The Great E Mail Challenge (Part 1) - The Conclusion & Email #4

The opening line of this blog was due to say something along the lines of “So, we failed again.” Except we didn’t.

After just 3 emails, we’re proud, but also a little gutted to announce that already the first part of our challenge is over. Before we had even got going with some of the comedy letters we had planned, the bloody NME have only gone and printed our email about bands being over exposed and not being allowed to make mistakes from two weeks ago as their Letter of the Week. They’ve edited it slightly for grammar (never the strong point here) and to reduce the word count slightly which we feel is acceptable. But what rankles is that they only went and got our name wrong. Who the hell is 'Gary' ? Idiots. And then they had the cheek to adjust our description of Robert Smith of The Cure as Fat Bob, to just Bob. We think they got scared that uncle Bob might send his goth lawyers round to burn down NME towers if they insulted his ‘Godlike Genius.’

We quite liked the response of Emily Mackay, this weeks letters editor to our little rant. It almost made us laugh. This is what she wrote.

“There’s no mystique anymore because of Twitter? Nonsense! You want to create a bit of enigmatic magic, just put up a Tweet that says “I’m doing something. You don’t know what it is, but it’s incredibly exciting and glamorous.” Instant stardust - EM. Just a shame you can't get my name right Emma, sorry Emily.

So before Breaking More Waves moves on to Part 2 of our email challenge, which will be revealed in a couple of weeks time, here is our final E Mail to the NME.

Dear NME

Thank you for publishing my email last week as ‘Letter of the week.’ What I don’t understand is how you can call yourselves journalists and then get basic facts wrong. You printed my name as Gary. Who the hell is that ? Idiots! I demand a full page apology and your weeks wages paid to a charity of my choice. Otherwise those pictures of you naked, laying in a pool of vomit after the NME Awards will be on their way to the internet.

Love Robin, Portsmouth

What disappoints us most about the end of this challenge is that we managed to get ‘Letter of the Week’ without even trying that hard. As we said a few weeks ago in our opening piece on this challenge, times have changed and the NME has undoubtedly dumbed down. This was just too easy. Our next challenge may be a little harder......

The Great E Mail Challenge (Part 1) - Email #3

Our second email to the NME failed to be published again. We knew this wasn't going to be easy. We're in for the long slog. So this week we're on the attack....

Dear NME

Mark Beaumont spouts utter rubbish. According to him the BRITS are for people who don’t like music. Isn’t that rather insulting to the readership of the NME ? In 2008 some band called The Arctic Monkeys won 2 BRIT awards and then won 3 at the NME Awards. This year Kings Of Leon won 2 BRITS and an NME Award. Conclusion ? Well, it doesn’t take an idiot to draw one, so it shouldn’t even be hard for Beaumont.

Robin, Portsmouth

The Great E Mail Challenge (Part1) - Email #2

Of course we never expected our first email to be published. We would have been disappointed if it had; the first part of the challenge would have been over too quickly for the development of this series to run. So it was actually a feeling of relief last Wednesday when we opened the NME letters page to see that our first attempt at correspondence with the folks at IPC Productions had failed.

Without any further planning, our second email is flying across the interweb. More comments on the state of music from Breaking More Waves. We'll continue this for a few more yet, before changing strategy.

Dear NME

Oh the irony. In last weeks issue you jumped on the bandwagon and ran a two page article on Twitter, whilst on the back page your godlike genius Robert Smith of The Cure said that he felt sympathy for artists starting out now, knowing that everything they do is out there for everyone to look at. Personally I’m with Fat Bob on this one. With Myspace, Facebook, Bebo and now Twitter, bands have no mystique anymore. Everything is known and there is no room for mistakes. Acts are being dropped before their album is even released. It’s a harsh harsh world for bands, and the chances of any of the indie hopefuls of today being around as long as The Cure are as slim as Kate Moss’s pinkie.

Robin, Portsmouth

The Great E Mail Challenge (Part 1) - Email #1

Seven minutes after posting the last blog, Breaking More Waves has composed an email to the NME and pressed send. We've started with our own style. Chances of publication ? Very little.

Dear NME

Your article on nostalgia was so wide of the mark that I wonder if you actually love music at all. Sure, some music is an exciting quick fling, a one night stand soon to be discarded. However other songs are long term partners, that maybe at first don’t stick their tongue straight down your throat, but gradually develop a relationship with the listener that one grows to love. Not every ‘guilty pleasure’ is liked in the first place, but some old songs develop a fondness, not through nostalgia, but through a gradual appreciation of a good tune that was maybe missed the first time around.

If the discovery rush of the new is all you want (I guess you are called NME so fair play) then you risk missing some of the most beautiful and amazing music that may be right under your nose. And remember as the volume of music and fashion out there continues to grow, it is becoming harder and harder to create something new. History has a way of repeating itself, almost everything is based in nostalgia these days.

PS: Dancing with hobbits to ‘You Can't Hurry Love' did sound pretty scary though. Were you on prescription medication by any chance ?

Robin, Portsmouth

E Talking - The Great E Mail Challenge (Part 1)

Remember letters? Scrappy pieces of paper, covered in scrawls of ink, placed in an envelope, sealed with a loving kiss and then delivered by Mr Postman? Yes, in the dim reaches of history people used to send them all the time.

Then the internet came along and everything changed.

Or did it? The basic philosophy of communicating an idea, thoughts, or a message to someone remains the same. Things just got quicker.

Back in olden times Breaking More Waves used to write lots of letters. We used to write to bands, record labels and music publications; but for some reason we seem to have stopped doing so. Maybe we had more time back then. Life wasn’t quite as busy or rushed. There’s a quandary; the internet revolution meant that everything happens quicker, supposedly more efficiently, and yet we seem to have less time to do the things we used to do.

Of course this may not be because of the internet. As one ages, relationships, families and careers expand, demanding more of our time. But here at Breaking More Waves we miss writing letters. So it’s time for a change.

And so it begins. Breaking More Waves great E Mail challenge. It’s a bit of a boy project really.

Our mission is simple; to write like we used to, but in the modern efficient way of electronic communication. An email is still a letter of sorts. In fact, the NME still contains a Letters Page, even although most of the items published are emails.

We used to write to the NME a lot. Several of our letters got published. There was a skill in writing an NME letter. Hit the criteria they were looking for and you could almost guarantee publication. That however was over a decade ago, when the NME letters page was full of intellectual debate and politics. Today however the NME letters page is full of comments such as “OMG NME what the hell is going on??? Alexa Chung is best dressed???” and “Thank you NME! I’ve just discovered MGMT and they’re amazing.” Times have changed and the NME has undoubtedly dumbed down.

So it’s time for a challenge.

The strap line for the NME letters page is You Write It, We Print It, Everyone Argues. That sounds good. It’s time for Breaking More Waves to take that on. I’ll write it, they print it, everyone argues. It’s Part 1 of The Great E Mail Challenge. We shall write to the NME. One email a week. Until we get published. Have we still got the knack? How long will it take? It’s time to find out…… It’s time to get writing.