Its A Labor Of Love: A Conversation With Anthony Fantano – Forbes

Anthony Fantano aka 'theneedledrop'

Anthony Fantano is an American music critic, interviewer, YouTuber and internet personality known for his music-related YouTube channel The Needle Drop.

You have an impressive 2,300,000+ subscribers on your main Youtube channel and were recently profiled by theN.Y. Timesin September 2020. As your brand continues to grow, does the role of being a content creator become easier or more difficult?

I think when you're doing anything for this long, you do fall into a groove with it. I think that's the point that I'm at now. The most recent development is learning to hire other people because there was a long time when I feel like I toiled very much independently. There wasn't a budget to hire or work with anyone else in the beginning. And even after the point where there was, I was still figuring out how to be a manager or a boss. I hate that word. But trying to figure out how to do that, on top of creating content, is even more difficult. There are still aspects of what I do that I'm still learning to do well, and a lot of it is behind the scenes stuff that nobody really knows or understands. Because, you know, all they see at the end of the day is the review, but they don't see everything that needs to occur for the content to happen. I'm trying to get better every day doing that stuff and trying to be better at bringing other people in on those processes so it can be done efficiently. So yeah, I think it's becoming easier. But even as things get comfortable, I then learn about new things that I could be doing or should be doing. And when I understand what those things are, I have to go out and learn to do them. There are always new challenges to take on even when things seem to be easy, you know?

Walk us through your listening & review process. How many times do you have to hear a record until you break it down? Do you keep notes? Is there a strict routine?

On average, I would say four to six times, and I do keep notes. And I would say that there is a strict routine given that I have to put out reviews regularly. So, as a result, there is a strict listening routine, a strict digestion routine, I guess you could say. And again, if you were watching it from the outside, it would be very much like watching grass growconcentrating, writing notes, doing a little bit of research online, etc. I'm not an encyclopedia, and I have to be reminded of things. But there's definitely a process, and I will spend some of the early listening sessions hearing the record casually and just getting a general sense for it instead of diving into the nitty-gritty of a record immediately. With a record, there's a macro and a micro picture, and I find personally it's a bit easier to write a review if I can take a little bit more time with it without feeling a time crunch. I can write an entire review of just nothing but micro-details from front-to-back of every track. Still, sometimes if you get a macro picture of the record first, it's easier to tell which details are worth sharing and which ones aren't, or which ones are vital to point out or explain as far as describing the appeal of the album for me personally.

How do you structure your week to consume so much music?

I have no idea. My week is a mosh pit between work, online stuff, family, shooting videos, and listening to music. It's crazy. To tame my chaotic days, I do a lot of listening at night. And since I signed up with Twitch, I do a lot of listening and live album reactions on stream. I would have to spend time listening to albums anyway, so I figured I'd spend it on Twitch getting subs, getting bits, and getting engaged on that platform. And it's made sense so far. It's been a fun experience bringing people in on that side of the process.

I feel like the only way I get through my week and get as much done as I want to is to have people who work with me pick up some of the slack. I can lean on them if I shoot a review and need it edited, or I'm running a show on Twitch and I need someone moderating so I can concentrate on listening to music and getting my writing done.

Your reviews carry a ton of weight online. Have artists ever thanked you for positive reviews? Have any of them threatened you because of a negative review?

There have undoubtedly been negative comments and some bad experiences for sure. But wow, you just went right to the threats. (Laughs) Like 'Anthony, you put out this review. Has Jack White threatened to kill you? Has Jack White sent you an email, put you on blast, and sent you a picture of a pistol and said "you're going to meet your maker, buddy" for that Dead Weather review?' No, Jack White's never done that; Jack White's never threatened my life. But yeah, of course, the reviews have gotten negative responses. None of which are worth noting or anything. There's no negative response from anybody that's haunting me to this day. There are great positive responses that I'm happy with, but nothing I want to toot my own horn about. I'm glad that I'm stirring feelings up in fans and artists alike. And honestly, I don't take the negative criticism as a bad sign, as long as there's balance. There are people firmly in my corner who understand what I do and feel it plays a vital role in their lives. Others think it's trash, garbage, the worst thing ever, and I should die. I guess as long as there's a balance in the force, then I think I'm doing something right. If all I ever did were piss everybody off, there'd be something wrong. And if all I ever did were elicit moderately positive vibes from everyone, I feel like I'd be doing something wrong as well. Because, as a critic, you've got to take out the trash sometimes, and there are going to be unhappy people with angry responses as a result.

Does it ever feel like 'work'? Are some artists harder to review than others?

I wouldn't say any artists in particular, but some projects are more challenging to review than others. Some projects, in a way, defy reviews. Outsider artists, legendary albums, and very lengthy projects fall into this category. Sometimes for personal reasons and sometimes due to time, it's hard to find the mindset to digest everything. Does that ever feel like work? Yeah, it does. It really does feel like it's work, work, work, work work. The listening and writing parts are both fun, but I'm not merely spending my entire day just reviewing, reviewing, reviewing, and reviewing. On top of that, there are commentary videos, streams, editing & uploading, social media stuff, P.R. people to email, brand deals, interviews, and so on and so forth. There's a lot to do and a lot to get done. It's work that I enjoy doing. It's a labor of love. It sounds clicheand it is a clichebut it's a labor of love.

How do you manage the balance of being an impartial reviewer while maintaining your personal music preferences?

I don't perceive myself to be an impartial reviewer. I try to lay it all out there so that everybody knows this is my opinion. Let's say Animal Collective comes out with a new record, and I think it's trash. And I think it's trash for reasons that are personal or petty or something along those lines. If I'm impartial, I'm going to take that reason and I'm going to hide it. And then I'm going to come up with a bunch of disingenuous reasons to mask the real personal reason that I'm not liking this record. Unfortunately, this is a habit people fall into, so I avoid it by being as straightforward as I can possibly be about what I do and don't like about something. Honestly, there are records that I dislike or don't have strong feelings about that I feel wouldn't make for a compelling review. There are some projects that I don't have much to say about. While I try to review all that I can, I can't possibly review everything, even if I wanted to force myself to. I try to be open and forthright about what's driving my feelings and what I don't like about a particular sound, artist, or record so that everybody knows where I'm coming from. I wouldn't call it impartiality, and I wouldn't call it objectivity. But I'm just trying to be as forthright as I can be, just lay all my cards out on the table.

Last but not least, let's talk album ratings. Out of the albums you've previously scored in the 0-5 range (out of 10), which of them would you elevate past a 6+/10 today?

I've done videos in the past where I've listed ten albums I would change my mind on and rank higher. For example, I'd slightly elevate Foo Fighters 'Wasting Light', Earl 'I Don't Like Shit, I Don't Go Outside,' and 2 Chainz 'Based on a T.R.U. Story'. There are plenty of records out there that have increased in terms of enjoyability. Opinions are not written in stone. If you're somebody who's always experiencing new things and open to having your mind changed, you're going to find yourself in a position whereespecially if you're reviewing 1000s of recordsyour opinions are going to change on some of them. It's just the law of averages working against you at that point. If you keep reviewing records, you're going to hit an opinion that you'll change down the road. It's inevitable. I'm honestly happy about it because I have another album I enjoy in my back pocket. I don't have to keep defending my opinion over and over again.

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Its A Labor Of Love: A Conversation With Anthony Fantano - Forbes