July 1, 2020 marked 20 years since I launched the original Muruch music blog to share music I loved with my friends. You can read some of Muruch’s history in this old post.
I had hoped to have a big celebration this month with exclusive offerings from some of the many artists I’ve featured here in the past 2 decades and a more thorough post about the long, strange trip Muruch has been. But the covid-19 pandemic put a stop to all my 2020 plans, online and off.
Muruch has survived worse–my 2004 hard drive crash, the 2008 Google battle, and the 2016 hack. But I always thought 2020 would be Muruch’s last year. Still, I wanted it to go out with a bang, not a whimper. But here we are.
I already let go of Muruch’s domain. I’ll leave the wordpress archives up as they are and I never say never, but obviously I haven’t been posting here for a while and I don’t plan to in the near future.
Since publishing my book, Give the Bard a Tetanus Shot, I’m become very active in the poetry community. Check out my author website for updates and social media links. And you can still follow @muruchblog on Twitter, though I rarely use it anymore.
A few historic Muruch memories to share:
-Muruch’s most popular posts ever were a then unknown Jordan Peele’s MadTV parody “Trapped in the Cupboard” in 2005 and Syreeta’s “Harmour Love” from the film Junebug in 2006
-My review of Vienna Teng’s Inland Territory was used as an example of excellent critical writing in a course as Maryland University
–The Office‘s Creed Bratton sang Chet Baker’s “Let’s Get Lost” to me during our wonderfully bizarre phone interview
-And I’m especially proud to have curated the Muruch for RAINN benefit album
I lack the words and time to express my gratitude to all of you readers and the artists, agents, record labels, and publishers who have supported Muruch over the past 20 years.
Muruch helped me hone my writing skills and opened so many doors for me–including become a freelance music journalist for my local newspaper, connecting with other writers in my community, and writing my book.
Special thanks to my fellow music bloggers and to Allison Crowe and her personable manager, Adrian. In addition to contributing so much great music to Muruch over the years, they’re also 2 of the kindest people I’ve ever encountered.
I’ll leave you with the Spotify playlist of songs I’ve been listening to since the start of the pandemic and some of my all-time favorite videos. Take care.
Muruch 