Popjustice

Popjustice
URL popjustice.com
Commercial? Yes
Type of site Music blog, online forum
Registration Forum required
Available language(s) English
Owner Peter Robinson (editor)
Created by Peter Robinson, various
Launched 2000
Alexa rank 37,938 (WW)
3,864 (UK)
20,578 (US)[1]
Current status Online

Popjustice is a music website founded in 2000 and is the work of UK freelance music journalist Peter Robinson, who has worked for NME, The Guardian, Attitude and many others.

The website seeks to celebrate commercial popular music and does this using humour, user interaction, and contacts within the music industry. Its writing style has been compared favourably by a number of critics to that of the now defunct Smash Hits magazine, in that it mixes a passion for Pop music with a surreal and biting wit.

Support of Debbie Harry, Rachel Stevens, Kylie Minogue, Sugababes, Sophie Ellis-Bextor, Jamelia, Busted, McFly and Girls Aloud prompted some to suggest financial links to Universal Music, although this was denied by Robinson who pointed out that Popjustice is run independently. Though accusations of bias towards acts who offer exclusive persist.

The website was relaunched in January 2006 with more features, music downloads and online shop. In November 2006 Popjustice won a Record of the Day PR & Music Journalism Award in the Best Online Music Publication category, with another individual award going to Peter Robinson in the Breaking Music: Writer Of The Year category.

Recent years the site has been criticised for losing touch with the voice of the pop listening people and for a shift to a more 'media eyed view' however the forum still remains popular with pop fans.

Contents

Popjustice £20 Music Prize

In 2003, Popjustice set up the Popjustice £20 Music Prize, in order to find the best British pop single of the year, as a parody of the Mercury Music Prize and held on the same night, usually at a bar in Central London.

Year Artist Song
2003 Girls Aloud No Good Advice
2004 Rachel Stevens Some Girls
2005 Girls Aloud Wake Me Up
2006 Girls Aloud Biology
2007 Amy Winehouse Rehab
2008 Girls Aloud Call the Shots
2009 Girls Aloud The Promise
2010 Example Kickstarts
2011 The Saturdays Higher

Popjustice books and albums

A series of Popjustice books called Popjustice Idols were published in March 2006. They are illustrated by David Whittle. Drawing inspriration from Roger Hargreaves' Mr Men books, these feature amusing looks at the lives of pop stars. The initial titles were Kylie Minogue, Madonna, Robbie Williams and Eminem with a Take That version released in April 2006. Four more were released in November 2006 featuring Pete Doherty, Elton John, Britney Spears and Michael Jackson, and there is talk of this range expanding into a TV format[2] A compilation album was also released in October 2006, titled Popjustice: 100% Solid Pop Music.

References

  1. ^ "popjustice.com". Alexa Internet. http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/popjustice.com#trafficstats. Retrieved 2010-01-26. 
  2. ^ *Observer newspaper article - Peter Robinson on Popjustice (March 2006).

External links