By Jodelen O. Ortiz
Music is in the air we breathe. There are many genres to choose from: classical, country, folk, pop, jazz, rock, grunge, psychedelic, RnB, techno, Americana and many more. In every genre, an artist rules out the others. And an artist become an icon, or to some, a demi-god.
I can be a fan of someone who has just released his first album or an artist who was been dead for decades, some musician who wasn’t heard of by others. One common denominator: I love the artist and his song and that alone mattered, that alone was reason to be his fan or more so, to aspire to be his Number One Fan.
Every music fan has the ultimate dream of meeting with his favorite performing band or artist and witnessing them perform live in concert. Every artist would like to know and meet his Number One Fan and Ultimate Follower - the one who buys every album released, keeps himself updated with the latest news about Mister (or Miss) Favorite Artist and who would surely break a neck or slap he-who-drops-a-negative-comment about the favored musician.
Among college students, there is a very thin line between fanaticism and cultic worship, seriously. In my experience as a Techno student, (Techno is the choice of students in coolly addressing the College of Engineering and Architecture), Black Trenchcoat Mafia does not refer to the group of students who terrorized Columbine High School, in our school it refers to the followers, or rather worshippers, of the rock band Metallica, Black Sabbath, Razorback and other deep-throat rock icons.
They, lovers and defenders of hard rock, wear black from shoes to lipsticks and makeup. Freedom of choice gives them immunity from prejudice.
Around the world, their number grows and quite surely, big enough to keep the careers of their favorite artists. Fans inspire publication and selling of posters, magazines and books about famous artists. Some Number One Fans, keep albums of articles and pictures of their Favorite Artist while some believes the world should know he is Favorite Artist’s Number One Fan by the print in her bag, the wallpaper of tiled artist’s photos, or a website dedicated for such an artist.
I can go on enumerating what extent other aspiring number one fans go and I’ll end up unsatisfied because it would remain lacking – for in the world of aspiring fans there is always a unique way of snatching the distinction from another person. Thank goodness, WikiMusicGuide comes with a solution.
WikiMusicGuide is a free music guide for music fans created by music lovers. It features mainstream and independent artists and bands of all genres. The main page contains a Featured Album / Site, Featured Upcoming / Indie Artist and Featured User / NumberOneFan for the week, all taken from its fast-growing pages. The Top Ten Songs and Top Ten Albums are also updated frequently. A highly visitor-friendly site, WikiMusicGuide also includes Current Events and What’s Popular in the music scene.
The NumberOneFan (NOF) Awards has been officially started on February 23 of this year with the following basic criteria: Make sure the favorite artist’s page is always factual and updated, free of vandalisms and plagiarism. Update includes albums, singles, tracks, personal and career information or biography, all information that are allowed by the Favorite Artist for publication. Copying content from other sites or plagiarism is a no-no and will automatically disqualify the candidate from winning the NOF.
Only those who are chosen by the Admin Board are given the prestigious NOF logo with authorization for use to personal sites and as email signatures, provided they state the name of the artist to whom they are NumberOneFans. Also there can only be one NOF per artist and from their rank, one is chosen to be featured on the WikiMusicGuide homepage every other week.
The first awardees were Kellan and Outofthesky (Charity McKay), NumberOneFans of Fall Out Boy and Madonna, respectively.
Outofthesky, is a 17-year old Southern American WikiGuide who started liking Madonna just last year but did not relent supporting the artist ever since. She watched the “1989″ episode of the VH1 I Love the ’80s series, with one segment dealing with Madonna’s “Like a Prayer” music video and the subsequent controversy with Pepsi and the Roman Catholic Church.
“The actual video was never shown in its entirety, however, so I decided to find it online. I was kind of mesmerized by it, and I ended up watching other Madonna music videos, too. It all just kind of snowballed after that,” she said in a WikiMusicGuide interview. “My favorite song, overall, is “Drowned World/Substitute for Love”, and my favorite album is Like a Prayer.” Outofthesky shows us that the NumberOneFan is not discriminatory in age and duration of fanhood.
Kellan6, born Kellan, likes Fall Out Boy because of the band’s complex drumming, great vocals, and above all, the genius lyrics, written by Pete Wentz. He has created and has been regularly updating the FOB artist page and six album pages.
What WikiMusicGuide has provided is the criteria for choosing NumberOneFans who express their support to artists online. It does not determine who among the general public is the Number One Fan, especially those who do not use the internet or the web. In this case, the gauge would be very basic and simple: Who knows the complete biography of his favorite artist? Who knows all the albums and songs of his favorite artist? Who knows the completed, present and upcoming events and activities of such artist? In short, who knows his favorite artist by his whole heart?
As with WikiMusicGuide, it promises to surprise the music fans. Its ultimate goal is to channel NumberOneFans to their Favorite Artists.
By the way, did I mention that WikiMusicGuide is Filipino-owned and majority of its editors are Filipinos? Surprise. It is a brainchild of Bienvenido David III who is presently based in Connecticut. Definitely, a site we Filipinos could be proud of.
Tags: Philippine Music News, Philippine Music Industry, Filipino Music Fans, Philippine Music Guide
About Jodelen Ortiz: .
March 20th, 2007 at 8:40 am
i agree. it is a very user-friendly site and you can access most of the things you love about music. as number one fan, music fans make their idols more known to the world!