ION INDIE MAGAZINE October 2014, Volume 5 | Page 70

THE END OF Fragmentation By DJ RTFX Over the past few weeks since my last article, I have seen a trend that at the time I thought was something new. I discovered that is has been a growing trend and needs to STOP--IMMEDIATELY! As I stated in my last article, there are different businesses and entities that are supposedly supporting Independent music and need to work collectively to bring the best value to artists and grow the scene. Unfortunately, this doesn’t happen due to the greed of the almighty dollar and not shared prosperity. My direction is now focused on the collective. While we think all of us are working together to support Independent music and we all have our best intentions in mind and heart, when we break off to do OUR OWN thing, we fragment what the COLLECTIVE is all about. There are ways you can work within a collective effort and have your voice be heard. It is also easy to see who is in it for themselves and NOT the collective Indie effort. Now of course, we are a Radio Station who provides a service to the listeners as well as the artists. With good numbers and some advertisers to support what we do, we give it RIGHT BACK to the community. When we BUY the EPs and CDs for airplay, we PAY for the shows we attend and we BUY the merch and wear it proudly-all in the effort that the Station and MISSION can continue to grow. When--and this happens all the time--someone decides to take what they have learned or acquaintances they have met through whatever collective they are associated with and think they can go on their own and grow THEIR own scene (and that’s the key word--THEIR own scene), they fragment what the collective is all about…and the REAL GROWTH of what we are all trying to do in this world called Independent Music.