There's little questioning the impact of the Internet on music fans,
who have flocked the Web to gab, gossip and give their opinion about
every artist with a recording deal. 
But what about the musicians? The chat lines, news groups and idolatry
Web sites appear to be the perfect place for musicians to get feedback
from fans--a chance to eavesdrop on what the people who buy their
albums and concert tickets have to say. There's never been a better 
way to safely connect to with the crowds who support them to learn what 
works in concert, what songs don't sound so hot or what the
common fan is thinking about. 
What's more it can be done undercover. No one needs to know theyre
reading along, and the fans who create these Web sites worship often
wibder whether the artists they're extolling aren't sneaking a peak.
And some do.

On her last concert tour, Melissa Ehteridge tole me that the Internet
represented the best opportunity to see what people really think.
"It's sort of honest feedback that I don't get  through the industry 
people who say ' Hey that's great!' or reviewers who get jaded one way 
or the other" she said" To hear a fan say ' Wow  it was a great show'-
that's what matters. I don't read the other stuff, the personal stuff, 
but I am interested in what they think about the shows"
 
But there are other who keep their distance for fear that it smacks of 
narcissism or might affect how they make their music. 
" I'm really falttered that that goes on" Neil Finn said recently. His 
fans are ardent and insatiable when it comes to information about the 
songwriter and his old bands, Crowed House and Split Enz, and a news 
group devoted to his work supplies daily updates and exhaustive chats
"But I don'tn like to look at it myself, because it's just too mush 
information, " said Finn, who worries that joining in might mess with 
his head. " I don't  know if  I want to know that much about what people 
are saying about the music. I think it might be harder to make it I 
think it's healthy not to be too involved with people's expectations and 
individual spins on thing." 
Others have more obvious reasons for not checking it our -- like that 
they don't own a computer

The last time his band was in town , Ben Gillies, the teen -age drummer 
for silverchair, said he didn't have access to the Internet
at home. Still, he was aware of that his band (dubbed Nirvana in 
Pyjamas----from me gena:can't they get over that????? sorry i'll move 
on---by derisive alternative fans put off by their youth)didn't get much 
respect on the Net and was even the subject of a few shoddy Web pages 
created by critics who hate the band 
"The Internet's cool and all" Gillies said. " I was over at a friend's 
house and he told me about some of the pages. He pulled some of them up, 
and they made me laugh. I don't really care what people write about us. 
" 
But the last word on the Web should be left to Metallica's James 
Hetfield. He might read what the fans have to say, but he doesn't 
approve of it and doesn't reccomend it to others.

"Don't read that drivel" he wared before Metallica's last concert at 
McNichols Arena. "That's horrible. Sometimes I'll go on there and read
all the stuff that people are writing about us. It's kind of like 
putting two pit bulls in a room and locking the door, and they just kind 
of fight, fight and fight. And then that's it"