While many western Massachusetts artists remain underground, rock critic finds solace in writing about the local acts that perk up his ears in his newsletter, Freak Scene.
Freak Scene is one of few places for broad coverage of varied musical acts in the Pioneer Valley. The newsletter takes submissions directly from bands who email Danton, with the critic selectively publishing articles on records that he enjoys.
Danton said he produces Freak Scene for creative and communal fulfillment rather than for financial gain.
“Financially, it doesn’t help very much. From a creative standpoint, it helps a ton,” Danton said. “I am
writing what I want to write about when I want to write about it.”
So how does a newsletter like Freak Scene gain traction in today’s media ecosystem? It doesn’t happen rapidly – at least not outside of the small niche Danton has cultivated. According to Danton, the newsletter only has 600 subscribers, but he has noticed a growth in the publication’s readership through word of mouth.
To Danton, Freak Scene is a passion project, and like most passion projects, it doesn’t make a lot of money. The newsletter’s only form of monetization comes through donations.
He said that having financial freedom allows him to continue pursuing his passions in rock criticism, saying, “I’m fortunate in that I’m married to someone with a stable income, so we’re not relying on my freelance income to make ends meet.”
As arts reporting becomes scarce and the music industry has become dominated by streaming platforms, rock critics have become an endangered breed. While mainstream acts can reap the rewards of their music through the accessibility of streaming, smaller artists find it difficult to stand out.
In Danton’s mind, this is where he comes in. His job is to filter through the vast amount of music available and spread the word about local acts. By finding musicians with varying degrees of publicity, discussing their work online and pointing listeners in their direction, critics like Danton make music more accessible, regardless of how much mainstream traction the artist has.
“A local musician who I’m interviewing may not be [famous] now or ever, but they are still putting effort into their creativity,” Danton said.
While Danton would like to increase the accessibility of local music, he feels promoting his journalism on social media is a tricky business.
“The difficulty is adapting yourself to the landscape in a way that is dynamic and interesting,” Danton said.
When considering the possibility of incorporating video into his work, Danton recalled his brief time working with Anthony Fantano when the two were on Connecticut Public Radio. Danton felt that Fantano’s energy on the radio was better suited for video-based criticism. Written criticism, conversely, is what Danton has been versed in for years.
Danton added that “[Video criticism] doesn’t feel like me. There’s a performance element of that that I’m not sure I want to develop.”
Danton’s writing process hasn’t changed much since he worked as the rock critic for The Hartford Courant, one of Connecticut’s biggest newspapers.
“A lot of [writing] is just trial and error,” Danton said. “You start writing a sentence and erase it and start writing another sentence and maybe tinker with it, and then decide that ‘no, that should be the second sentence.’”
In a review of Trash Panda Kill Kill, a western Mass. hard rock outfit, Danton described the group’s “razor-blade guitar” sound and compared it to “a muscle car … smashing through a closed garage door.”
Danton packs in a vivid description of Trash Panda Kill Kill’s “lean, loud and sweaty” identity as a band, complete with an embedded link to the group’s Bandcamp, in just five paragraphs. His description of the music gives a preview of the audio to the audience, all without having to listen to a single note.
Google Search yields few results for Trash Panda Kill Kill, but their feature in Freak Scene is among them. This gives the group an increased presence online, however small.
“What I hope that I’m doing is being the guy waving the flag like, ‘Hey, look at this!’” Danton said, expressing his hope to bring prominence to artists who may not be in the mainstream.
With the advent of Freak Scene, Danton feels like he knows the Pioneer Valley’s music better, saying “I’m back in touch with it in a way that I wasn’t for a while…[I am] surprised and delighted at how much there is that is great.”
Even so, there are areas of the Valley’s music scene where Danton feels he’s barely scratched the surface.
“There are people doing stuff in [Veterans of Foreign Wars] halls that I don’t know about and basement shows that I don’t know about,” Danton said.
In Danton’s eyes, western Massachusetts and Connecticut flourish with sonic expression, but suffer from a lack of exposure. Danton has named groups including Perennial, Winterpills and Gold Dust as being among his favorite bands from the Valley. Combined, they have garnered less than 30,000 monthly listeners on Spotify.
One thing remains certain: Danton feels blessed to be part of the Valley’s music scene.
“People are wanting to boost each other here. It’s not competitive in that sense,” Danton said. “And I think that’s good … It’s like, ‘What are we all doing to make this scene cool?’”
Seamus Q. Kelley can be reached at [email protected].