When I first started doing reviews, I chose to write them on my own personal website for a few reasons. I was really focused on having an original style; there were a shit ton of music critics on YouTube when I started doing this in late 2014, and there are even more now. Because of the manner in which I form my opinions and experience albums, I realized that I would basically be ripping off Big Quint, which at the time seemed like a really bad thing. I personally still think it’s a bad thing, but apparently nobody else does because there are a fuck ton of Big Quint clones on YouTube now. There might have been a couple back when I first started, but now there are literally… Well… I don’t know exactly how many there are. I’m assuming there are at least 100 though. Also, even if I did make videos like that, they would be boring as shit. My reactions are rarely as over the top as his. 90% of my videos would just be me staring at my computer and saying “…ehhh this is alright I guess.” I wouldn’t be able to hold anyone’s attention. Later on I considered doing more traditional reviews where I just give my overall thoughts on a project, like many other reviewers do. That leads me into my next issue though. If you know me, you know I have low self esteem, and it’s mainly because I don’t actually think I speak very well. I’m not really good at carrying a conversation with people in real life, so I sure as hell wouldn’t be able to carry a conversation with myself. I mean, I guess I’m kinda doing that right now, but it’s far easier when I’m given time to think about what I write down. If I did this in a video format, there would probably be a jump cut between every other thought I expressed. Having it written down like this leads to a much smoother experience for my audience. There is one major downside to doing written reviews that I’ve discovered, and it’s that niggas don’t like reading. You may be an exception, but there are a shit ton of people who would rather just listen to people tell them what they think rather than read a full article about it. Traffic on this website has been growing, but that shit is slow as fuck. Don’t get me wrong, I have WAAAY more views than I did in 2015, but compared to a lot of other critics who I know that are on YouTube that started around the same time as me, I’ve been left in the dust. Me and Luke James actually started doing reviews around kind of the same time. Right now that dude has over 20K subscribers. Guess how many followers this blog has. Hint: it’s less than 1% of that. Views aren’t what I do this for, and if they were I would’ve sold out and turned into an exaggerated reaction channel who constantly makes videos about mainstream hits by now. Sometimes I just wish there was more discourse sparked by my work though. Thankfully many of the people who do follow this blog consistently give their own thoughts on whatever I’m discussing, which I’ll always appreciate. I honestly stopped checking how many views I get each day a while ago. These days I probably only glance at my views once every two or three months. I care less about views and more about having actual discussions with people who stumble upon my reviews. Anyway, another benefit of doing written reviews that I sometimes take for granted is the fact that I can do it whenever I want, and however I want. When I reviewed To Pimp a Butterfly, I was literally writing about the album while butt ass naked, sitting on the couch in my bedroom at like three in the morning. I do a lot of my reviews on the toilet too. Buffalo Staple can’t do shit like that. I mean, he could I guess. He won’t though. Another thing I’ve noticed is that a lot of video reviewers who are around my age seem to be getting really exhausted and burnt out by it. You can tell it’s taking a toll on them mentally as well. I’m not gonna name anyone specifically, but if you follow the community you might have an idea of who I have in mind. I mean, I guess the same thing could potentially happen to me; it’s not really an issue that’s specific to YouTube. I feel like making well produced videos would really just take way more effort than what I currently do though. I most likely wouldn’t be posting reviews as consistently as I currently do, and I’m already really far behind. I probably won’t even get around to hearing Bandana until September or maybe even October. Oh, I almost forgot; one thing I should probably mention is that I do actually have a YouTube channel that I use to post videos. They’re just shitposts though. One thing I’ve learned about shitposting is that the person who creates them is usually very proud of their work, while everyone else hates it. That just makes it even more fun though. Here’s one of the first shitposts I ever made.

Man, there are a lot of great memories I have with that video. Anyway, just to recap, I don’t wanna be a generic clone of every other YouTube critic, I wouldn’t be interesting to watch, and I like being able to do my reviews in the nude. Maybe at some point in the future I’ll decide to give the video format a shot, but that’s very very very very very very unlikely.