Blog: GRAPEVINE GROWS

A few years ago every muso had, in their back pocket, the Grapevine. At the start it was an A4 newsletter and it printed every pub gig that month, and if your gig wasn't listed the pub was empty. At our gigs the pub was always empty, so the Grapevine took a lot of un-warranted flack! And when you needed to find a new bass player or singer, that's where you looked. It instantly became a classic. All of my friends say the same. Well, of course, I'm talking with musicians of my own age. Nostalgia is not what it used to be.

Many years later I find myself working for Grapevine and I am very pleased. I am very pleased that it has the same commitment to entertainment, and I am very pleased that it is recognised as the most comprehensive FREE what's on guide in East Anglia. I see how hard The Team work to meet deadlines and I am really pleased that they take the opportunity to sponsor and support others that work to similar goals in local entertainment. Recently I have been involved in the torturous process of updating the website, which sounds really quite simple. Doesn't it? Does it?

A magazine has its own limits due to the physical issues of printing and distributing to hundreds of outlets all over East Anglia, but a website doesn't. It is instantly worldwide. I like a printed magazine as printing has been my career, but it is instantly outdated when it is off the press. A website is always alive, with the events pages changing all the time, and instant news and gossip leaping to the screen. And now we don't plan and arrange what we are going to do, we use our mobiles to catch up with friends and events at the time, out in town, on the move, leaping to our iPhone, Android or Blackberry. So, this is the new Grapevine in the back pocket where the mag used to be.

Long may people pick up the Grapevine mag in the pub and stuff it in their pocket, and I hope they do. But it is good that the Grapevine is going mobile, putting pixels on screens as well as dots on paper. The thing is for the Grapevine Team, they must maintain their standards, as an event missed from the list makes an empty pub. Mind you, there are still a few performers that regularly empty pubs, and they will still blame the Grapevine, mobile or no mobile!

Kim Williamson