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Sympathy for the Music Journalist—This Week On VICE: Members Only

Behind the paywall this week: two stories that reflect the state of music journalism in 2026 (spoiler: it’s not so good).

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I have been a music journalist, professionally, for about 15 years. Once upon a time, that sentence would inspire a chorus of BOOOO’s or a series of lifestyle condemnations about what a penniless, spiteful existence it is and how “those who can’t, teach.” Or, on a good day, someone might ask who’s the most famous person I’ve ever interviewed and I will say, with a disproportionate sense of achievement, that I have pissed in Robbie Williams’ home toilet. (Laugh all you want, that goes down a treat among British women aged between 45 and 60.) 

These days, if you tell people you’re a music journalist they just shoot you a quiet look of pity, or else frown and say something like “Really?” or “What’s that?” Point being: It is a bad career choice no matter how well the industry is doing. The thing is, when I was 11 years old I watched Philip Seymour Hoffman as Lester Bangs in Almost Famous deliver the line, “The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you’re uncool.”........

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