Tag Archives: joel oberstein

Joel Oberstein (New Releases Now!) – Interview (Part 2)

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This is the last part of the conversation I had with Joel Oberstein from New Releases Now! You can read how it all started by checking yesterday’s post, and see what I had to say about the site when it was first reviewed on MusicKO here.

 

PART II

MUSIC & YOU

 

When did you become interested in music? What was the first album or single you ever purchased?

I’ve always loved music, and my parents turned me onto a lot of good stuff growing up.  I’d lock myself in my room, blast music and study every photo and word on an album.  It’s difficult to remember the first thing I ever bought, but I’ll go with the vinyl single of “The Night Chicago Died” by Paper Lace.

Are you in a band yourself, or have you been in a band in the past? Is there a clip on YouTube or elsewhere we could watch?

Yes, I was in a few local bands…one of them was called Soaked, which had a few songs featured on the TV show ‘Party Of Five’ several years ago.  Continue reading →

Joel Oberstein (New Releases Now!) – Interview (Part 1)

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A new interview fresh from the oven for you. The interviewee this time is Joel Oberstein from New Releases Now!, a site that was recently reviewed on MusicKO.

This is the first half of the interview. The second (“Music & You”) has just been posted. Give it a look.

Full Name: Joel Oberstein
Startup: New Releases Now!
Position:  Co-owner / President

 

 

PART I

THE STARTUP

 

Tell us a little about your startup. How was it conceived? What are its most distinctive features in your opinion?

We’ve been in the music marketing business since 1995 and despite the fact that we’re living in the information age we found that there wasn’t a comprehensive source for retailers, radio programmers and on-air personalities, music supervisors, clubs/concert promoters, and others in the entertainment industry, as well as music fans to sample what was being released each Tuesday across all genres of music.  Having grown up in the heyday of record stores, we like to think of it as a virtual new release end-cap.  We keep release info active in the system well past street date, so if you’re interested in seeing what came out in prior weeks you can do that.  Users can also search for titles by genre or even record label, so if you’re a fan of Prog Rock or Sub Pop Records for instance you can easily find those titles as well.  NRN Radio then allows a user to stream a track from those selections.  We also partner with several popular music related and pop culture sites such as Ranker, Popdose, The Music’s Over, and American Music Association (to name a few) to provide content for them.  In addition to being a high traffic site, we also deliver NRN electronically every week to a large industry/fan mailing list.  As a huge music fan, it’s the type of service I would sign up for if I didn’t work in the biz just so I could stay up to date on what’s going on release-wise.

What was the original launch date?

November 2009

What has been the response so far?

People seem to like that it’s easy to navigate and has what they’re looking for in one place.

In which countries has it been more successful?

Since we’re based in the U.S. that’s where most of our traffic comes from, but we do see a lot of activity in the Europe, South America, and Australia/New Zealand.     Continue reading →