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| Photo credit: Sam Horine (@samhorine) |
Nora Walker started I Rock I Roll seven years ago after a stint as a music publicist. Although her career has since taken a different path, the blog has become a popular destination for music lovers and she has grown into local expert on the New York music scene.
I had the chance to meet Nora in New York at a John Legend and The Roots concert HP sponsored. I also owe her a thank you (and probably a drink) for introducing us to one of the Lower East Side’s cooler spots after the concert. Nora and I both have official gigs in social media, and I found it interesting how her blog has helped her career. Here’s her story.
How did I Rock I Roll get started? Have you been at it a long time?
I started writing my blog just under seven years ago. Having been laid off from my first out of college job as a music publicist and finding myself young and unemployed in New York, I decided to start exploring what the city had to offer while I tried to figure out what I wanted to do with my life/career. I started going to see a bunch of shows at venues like Pianos, Mercury Lounge and Sin-e and found myself discovering tons of new local bands and a scene that I had no idea existed before. As a result, I befriended some cool local music bloggers who inspired me to start my own site. At the time, most of my blogging was devoted to covering my "somewhat irresponsible" evenings running around the East Village and staying out too late, but eventually I focused more, started really covering shows, and ended up getting a full time job at a record label.
What about your approach makes your blog unique from other music blogs?
I'm sure I'm not really that unique in this, but my biggest goal is to just write about the music that I actually genuinely like or love. There are a lot of blogs who cover every new item and show or are super genre specific, and they do a great job of that. For me, it really comes down to my not feeling so much that I'm a critic or a news resource but more like I'm someone who just really loves music, is around it and listening to it all the time, and wants to share that with people.
You recently told The Deli Magazine that Oberhofer was your favorite band from CMJ 2010. Outside of CMJ, what would you say the stand out album and songs are of 2010?
Well I just posted my top 20 albums of 2010 list (check it out here.) As far as albums go I was completely head over heels for The National, Yeasayer, Hurts and The Joy Formidable this year. I definitely also had a lot of fun with acts like Sleigh Bells, Penguin Prison, and Tame Impala. As a DJ, picking a favorite song is almost impossible for me! According to my last.fm profile the song I have listened to the most in the past 12 months is the Washed Out remix of "Despicable Dogs" by Small Black, so I may have to go with that, although lately I have had an impossible time not listening to Barbra Streisand by Duck Sauce, that song is like crack!
You moved to New York from Chicago. How do the music scenes in each city compare?
To be fair, most of my experience in Chicago is from when I was 18 and younger. Going to see Everclear at the Riv or Smashing Pumpkins at the United Center when I was a teenager doesn't really qualify me as a scene expert. However, I do think that Chicago has an amazing music scene, and a lot of my favorite bands from the past ten years like The Changes and Skybox are Chicago-based. The scene there just seems a lot smaller and closer knit from what I have experienced, while New York's music scene is huge and often overwhelming to navigate because there is just so much going on.
You also have an interesting day job as a social media strategist at Morpheus Media. How has your experience as editor of I Rock I Roll helped your career?
Funny enough, I actually got my job in large part because of my blog! After tweeting that I was looking for a new gig and really hoping for a career change given the music industry slump, one of my readers messaged me about an opportunity at her company and I interviewed and got the job! Two years later I absolutely love what I do and still somehow manage to find the time to keep up with I Rock I Roll - although a lot of my tweets definitely talk about the amazing world of social media just as much as they do about the next up and coming band I'm into. I've found that working in this industry it's really important to be passionate about something and curious about everything, so it definitely helps!
You also worked as a record label rep for some time. How was that experience?
Honestly I have mixed feelings about the time I spent working at a major label. While I was there I saw a lot of great shows, met amazing people and really learned a lot about how the industry works. That being said, it also kind of took a lot of what I loved about music away from me and I quickly learned that what I love about a band or artist and what a label is looking for in order to sign them and make money off them are very different things. In the end, I'm definitely glad that I had the opportunity to work there when I did, but it just wasn't the right career for me. Writing a music blog gives me just the right balance.
And what’s the story behind fetching vegan pizza for “some of your favorite (and not so favorite) rock stars?”
I wish I could elaborate on that, but "some of your favorite rock stars" probably wouldn't be too happy with me! Let's just say that vegan pizza is really hard to find when you aren't a vegan yourself and I'm glad I only had to do that once.
By now you’ve had a chance to play around with the Envy 14 Beats Edition laptop. What are your first thoughts?
Seriously I have gotten so many compliments, "ooos" and "ahhhs" from my co-workers since the laptop arrived. The design of it is really slick looking and polished, and so far it runs amazingly quickly, which is a big plus for me since I tend to run my computers to the max. I'm a crazy multi-tasker. Also the hard drive on this thing is HUGE, which is perfect for my gigantic music collection.
