The Needle Drop

Early life

Fantano grew up in Connecticut and spent his teenage years in Wolcott. As a child he had a desire to become a cartoonist, stating he was a fan of The Simpsons and that he still enjoys cartoons from today such as Adventure Time and Regular Show.

Fantano was introduced to independent music in the early 2000s which eventually influenced him to start The Needle Drop. He has said, "I had a friend of mine on Livejournal–lol, I know–back in the early 00s who used to do these long writeups about certain artists and she turned me on to a few that were pretty great. It made me want to do the same, share the musical experience on the internet. It didn’t really turn into "reviews" until I tried doing YouTube in 2009, which I only did as an experiment because my blog and podcast were making much traction at the time."

Fantano attended Southern Connecticut State University where he studied political science and journalism.

Career

Fantano started his career in the mid-2000s as a music director for the Southern Connecticut State University college radio station. He stated, "I've always loved music, but working there got me turned into a lot of different styles, and got me pushing my tastes into different areas".

In 2007, Fantano started working at Connecticut Public Radio in which he hosted The Needle Drop. That same year, Fantano also launched The Needle Drop in text reviews, eventually starting as video reviews in 2009. Fantano, at the time, was working on The Needle Drop, at the college radio station, and at a pizza restaurant. In late 2011, Fantano decided to pursue The Needle Drop full-time.

In 2011, Fantano was interviewed at SXSW about the rise of music vlogging, along with Matt Galloway of the Rock It Out! Blog, and Michael Roffman, president and editor-in-chief of Consequence of Sound. In March 2011, he was featured in an article from The Guardian also about the rise of music vlogging.

The Needle Drop

The blog The Needle Drop is a spin-off of a WNPR show of the same name.

A recurring character on The Needle Drop is Anthony Fantano's fictional musically oblivious and socially awkward roommate, Cal Chuchesta. Fantano, as Chuchesta, released a comedic mixtape, The New CALassic, on August 18, 2015, as a free digital download. Fantano later reviewed the mixtape on August 19, 2015, and rated it a light 3. At the end of the review Chuchesta took over the show in a fit of anger and claimed that Fantano had agreed to give the mixtape a 10 off camera. However, Fantano's rating still stands.

Personal life

Fantano lives in Plainville, Connecticut. He is three-quarters French Canadian and a quarter Sicilian. Fantano is a vegan, having grown into the diet since becoming vegetarian around 18–19. He is married.

Rating system

The blog rates albums and tracks on a scale from 0 to 10, with an accompanying adjective, either "light", "decent", or "strong", for further qualification of its score. Occasionally he will do parody reviews of albums such as I'm Gay (I'm Happy) by Lil B, Born This Way by Lady Gaga, Unknown Death 2002 by Yung Lean, Mastermind by Rick Ross, Dark Sky Paradise by Big Sean August 26 by Post Malone, Ether by B.o.B Gold Cobra by Limp Bizkit and Sketches of Brunswick East by King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. He has only given three perfect 10/10 ratings in his career so far. Additionally, Fantano will also review albums that are considered "classic" music releases. These are reviewed without a rating on during a yearly segment known as Classics Week.

In July 2016, a new rating dubbed "Not Good" was introduced, which is not based on a numeric score and is assigned to albums which Fantano does not feel like giving a proper negative review on. The first album to receive the rating was Desiigner's New English. He also did a near-unedited 50-minute "Not Good" review of Angelic 2 the Core by Corey Feldman, in which he dubbed the album the worst of 2016.