Feature /// The Lockeland Springsteen Commandments for 2013

Hello, dear readers, and happy new year. I know it’s been a good break since our last post – holidays, birthdays, the flu and tinsel scattered everywhere was the basis for our nice blogging pause.  It’s also given me a good amount of time to think about what this blog stands for and will stand for in 2013; what our goals are, what we believe and why we’re doing this. So in the theme of a fresh year, new starts and the road ahead, we present a sort of Lockeland Springsteen New Year’s Resolutions – commandments, so to speak. More of a code, maybe. A little of what to expect from this blog in the new year, and, well, just in general.

The Lockeland Springsteen Commandments for 2013:::

1. We Only Write About Local Artists or Happenings.

2. We Don’t Do Reviews. We Never Do “Best Of” Lists. We’re Not Innately Critical.

3. We Aren’t A News Blog. We’re A Blog About the Musical Personalities, Stories and Voices of Nashville.

4. We Post With Intention. We Don’t Post Just Because, or Just For Hits.

5. We Believe in Awesome, Original Content.

6. We Believe Real Life is Still Better than Blogging or Reading Blogs.

Let us elaborate.

1. We Only Write About Local Artists or Happenings ::: This may seem like an obvious point. But I wanted to reiterate that this is a local music blog, with no designs on being a music blog simply based in Nashville. We cover local artists and local events. If there is no local tie, we don’t cover it. That’s because this blog is about community. A virtual city hall for music happenings in our fair town and the amazing cast of characters that spin the wheel.

2. We Don’t Do Negative Reviews. We Never Do “Best Of” Lists. We’re Not Innately Critical ::: Things you will never see on Lockeland Springsteen: an album review. A concert write-up whose sole purpose is to disparage the experience. A list ranking the best this-and-that (the only thing we do in list form is, of course, our Nashville Five – which is never a ranking and never negative). Or a sarcastic post on a band we don’t like. Look, I write reviews as part of my living. And I believe in criticism wholeheartedly. But this is a blog devoted to music, and I see no real value in wasting time on writing about something I don’t like. I’m not sure what service that is to you, my dear readers — I think we’re better off just telling each other about what we love, the stories that interest us, our favorite spots in town. And there are just too many damn sarcastic full-of-shit blogs out there that find their value by providing good albums with horrible reviews just to create chatter, or take up hobby chipping away negatively on a particular band or style of music. And we don’t do rankings. Not here. Never. Why bother?

3. We Aren’t A News Blog. We’re A Blog About the Musical Personalities, Stories and Voices of Nashville :::  Well, sure. We do post about news from time to time. But we aren’t a news blog. Want consistent local music news? No one does that better locally than the Nashville Cream. Here at LS, we focus more on stories – bringing the local musical personalities to life; bringing you their local favorites, musical and otherwise; bringing you their thoughts and what makes them tick, their ideas. So that’s why in 2013 we’ll bring you even more of our most popular section, Nashville Five, as well as many more artist/musician-written blogs: tour diaries, In Their Own Words features and other content that let’s you get to know the bands and musicians you follow and love. And you’ll hear our voices too: like in our recent Sol Cat post by Lockeland Springsteen contributor Emily King, you get to know the writer as much as you get the band. I think that’s important. You should know me, Emily and any future writers we bring on board.

4. We Post With Intention. We Don’t Post Just Because, or Just For Hits ::: While we strive to have excellent content to post every day, sometimes, we may not. Sometimes, a week might go by. We’ll try to avoid that, but here’s a rule. We’ll never post just to “get something out there,” just to have a daily piece, to keep readers, to get hits. That might result in less content, but we think of ourselves more of a blog-magazine hybrid that a news stream. We want every post to be as thoughtful, creative, interesting and copy-edited as possible.

5. We Believe in Awesome, Original Content :: What we said above – this is what we strive for. But besides the written component, we hope to bring you much more of original video content like Cabin Country and Lockleand Lunchbreak and exclusive video sessions. Expect much, much more of that in 2013.

6. We Believe Real Life is Still Better than Blogging or Reading Blogs ::: Because it is. Enough said.