constructive feedback to the bands, producers, and artists after the production and release of the album. Alternative Press has provide fans in the industry with the AP Tour. The AP Tour is a tour that Alternative Press runs. They book bands together to not only promote their magazine but also the headlining and supporting bands that are on that tour. Another cool thing AP does that not a lot Rock magazine do is the Alternative Press Music Awards(APMA). APMA started last year and has been a huge hit. This past year, the APMA featured bands like Motionless in White, A Day To Remember, and more. The awards show had Alex Gaskarth and Jack Barakat from All Time Low host the show. There are many things AP does for the industry, I can honestly say they are killing it.
Next on the list would be Absolute Punk. Absolute Punk is a website and online community that is an alternative to the mainstream news sites for the Rock Genre. Started in 2000 by Jason Tate, Absolute Punk has become a huge hit for fans and artists to go online for news and blogs on the industry. This website provides its fans with album reviews, articles, blogs, journals, photos and more. Unlike AP, Absolute Punk focuses its energy more on Punk bands, Pop-Punk bands, and Pop-Rock bands. Recent blog from this site include bands such as Fall Out Boy, and Mayday Parade.
If you’re a Punk Rock fan that loves any type of Punk music, than this is the online community website for you! You can find more low-key and underground artists with this website than AP. Absolute Punk also has videos of live performances and interviews. Here is a video of an Absolute Punk Backstage Session featuring the band Four Year Strong performing live acoustically.
In this video, the band is playing an original called Abandon Ship and Abandon All Hope. This shows that the website promotes bands and artists in many ways, from studio updates, to acoustic live performances backstage before a show. Absolute Punk is definitely one of my favorite online community to read about bands today, and I highly suggest you check out the website.
The last website music magazine subscription is Kerrang! Kerrang is a UK based rock music magazine. Like AP and Absolute Punk, Kerrang provides great insights on the Rock music industry as well. From tours, to studio updates, to album releases, Kerrang follows up with the latest bands the news in the industry. One of the best things about Kerrang is that they are based out of the UK. Therefore they have a different perspective on how the music industry is. Like Alternative Press, Kerrang also has a music awards. Kerrang has nominated bands like All Time Low, Mayday Parade, A Day To Remember and more on great awards. The best thing I like about Kerrang is actually the awards and how underground it is. Kerrang’s music awards do not air on TV. The awards and results are announced online. I believe this gives fans a more intimate feeling when connecting with the magazine and the artist they follow.
All of these magazines and online communities are great alternatives to to read about news on artists in the Rock industry. They give good insights on bands and updates and are straight forward. With all of the mainstream artists taking over the main news outlets, Alternative Press, Absolute Punk, and Kerrang are the best alternatives to get updates in the music industry.
PunkVolume 