For the past few years, I have been a contributor to Flux Music, a now London-based record label. They started many moons ago in Leeds, putting on nights showcasing house and techno artists. Over time, they expanded, and this is where I come in:

Under the exciting moniker of Brendan Malufuss-Jones, I had an array of articles to write, including:

• Interviews – This included researching the artist’s tendencies, preferences and previous interviews and putting together sets of questions to ask to their face, over the phone or even by email
• Reviews – I was, and still am, tasked with giving honest but enticing afterthoughts of releases and events. These were particularly important with regards to strategy. If good solid reviews are written consistently, Flux can develop a reputation as an arbiter of good taste as a brand, and can thus increases ticket sales for their own events

Most importantly, though, was my creative freedom. I had the chance to pick and choose what I wrote about, and completely exercised this freedom. It allowed me creative control and more flexibility with my tone of voice to write naturally. By this stage of my career, I have now developed an ability to completely adapt my style, vocabulary and voice for each individual project and set of stakeholders or clients.

This was also fantastic exposure to Content Management Systems. Everything I do for Flux (and this website incidentally) is on WordPress. In fact, I’ve been using WordPress sincerely for around years, so have developed a genuine fluency in it, and thus, by extension, I’m not half bad at most other CMSs – I’ve been lucky enough to fiddle around with Drupal in a professional capacity, for example.