Dr Peter Webb is a writer, lecturer and musician who specialises in research into popular and contemporary music, subcultures, globalisation, new media technology, politics, cultural and social theory.
He is a Lecturer in the Department of Sociology at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Fitzwilliam College. He has previously worked at Goldsmiths College, the University of Birmingham and was an RA on an ESRC project on E-commerce and the music, fashion and financial services industries at the University of Bristol. He has engaged with and organised user groups with the BPI, EMI, FSA, and high level executives in companies such as the Creative Commons, Jupiter Media Metrix, Warners, Live 365.com, CD Baby, Oki-Ni and Yves Saint Laurent.
His PhD was on the Sociology of networks of musicians and their negotiations with the music industry. He has published a book on these networks and on social and cultural theories of music scenes entitled; `Exploring the Networked worlds of Popular Music: Milieu Cultures’ (Routledge).
He has published a number of journal articles and presented conference papers on the music industry and cultural/political themes. He has also been published in Music related magazines such as The Wire.
He is a member of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IAPSM) and organised their large international conference in Birmingham in 2006.
Webb has a lot of commercial experience and has expertise in user engagement – he was part of a team that managed a web based `Bristol Music – City of Culture’ project – which resulted in a website, series of cultural events and concerts – http://www.electricpavilion.org/dugout/. In addition, he has worked within an independent record label from 1996 – 2002 as an artist and tour manager and is a published musician (member of the PRS and PPL) with three albums, various singles and remixes under the names of Statik and Statik Sound System. As a musician he has worked with the physical theatre companies Blast Theory and Intimate Strangers and the film company Parallax Pictures.
Pete currently makes music with Nick Doobay and Luis Ruocco in the group New Brand: