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Awards Top Stories
Closing Observer Music Monthly named magazine of the year at ROTD Awards
By CMU Editorial | Published on Friday 27 November 2009
So, the great, the good, the beautiful, and I don’t know, maybe the ugly of the British music press and PR community amassed in a little bar just down the road from CMU HQ last night for the annual Record Of The Day Awards. Now in their seventh year, these are primarily voted for by media and publicity people, and celebrate the skills of those who ramble about music for a living, and those who persuade the ramblers to ramble about this rather than that.
Among the winners were the Observer Music Monthly, which was voted Magazine Of The Year just weeks after its owners, Guardian Media Group, announced they were shutting the music supplement down. Collecting his award, editor Caspar Llewellyn Smith joked that it doesn’t get better then winning the Magazine Of The Year gong at the RoTD Awards, and so now he and his team would be calling it quits.
Elsewhere Popjustice’s Peter Robinson picked up two writer of the year awards, one for Breaking Music and one Student Choice. Music critic’s music critic Alexis Petridis of The Guardian won reviewer of the year for the seventh year in a row, leading host Matt Everitt to joke that Alexis Petridis was winning the Alexis Petridis Award For Music Reviewing. While the surprise of the evening was probably Editor Of The Year, which went to the boss of one of the smaller music mags out there, Kruger Magazine.
On the PR side of the equation, the Polydor press team picked up three gongs, one for best in-house team, and two for Polydor publicist Adrian Read, who won Best In-House PR Person and Best PR Campaign For A Non-UK Act. Deserved winners I reckon, despite Team Polydor failing to fulfil an earlier commitment made to CMU via Twitter to wear their best hats to the awards event. In the end, there was not a hat in sight.
Finally, there were three student-based awards this year, supported by CMU and organised in association with our sister website CreativeStudent.net. We consulted a panel of opinion forming student journalist types about which publication and professional music writer they most admired, and NME.com and Peter Robinson came out top respectively. Meanwhile, we threw the work of a barrage of student music journalists in the direction of some pros, and they picked out Simon Catling from Student Direct in Manchester for the prestigious Student Music Journalist Of The Year award. Well done him.
Coming up, the full list of winners. But first, here’s RoTD chief Paul Scaife saying things: “The rise of digital platforms and blogs has seen the media landscape shift dramatically in recent times but this has not affected the best of UK music journalism and PR. Interest in great writing remains high and is perhaps best illustrated by the record number of votes we received this year. To properly represent the evolving media world we now inhabit we have re-introduced the ‘Best Free Magazine’ category and have launched a brand new award, ‘Best Feature’, to reflect how in-depth, intelligent music journalism deserves highlighting. The event marks a real celebration of the music media and all those who work in it”.
The full list of winners:
Student Choice Publication Of The Year: NME.Com
Student Choice Writer Of The Year: Peter Robinson
Student Music Journalist Of The Year: Simon Catling, Student Direct, Manchester Uni
Magazine Of The Year: The Observer Music Monthly
Best Music Coverage In A Newspaper: The Guardian
Best Music Coverage In The Popular Press: The Sun ‘Something For The Weekend’
Free Magazine Of The Year: The Stool Pigeon
Digital Publication Of The Year: The Quietus
Best Blog: No Pain In Pop
Feature Of The Year: Warp Records 20th Anniversary Feature – Clash Magazine, written by Matthew Bennett And Kris Needs
Live Reviews Writer Of The Year: John Doran, The Quietus, NME And Others
Record Reviews Writer Of The Year: Winner: Alexis Petridis, The Guardian
Breaking Music Writer: Peter Robinson, Popjustice
Editor Of The Year: Mike Williams, Kruger
Best Independent PR Company: Stoked
Best In-House PR Department: Polydor Records
Best Independent PR Person: Beth Brookfield, Purple PR
Best In-House PR Person: Adrian Read, Polydor
Best PR Campaign For A Breakthrough UK Act: Toast PR for Florence And The Machine
Best PR Campaign For An Established UK Act: Michael Cleary (formerly of XL Recordings now of Columbia Records) for Dizzee Rascal
Best PR Campaign For An Established Non-UK Act: Taponeswa Mavunga – Atlantic Records for Jay Z
Best PR Campaign For A Breakthrough Non-UK Act: Adrian Read – Polydor Records for Lady Gaga
The PR Reputation Management Award: Michael Cleary (Formerly of XL Recordings now of Columbia Records) – Dizzee Rascal
Outstanding Contribution To Music Journalism Award: Phil Alexander
Outstanding Contribution To PR Award: Alan Edwards
