Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Blackmill (musician)

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. Vanamonde (Talk) 18:46, 22 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Blackmill (musician)[edit]

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This artist is not unknown. But the subject lacks notability, due to lack of sources. My WP:BEFORE does not reveal that the subject meets WP:GNG (no in-depth coverage), WP:MUSICBIO, WP:ANYBIO, or WP:BASIC (most sources don't contribute to notability). The used sources are really bad, such as the booking agency website and edm.com, which publishes sponsored content (on their website: "In the interest of journalistic integrity we here at EDM.com are committed to the transparency of our business model. A portion of our content is sponsored by advertisers and we cover music released by the record labels with which we partner.") —Alalch E. 11:04, 1 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Bands and musicians, Music, and Scotland. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 11:28, 1 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Note, after running a check I found some promising sources. [1], [2], [3] not sure if this will help @Alalch E.: Schminnte (talk • contribs) 01:08, 5 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
- Thanks. I was aware of those sources when I nominated the article for deletion. They are not useful for establishing notability. First of all, two of those three are not reliable: onthecomeuptv.com is WP:SPS (lacks editorial oversight, anonymous posts, all bylines are "ByOTCUPTV") and possibly sponsored content; consciouselectronic.com's posts are not anonymous but it also lacks editorial oversight and resembles a blog. www.youredm.com while not looking substantially different in terms of editorial oversight is better known and seems to be accepted as a source on Wikipedia. In terms of content, these are announcements of singles and an album, which fails WP:MUSICBIO (Works consisting merely of trivial coverage, such as articles that simply report ... release information). A combination of lack of reliability and triviality renders a negative verdict on all three sources. The only source which could be considered reliable deals with the subject the least, and is the most terse. To establish notability something from more mainstream outlets is needed; and in-depth coverage, or at least more scattered coverage in reliable sources that imparts significant information equivalent to what we would get from approx. WP:THREE sources each offering in-depth coverage (WP:NBASIC) —Alalch E. 09:00, 5 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Alalch E.: Thanks for responding. Seeing as you are aware of those sources I think we should delete as the article fails WP:GNG. Schminnte (talk • contribs) 12:11, 5 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Previously nominated via WP:PROD, ineligible for soft deletion.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, ✗plicit 13:34, 8 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

keep in my opinion, the sources in the article, the ones mentioned here + few others like [4] should do the trick. Pelmeen10 (talk) 18:37, 8 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

That's not WP:RS. —Alalch E. 19:21, 8 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Keep I was surprised to see Blackmill here. I clicked on the entry and was even more surprised to see what a poorly written, woefully incomplete article this is. Blackmill is a well known entity: 3 full length albums, and his top song "Let It Be" has almost 37M listens on Spotify (despite being from 2011, before the widespread adoption of Spotify). Matter of fact, his top 5 songs have over 20M listens on Spotify (I know, probably not WP:RS too, but definitely important for GNG)... not to mention constant play throughout radio, internet radio, and concerts throughout the early-mid 2010s. IMHO, this is an article needing expansion and cleanup, not deletion.

I'm not sure what type of sources nominator is expecting, but in the EDM world, Blackmill has gotten a lot of press. Here is one such article: [5]https://www.edmsauce.com/2017/02/20/blackmill-songs/. Another article from a major EDM website: [6]https://edm.com/music-releases/blackmill-first-album-in-ten-years-home. He is the main subject here of a Billboard (a rather big name in music) article: [7]https://www.billboard.com/music/pop/john-edge-blackmill-emerald-city-premiere-7989272/. Another independent article from another major EDM site: [8]https://edmidentity.com/2021/12/27/blackmill-brings-us-home-with-new-album/. Finally, Relentless Beats, another huge player in the EDM world, has given him coverage while espousing his fundamental role in the melodic dubstep genre: [9]. There's more than plenty here for WP:GNG. 50.237.197.242 (talk) 15:26, 9 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

It's a sad affair in the form of a poorly written woefully incomplete article because the article should never have been created in the first place. Lack of notability on Wikipedia is not a judgement that someone isn't important or that an artist doesn't have listeners, it means precisely that we can't, are unable to, write reasonable encyclopedic content that amounts to something at least resembling an article. When someone thinks that we maybe can (and starts an article), but it turns out that we can't, instead of having a quasi-article that fails the expectations of our readers (like you), we delete, and that's what notability means, and is the purpose which GNG source criteria serve. I listen to a lot of electronic music myself (and the first thing I said when starting this discussion was This artist is not unknown.), but Wikipedia is encyclopedia world, not EDM world, and we need something to source information from, and that something can't be just anything, it needs to be reliable, so that readers, apart from having something to read, are also assured that what they read is reasonably authoritative. User generated content and self-published sources are not considered reliable. The sources which you mention which are already included in the article don't suffice to develop the article further, which comes from the fact that they lack in-depth coverage. The rest of the sources mentioned so far in the discussion are not reliable. Blackmill self-published his albums and other releases, and the coverage he gets is therefore also self-published and highly niche (where are at least reviews of his albums, in any music journalism outlet outside of blogs, Sputnik, and rateyourmusic?), that's just how it works in music.—Alalch E. 17:33, 9 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Several points of contention/discussion, respectfully: 1) The Billboard.com article is not a "self-published" source. The author Allison Stubblebine is one of their regular authors, and Billboard.com is a major, very reliable music source with a full editorial board (https://www.billboard.com/about-us/). 2) There is absolutely no proof at all that we cannot write reasonable encyclopedic content about this topic. It simply appears nobody has tried. Furthermore, if I'm not mistaken, it appears the article was only created on December 31, 2022! And you proposed for it's deletion the same day. Wow. It was barely a few hours old before you tried to delete it. Therefore, it has never even been given a chance to become an article. 3) I'm not sure I follow your logic that "Blackmill self-published his albums and other releases, and the coverage he gets is therefore also self-published". The separate sources independently covering his album are not self-published. Article #6 provided above from EDM.com is written by Nick Yopko. He is the associate editor of EDM.com and not affiliated in any way with Blackmill (https://edm.com/author/nick-yopko). 4) Finally, Blackmill meets multiple criteria for WP:WPMN (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability_(music)#Criteria_for_musicians_and_ensembles). He satisfies criteria #1, 7, 10, and 11. 50.237.197.242 (talk) 20:14, 9 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

2) I tried. That's why I'm the nominator here. I gave it a chance to become an article when doing WP:BEFORE. I searched the Wikipedia Library as well. I was aware of all the sources that have been mentioned so far, and that have been added to the article, I imagined how I could use them and concluded that a satisfactory article can not be written, seeing how the subject isn't notable. My work involves research and writing, I look at recent changes and see many borderline cases, have accumulated some experience dealing with them, and I can do this in well under an hour, let alone a day.

1&3) Your contentions on these points arise from your not correctly reading what I wrote I'm afraid. When I said in my last comment: The sources which you mention which are already included in the article ..., I was referring to these sources which you just mentioned in the comment which I am now replying to (I will call them sources A). The problem with sources A is that they lack in-depth coverage. I did not refer to sources A as self-published and highly niche, and I only used these attributes to describe The rest of the sources mentioned so far in the discussion (I will call those sources B). Yes Billboard.com is okay, and EDM is usable, as in not a source I would remove from the article, but is far from a good source because it generally publishes sponsored content and does not adhere to journalistic standards. They churn press releases and include some pseudo-review (usually vacuous, as is typical for such borderline music outlets) commentary in them which is always positive in tone. There is no real music criticism. But this isn't even the main point regarding Sources A -- the crucial point is that they do not even approach in-depth coverage.

4) Subject doesn't meet those criteria:

#1: ... multiple, non-trivial, published works appearing in sources that are reliable, not self-published, and are independent of the musician ... -- Clearly not the case based on what we've discussed so far.

#7: most prominent representatives of a notable style -- Which notable style? Which reliable source calls him the most prominent representative of any style?

#10: Has performed music for a work of media that is notable. -- Which notable work? Reliable source please.

#11: Has been placed in rotation nationally by a major radio or music television network. -- Simply not true and not present in any source. Regards—Alalch E. 11:26, 10 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

A few things here: I feel like an article should be given more than a few hours to thrive before being nominated for deletion. I understand you may feel like you have scoured all internet sources, and are efficient at doing so, and were able to come to a conclusion that no decent article can possibly be developed and therefore it warrants deletion. However, a few of us found sources you were not able to; ie those cited above by Schminnte, Pelmeen10, and myself.

Secondly, to address criteria:

1) The Billboard and EDM.com articles, among many others, certainly qualify as reliable, non-self-published, independent sources and are non-trivial. So category #1 seems to be met. Unless I missed it, there is no evidence in this case that the coverage of Blackmill is sponsored by his camp.
7) Which notable style you ask? Take your pick: Melodic dubstep (as mentioned above. See Alexandra Myer's article in Relentlessbeats again. She's an independent author and one of their regulars, again with no relation to Blackmill). Or Chillstep. Another independent source (not listed before): [10]https://dancingastronaut.com/2019/12/blackmill-returns-with-melodic-dub-offering-in-hand/.
10) He's on the BBC Hustle Soundtrack. [11]https://bpb.opendns.com/a/bbchustle.weebly.com/commercially-available-songs.html. Series 8, Episode 6, to be specific.
11) Blackmill has his own Spotify station. [12]https://open.spotify.com/playlist/37i9dQZF1E4vxbqlFLMsTX. Not everybody gets that: It means he's achieved a certain distinction, and recognition for a certain type of sound, that Spotify recommends to listeners who want to hear other music and sounds like him. He was also heavily in play in Pandora stations throughout Europe and North America during his peak - ie early to mid 2010s.

50.237.197.242 (talk) 22:54, 13 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 18:19, 15 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Keep as there is enough significant coverage in reliable sources identified in this discussion such as Billboard, EDM.com, and others so that WP:GNG is passed and deletion is unnecessary in my view, Atlantic306 (talk) 00:25, 20 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Reply to the IP:
1. There are no "many others". AAE page is not an article, it's a listing. Billboard article is not about the subject per se but about a song (which is a collaboration by him and another musician). Significant coverage criterion not met.
2. Melodic dubstep and chillstep are not notable styles (no article, and no prospect of an article). Furthermore, there is no evidence in reliable sources that Blackmill is the most prominent representantive of either of those styles (he certainly isn't)
3. His song was used in one BBC series' episode's soundtrack. I agree that that is interesting but isn't enough to warrant having an article on someone. The series as a whole is notable but an individual episode isn't.
4. This is about Rotation (music), which is a notion in traditional broadcasting: rotation is the repeated airing of a limited playlist of songs on a radio station or satellite radio channel, or music videos on a TV network. This is fundamentally different from streaming services (Spotify and Pandora) and incompatible with how they work.
  BTW, the best and most reliable source I can identify, Dancing Astronaut [13], gives the subject, expressly (while also not writing about him per se, but about a release), a claim of non-notability, calling him an eternally under-the-radar producer. Wikipedia editors need things to be on the radar, not under the radar, to be able to do proper article work. —Alalch E. 10:15, 20 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.