After years of inquiries, we started a newsletter for A CLOSER LISTEN at the start of 2022. Compiled by me, Joseph, it’s mostly been a digest of what’s been on the blog, as well as an archive for our constantly updated UPCOMING RELEASES section. Yet after writing and compiling weekly dispatches for nearly four full calendar years, the newsletter has taken a form of its own, and it feels like its past time to highlight the newsletter here on the blog.
Each regular edition of the newsletter comes every other week, packed with excerpts of features and a selection of reviews that ran on the blog in the previous fortnight. But there’s also exclusive material, usually in my introductory remarks, many of which have been quite substantial. Some of these have developed into reviews that landed on the blog, while a growing number have been eulogies to departed artists. At other times, I’ve simply needed a space to reflect on daily experiences and news, experimenting with tones I don’t usually let sneak into what I write here. Beyond that, it seems important to generate an archive of writing about live music experiences, since the music press incentivizes writing about concerts for promotion and marketing, there’s long been a dearth of concert reviews, especially for artists in our corner. So it’s also been a place for me to reflect in print on performances.
At the start of last year, I added Mini-Reviews to the regular newsletters, allowing me to feature many more records than we can manage to dedicate to full reviews. More recently, those have become quarterly Mini-Review Marathons, with more regular Recommendation lists available in between. I’ve also used these sections to promote hip hop, which tends not to get much space here on the blog, alongside occasional BEATS and/or RHYMES mini-reviews.
Off-weeks, when there’s no regular newsletter, are filled with several features that have developed over the years.
OUT OF THE BOX is a monthly series focusing on seven inch records, which I began as an excuse to engage with my collection in a new way, as well as to write about older records and genres we don’t often cover at ACL. The first installment also includes an essay reflecting on being a collector and a defense of physical media. I began with Minor Threat, most recently featured Clarence Carter, with many genres and eras represented in between, including screamo, Italo-Disco, and hip hop.
Another recurring feature is FROM THE ARCHIVES, selections from our extensive back catalog, usually essays or interviews that feel relevant to something in the present moment. Often I am republishing features of my own that were published elsewhere, such as this interview with Jerusalem in my Heart or this essay on radiophonics.
I’ve occasionally published other material without any unifying branding, including translations, manifestos, personal artistic projects, and other texts. The newsletter has also become a home for my personal end of year lists. I haven’t posted my end of year lists on this site since 2020, and I took 2021 off but SP 2022, SP 2023, and SP 2024 were published via our newsletter.
In October 2023, I covered the UNSOUND festival in real time, posting daily recaps and commentary, as well as quite a few photos and the occasional video, over the eight days. Those posts became my notes for the review that ran here afterwards. I hope to do the same for other festivals in the future. In order to help cover the costs of traveling to Poland from Canada, I began offering paid subscriptions as well. But the newsletter will always be available to subscribe to for free. Check it out, and thanks for Listening with us. (Joseph Sannicandro)
a closer listen 