Ears To The House must admit we’ve been enjoying the state of open warfare developing in the dance music press this week. As your favourite dance music site has been writing in detail about the appalling treatment of Annabel Ross at the hands of Carl Craig and Alexander Omar Smith, what have they been doing?

Tied to the informal old rule that press outlets don’t write about each other, they’ve been left stuck. This story raises big questions about the craven way that Mixmag operates – and none of the big press outlets can ask too much, because they operate in much the same way. The incestuous nature of the dance music press also ensured they had one hand tied behind their back on this story.

And this has not gone unnoticed in the dance music press outlets either. A source contacts Ears To The House says there’s been “a very uneasy atmosphere at the Mixmag offices this week. There’s a clear divide between people who think we should ignore it, and people who think we have to address this now. I just wonder what Dom Phillips would have made of all this nonsense.”.

Chicago’s 5 Magazine have now declared their hand – a full ten days after Ears To The House first wrote about the story, and eight days after Annabel Ross published her own account. It’s safe to say they’re not happy about this either…

This should be addressed by @paxahau and @Mixmag – banning a journalist because of past coverage on behalf of one aritst – if that's what happened – is appalling.

Based upon what that "coverage" consisted of, it's disgusting. @annabel_ross pic.twitter.com/RHsinDYT0g

— 5 Mag Dot Net (@5Magazine) June 23, 2022

Paxahau, the owners of the Movement Electronic Music Festival don’t escape their wrath, either. Feel free to ask Sam Fotias, their director of operations, about the matter – he declined to comment when contacted by our editor earlier this week. Fotias appears to be taking the same approach as Carl Craig, Mixmag and pretty much everyone else involved – which is putting their fingers in their ears and hoping the questions go away.

This approach might well work with traditional media, who are dependent on an increasingly small network to retain their access for so-called big interviews – which are usually painfully stage managed and incredibly boring in equal measure. But for the likes of Ears To The House, which doesn’t care whether we have “access” or not? Not so much…