I'm trying to make a big succulent, steaming, hearty stew for dinner right now, so I'm just going to outline what really gets my shorts in a knot about this. If it's got some "legs" I'll come back and REALLY do a useless rant.

Now that "Roots" music (uggh how I hate that word) has not only reached the masses, but actually appears to be a corporate money maker, I'm getting used to seeing mainstream magazines (and newspapers) featuring articles on stuff that I've cared dearly for over many years. The New Yorker article on Ralph Stanley is just the latest, and is certainly no better or worse than anything else. It's simply WAYYYYY over due!

The amount of inaccuracies in many of these articles is staggering. In fact I wonder if any other genre is as poorly edited and fact checked as ALTERNATIVE music. I simply can't picture an article on Corvettes, or philately, or Nuclear waste, or The Bush Twins, escaping with the kind of blatantly wrong information being stated as fact when it comes to music.

Even though it's a mainstream magazine (or newspaper or TV documentary etc.) why can't they get someone from INSIDE the music to either write it or at least seriously edit it?

I suspect this DOES happen in other areas, where they write about a subject dear to your heart, and you sit there opened mouthed saying "WHAT are they talkin' about?" but it just seems that traditional folk music forms REALLY suffer.

Rant off.

Rick