Okay, so I have a background in music and television, having worked full time in programming roles in both industries, as well as playing bass and singing in a plethora of semi-successful cover (and one original music) bands.
Way back in 2004, I registered my own domain name and started my own website, writing movie and music reviews (and other inane ramblings) for an audience of about eight people who humoured me because they sometimes made cameo appearances in what I was writing about. I mostly wrote about pop culture back then – and angst about being single.
In 2006, I started writing music reviews for Ian Wishart’s Investigate Magazine, and features for Whangarei’s Scene Magazine, including an interview with Don McGlashan in late 2007 that I’m actually pretty proud of.
Later, in 2010, I pestered the blogs editor at Stuff.co.nz until he let me write about television; we started a blog called On The Box, and I eventually took my talents to NZHerald.co.nz. My written work has appeared in the Whangarei Leader, the Northern Advocate, the Christchurch Press and The Spinoff, in addition to Investigate, Scene, Stuff and the NZ Herald – and if that wasn’t enough, I’ve also appeared on RadioLive and Kiwi FM (RIP).
In early 2014, I made a shift to the television industry, programming a sci-fi channel and, later, a pair of classic channels for Sky TV, before leading a team who worked on (checks notes) 50+ factual and free-to-air channels.
In 2021, I endeavoured to listen to an album a day, and wrote about each one on Facebook, as a way to try and find new music I loved; this year, I’m doing the same while also focusing on brand new music released this year. You can follow along on Instagram if you want (link is below).
Nowadays I work at TVNZ, and play music part time with my wife Rhianon. We live in Auckland with our kids.
Facebook: Chris Philpott
Instagram: Chris Philpott | Chris Listens To Music
Substack: Ephemeral
