RA News
I was the News Editor of Resident Advisor from April 2018 – October 2020, when I was made redundant due to the pandemic (deep sigh). There, I managed a team of staff and freelance writers based around the world for 24/7 news coverage. I wrote and edited thousands (I mean that very literally) of news posts ranging from quick-hit blogs to longer, in-depth news features.
The wide-range of topics I/we covered included: music releases and updates, local government policy news, venues/events, obituaries, streaming, and the culture at large. Of course, my last months at RA were filled with wall-to-wall pandemic coverage as it ravaged the industry and artists’ livelihoods while the future of venues hung on the government‘s every move.
I couldn’t possibly link to every story I wrote and edited, but please find a thorough yet incomplete outline of my work at RA after the jump.
A summary of my bylined RA news stories:
- Covid-19 Pandemic
- Coronavirus latest: A thorough news log of key Covid-19 pandemic news updates related to the music and events industries, running throughout 2020
- London venues adapt in attempt to survive pandemic
- England’s pubs and bars could face £1K fine for loud music and ‘allowing dancing’
- UK government instates 10 PM curfew on bars, pubs and restaurants as Covid-19 cases rise
- Canavan’s Peckham Pool Club will close tonight after UK’s new Covid-19 jobs support scheme fails nightlife
- New UK report proposes measures for ‘COVID-secure opening of nightclubs and venues’
- UK chancellor Rishi Sunak suggests musicians should retrain to find new jobs in pandemic
- A third of UK musicians are considering ‘abandoning’ their music career due to the pandemic
- UK chancellor Rishi Sunak expands new jobs support scheme after controversial week
- UK government offers self-employed workers 80 percent of earnings as country goes into coronavirus lockdown
- UK nightlife community urges government to include clubs in £1.57 billion pandemic relief package for the arts
- Arts Council England will provide £500 million in grants to cultural organisations
- Netherlands allocates €482 million in pandemic relief for cultural sector
- Switzerland orders 300 Zurich clubgoers to quarantine after one tests positive for coronavirus
- Key South Korean venues reopen this weekend after coronavirus-related closures
- UK Government & Policy
- Hackney Council to vote on controversial licensing policy for new clubs and pubs tonight
- London Night Czar Amy Lamé responds to criticism around controversial new Hackney licensing policy
- We Love Hackney fights to overturn council’s controversial licensing policy
- London music community urges Parliament that cause of knife crime is deeper than drill and grime
- London mayor approves Elephant and Castle shopping centre demolition plan, affecting local nightlife
- Proposed Brexit UK immigration policy will have ‘devastating impact,’ music industry warns
- DJs to stand against Brexit at Gideön’s second Revolution Day protest rave
- UK Parliament committee will investigate the economic impact of streaming on musicians and labels next month
- Arts Council England allocates £1.5 million to support independent clubs and promoters
- Industry & World News
- Red Bull Music Academy and Red Bull Radio to shut down this year
- Georgia’s Minister Of Internal Affairs apologises for police raids of Tbilisi clubs
- Radar Radio suspends broadcasting after Pxssy Palace and former producer allege toxic work environment
- French Senate approves ‘anti-rave’ bill
- UK events production agency Loud Sound accused of poor training and management of emergency morgues
- Live Nation’s memo asking artists to cut fees deemed ‘exploitative’ by industry groups
- Ambient artist Klaus among protesters convicted for blocking Stansted Airport deportations
- Oramics member Avtomat arrested in Warsaw LGBTQIA+ protests
- ‘There could be 100 comas in the year’: Paris police chief reacts to rise of GBL, GHB overdoses in clubs
- Nastia, The Blessed Madonna respond to phallic, misogynist Vakula EP artwork
- Kevin Saunderson: ‘You feel like somebody is eliminating Black artists and producers from being part of the scene’
- Fundraiser aims to pay Adonis’s never-seen royalties for Trax Records releases
- FACT pivots to video, Stereogum sold back to founder
- James Blake speaks out about ‘suicidal thoughts,’ anxiety and the stigma around mental health
- Mars89 organizes protest rave in Tokyo: ‘We Dance Together. We Fight Together.’
- Providence Equity Partners’ Superstruct Entertainment buys majority stake in Sónar
- Investment firm Superstruct Entertainment buys stake in Helsinki’s Flow Festival
- BBC to close iconic Maida Vale Studios
- Music
- Blowing Up The Workshop mix series bows out after eight years
- Tri Angle Records shuts down after a decade
- Honest Jon’s opens new record shop in central London
- Afrobeats gets official UK music chart
- Freedom To Spend mines Italian composer Tiziano Popoli’s archives for new retrospective double-LP
- Ikonika, KG, Sam Binga remix Swing Ting’s debut album, 100 Dances
- Oneohtrix Point Never breaks down his Uncut Gems score in Moog documentary
- Venues, Development & Events
- What’s going on with fabric? London club wipes social media, boards up entrance in mysterious blackout
- fabric breaks silence after blackout to reveal 20th anniversary celebrations, fabric XX
- London venue FOLD ordered to shut by Newham Council over fraud allegations
- London club FOLD allowed to reopen by Newham Council during fraud investigation
- Save Nour campaign seeks to stop Brixton Market eviction by Housekeeping DJ landlord
- Sub Club doubles fundraising target, club director Usman Khushi responds to criticism
- Psychosis-causing ‘fake MDMA’ pills discovered at Parklife festival
- Gideön is taking over Soho Radio for a marathon protest party when Donald Trump visits the UK
- Police arrest five people at illegal West London rave inside abandoned Toys R Us
- Solidarity Sounds UK hosts Change The Record fundraiser for Black History Month
- Houghton Festival cancelled due to extreme weather forecast
- London gets new listening bar, Moonglow, this month
- Griessmuehle sends SOS with Save Our Spaces campaign: ‘We are in danger’
- Paris club Dehors Brut reopens after forced closure by police
- UK festival The Masked Ball could end after more than a decade due to ‘tripled’ costs, ‘guestlist culture’
- Block9’s new Glastonbury stage, IICON, is a ‘call to stop messing around on Instagram’
- Hamburg club Golden Pudel secures protection from private market with new foundation
- Amsterdam’s newest club, noorderling, is on an old pirate radio boat
- How to spot an illegal rave, according to South Wales police and ITV
- Streaming & Tech
- Obituaries
- London DJ Paul ‘Trouble’ Anderson dies
- Aretha Franklin dies aged 76
- Willie Wright has died at 80
- Andrew Weatherall has died, aged 56
- UK music community remembers DJ and record shop owner Liz Edwards
- Influential dub producer Bunny ‘Striker’ Lee has died aged 79
- Kraftwerk cofounder Florian Schneider has died aged 73
You can view an archive of my bylines via my RA and Muck Rack profiles.
A summary of my editing and commissioning work at RA that extends beyond the predictable day-to-day churn of news stories:
- Early 2020 Coronavirus pandemic coverage in South East and East Asia by a freelancer based in the region
- Other Covid-19-related coverage
- International news on relevant government moves and restrictions
- How countries plan to restart nightclubs and music festivals
- Clubs and venues respond to UK’s £1.57 billion pandemic package for the arts
- Events will return to Spain this month, with open-air events of 800 allowed in June
- Ibiza’s superclubs may not open in 2020
- Gerd Janson played a socially distanced open-air party in Germany last night
- Events will return to Spain this month, with open-air events of 800 allowed in June
- Spain to allow foreign visitors from July with no quarantine
- Berlin limits capacity for private parties amid jump in Covid-19 cases
- Berghain reopened as an art gallery today
- Seoul shutters nightclubs after spike in coronavirus infections
- Perth nightclubs reopen with minimal social distancing measures
- Berlin’s events sector edges back as Covid-19 cases rise around Germany
- Swiss club scene reopens slowly with low-capacity events and no social distancing
- France announces €2 billion cultural recovery fund
- Cancelling Ibiza summer could cost up to 4,000 nightclub jobs
- Berlin’s senate seeks open-air spaces where local clubs can host socially distanced parties
- Hundreds gather at Renegade rave in Brooklyn this past weekend
- Serbian PM urges Exit Festival to take place this August
- Ireland may allow socially distanced music festivals to take place as early as August
- Frequently updated Save Our Scene resource guides rounding up:
- Monthly Bandcamp Friday buyer’s guides
- International news on relevant government moves and restrictions
- In-depth global news stories with original reporting
- 2018 Tbilisi club police raids and follow ups
- Beirut’s nightclub district ‘wiped out’ in port explosion
- Fire hits Berlin’s Club der Visionaere
- Dekmantel faces criticism over lack of Latin American artists at 2019 festival
- Closing the RA comment section
- Opinion: Why we’re closing comments — The result of years of discussion and deliberation weighing the impact of the regrettably infamous and harmful comment section, considering possible ways forward with the feature and other future engagement avenues
- News features on new music announcements
- Too many stories covering sexual assault and harassment allegations against male DJs and producers, as well as artists and employees alleging racism against their seniors
Marissa Cetin 