I visited the Jann Arden site today (jannarden.com). Nice site. Very good design though there are a few artsy kind of aspects to it that make it a bit annoying. (Fonts, icons, images - everything is small. Requires some squinting.)

I think the thing that makes the site interesting is Jann herself. In other words, the content which, in this case, is essentially Jann Arden. So if you don't particularly like her you probably won't like the site. C'est la vie.

Okay ... So I'm not a huge fan of her music. This doesn't mean I dislike it. I like it quite a bit, generally, but I'm not wildly enthusiastic about it. I suppose the lyrics of her songs are what most attract me to them. There is a level of thought there, both in terms of what they are about and how they are constructed, that is largely absent in most popular music. In this sense, she's essentially a folk songwriter since this is one genre of music where people tend to think before writing.

I wonder, too, whether her fan base is attracted by the music or the personality of Jann Arden. My guess is the music, particularly the lyrics, are what first attract people. It's the person behind the music, revealed both in the songs and in the media interviews etc., that holds them. And for me, a large part of the attraction is the humour that flavours everything (though it is by no means the only thing).

Well ... just thought I'd ramble about Jann Arden for no brilliant reason. (Saw her on Bravo! last night and that sent me to the Web site and so on.)

One other thing with the site ... She has a new disc out and tour coming up and so the marketing guys to some extent have gotten their hands on the site. So there are various annoying things (not a lot) to send you to loveistheonlysoldier.com (title of the new disc). On this site, well ... you have to buy the disc in order to get access to most of the material. If I were one of the marketing guys, it's probably what I would have recommeded doing. But since I'm just a schmuck visiting Web sites, it burns my ass a bit.

The corporate bastards are waging Internet war on us and the marketing people are their suicide bombers!

Toodle-oo!!!