The Mila Kunis Interview

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4Ezruu1oeQ

10,135,014 views.

And they say to go on late night TV...

Normalcy, it's the new rock star persona.

I mean what kind of crazy, f***ed up world do we live in where an actress is more honest and more real and delivers more personality than a musician?

One in which music is a second-class citizen. As it was way back when, before the classic rock artists made Warner stockholders rich by testing limits and being themselves.

One of the problems with today's media is the feedback loop. The mainstream says it's so, so that's the way it is, repeated endlessly by the big blowhards. But that's not the case at all. I didn't hear about this Mila Kunis interview via the mainstream, but via e-mail and social networks. That's what drove the view count up.

Virality.

Almost nothing you do has this. You mail your CD, speak to reporters, do what your publicist says and you get a blurb in the newspaper, everybody involved pats themselves on the back, yet there's nearly zero effect. You've got to get into the trenches and reveal the real you, if you want a chance at success.

This is why Howard Stern is so successful.

Ever notice the mainstream media never comments on Stern? Because he's not one of them! Not because he doesn't have an audience, hell, his is larger and more rabid than any late night television host's, but because he doesn't play the game. The gossip sites, RadarOnline, will post excerpts from his interviews every once in a while, but there's a blackout in the mainstream. Yet, Howard can help you more than anybody. Hell, if Clive Davis were on Howard Stern, his book would sustain on the chart.

But Clive doesn't get it.

No one in the mainstream gets it. That we're in the midst of a revolution.

Then again, the "Wall Street Journal" published an absolutely eye-popping article about self-publishing in Saturday's paper. Did you see it? The author has already made seven figures on Amazon, and refuses to give Simon & Schuster digital rights! The revolution has begun! The one the fat cats said would never happen, that they still say will never happen. Talk to Lucian Grainge and he'll tell you you need a major label, Doug Morris doesn't even know indies exist, he thinks he's the big kahuna. Then tell them you don't write Top Forty material... They won't want to make a deal, and if they do, it'll be for peanuts. And if you succeed, the man will make most of the money. But you'll be able to tell your mommy you're on Sony or Universal, like that means anything anymore.

We're all caught up with brand names, anything but the truth.

And art is truth. Lightning captured in a bottle. That's why the oldsters pooh-pooh today's music. It might be catchy, but it was written by some guy in Sweden and has got nothing to do with the "artist." Whereas when it comes straight from the heart...

That's what built Taylor Swift's career. Honesty. She's veered from that, that's why she's getting so much blowback now. She's playing the role of star as opposed to artist. Then you're a football. Whereas if they even bother to kick around Bob Dylan, he doesn't respond, he just doesn't give a sh*t.

And neither should you.

We live in an era that's person to person. Every man for himself. Woman too! You can make it if you really try, but you must cast aside the old rules and be out there, engaging the public, taking risks, sometimes failing, sometimes succeeding. The packaged star went over the transom once Perez and TMZ got traction. Everybody's smoking dope and having sex. You're not clean and almost nobody's sober. You're better off owning it. Kind of like Janis Joplin swigging her Southern Comfort. If you try to hide it, then you're playing a game of GOTCHA, and you look bad.

Then again, there are no rules.

Other than you've got to have something to sell.

If your music can't stand alone, if it needs videos and hype, you're not going to last. No one in the world is waiting for PSY's next song. Hell, it wasn't about the song, it was about the video. Heard anything from...what was the name of that band on Capitol again..? OK Go recently? OF COURSE NOT! It was about the videos, not the music.

But videos are easy, music is very hard.

But everybody's looking for an easy way out. They think marketing will make them a star. Yeah, back in the MTV era.

Now you can be famous and a joke. Just ask Kim Kardashian. As for Kanye West, I wish he'd stop talking and just make music. Every time he opens his mouth and boasts he loses another fan. We get it Kanye, you're talented, now STFU!

But if you are going to speak. And you're somewhat famous.... Do it from the heart. That's your only chance of connecting. Because we live in a lonely alienated world where everybody's telling you you're inadequate and inferior and when someone famous comes down off their perch and speaks some truth, we immediately run to them, because it's so rare.

But it's the way of the future.

Hell, it's the way of the now.

"Sci-Fi's Underground Hit - Authors are snubbing publishers and insisting on keeping e-book rights. How one novelist made more than $1 million before his book hit stores.": http://on.wsj.com/ZjaeeF


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