FAQs and Marginalia

For a pretty comprehensive rundown on who we are, where we’ve been and where we might go, it’s all pretty much covered in the About section.

For answers to just about everything related to getting reviewed or listed here, here’s our Review Policy page.

Otherwise, if what you need to know isn’t answered here, you can always email us.

Q: WTF? What happened to you guys? Is this blog still active?

A: Absolutely. Lucid Culture simply had a shift in focus – you could say that after more than four years, we finally got some focus. Over that time, it became impossible to ignore the fact that while the classical and jazz crowds that follow us also have an interest in rock music, that feeling isn’t reciprocated nearly as much by the rock crowd. So we moved all the rock, along most of the country, and reggae, and other stuff that could be considered rock-related, to our new, younger sister blog New York Music Daily. NYMD has also taken over pretty much everything else that’s New York-centric, including the monthly NYC live music calendar, along with most concert coverage. If you’re looking for rock, you should head there; if jazz and classical are your thing, stick around, there’s a lot here that you might like.

Q: Why has your daily 1000 Best Albums of All Time countdown stalled out at #485? Why don’t you keep it going?

A: Keep asking that question and we might. As you might already know, the Best Albums of All Time list is a spinoff of our 666 Best Song of All Time countdown, which was very popular while we were putting it up one song a day back in 2008 and 2009. For some reason – probably because albums are considered passe, and the fact that we still cover any albums at all – the Best Albums countdown never caught on to the extent that the Best Songs list did. And in case you were suspecting, both of those lists were gimmicks designed to increase traffic here as well as to provide something new and fresh for the front page here every day, when there wasn’t other content ready to go. And these days, anyway, New York Music Daily has taken over the responsibility of having something brand-new ready to go each and every day.

Q: Why did you get rid of the “sneak peek at upcoming coverage at Lucid Culture” page?

A: Because at this point in time, with coverage here much more focused on jazz, classical and world music, the “upcoming at Lucid Culture” page isn’t really necessary anymore. If you like any of those styles, you at least have an idea of what’s coming here.

Q: Free mp3s! Free mp3s! We want our free mp3s, where are they?

A: There’s this wonderful, newfangled contraption called a link. Lots of them here. Depending on what browser you’re using, they may be lit up in blue or green. When you click on them they’ll frequently take you somewhere you can get one, whether it’s a torrent site or elsewhere. Please remember that not everybody has a good broadband connection, and the more bells and whistles we have on the page, the harder it is for people who have dodgy wifi to access us.

Q: Where are the photos? Graphics? Widgets galore? Something other than text? C’mon, we’re not in the 19th century anymore.

A: You’ve just stumbled upon the one-and-only text-only blog in all of cyberspace. Imagine that! For awhile here, it was “um, we ought to put up some photos sometime.” Then a year went by (a year in blog time is the equivalent of what, forty in reality?) and still no photos. So it became our shtick. We’re sticking with it, for better or worse.

Q: Some of the links to reviews listed in the site index are dead. Can you help?

A: Try copying and pasting the link into your browser first – that ought to work. If not, let us know.

Q: Some of the information in a review or article is inaccurate. Can you correct this?

A: Absolutely. Please let us know, via the comment button at the bottom of the page.

Q: I’ve sent you six emails suggesting that you review my band and I still haven’t heard back from you. What’s up with that, or are you just plain rude?

A: If you’ve sent us six emails and we haven’t gotten back to you…hmm…remember, we get tons of inquiries like yours. Most of what we review is pretty edgy: maybe you’re not. That would explain a lot. Or maybe we’d rather not come right out and tell you how much you suck – we hardly ever publish bad reviews. Whatever the reason, if you’ve been bugging us for months and we haven’t responded…you get the picture…we hope.

Q: I am the owner of a club listed on the Venues page and object to the way you characterized it [we actually got an email like this once].

A: Tough cookies. You might want to take our comments to heart and fix everything that’s wrong with your place. Or maybe you should just close down.

Q: You reviewed my band last year. Can you do it again?

A: Maybe. Your chances of getting us to do that increase the better you get, or the more diverse you’ve become, or if you’ve just fired your whole band (just kidding about that last one). But don’t be offended if we don’t: we’re trying to cover an awful lot of ground here, with limited time and resources.

Q: What’s with the monicker? Lucid Culture, lol!

A: Hey, most of the good internet names were taken and this wasn’t. Actually, we chose it because in the beginning we thought it would generate traffic (it did, for about a week).

Q: You plug your friends’ bands, don’t you? Isn’t that a conflict of interest?

A: Duh, of course we plug our friends’ bands. What kind of friends would we be if we didn’t? As far as a conflict of interest is concerned, everybody plugs their friends, no matter how sanctimoniously they may preach about “journalistic ethics.” We’re just shameless about it. If you don’t take everything you read – whether here or elsewhere – with a grain of salt, you’re beyond help.

Q: Why can’t I put up a blurry cellphone photo here showing me nodding off at last week’s Cold War Kids show?

A: Dude, there are a zillion blogs where you can graffiti to your heart’s desire. Not this one. Spare us. Please.

Q: What’s up with the hodgepodge of fonts, type sizes and styles?

A: Looks like you just stumbled across an older page here which somehow missed our ongoing site-wide facelift.  If you see something like that, let us know via the comments button at the bottom of the page. Thanks for putting up with the old lo-fi look for as long as you did.