He gave Irving Azoff his first job in Hollywood.
Irving sent letters to all the major players and Jerry was the only one who said yes, and Irving was loyal to Jerry forever thereafter, because that's how the game is played, you remember where you came from.
'Cause I was wondering why Irving would respond. We'd get caught up in these e-mail chains...
Jerry had a band. It was from Denver or Philly or Pittsburgh and he put on the full court press, if you didn't go to the show you'd pay, the Israeli Mafia would come after you. That's right, Jerry had support. Bodyguards. He lived through the rap wars.
As for what happened with Jerry and Eazy-E and Dre... I don't know. As a matter of fact, Jerry never bitched about them to me. All the hatred seems to go in one direction. You can read his book if you want his viewpoint, which is interesting but has been plowed under.
But Jerry could tell a tale. He'd get you in a corner and go on like he was revealing state secrets.
He told me about Dre going to Death Row. And the most fascinating part involved Jimmy Iovine. Scared for his life. Riding in his limo lying down so he wouldn't get shot.
Would Jimmy tell it the same way?
I don't know.
But my favorite Jerry Heller story, the one I tell over and over again, is...
A guy was writing a book about Ruthless Records. And Jerry's going on about it, because with Jerry everything was ultra-important, the world depended upon it. And the guy asked...
"How many albums did you sell at Ruthless Records?"
SEVENTY MILLION!
And then Jerry leaned his head into mine and said sotto voce, like in a "Godfather" movie...MY COMPANY, MY NUMBER!
And there you have the music business in a nutshell, it's all smoke and mirrors.
Jerry was good entertainment, even if you got uptight every time you heard from him.
He's gone now.
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Saturday 3 September 2016
Friday 2 September 2016
More Exclusives
"Another Apple Exclusive: Travis Scott": http://bit.ly/2bKEcFS?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives
This is the company that doesn't pay taxes.
I don't know why everybody keeps pontificating that Apple is a beloved enterprise whose customers will follow it like lemmings no matter where it goes. That's a dying paradigm which is undermined every time the Cupertino company does something consumer unfriendly.
This is not DuPont, not some mining company no consumer actually touches. Rather, Apple made its bones by selling to the rank and file, not corporations. And even though Tim Cook has tied up with IBM, even though there's been a push into the corporate sphere, the lion's share of the dough comes from you and me. And we're starting not to like these people.
Cook is bland, Jony Ive has disappeared, and Eddy Cue was lambasted in the "Wall Street Journal" for overreaching. ( Apple's Hard-Charging Tactics Hurt TV Expansion: http://on.wsj.com/2agkAFs)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives As for Apple Music, it's faceless. Musicians criticize Daniel Ek, but they don't know who to complain about at Apple Music. Until Apple-bleeder Sean Glass said that Larry Jackson was the man, no one knew who was working with acts at Apple. (http://bit.ly/2bKESLb)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives As for Jimmy Iovine, he seems to be in the witness protection program.
Kind of like streaming itself.
There's a fiction that these exclusives will drive subscriptions.
I'm not so sure. You see the average person just doesn't need one. At least that's what they believe. Sure, YouTube is free, but the Tidal people kept bitching the competition didn't pay enough and they were getting poor when they were all rich, the wannabes and already made-its say Spotify doesn't pay enough and Apple Music...worked even worse than MobileMe and is about as desirable as the Watch. As for their vaunted Beats 1 radio service, when in hell did anybody have a "successful" product and not tell anybody about it, that's not Entertainment 101. The reason we haven't heard any ratings numbers is because they suck, you know that. And now the Apple Music Festival in London is going behind the paywall. (http://bit.ly/2bq8vAc)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives This is like charging people for single episodes of "Vinyl" and "Roadies," they just don't care. You've got to make people want the product first before you can charge them. What next, an entry fee at the Apple Store?
Spotify says the free tier causes conversion, you've got to taste it to embrace it, like dope. I was against the service being free on the mobile handset, but data said it caused conversion, so I was convinced. As for the future, tweaks are reasonable, but I wouldn't go against the data, no growing company does. But we live in an industry where it's show me the money 24/7 and we do our best to destroy our nest egg. Recording revenues are off by 66% since the turn of the century... Are we gonna blame that all on pirates? No, I think the industry is complicit. First by selling overpriced CDs with only one good track. If I was running the world I'd be more fan-friendly. But no, the music industry would rather have the public as an enemy, in an adversarial position, is this any way to run a business? OF COURSE NOT!
As for Lucian Grainge banning exclusives... I'm worried we've got a "Hit Men" situation, wherein CBS drops indie promo and everybody else doubles down, loves the lack of competition. Time will see but in a world where cash is everything it's not hard to believe these acts are dashing for it.
Do you know who Travis Scott is?
I don't. And I'm proud of it. And the only people who do are young without credit cards, and they're gonna tell their parents to cough up ten bucks a month for Apple Music? Come on, they're just gonna steal it, find it elsewhere like with Frank Ocean. (http://bit.ly/2bKG9C9?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives, http://bit.ly/2bQKPoL)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives You've got to convince the people with the wallets first, the parents.
I'm interested to see iPhone 7 adoption. Because handsets are no longer subsidized in the U.S. And it is not a revolution, that's the iPhone 8, next year.
What has Apple done for us lately? Just ask Walt Mossberg, who drank the kool-aid, who was a friend of Jobs, he questions a company that hasn't upgraded its laptops in four years. (http://on.recode.net/2clLzoE)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives This is the gang that can't shoot straight. As for Samsung Galaxy Note 7's burning up... Who cares? Samsung is the alternative, the yin to the yang. People are gonna jump from Android to Apple like they do from Trump to Clinton, as in NEVER!
What kind of enticement is this? Music that used to be free on YouTube, that I can still buy on iTunes, I've got to pay ten bucks a month to hear it and then have it disappear?
We're putting the cart before the horse. Closing the barn door before most people see a need to pass through it. Exclusives would work better when everybody paid for a music subscription and they might jump ship. Now it's just a circle jerk amongst players who want to get paid and a corporation rolling in dough with no future roadmap.
But ain't that America, where everybody has their head in the sand until disaster arrives. Kind of like BlackBerry. The company thought it was indomitable and so did the financial press, and then it crashed. It used less data! It was more secure! There was a keyboard! Who cares!
Who cares about these exclusives other than those involved with them?
Almost nobody.
This is the company that doesn't pay taxes.
I don't know why everybody keeps pontificating that Apple is a beloved enterprise whose customers will follow it like lemmings no matter where it goes. That's a dying paradigm which is undermined every time the Cupertino company does something consumer unfriendly.
This is not DuPont, not some mining company no consumer actually touches. Rather, Apple made its bones by selling to the rank and file, not corporations. And even though Tim Cook has tied up with IBM, even though there's been a push into the corporate sphere, the lion's share of the dough comes from you and me. And we're starting not to like these people.
Cook is bland, Jony Ive has disappeared, and Eddy Cue was lambasted in the "Wall Street Journal" for overreaching. ( Apple's Hard-Charging Tactics Hurt TV Expansion: http://on.wsj.com/2agkAFs)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives As for Apple Music, it's faceless. Musicians criticize Daniel Ek, but they don't know who to complain about at Apple Music. Until Apple-bleeder Sean Glass said that Larry Jackson was the man, no one knew who was working with acts at Apple. (http://bit.ly/2bKESLb)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives As for Jimmy Iovine, he seems to be in the witness protection program.
Kind of like streaming itself.
There's a fiction that these exclusives will drive subscriptions.
I'm not so sure. You see the average person just doesn't need one. At least that's what they believe. Sure, YouTube is free, but the Tidal people kept bitching the competition didn't pay enough and they were getting poor when they were all rich, the wannabes and already made-its say Spotify doesn't pay enough and Apple Music...worked even worse than MobileMe and is about as desirable as the Watch. As for their vaunted Beats 1 radio service, when in hell did anybody have a "successful" product and not tell anybody about it, that's not Entertainment 101. The reason we haven't heard any ratings numbers is because they suck, you know that. And now the Apple Music Festival in London is going behind the paywall. (http://bit.ly/2bq8vAc)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives This is like charging people for single episodes of "Vinyl" and "Roadies," they just don't care. You've got to make people want the product first before you can charge them. What next, an entry fee at the Apple Store?
Spotify says the free tier causes conversion, you've got to taste it to embrace it, like dope. I was against the service being free on the mobile handset, but data said it caused conversion, so I was convinced. As for the future, tweaks are reasonable, but I wouldn't go against the data, no growing company does. But we live in an industry where it's show me the money 24/7 and we do our best to destroy our nest egg. Recording revenues are off by 66% since the turn of the century... Are we gonna blame that all on pirates? No, I think the industry is complicit. First by selling overpriced CDs with only one good track. If I was running the world I'd be more fan-friendly. But no, the music industry would rather have the public as an enemy, in an adversarial position, is this any way to run a business? OF COURSE NOT!
As for Lucian Grainge banning exclusives... I'm worried we've got a "Hit Men" situation, wherein CBS drops indie promo and everybody else doubles down, loves the lack of competition. Time will see but in a world where cash is everything it's not hard to believe these acts are dashing for it.
Do you know who Travis Scott is?
I don't. And I'm proud of it. And the only people who do are young without credit cards, and they're gonna tell their parents to cough up ten bucks a month for Apple Music? Come on, they're just gonna steal it, find it elsewhere like with Frank Ocean. (http://bit.ly/2bKG9C9?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives, http://bit.ly/2bQKPoL)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives You've got to convince the people with the wallets first, the parents.
I'm interested to see iPhone 7 adoption. Because handsets are no longer subsidized in the U.S. And it is not a revolution, that's the iPhone 8, next year.
What has Apple done for us lately? Just ask Walt Mossberg, who drank the kool-aid, who was a friend of Jobs, he questions a company that hasn't upgraded its laptops in four years. (http://on.recode.net/2clLzoE)?utm_source=phplist5550&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=More+Exclusives This is the gang that can't shoot straight. As for Samsung Galaxy Note 7's burning up... Who cares? Samsung is the alternative, the yin to the yang. People are gonna jump from Android to Apple like they do from Trump to Clinton, as in NEVER!
What kind of enticement is this? Music that used to be free on YouTube, that I can still buy on iTunes, I've got to pay ten bucks a month to hear it and then have it disappear?
We're putting the cart before the horse. Closing the barn door before most people see a need to pass through it. Exclusives would work better when everybody paid for a music subscription and they might jump ship. Now it's just a circle jerk amongst players who want to get paid and a corporation rolling in dough with no future roadmap.
But ain't that America, where everybody has their head in the sand until disaster arrives. Kind of like BlackBerry. The company thought it was indomitable and so did the financial press, and then it crashed. It used less data! It was more secure! There was a keyboard! Who cares!
Who cares about these exclusives other than those involved with them?
Almost nobody.
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Thursday 1 September 2016
The CAA Book
"Powerhouse: The Untold Story of Hollywood's Creative Artists Agency": http://amzn.to/2cjIu8D?utm_source=phplist5549&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=The+CAA+Book
This book is so depressing I almost want to tell you not to read it.
But that would be a mistake.
I was not going to read it, because I hate oral histories and the reviews were horrid. Then I ran into Steve Barnett who told me he finished it in two days on vacation in Hawaii and I had to dive in.
I did.
It's a tome. There's no way you can finish it in forty eight hours unless it's the only thing you do. But it does call out to me, I have wanted to read it. And I'm just positively stunned...
How it's all ancient history and so many of the players are irrelevant.
Live in the belly of the beast long enough and it seems so important. But when they go back thirty years and lay it all out, you remember the movies but don't care about them and realize they've got no staying power. It's as if all this work has been done for naught. As guys, and it is mostly guys, beat their chests, take credit and play chess with each other believing they're Gary Kasparov when the truth is they're kids playing Chinese checkers.
The progenitors left William Morris. The Morris agency was a bastion of fiefs with no upward mobility. Ovitz, et al, wanted to start over with a teamwork ethos that truly served the client.
They won.
And in the process they got big-headed and Ovitz alienated everybody and CAA became a monolith... SO WHAT?
My favorite part of the book is when Paula Wagner, known primarily as Tom Cruise's producing partner, says...
"I left CAA in August '92. As an agent, you aren't a principal. You're the representative of the principal, and I decided I wanted to be a principal."
Bingo! Exactly how I felt practicing law, something I never planned to do but fell into awaiting my bar results, it takes a long time to get them in California. And I passed and not long into my tenure I said...I don't want to be a lawyer and be told what to do, I want to call my own lawyer and tell him what to do!
But actually, the truly best part of the book, the laugh out loud part, is a story told by Tom Ross, who goes to rehab for weight-loss:
"I was there a month, and one day I ran into Steven Tyler, who was there for drug rehab and sexual addiction. They arranged for us to spend an afternoon together and Steven said to me 'Man, I don't know if I can do this. I just can't imagine going to a gig and not getting laid or not getting a few blow jobs.' I looked at him and said, 'Try being an agent for a few years. You get used to it.'"
Bada-bing!
But the execs have the last laugh, except for a few outliers like Tyler, true stars, the business people outlast the talent. The talent leaves its mark, but the business people make more money and soldier on, until they can't.
"Mike left because he knew there are good agents and there are old agents, but there are no good old agents."
Bingo!
A lot of this book is about knowing when to move on, when your time is done, when you've got to pass the torch to the younger generation before they gain control and fire your ass. I heard it from a famous A&R guy the other night, he says his biggest challenge is the boomers who hate their jobs who won't retire. I mean Snapchat? That's where oldsters draw the line. That's when you know you're done. When you've built a home on Facebook and find out time has passed you by, there's a new sheriff in town, and you just want to move on down the road to elude his reach.
But it is old news. CAA is a juggernaut today. But it's a different company in different businesses. Deep into sports, it's sold equity to outsiders. Trying to figure out how to survive as movies become marginalized and the realization hits...there's just not that much money in entertainment.
But you can own your identity.
Mick Fleetwood comes into the office just as Tom Ross has joined the agency and says:
"I can't talk to you with that tie on. It's not you."
And Tom rips it off and never wears one again.
It's who you are, not your image.
That's the difference between the rock stars of yesterday and those of today. Before, they marched to the beat of their own drummer, today they're trying to fit in. And they never really can. Because that's not their skill. The business people will eat them alive.
And Ovitz screws his partners but makes them money and everybody comes out to piss on his grave, as Ovitz continues to explain away the faux pas. It's hard not to feel sorry for these people. Who think this is oh-so-important. It's not. Can you even name the heads of today's movie studios?
But there are so many lessons to be learned, Bill Haber says:
"In any business on earth - I always say to people - nobody will leave you for the money, and nobody will leave you over titles. People will only leave if they have no loyalty to you."
Hollywood is incredibly tribal. It's all about gangs. You've got your people and you'd take a bullet for them.
Or you're not in the game.
That's one of the eye-opening elements, how Ovitz and his gang foist advantages upon their clients.
Sign with CAA and they'll introduce you to Marty and Bob. They can not only solve problems, they can create opportunities. Who you're with is sometimes more important than who you are. There are very few slots in Hollywood, in filmed entertainment and music too. If you think you can just waltz in and take your shot, you've got no idea how the game is played. It's a controlled universe. You need your team. And this book makes that very clear.
It all seemed so important at the time. The Eszterhas affair. "Legal Eagles." Ovitz going to Disney and getting fired.
But not only is Ovitz out of the picture, so is Eisner. Sid Sheinberg too. Take away their power base and they're mortal. Meanwhile, the youngsters want to freeze you out, they don't want to give you another shot, Ovitz had no chance with AMG.
So where does this leave us?
It's about you baby. Follow your dream. You think you want to be at the center of it all, but the more you read the book the less you care. Never mind everybody working 24/7 just to stay in place, it's just a matter of when the clients will leave you, not if.
But wisdom comes with experience and age. One can tell youngsters how it works but they never listen, they need to do it for themselves.
And I don't think any youngsters are reading this book. Because they can't catch the references, they have no idea who the people are, all plowed under, in the rearview mirror. Sydney Pollack is six feet under. Dustin Hoffman is a guy who had a series on HBO that god cancelled. Bob Redford is that old guy with a film festival. There's a whole section on "Sneakers." Do you even know that film? I saw it, I liked it, but it's a distant memory, a faded photograph of a Little League team, if you were there it's meaningful, if not, it's meaningless.
Boys and their toys. Their Ferraris and their private jets. And you buy it, you want what they've got. Even though so many are faking it, and are unhappy inside.
To hear competitors rain on Ovitz's parade, to say he was a bad businessman...
I mean come on, even if in some instances that's true, it's basically jealousy. Ovitz changed the agenting industry. And made beaucoup bucks doing it. Hell, he even changed the medium, both movies and TV. He left his mark.
But he did have blind spots.
We've all got blind spots.
And you conquer them via information. That's what Hollywood runs on, information. If you're not communicating 24/7, if you're not hoovering up tidbits and analysis, you'll never make it.
It's good to be the king.
But it never lasts.
P.S. Read the damn book. Your eyes will glaze over at times as they go down the rabbit hole, jumping around in the process, but you'll learn more about how Hollywood really works than in a lifetime of college courses.
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This book is so depressing I almost want to tell you not to read it.
But that would be a mistake.
I was not going to read it, because I hate oral histories and the reviews were horrid. Then I ran into Steve Barnett who told me he finished it in two days on vacation in Hawaii and I had to dive in.
I did.
It's a tome. There's no way you can finish it in forty eight hours unless it's the only thing you do. But it does call out to me, I have wanted to read it. And I'm just positively stunned...
How it's all ancient history and so many of the players are irrelevant.
Live in the belly of the beast long enough and it seems so important. But when they go back thirty years and lay it all out, you remember the movies but don't care about them and realize they've got no staying power. It's as if all this work has been done for naught. As guys, and it is mostly guys, beat their chests, take credit and play chess with each other believing they're Gary Kasparov when the truth is they're kids playing Chinese checkers.
The progenitors left William Morris. The Morris agency was a bastion of fiefs with no upward mobility. Ovitz, et al, wanted to start over with a teamwork ethos that truly served the client.
They won.
And in the process they got big-headed and Ovitz alienated everybody and CAA became a monolith... SO WHAT?
My favorite part of the book is when Paula Wagner, known primarily as Tom Cruise's producing partner, says...
"I left CAA in August '92. As an agent, you aren't a principal. You're the representative of the principal, and I decided I wanted to be a principal."
Bingo! Exactly how I felt practicing law, something I never planned to do but fell into awaiting my bar results, it takes a long time to get them in California. And I passed and not long into my tenure I said...I don't want to be a lawyer and be told what to do, I want to call my own lawyer and tell him what to do!
But actually, the truly best part of the book, the laugh out loud part, is a story told by Tom Ross, who goes to rehab for weight-loss:
"I was there a month, and one day I ran into Steven Tyler, who was there for drug rehab and sexual addiction. They arranged for us to spend an afternoon together and Steven said to me 'Man, I don't know if I can do this. I just can't imagine going to a gig and not getting laid or not getting a few blow jobs.' I looked at him and said, 'Try being an agent for a few years. You get used to it.'"
Bada-bing!
But the execs have the last laugh, except for a few outliers like Tyler, true stars, the business people outlast the talent. The talent leaves its mark, but the business people make more money and soldier on, until they can't.
"Mike left because he knew there are good agents and there are old agents, but there are no good old agents."
Bingo!
A lot of this book is about knowing when to move on, when your time is done, when you've got to pass the torch to the younger generation before they gain control and fire your ass. I heard it from a famous A&R guy the other night, he says his biggest challenge is the boomers who hate their jobs who won't retire. I mean Snapchat? That's where oldsters draw the line. That's when you know you're done. When you've built a home on Facebook and find out time has passed you by, there's a new sheriff in town, and you just want to move on down the road to elude his reach.
But it is old news. CAA is a juggernaut today. But it's a different company in different businesses. Deep into sports, it's sold equity to outsiders. Trying to figure out how to survive as movies become marginalized and the realization hits...there's just not that much money in entertainment.
But you can own your identity.
Mick Fleetwood comes into the office just as Tom Ross has joined the agency and says:
"I can't talk to you with that tie on. It's not you."
And Tom rips it off and never wears one again.
It's who you are, not your image.
That's the difference between the rock stars of yesterday and those of today. Before, they marched to the beat of their own drummer, today they're trying to fit in. And they never really can. Because that's not their skill. The business people will eat them alive.
And Ovitz screws his partners but makes them money and everybody comes out to piss on his grave, as Ovitz continues to explain away the faux pas. It's hard not to feel sorry for these people. Who think this is oh-so-important. It's not. Can you even name the heads of today's movie studios?
But there are so many lessons to be learned, Bill Haber says:
"In any business on earth - I always say to people - nobody will leave you for the money, and nobody will leave you over titles. People will only leave if they have no loyalty to you."
Hollywood is incredibly tribal. It's all about gangs. You've got your people and you'd take a bullet for them.
Or you're not in the game.
That's one of the eye-opening elements, how Ovitz and his gang foist advantages upon their clients.
Sign with CAA and they'll introduce you to Marty and Bob. They can not only solve problems, they can create opportunities. Who you're with is sometimes more important than who you are. There are very few slots in Hollywood, in filmed entertainment and music too. If you think you can just waltz in and take your shot, you've got no idea how the game is played. It's a controlled universe. You need your team. And this book makes that very clear.
It all seemed so important at the time. The Eszterhas affair. "Legal Eagles." Ovitz going to Disney and getting fired.
But not only is Ovitz out of the picture, so is Eisner. Sid Sheinberg too. Take away their power base and they're mortal. Meanwhile, the youngsters want to freeze you out, they don't want to give you another shot, Ovitz had no chance with AMG.
So where does this leave us?
It's about you baby. Follow your dream. You think you want to be at the center of it all, but the more you read the book the less you care. Never mind everybody working 24/7 just to stay in place, it's just a matter of when the clients will leave you, not if.
But wisdom comes with experience and age. One can tell youngsters how it works but they never listen, they need to do it for themselves.
And I don't think any youngsters are reading this book. Because they can't catch the references, they have no idea who the people are, all plowed under, in the rearview mirror. Sydney Pollack is six feet under. Dustin Hoffman is a guy who had a series on HBO that god cancelled. Bob Redford is that old guy with a film festival. There's a whole section on "Sneakers." Do you even know that film? I saw it, I liked it, but it's a distant memory, a faded photograph of a Little League team, if you were there it's meaningful, if not, it's meaningless.
Boys and their toys. Their Ferraris and their private jets. And you buy it, you want what they've got. Even though so many are faking it, and are unhappy inside.
To hear competitors rain on Ovitz's parade, to say he was a bad businessman...
I mean come on, even if in some instances that's true, it's basically jealousy. Ovitz changed the agenting industry. And made beaucoup bucks doing it. Hell, he even changed the medium, both movies and TV. He left his mark.
But he did have blind spots.
We've all got blind spots.
And you conquer them via information. That's what Hollywood runs on, information. If you're not communicating 24/7, if you're not hoovering up tidbits and analysis, you'll never make it.
It's good to be the king.
But it never lasts.
P.S. Read the damn book. Your eyes will glaze over at times as they go down the rabbit hole, jumping around in the process, but you'll learn more about how Hollywood really works than in a lifetime of college courses.
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Wednesday 31 August 2016
Jealousy
Taylor Swift has a rich father. Florida Georgia Line auto-tune their vocals. Scott Borchetta built his company upon Scott Swift's cash.
The wannabes complain, they could do it better.
But they hardly do it at all.
I'm not saying you have to like the work of those who make it, but you do have to admire their pluck, their perseverance, all the hard work they put into making it.
Sure, Taylor Swift got a leg up by having a rich parent. You grew up poor, it sucks. But the truth is many people are just poor-mouthing. You see it all the time in interviews. Some actor or comedian will say they grew up lower class, and then they'll let slip that their father was a lawyer or a bank president... It's the great American game, downplaying your advantages. When you're not boasting about all the money you've made. I know, I know, it's a conundrum. But never ever take Hollywood publicity at face value. It's lies. It's images. It's for your consumption. Most of these people came from backgrounds no different from yours. Although they may have made choices you wouldn't. Like screwing friends, stepping on others... Because it's a jungle out there and you don't get to roar by being a nice guy or gal.
As Helen Kushnick so famously put it to Jay Leno... "I've been serving you steak dinners for almost eighteen years, I just haven't bothered showing you how I slaughtered the cow."
Florida Georgia Line, hell, they're not the best singers. But they have hit records, because they found a niche and exploited it. Mashing up hip-hop and country. With a beer/bro viewpoint that no one else had expressed quite the same way. You could have done the same thing, only you didn't pay your dues at Belmont and you didn't play without a net. Talk about risk... If you want to make it in music it can't be your side gig, but your only gig. And it takes years to make it. So while others are coding at Google, buying houses and getting married, you're renting an apartment, driving an old Nissan and have nothing to show for it. Are you willing to go that route? Almost no one is, not for a long time. As for those bitching that they've been playing but not winning, odds are inherently long, but these people never look at themselves and examine their flaws, their hard to get along with personalities, their lack of talent. Just because you desire something that does not mean it can be so. It's like being 5'2" and wanting to star in the NBA. Or being the same height and wanting to be a runway model. Impossible. Oh, now I'm gonna get e-mail about Muggsy Bogues and... That's exactly the point, you're trying to prove me wrong as opposed to digesting my lesson, which you're free to embrace or discard. But you think by playing gotcha you're winning, but the joke is on you.
Scott Borchetta ASKED Scott Swift for the money. Couldn't have been easy. Then again, he asked so many who wouldn't pony up before Swift. How many doors are you willing to knock on? How many times are you willing to hear no? And still soldier on with a smile on your face without sour grapes.
I'm not saying the winners are admirable people. I'm not saying all their work is of the highest standard, never mind a breakthrough. But I am saying you've got to applaud them for making it. And rather than point out their flaws, look at their attributes, what they have that pushes them over the line. People talk crap about Irving Azoff all the time, do you know that he's charming and the life of the party? As for Michael Rapino, do you know he's the best politician in the music business? Come on, he killed Michael Cohl! But rather than investigate his relationship with Greg Maffei, rather than uncover the choices that go along with the steps, you just knee-jerk your hatred. All the songs on the hit parade suck. The person singing or writing or agenting or directing has your job. That's what it is, raw jealousy. And if you want to sit on the sidelines and carp, that's your prerogative. But the truth is those who've won are ignoring you, they're circling the wagons and leaving you out, you're the one who's empty inside. You could move to Hollywood, you could scrape and save and try to find a way in, lose your job and network for another. You could get a record deal and lose it and still keep making music. But that's too hard.
America's a great country. More doors are open than closed. Especially in fast-moving enterprises like entertainment where where you went to college is irrelevant and except for a chosen few who your daddy is doesn't matter. It's a roiling cauldron that might boil the life out of you, but might just yield riches and fame. This is not banking, a soulless enterprise where cash is the only dividend. This is not tech, where you have to know how to code. This is a realm where street smarts are everything, where emotional intelligence is key. Are you up to it?
Well step up to the plate and find out.
The wannabes complain, they could do it better.
But they hardly do it at all.
I'm not saying you have to like the work of those who make it, but you do have to admire their pluck, their perseverance, all the hard work they put into making it.
Sure, Taylor Swift got a leg up by having a rich parent. You grew up poor, it sucks. But the truth is many people are just poor-mouthing. You see it all the time in interviews. Some actor or comedian will say they grew up lower class, and then they'll let slip that their father was a lawyer or a bank president... It's the great American game, downplaying your advantages. When you're not boasting about all the money you've made. I know, I know, it's a conundrum. But never ever take Hollywood publicity at face value. It's lies. It's images. It's for your consumption. Most of these people came from backgrounds no different from yours. Although they may have made choices you wouldn't. Like screwing friends, stepping on others... Because it's a jungle out there and you don't get to roar by being a nice guy or gal.
As Helen Kushnick so famously put it to Jay Leno... "I've been serving you steak dinners for almost eighteen years, I just haven't bothered showing you how I slaughtered the cow."
Florida Georgia Line, hell, they're not the best singers. But they have hit records, because they found a niche and exploited it. Mashing up hip-hop and country. With a beer/bro viewpoint that no one else had expressed quite the same way. You could have done the same thing, only you didn't pay your dues at Belmont and you didn't play without a net. Talk about risk... If you want to make it in music it can't be your side gig, but your only gig. And it takes years to make it. So while others are coding at Google, buying houses and getting married, you're renting an apartment, driving an old Nissan and have nothing to show for it. Are you willing to go that route? Almost no one is, not for a long time. As for those bitching that they've been playing but not winning, odds are inherently long, but these people never look at themselves and examine their flaws, their hard to get along with personalities, their lack of talent. Just because you desire something that does not mean it can be so. It's like being 5'2" and wanting to star in the NBA. Or being the same height and wanting to be a runway model. Impossible. Oh, now I'm gonna get e-mail about Muggsy Bogues and... That's exactly the point, you're trying to prove me wrong as opposed to digesting my lesson, which you're free to embrace or discard. But you think by playing gotcha you're winning, but the joke is on you.
Scott Borchetta ASKED Scott Swift for the money. Couldn't have been easy. Then again, he asked so many who wouldn't pony up before Swift. How many doors are you willing to knock on? How many times are you willing to hear no? And still soldier on with a smile on your face without sour grapes.
I'm not saying the winners are admirable people. I'm not saying all their work is of the highest standard, never mind a breakthrough. But I am saying you've got to applaud them for making it. And rather than point out their flaws, look at their attributes, what they have that pushes them over the line. People talk crap about Irving Azoff all the time, do you know that he's charming and the life of the party? As for Michael Rapino, do you know he's the best politician in the music business? Come on, he killed Michael Cohl! But rather than investigate his relationship with Greg Maffei, rather than uncover the choices that go along with the steps, you just knee-jerk your hatred. All the songs on the hit parade suck. The person singing or writing or agenting or directing has your job. That's what it is, raw jealousy. And if you want to sit on the sidelines and carp, that's your prerogative. But the truth is those who've won are ignoring you, they're circling the wagons and leaving you out, you're the one who's empty inside. You could move to Hollywood, you could scrape and save and try to find a way in, lose your job and network for another. You could get a record deal and lose it and still keep making music. But that's too hard.
America's a great country. More doors are open than closed. Especially in fast-moving enterprises like entertainment where where you went to college is irrelevant and except for a chosen few who your daddy is doesn't matter. It's a roiling cauldron that might boil the life out of you, but might just yield riches and fame. This is not banking, a soulless enterprise where cash is the only dividend. This is not tech, where you have to know how to code. This is a realm where street smarts are everything, where emotional intelligence is key. Are you up to it?
Well step up to the plate and find out.
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God, Your Mama, And Me
Spotify: http://spoti.fi/2bCkT38?utm_source=phplist5547&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=God%2C+Your+Mama%2C+And+Me
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Everybody hates Florida Georgia Line but its fans. One of the biggest acts in country, FGL is excoriated by traditionalists and so many modern listeners, but they keep burning up the charts because they've managed to capture the zeitgeist of the younger generation, mashing up rap and other elements of today into a genre that prefers to be walled off from pop and the mainstream. But...
I'm addicted to Release Radar. All the publicity is about Discover Weekly, but it pales in comparison to Release Radar, Discover Weekly will tell you where you've been but not where you're going, it'll hook you up with your old girlfriend and take you on a tour of your high school, but Release Radar is like a trip to a destination you not only have never visited, but didn't even dream of, but one that fits like a glove. I find myself skipping through Discover Weekly, but I LISTEN to Release Radar.
And that's where I heard "God, Your Mama, And Me."
The funny thing about music is you know immediately, not always, but usually. A sound resonates, you start nodding your head, you begin singing along. I'm riding the recumbent bike and I'm asking myself...WHAT IS THIS?
Oh, I knew it was FGL, the lead vocal is unmistakable. But, other than that, it's not country, and then in the second verse a mellifluous voice that feels so right takes over and...
IT'S THE BACKSTREET BOYS!
Do you own "Millennium"? Released in the spring of '99, it only sold 40 million copies world wide, a mere trifle, ha! I had to go out and buy it because of "I Want It That Way," the Max Martin/Andreas Carlsson nugget that superseded anything recorded by the legends of the era, it made the Backstreet Boys superstars, an incredible follow up to one of the great breakthrough cuts of all time, "Quit, Playing Games With My Heart." If you don't like "Quit, Playing Games With My Heart," you don't like Jon Secada's "Just Another Day Without You," possibly SBK's greatest hit, it's moody and infectious and... Never forget that the Beatles started as pop, then they expanded the medium, tested limits, classic rock was birthed and dominated and ever since we've gone down a rabbit hole of ever more derivative numbers that are so far from the garden that...people have tuned out.
And speaking of rock, as good as "I Want It That Way" was, it was the opening cut on "Millennium" that sealed the deal, that made me a Backstreet Boys fan, that had me blasting the CD in my car to the point my BMW shook, because "Larger Than Life" rocked harder and more endearingly than anything on rock radio, which is not hard to believe, since Max Martin started out in a metal band.
So, if you haven't tuned out yet...
That's the problem, self-identifiers stuck in the past. You know them, wearing their black clothing and silver jewelry, waiting for the eighties to come back, putting down all that which is not pure...the train has positively left them behind, times have changed, they're the ones who are out of the loop.
And now the people being left behind are all those mired in the modern machine pop/urban landscape, playing it safe to appeal to a brain dead audience. Meanwhile, Florida Georgia Line goes back to the well and comes up with something that can be loved by EVERYBODY!
"That Sunday morning choir, church doors open wide"
I'd be lying if I didn't say I winced. That's a big problem with country, they appeal to right wing canards. Turns out the nation is becoming less religious. Country acts drug and booze, can they stretch the paradigm a bit, stop pandering? Sturgill Simpson had it right, the Nashville establishment is two-faced, it runs Merle Haggard out of town and then wants to embrace him. Didn't catch that memo? It burned up the country newswires, Sturgill excoriated the establishment on Facebook, read it here: http://bit.ly/2bR2lKx?utm_source=phplist5547&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=God%2C+Your+Mama%2C+And+Me And while you're at it, listen to Sturgill's "Brace For Impact (Live A Little)," which I also discovered via Release Radar. I've been hyped on Sturgill for years, but this track finally closed me, listen to it if you like to go to dive bars in your cowboy boots and sip a longneck as you twist your toes in the sawdust and get your juices flowing. This is more rock than modern Metallica, more soulful than Sharon Jones, it's the ghost of Waylon with some Willie and even if you think you hate country you'll like this, it'll sex you up to the point you'll stop reading this to relieve yourself.
ANYWAY...
I've got to calm myself down, get back to where I once belonged.
So, my point is "God, Your Mama, And Me" is the best Backstreet Boys track in excess of a decade. It's got melody, you sing along, it makes you feel good...ISN'T THAT WHAT MUSIC IS SUPPOSED TO DO?
But most people have not heard it. That's the modern era. You can make it, but if it's not marketed, if it's not pushed, it's like it doesn't exist. But I'm sure Scott Borchetta is gonna push the button on this. It's stuff like this that used to be the song of the summer before we moved so far from the mainstream there was no way we could hit the target.
That's right, sometimes you've got to go back to basics.
There was a reason those Backstreet Boys records were so successful. They appealed to EVERYBODY! Maybe not you, but you're the minority, and right now the minority is ruling in music, its tail is wagging the dog.
Not that I want to give Scott that much credit. FGL's new album is not on Spotify, only cherry-picked hits. I just don't get it, are the people not on the service really gonna give up their CDs and files? As for Jason Aldean keeping his new album off all streaming services... He's like the last guy to use a wooden tennis racket. Yes, you can win that way, but really it's all about metal and composites. The bleeding edge is much more satisfying than mopping up the past with the lemmings. As soon as I heard "God, Your Mama, And Me" I immediately wanted to hear the rest of the new album, but I couldn't.
And "God, Your Mama, And Me" is not perfect. It almost seems unfinished, it could use another section, but it's like...seeing a beautiful woman and being attracted without speaking to her, not yet knowing who she truly is. But you want to know more. (And feel free to flip the script, think about your hunk.) And isn't that what we're trying to do, isn't that our mission, infecting the public and making people want more?
"God, Your Mama, And Me" is infectious because it builds upon the basic blocks. Employ good voices, have choruses people can sing along with, never underestimate the power of melody, create something so ear-pleasing it can't be denied.
And one can argue, as Tom Petty has, that country is the rock and roll of the seventies. But I'll argue that was a golden era, a peak much higher than today, and better to go back to the garden and grow from there as opposed to working untillable soil.
YouTube (It's blocked, but you can hear a snippet): http://bit.ly/2bCi8Ph?utm_source=phplist5547&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=God%2C+Your+Mama%2C+And+Me
Everybody hates Florida Georgia Line but its fans. One of the biggest acts in country, FGL is excoriated by traditionalists and so many modern listeners, but they keep burning up the charts because they've managed to capture the zeitgeist of the younger generation, mashing up rap and other elements of today into a genre that prefers to be walled off from pop and the mainstream. But...
I'm addicted to Release Radar. All the publicity is about Discover Weekly, but it pales in comparison to Release Radar, Discover Weekly will tell you where you've been but not where you're going, it'll hook you up with your old girlfriend and take you on a tour of your high school, but Release Radar is like a trip to a destination you not only have never visited, but didn't even dream of, but one that fits like a glove. I find myself skipping through Discover Weekly, but I LISTEN to Release Radar.
And that's where I heard "God, Your Mama, And Me."
The funny thing about music is you know immediately, not always, but usually. A sound resonates, you start nodding your head, you begin singing along. I'm riding the recumbent bike and I'm asking myself...WHAT IS THIS?
Oh, I knew it was FGL, the lead vocal is unmistakable. But, other than that, it's not country, and then in the second verse a mellifluous voice that feels so right takes over and...
IT'S THE BACKSTREET BOYS!
Do you own "Millennium"? Released in the spring of '99, it only sold 40 million copies world wide, a mere trifle, ha! I had to go out and buy it because of "I Want It That Way," the Max Martin/Andreas Carlsson nugget that superseded anything recorded by the legends of the era, it made the Backstreet Boys superstars, an incredible follow up to one of the great breakthrough cuts of all time, "Quit, Playing Games With My Heart." If you don't like "Quit, Playing Games With My Heart," you don't like Jon Secada's "Just Another Day Without You," possibly SBK's greatest hit, it's moody and infectious and... Never forget that the Beatles started as pop, then they expanded the medium, tested limits, classic rock was birthed and dominated and ever since we've gone down a rabbit hole of ever more derivative numbers that are so far from the garden that...people have tuned out.
And speaking of rock, as good as "I Want It That Way" was, it was the opening cut on "Millennium" that sealed the deal, that made me a Backstreet Boys fan, that had me blasting the CD in my car to the point my BMW shook, because "Larger Than Life" rocked harder and more endearingly than anything on rock radio, which is not hard to believe, since Max Martin started out in a metal band.
So, if you haven't tuned out yet...
That's the problem, self-identifiers stuck in the past. You know them, wearing their black clothing and silver jewelry, waiting for the eighties to come back, putting down all that which is not pure...the train has positively left them behind, times have changed, they're the ones who are out of the loop.
And now the people being left behind are all those mired in the modern machine pop/urban landscape, playing it safe to appeal to a brain dead audience. Meanwhile, Florida Georgia Line goes back to the well and comes up with something that can be loved by EVERYBODY!
"That Sunday morning choir, church doors open wide"
I'd be lying if I didn't say I winced. That's a big problem with country, they appeal to right wing canards. Turns out the nation is becoming less religious. Country acts drug and booze, can they stretch the paradigm a bit, stop pandering? Sturgill Simpson had it right, the Nashville establishment is two-faced, it runs Merle Haggard out of town and then wants to embrace him. Didn't catch that memo? It burned up the country newswires, Sturgill excoriated the establishment on Facebook, read it here: http://bit.ly/2bR2lKx?utm_source=phplist5547&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=God%2C+Your+Mama%2C+And+Me And while you're at it, listen to Sturgill's "Brace For Impact (Live A Little)," which I also discovered via Release Radar. I've been hyped on Sturgill for years, but this track finally closed me, listen to it if you like to go to dive bars in your cowboy boots and sip a longneck as you twist your toes in the sawdust and get your juices flowing. This is more rock than modern Metallica, more soulful than Sharon Jones, it's the ghost of Waylon with some Willie and even if you think you hate country you'll like this, it'll sex you up to the point you'll stop reading this to relieve yourself.
ANYWAY...
I've got to calm myself down, get back to where I once belonged.
So, my point is "God, Your Mama, And Me" is the best Backstreet Boys track in excess of a decade. It's got melody, you sing along, it makes you feel good...ISN'T THAT WHAT MUSIC IS SUPPOSED TO DO?
But most people have not heard it. That's the modern era. You can make it, but if it's not marketed, if it's not pushed, it's like it doesn't exist. But I'm sure Scott Borchetta is gonna push the button on this. It's stuff like this that used to be the song of the summer before we moved so far from the mainstream there was no way we could hit the target.
That's right, sometimes you've got to go back to basics.
There was a reason those Backstreet Boys records were so successful. They appealed to EVERYBODY! Maybe not you, but you're the minority, and right now the minority is ruling in music, its tail is wagging the dog.
Not that I want to give Scott that much credit. FGL's new album is not on Spotify, only cherry-picked hits. I just don't get it, are the people not on the service really gonna give up their CDs and files? As for Jason Aldean keeping his new album off all streaming services... He's like the last guy to use a wooden tennis racket. Yes, you can win that way, but really it's all about metal and composites. The bleeding edge is much more satisfying than mopping up the past with the lemmings. As soon as I heard "God, Your Mama, And Me" I immediately wanted to hear the rest of the new album, but I couldn't.
And "God, Your Mama, And Me" is not perfect. It almost seems unfinished, it could use another section, but it's like...seeing a beautiful woman and being attracted without speaking to her, not yet knowing who she truly is. But you want to know more. (And feel free to flip the script, think about your hunk.) And isn't that what we're trying to do, isn't that our mission, infecting the public and making people want more?
"God, Your Mama, And Me" is infectious because it builds upon the basic blocks. Employ good voices, have choruses people can sing along with, never underestimate the power of melody, create something so ear-pleasing it can't be denied.
And one can argue, as Tom Petty has, that country is the rock and roll of the seventies. But I'll argue that was a golden era, a peak much higher than today, and better to go back to the garden and grow from there as opposed to working untillable soil.
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/?utm_source=phplist5547&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=God%2C+Your+Mama%2C+And+Me
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Tuesday 30 August 2016
Willy Wonka
It was a stiff upon release. It cost $3 million and grossed $4 million in a pre-home video era. In other words, it lost money, with only half of gross receipts coming back to the studio. Sure, there was television income, but this was pre-cable. No one knew the movie and no one knew the songs. Yet today, it's a classic.
Originally it was called "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory." A twisted story by author Roald Dahl, there were no songs, but he had a cult following, one of whose members was my younger sister Wendy, she bought all his books, I read it, I saw the movie back in '71, when it first came out. The Oompa Loompas were too orange, but one viewing and I knew their song by heart. And the kids all had different personalities, not all likable. That's a fiction of media, that characters have to be likable, no, the story has to be good. And I was the only person I ever knew who saw the flick and then...
Gene Wilder dies yesterday and it's the first movie listed in his obit.
Mind-blowing. I too first saw Gene in 1967's "Bonnie & Clyde." I remember 1968's "Producers," which caused a kerfuffle to the point where the Fine Arts in Westport, Connecticut, edited it itself. The scene with the blankie, it was incomprehensible.
And then came "Young Frankenstein." The Mel Brooks tour-de-force, it cleaned up at the box office at the end of '74. It was a cultural staple.
Not that I had not followed Mr. Wilder. I remember going to see "Quackser Fortune Has a Cousin in the Bronx" just before I shipped off for college in 1970. Gene played a mentally-challenged dung salesman who fell in love with Margot Kidder. It was the first time I ever saw her, before "Superman," before the exploits revealing her mental issues, it was a small movie that stuck with me, but don't they all.
"Willy Wonka" was a small movie. Not shot for a hundred million and marketed at half that number. Sure, the studio wanted to make money, but comic book heroes were not the only stars who could get a green light. But today, today, if you're not shooting for the moon, the studio doesn't want to play.
Nor does the record label. There's all this hogwash about costs, both real and opportunity. No one wants to hit singles, never mind bunts, and...
The movies come and go.
But not "Willy Wonka."
I was with a bunch of Gen X'ers and we were discussing the greatest comedies of all time.
All of theirs came from the twenty first century. I was stunned. No "Stripes," never mind thirties classics.
But that's today, when almost nothing from the past survives, when it's all new and then thrown away.
Except for "Willy Wonka."
"Willy Wonka" is Nick Drake. A film from the classic era which got a second chance, which resonated and held on. That's right, it was re-released in 1996 and made $21 million.
And the lion's share of streams on Spotify are catalog, old stuff, that just lasts and lasts.
So in an era of flash are we doing it wrong? Are we focusing on blockbuster me-too product when it's the challenging stuff that tests limits which survives? Led Zeppelin sold out to Atlantic, their manager felt the records wouldn't be worth anything in the future. Jim Morrison was dead for ten years before "Rolling Stone" put him on the cover. Led Zeppelin and the Doors not only survived, they flourished! Who from today will flourish in the future? Who are our "Willy Wonkas"? Are we even producing "Willy Wonkas"?
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Originally it was called "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory." A twisted story by author Roald Dahl, there were no songs, but he had a cult following, one of whose members was my younger sister Wendy, she bought all his books, I read it, I saw the movie back in '71, when it first came out. The Oompa Loompas were too orange, but one viewing and I knew their song by heart. And the kids all had different personalities, not all likable. That's a fiction of media, that characters have to be likable, no, the story has to be good. And I was the only person I ever knew who saw the flick and then...
Gene Wilder dies yesterday and it's the first movie listed in his obit.
Mind-blowing. I too first saw Gene in 1967's "Bonnie & Clyde." I remember 1968's "Producers," which caused a kerfuffle to the point where the Fine Arts in Westport, Connecticut, edited it itself. The scene with the blankie, it was incomprehensible.
And then came "Young Frankenstein." The Mel Brooks tour-de-force, it cleaned up at the box office at the end of '74. It was a cultural staple.
Not that I had not followed Mr. Wilder. I remember going to see "Quackser Fortune Has a Cousin in the Bronx" just before I shipped off for college in 1970. Gene played a mentally-challenged dung salesman who fell in love with Margot Kidder. It was the first time I ever saw her, before "Superman," before the exploits revealing her mental issues, it was a small movie that stuck with me, but don't they all.
"Willy Wonka" was a small movie. Not shot for a hundred million and marketed at half that number. Sure, the studio wanted to make money, but comic book heroes were not the only stars who could get a green light. But today, today, if you're not shooting for the moon, the studio doesn't want to play.
Nor does the record label. There's all this hogwash about costs, both real and opportunity. No one wants to hit singles, never mind bunts, and...
The movies come and go.
But not "Willy Wonka."
I was with a bunch of Gen X'ers and we were discussing the greatest comedies of all time.
All of theirs came from the twenty first century. I was stunned. No "Stripes," never mind thirties classics.
But that's today, when almost nothing from the past survives, when it's all new and then thrown away.
Except for "Willy Wonka."
"Willy Wonka" is Nick Drake. A film from the classic era which got a second chance, which resonated and held on. That's right, it was re-released in 1996 and made $21 million.
And the lion's share of streams on Spotify are catalog, old stuff, that just lasts and lasts.
So in an era of flash are we doing it wrong? Are we focusing on blockbuster me-too product when it's the challenging stuff that tests limits which survives? Led Zeppelin sold out to Atlantic, their manager felt the records wouldn't be worth anything in the future. Jim Morrison was dead for ten years before "Rolling Stone" put him on the cover. Led Zeppelin and the Doors not only survived, they flourished! Who from today will flourish in the future? Who are our "Willy Wonkas"? Are we even producing "Willy Wonkas"?
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The Black Pastrami Reuben
It was the sauerkraut that put it over the top.
Don't let yourself get too hungry, that's what my nutritionist says. And I've been oh-so-good, avoiding carbs, last Thursday I was at a dinner party where Tom Windish and his bride-to-be brought a blueberry pie and a three berry cake from Sweet Lady Jane and I did not partake, not a bite, not even Rachel's tiramisu, because I'm insulin resistant, and when I eat carbs my blood sugar spikes and after being wide awake I'm sleepy and then I feel like crap for two days and...like I said, I've been very good.
But I was hungry.
And I'm lying on the PT table in Century City dreaming of food.
There's an entire stash in the fridge, if I can just make it back to the house, but I'm thinking of something savory, something that will hit the spot, like a burger from Five Guys or...
A hot pastrami sandwich.
Not that I'm that big on Five Guys. But at least there's enough beef, but they play the music too loud, as if they want you to exit immediately, and the fries are tasty but there are way too many of them so...
I decided to go to Brent's.
It all made sense. I had all three papers with me. It was gonna be a field day.
Now I checked Google Maps. Never use Apple Maps, the timing is way off. It said it'd be fourteen minutes beyond home. I could do that. Hell, I'd write off the entire afternoon, not even check my phone, this was gonna be FUN!
And with Howard on vacation I was switching back and forth between No Shoes Radio and the Highway on the satellite, but when I hit a bummer I decided to go all news, I was taking a break, I worked my way from left wing to right wing, from MSNBC to Fox, and ended up on some Sirius news program dedicated to tech, they were talking about AI, artificial intelligence for the uninitiated, and it rang my bell as I crested the hill, passed under Mulholland, and the temperature began to rise.
Instinct would say to take the 405 all the way to Parthenia.
But Google said to transfer to the 101 and take Tampa. And you should never argue with technology, it's always right.
And when I got to Brent's parking lot, it was 104 degrees. East coast hot. You know, where you don't need a jacket at night. It's rarely this hot in L.A.
And needless to say, Brent's was empty. It was 3:30 in the afternoon. Well, not completely empty, but I could get a booth and not feel guilty for hogging it, being one person only, but I needed the real estate, to spread out my papers.
So I pointed out my place to the hostess, she exhibited no resistance, and I took the proffered menu. Many people don't take a menu at a deli, they know it all, and what they don't know the kitchen will make.
But I wanted to peruse the sandwiches, I wanted to drill down to the right one, I needed pastrami with Swiss cheese and Russian dressing, like they do it at Langer's.
Yes, the pastrami is better at Langer's. It's the thicker cut, the twice cooked bread. And actually, they now imitate it at Brent's. They've even given it a number, 13, to compete with Langer's famous Number 19. But on the facing page...
I saw it. The black pastrami reuben!
Once upon a time reubens were only made with corned beef. And as much as I love pastrami, that's how much I hate corned beef. But as the years have passed the rules have been bent, and in my salad days at Brent's I tasted one of these reubens, and it was off the charts, that was what I was gonna get! Rule number one of eating out, get what feels right, not what you think is right.
But then it got better, the black pastrami reuben came with FRIES! it was my lucky day, that was one of the reasons I was craving Five Guys, I had a smile upon my face.
Which at first I did not, because I realized my chosen abode was so close to the kitchen, and my OCD was kicking in and I thought I was gonna have to move but then I realized that the shrink's exposure technique would work, and it did, I got over it, it didn't bother me a whit!
But as I unfolded the L.A. "Times" I realized the next table over had two little kids. Would this be trouble? No, they were very well-behaved, near quiet, the stars were aligning!
So I ordered my sandwich. Along with a Dr. Brown's Black Cherry, I mean you've got to go all the way, or don't go at all. And I was intellectually saving room for a slice of carrot cake, but...
The sandwich came with so many fries, skinny cut, my preference, that there was no way I could eat anything after I devoured what was on this plate.
I ordered extra Russian dressing. The sandwich has to be wet.
And I was worried I was gonna run out of reading material, I'd covered too much of the "Wall Street Journal" on the phone the night before.
But, when I bit into the black pastrami reuben...
How am I gonna describe this?
Brent's is not exactly a dump, but it is a deli, with no atmosphere and a constant din.
And it's not like I'm fine dining, not even slumming at a fast food joint. Rather, I'm eating the food of my people, my heritage, that heartburn-generating fare of my youth.
So you've got to picture it...
The bread is toasted very brown. You can barely see the white of the rye. This is a serious sandwich, not for wimps, not for the faint of heart.
And the cheese is gooey and they put enough Russian dressing on it and...
I can't describe it! I can't tell you how it all came together in my mouth, poured down my gullet and satisfied me in a way that I felt fully alive and life was worth living, if I didn't die of a heart attack on the way out.
Yes, I had misgivings. Just before I sat down. What was I doing here?
What are we doing here, what are we on this planet for? To work, to achieve, or to EXPERIENCE!
You don't have to be rich to buy Brent's black pastrami reuben, you don't need a graduate degree, you just need taste buds and a hand to lift it.
Yes, I ate it one-handed, my other arm is only just now coming back to life.
And there was enough.
The more upscale the restaurant, the smaller the portions. And the cheapie places don't give you enough protein, that's what my nutritionist says, it's the protein that satisfies your hunger.
So the first half of the sandwich... The toast, the pastrami, the gooey cheese, the Russian dressing...and the SAUERKRAUT! That's right, there was a taste of sourness that shot this sandwich into the stratosphere, a delectable delicacy you can buy all day long which most people never consume, even though it's hiding in plain sight.
I started with the fries.
But when I switched to the sandwich I couldn't let go. I dipped it in some of the extra Russian dressing, figuring if I didn't partake of it the waitress would judge me for requesting it, stupid, I know, but that's me, and when I finished half...
I just dug into the other half. I wasn't gonna take it home. I was after the full effect, this was full on GLUTTONY!
To the point the mountain of fries left after the sandwich disappeared seemed way too much, but I consumed them anyway. Who knows, there might be an apocalypse on my drive home from Northridge, I might not be able to eat for days, I'm gonna DENY MYSELF??
And when I finished, I just sat there. No need to rush out, I'd already blown the afternoon. But when only the last pages of the front section of the "New York Times" were left, I sidled out of there.
That's right, just me, anonymously. No one cared who I was and no one cared what I did. I was in charge of my own life, and I'd just had a peak experience.
I haven't eaten anything since.
Although I did pound five Caffeine Free Diet Cokes. You see I'm dry, dry, dry. Reminds me of drinking back at Middlebury, when I'd wake up Sunday morning and go in search of Pepsi, which controlled the concession on campus. They didn't refill the machines on weekends and sometimes I'd have to march through four dorms to quench my thirst, to survive, you've always got to have the effervescent elixir on hand.
And now it's after midnight, I'm reading the CAA book about Tom Ross going to fat rehab and that's when it hit me, the sauerkraut, how it put the black pastrami reuben over the top.
And I just had to write about it.
Because it's these moments in life that really count, that make it worth living.
I cried when I wrote this down, sue me if I went on too long.
Just call me Deacon Pastrami, Deacon Black Pastrami Reuben.
"Brent's Deli Presents: How to make a Pastrami Reuben": goo.gl/tkYnQA
"Brent's Deli Makes the Meanest Pastrami Reuben in Los Angeles": goo.gl/CtGKI2
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Don't let yourself get too hungry, that's what my nutritionist says. And I've been oh-so-good, avoiding carbs, last Thursday I was at a dinner party where Tom Windish and his bride-to-be brought a blueberry pie and a three berry cake from Sweet Lady Jane and I did not partake, not a bite, not even Rachel's tiramisu, because I'm insulin resistant, and when I eat carbs my blood sugar spikes and after being wide awake I'm sleepy and then I feel like crap for two days and...like I said, I've been very good.
But I was hungry.
And I'm lying on the PT table in Century City dreaming of food.
There's an entire stash in the fridge, if I can just make it back to the house, but I'm thinking of something savory, something that will hit the spot, like a burger from Five Guys or...
A hot pastrami sandwich.
Not that I'm that big on Five Guys. But at least there's enough beef, but they play the music too loud, as if they want you to exit immediately, and the fries are tasty but there are way too many of them so...
I decided to go to Brent's.
It all made sense. I had all three papers with me. It was gonna be a field day.
Now I checked Google Maps. Never use Apple Maps, the timing is way off. It said it'd be fourteen minutes beyond home. I could do that. Hell, I'd write off the entire afternoon, not even check my phone, this was gonna be FUN!
And with Howard on vacation I was switching back and forth between No Shoes Radio and the Highway on the satellite, but when I hit a bummer I decided to go all news, I was taking a break, I worked my way from left wing to right wing, from MSNBC to Fox, and ended up on some Sirius news program dedicated to tech, they were talking about AI, artificial intelligence for the uninitiated, and it rang my bell as I crested the hill, passed under Mulholland, and the temperature began to rise.
Instinct would say to take the 405 all the way to Parthenia.
But Google said to transfer to the 101 and take Tampa. And you should never argue with technology, it's always right.
And when I got to Brent's parking lot, it was 104 degrees. East coast hot. You know, where you don't need a jacket at night. It's rarely this hot in L.A.
And needless to say, Brent's was empty. It was 3:30 in the afternoon. Well, not completely empty, but I could get a booth and not feel guilty for hogging it, being one person only, but I needed the real estate, to spread out my papers.
So I pointed out my place to the hostess, she exhibited no resistance, and I took the proffered menu. Many people don't take a menu at a deli, they know it all, and what they don't know the kitchen will make.
But I wanted to peruse the sandwiches, I wanted to drill down to the right one, I needed pastrami with Swiss cheese and Russian dressing, like they do it at Langer's.
Yes, the pastrami is better at Langer's. It's the thicker cut, the twice cooked bread. And actually, they now imitate it at Brent's. They've even given it a number, 13, to compete with Langer's famous Number 19. But on the facing page...
I saw it. The black pastrami reuben!
Once upon a time reubens were only made with corned beef. And as much as I love pastrami, that's how much I hate corned beef. But as the years have passed the rules have been bent, and in my salad days at Brent's I tasted one of these reubens, and it was off the charts, that was what I was gonna get! Rule number one of eating out, get what feels right, not what you think is right.
But then it got better, the black pastrami reuben came with FRIES! it was my lucky day, that was one of the reasons I was craving Five Guys, I had a smile upon my face.
Which at first I did not, because I realized my chosen abode was so close to the kitchen, and my OCD was kicking in and I thought I was gonna have to move but then I realized that the shrink's exposure technique would work, and it did, I got over it, it didn't bother me a whit!
But as I unfolded the L.A. "Times" I realized the next table over had two little kids. Would this be trouble? No, they were very well-behaved, near quiet, the stars were aligning!
So I ordered my sandwich. Along with a Dr. Brown's Black Cherry, I mean you've got to go all the way, or don't go at all. And I was intellectually saving room for a slice of carrot cake, but...
The sandwich came with so many fries, skinny cut, my preference, that there was no way I could eat anything after I devoured what was on this plate.
I ordered extra Russian dressing. The sandwich has to be wet.
And I was worried I was gonna run out of reading material, I'd covered too much of the "Wall Street Journal" on the phone the night before.
But, when I bit into the black pastrami reuben...
How am I gonna describe this?
Brent's is not exactly a dump, but it is a deli, with no atmosphere and a constant din.
And it's not like I'm fine dining, not even slumming at a fast food joint. Rather, I'm eating the food of my people, my heritage, that heartburn-generating fare of my youth.
So you've got to picture it...
The bread is toasted very brown. You can barely see the white of the rye. This is a serious sandwich, not for wimps, not for the faint of heart.
And the cheese is gooey and they put enough Russian dressing on it and...
I can't describe it! I can't tell you how it all came together in my mouth, poured down my gullet and satisfied me in a way that I felt fully alive and life was worth living, if I didn't die of a heart attack on the way out.
Yes, I had misgivings. Just before I sat down. What was I doing here?
What are we doing here, what are we on this planet for? To work, to achieve, or to EXPERIENCE!
You don't have to be rich to buy Brent's black pastrami reuben, you don't need a graduate degree, you just need taste buds and a hand to lift it.
Yes, I ate it one-handed, my other arm is only just now coming back to life.
And there was enough.
The more upscale the restaurant, the smaller the portions. And the cheapie places don't give you enough protein, that's what my nutritionist says, it's the protein that satisfies your hunger.
So the first half of the sandwich... The toast, the pastrami, the gooey cheese, the Russian dressing...and the SAUERKRAUT! That's right, there was a taste of sourness that shot this sandwich into the stratosphere, a delectable delicacy you can buy all day long which most people never consume, even though it's hiding in plain sight.
I started with the fries.
But when I switched to the sandwich I couldn't let go. I dipped it in some of the extra Russian dressing, figuring if I didn't partake of it the waitress would judge me for requesting it, stupid, I know, but that's me, and when I finished half...
I just dug into the other half. I wasn't gonna take it home. I was after the full effect, this was full on GLUTTONY!
To the point the mountain of fries left after the sandwich disappeared seemed way too much, but I consumed them anyway. Who knows, there might be an apocalypse on my drive home from Northridge, I might not be able to eat for days, I'm gonna DENY MYSELF??
And when I finished, I just sat there. No need to rush out, I'd already blown the afternoon. But when only the last pages of the front section of the "New York Times" were left, I sidled out of there.
That's right, just me, anonymously. No one cared who I was and no one cared what I did. I was in charge of my own life, and I'd just had a peak experience.
I haven't eaten anything since.
Although I did pound five Caffeine Free Diet Cokes. You see I'm dry, dry, dry. Reminds me of drinking back at Middlebury, when I'd wake up Sunday morning and go in search of Pepsi, which controlled the concession on campus. They didn't refill the machines on weekends and sometimes I'd have to march through four dorms to quench my thirst, to survive, you've always got to have the effervescent elixir on hand.
And now it's after midnight, I'm reading the CAA book about Tom Ross going to fat rehab and that's when it hit me, the sauerkraut, how it put the black pastrami reuben over the top.
And I just had to write about it.
Because it's these moments in life that really count, that make it worth living.
I cried when I wrote this down, sue me if I went on too long.
Just call me Deacon Pastrami, Deacon Black Pastrami Reuben.
"Brent's Deli Presents: How to make a Pastrami Reuben": goo.gl/tkYnQA
"Brent's Deli Makes the Meanest Pastrami Reuben in Los Angeles": goo.gl/CtGKI2
--
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Monday 29 August 2016
VMA Ratings Crash
"Ratings Are No Hit for MTV Video Music Awards": http://nyti.ms/2bvHXBs?utm_source=phplist5544&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=VMA+Ratings+Crash
It's the content, stupid.
24 million people tuned into Fox last August to see the initial Republican debate. But only 6.5 million people tuned into a multiplicity of Viacom channels to watch the train-wreck known as the VMAs.
It was an unwatchable show. Unmoored from its previous iterations, wherein the audience was king and the acts were paying fealty, last night's travesty was a mess wherein the acts got unlimited time to ramble and sing... Not only did Kanye get mic time, he got to debut his new video. I'll argue the VMAs nosedived when Macy Gray advertised her new record was gonna drop on the back of her dress, but the lunatics have now taken over the asylum, it was all promotion all the time. And if Beyonce was that damn good, why were the ratings so piss-poor?
Most people don't care.
The VMAs used to be a tribal rite for not only the younger generation, but the country at large, the world at large, we lived in a monoculture and MTV was the heartbeat. If you made it on MTV you could tour the world, everybody knew your name.
Today, pop is the dominant format, but most shrug their shoulders. What's a poor boy to do? What's a poor industry to do?
Never has it been this bad, never has the industry lost touch with the mainstream to this degree since the Beatles. I'm not saying all the wannabes fighting on YouTube for attention deserve it, but I am saying the nation hungers for music with a bit more gravitas, a bit more quality, a bit more there there. Dancing is not music, and lip-synching is not vocalizing.
Meanwhile, Adele reached everybody. On "21." Before she made a dash for cash with "25" and marginalized herself. That's the Adele story, not how much money they made selling albums, but how she lost touch with the audience, went from being a cultural icon to a niche player. Remember, the Dixie Chicks sold out arenas after Natalie Maines's faux pas and even went to number one and then they couldn't get arrested. Just because you're big today, that does not mean you'll be big tomorrow.
But "21" was ten times bigger than anything else. Why?
It's not like Adele played the game. Appeared everywhere and did endorsements. Rather, the music stood on its own, and appealed to a broad swath of human beings as opposed to the pop and hip-hop niches of today.
No, this is not a racist rant. No, this isn't even anti-pop. It's just pointing out a giant hole that someone could drive a truck through if they just made music most people wanted to hear!
A certain segment of the population will never listen to hip-hop, never ever.
As for rock... It's so far from classic, it's laughable. Bad voices with unmemorable tunes...
And pop can stagger us, listen to recent Bieber hits, those of Major Lazer and DJ Snake. But most is exactly what it appears, lowest common denominator tripe constructed for a young audience that doesn't seem to care, otherwise they'd have tuned in to this broadcast.
We need a reset. We need bold actors who truly embrace artist development. We need to emphasize skill and talent, developed via practice. Enough with the youngsters propped up by old men, those whose vocals are fixed in the studio, raw talent alone can wow us, assuming people have got it.
And songs have umpteen writers and lose their soul in the process. They're like Doritos or some other snack, cooked up in a lab to titillate your taste buds but they leave you wincing over the empty calories. Fast food tanks, replaced by fast casual, the Food Network trumps MTV, but we're still selling crap music to a young audience of ignoramuses.
We're ripe for a revolution.
We're ripe for someone to sign acts whose success is not dependent upon radio. To care about radio is akin to placating physical retail, both rearguard enterprises thrown over by the public. You can't let the tail wag the dog.
So, what do we know?
MTV is history, extinct. You can't read the obit in the paper, the nitwits are too busy fawning over the "stars," but Philippe Dauman wouldn't have lost his job if there was anything left, and there's not.
People love music, they're hungry for it.
We live in an era of blockbusters, how come today's musical stars are so niche?
Disruption comes from outside, from those who don't see the game the same way. Major labels only sign that which they can market via traditional channels. Innovators break rules, they don't adhere to them.
But anybody with a brain neither makes music nor markets it. There's just not enough money in it.
But money isn't everything, power is. And nothing is as powerful as a talented musician playing and singing from the heart.
You can win, if you pay your dues and speak your mind, do it your way and not theirs. We're hungry for that which satiates us, not music we need a manual to understand, but that which we get on the first listen. We used to have the formula, but now we've lost it.
Once again, it starts with songs. And the scene is healthiest when those who perform them write them, because it adds a layer of credibility, of authenticity, which is key to lasting stardom.
And then comes skill. Practice. Ability. If you can't wail, on your axe or with your voice, if you can't improvise, if you've got no facility on your instrument, you're a momentary player waiting to be thrown upon the scrapheap.
And then comes vision.
It's not hard to out-Kanye Kanye, you've just got to believe in yourself.
Something the music business gave up on years ago.
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It's the content, stupid.
24 million people tuned into Fox last August to see the initial Republican debate. But only 6.5 million people tuned into a multiplicity of Viacom channels to watch the train-wreck known as the VMAs.
It was an unwatchable show. Unmoored from its previous iterations, wherein the audience was king and the acts were paying fealty, last night's travesty was a mess wherein the acts got unlimited time to ramble and sing... Not only did Kanye get mic time, he got to debut his new video. I'll argue the VMAs nosedived when Macy Gray advertised her new record was gonna drop on the back of her dress, but the lunatics have now taken over the asylum, it was all promotion all the time. And if Beyonce was that damn good, why were the ratings so piss-poor?
Most people don't care.
The VMAs used to be a tribal rite for not only the younger generation, but the country at large, the world at large, we lived in a monoculture and MTV was the heartbeat. If you made it on MTV you could tour the world, everybody knew your name.
Today, pop is the dominant format, but most shrug their shoulders. What's a poor boy to do? What's a poor industry to do?
Never has it been this bad, never has the industry lost touch with the mainstream to this degree since the Beatles. I'm not saying all the wannabes fighting on YouTube for attention deserve it, but I am saying the nation hungers for music with a bit more gravitas, a bit more quality, a bit more there there. Dancing is not music, and lip-synching is not vocalizing.
Meanwhile, Adele reached everybody. On "21." Before she made a dash for cash with "25" and marginalized herself. That's the Adele story, not how much money they made selling albums, but how she lost touch with the audience, went from being a cultural icon to a niche player. Remember, the Dixie Chicks sold out arenas after Natalie Maines's faux pas and even went to number one and then they couldn't get arrested. Just because you're big today, that does not mean you'll be big tomorrow.
But "21" was ten times bigger than anything else. Why?
It's not like Adele played the game. Appeared everywhere and did endorsements. Rather, the music stood on its own, and appealed to a broad swath of human beings as opposed to the pop and hip-hop niches of today.
No, this is not a racist rant. No, this isn't even anti-pop. It's just pointing out a giant hole that someone could drive a truck through if they just made music most people wanted to hear!
A certain segment of the population will never listen to hip-hop, never ever.
As for rock... It's so far from classic, it's laughable. Bad voices with unmemorable tunes...
And pop can stagger us, listen to recent Bieber hits, those of Major Lazer and DJ Snake. But most is exactly what it appears, lowest common denominator tripe constructed for a young audience that doesn't seem to care, otherwise they'd have tuned in to this broadcast.
We need a reset. We need bold actors who truly embrace artist development. We need to emphasize skill and talent, developed via practice. Enough with the youngsters propped up by old men, those whose vocals are fixed in the studio, raw talent alone can wow us, assuming people have got it.
And songs have umpteen writers and lose their soul in the process. They're like Doritos or some other snack, cooked up in a lab to titillate your taste buds but they leave you wincing over the empty calories. Fast food tanks, replaced by fast casual, the Food Network trumps MTV, but we're still selling crap music to a young audience of ignoramuses.
We're ripe for a revolution.
We're ripe for someone to sign acts whose success is not dependent upon radio. To care about radio is akin to placating physical retail, both rearguard enterprises thrown over by the public. You can't let the tail wag the dog.
So, what do we know?
MTV is history, extinct. You can't read the obit in the paper, the nitwits are too busy fawning over the "stars," but Philippe Dauman wouldn't have lost his job if there was anything left, and there's not.
People love music, they're hungry for it.
We live in an era of blockbusters, how come today's musical stars are so niche?
Disruption comes from outside, from those who don't see the game the same way. Major labels only sign that which they can market via traditional channels. Innovators break rules, they don't adhere to them.
But anybody with a brain neither makes music nor markets it. There's just not enough money in it.
But money isn't everything, power is. And nothing is as powerful as a talented musician playing and singing from the heart.
You can win, if you pay your dues and speak your mind, do it your way and not theirs. We're hungry for that which satiates us, not music we need a manual to understand, but that which we get on the first listen. We used to have the formula, but now we've lost it.
Once again, it starts with songs. And the scene is healthiest when those who perform them write them, because it adds a layer of credibility, of authenticity, which is key to lasting stardom.
And then comes skill. Practice. Ability. If you can't wail, on your axe or with your voice, if you can't improvise, if you've got no facility on your instrument, you're a momentary player waiting to be thrown upon the scrapheap.
And then comes vision.
It's not hard to out-Kanye Kanye, you've just got to believe in yourself.
Something the music business gave up on years ago.
--
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Sunday 28 August 2016
More Frank Ocean
Apple is not threatening Universal.
After all, it's just business. And in business, you protect your turf.
Prognosticators are saying this is the end, that since Frank Ocean's second LP of last weekend was independent, not under contract to Universal, we're at the advent of a new era wherein power shifts from the label to the distributor and the majors decline.
Don't hold your breath.
Let's assume "Blond" was truly indie, no one knows for sure. Let's even assume Frank Ocean played his cards correctly, that he read his contract and saw an escape clause, which is dubious at best. But, if so, don't expect it to happen again. Read a recent recording contract? Used to be rights were for the world, in physical formats. Now they're for the universe in all formats now known and to be discovered, usually for the life of the copyright. Those twenty five year reversions that allowed acts like Aerosmith to get another bite at the apple? Pfft..., they're gone.
Of course if you've established independent success you can cut a better deal, with more revenue and a shorter term, even with rights reversion. But if the label built you, it not only wants a pound of flesh, but your whole body.
We've been hearing that the major labels are going to be disrupted for fifteen years. Hasn't happened and still won't in the foreseeable future. Because of rights, i.e. the catalog, which labels wield like a parent corralling an unruly child, and relationships. Just try getting on terrestrial radio without being on a major, it's nearly impossible.
It's always those far from the center, usually not involved in the day to day business, who prognosticate about change and evanescence. Those inside know it's a fight for survival, and you circle the wagons, load up with ammo and fight back to protect what you've got. And the majors have done this oh-so-well.
As for playing out your contract and going indie... Just ask Trent Reznor, he hated Universal but then moved on to Sony after his indie interlude, because running your own ship doesn't scale. You're in charge of only one project, a major can spread its costs amongst many acts, furthermore, you can't staff up in every area. Sure, you can hire indies, but after they get the check don't expect them to deliver. You're one of many, you might not have another project for years.
Which is why the majors continue to triumph. Their lunch was eaten by Napster, they got snookered by Steve Jobs and iTunes, and now they're partners with Spotify. Literally, they're investors. Which is why when you hear that Spotify is out of contract you should not waste time thinking about it. The majors want Spotify in business. And they also want a free tier, they want their new projects heard, especially at a site that pays better than YouTube, one upon which they can exert their leverage.
But along comes Jimmy Iovine, friend to all.
But Jimmy's history is winning for himself. Where is Ted Field today?
And the majors granted licenses to ensure competition, but they're not about to let Apple run the table.
That's right, Apple was complicit with Frank Ocean, and for that it must pay. Not with a check, but remorse. Lucian Grainge took its golden ticket away, no more exclusives. Jimmy didn't fight fair and now Lucian is showing his armor.
Very interesting.
But even more interesting is that Apple provides little beyond cash. You get placement on its service, where most people aren't. Success is about exposure which leads to ticket sales and endorsements. Reduce exposure and you're collapsing the enterprise. Sure, Frank Ocean is swimming in media today, but the lion's share of the public either doesn't care or stole the product. Is this any way to run a business?
And if you want to do it yourself, you fail. Remember the saga of Garth Brooks, who refused to embrace the new paradigm and did it himself? Garth is clueless and lost. His last project failed miserably and he's missing out on streaming revenue, believing the disc will come back and files will have a renaissance. Might as well invest in BlackBerry while you're at it. The biggest name in nineties country music has to play by today's rules, or be relegated to the dustbin. Sure, he can sell concert tickets, but so can Def Leppard and Styx, and you don't see them anywhere on the chart. Which is fine if you want to ride the road to retirement, but if you're young you've got to still put points on the board, via recordings.
Money changes everything. It'll get people to work against their interests. Exclusives may put cash in your pocket, but they hurt your career. Music is a mass medium, and if the masses are left out, you're toast.
So, Apple knows how to distribute. But it is not the dominant player. The majors saw the MTV movie, which is why they invested in Spotify and wanted a competitor to it at the same time. But MTV faded away and the majors remained. Because distribution is not enough. It's about investing in acts, developing them, exposing them. Sure, you can take the cream off the top. But there's very little cream and then the froth evaporates. The music landscape is littered with that which hit today and is forgotten tomorrow. Lucian Grainge and his merry band of executives have longer careers than almost all the acts Universal has ever signed, remember that.
So, Frank Ocean is not a harbinger of what's to come. No more than acts doing direct deals with Wal-Mart were last decade. He's an outlier. A momentary blip. And to the degree "Blond" punched a hole in the dam, it's being plugged as I write this.
As for disruption...
It's about music, not systems. Want to own the world, change the landscape? Write a hit tune that sounds nothing like what's on the chart and then dominate. That's the story of the Beatles, that's the story of classic rock. It wiped the deck clean of the old players, not only acts, but executives. And then Peter Grant employed his leverage to make live a 90/10 split, in favor of Led Zeppelin. All the change came from young 'uns, not the established players. Kind of like music discovery lives on Spotify, with its algorithms, Discover Weekly and Release Radar. Jimmy pays lip service to discovery, doing it the old way, via hand, but Spotify wins, it's running circles around Apple because it's run by the young not inured to old ways.
The enemy is not the major label. And it's not the streaming service either. The enemy is you, your brain, which prevents you from thinking different, which believes doors are closed and you're constricted. The music business has been and forever will be one of leverage. He with hits writes his own rules. And he who controls more hits changes the game.
Don't bitch about minor skirmishes, don't fight wars that cannot be won or are irrelevant. Spotify payments suck if you're no one, they're gargantuan if you're someone.
So be someone.
That's your challenge. If you're trying to win via subterfuge, via contracts, you'll never succeed. But if you're emerging victorious via art, you write your own ticket.
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After all, it's just business. And in business, you protect your turf.
Prognosticators are saying this is the end, that since Frank Ocean's second LP of last weekend was independent, not under contract to Universal, we're at the advent of a new era wherein power shifts from the label to the distributor and the majors decline.
Don't hold your breath.
Let's assume "Blond" was truly indie, no one knows for sure. Let's even assume Frank Ocean played his cards correctly, that he read his contract and saw an escape clause, which is dubious at best. But, if so, don't expect it to happen again. Read a recent recording contract? Used to be rights were for the world, in physical formats. Now they're for the universe in all formats now known and to be discovered, usually for the life of the copyright. Those twenty five year reversions that allowed acts like Aerosmith to get another bite at the apple? Pfft..., they're gone.
Of course if you've established independent success you can cut a better deal, with more revenue and a shorter term, even with rights reversion. But if the label built you, it not only wants a pound of flesh, but your whole body.
We've been hearing that the major labels are going to be disrupted for fifteen years. Hasn't happened and still won't in the foreseeable future. Because of rights, i.e. the catalog, which labels wield like a parent corralling an unruly child, and relationships. Just try getting on terrestrial radio without being on a major, it's nearly impossible.
It's always those far from the center, usually not involved in the day to day business, who prognosticate about change and evanescence. Those inside know it's a fight for survival, and you circle the wagons, load up with ammo and fight back to protect what you've got. And the majors have done this oh-so-well.
As for playing out your contract and going indie... Just ask Trent Reznor, he hated Universal but then moved on to Sony after his indie interlude, because running your own ship doesn't scale. You're in charge of only one project, a major can spread its costs amongst many acts, furthermore, you can't staff up in every area. Sure, you can hire indies, but after they get the check don't expect them to deliver. You're one of many, you might not have another project for years.
Which is why the majors continue to triumph. Their lunch was eaten by Napster, they got snookered by Steve Jobs and iTunes, and now they're partners with Spotify. Literally, they're investors. Which is why when you hear that Spotify is out of contract you should not waste time thinking about it. The majors want Spotify in business. And they also want a free tier, they want their new projects heard, especially at a site that pays better than YouTube, one upon which they can exert their leverage.
But along comes Jimmy Iovine, friend to all.
But Jimmy's history is winning for himself. Where is Ted Field today?
And the majors granted licenses to ensure competition, but they're not about to let Apple run the table.
That's right, Apple was complicit with Frank Ocean, and for that it must pay. Not with a check, but remorse. Lucian Grainge took its golden ticket away, no more exclusives. Jimmy didn't fight fair and now Lucian is showing his armor.
Very interesting.
But even more interesting is that Apple provides little beyond cash. You get placement on its service, where most people aren't. Success is about exposure which leads to ticket sales and endorsements. Reduce exposure and you're collapsing the enterprise. Sure, Frank Ocean is swimming in media today, but the lion's share of the public either doesn't care or stole the product. Is this any way to run a business?
And if you want to do it yourself, you fail. Remember the saga of Garth Brooks, who refused to embrace the new paradigm and did it himself? Garth is clueless and lost. His last project failed miserably and he's missing out on streaming revenue, believing the disc will come back and files will have a renaissance. Might as well invest in BlackBerry while you're at it. The biggest name in nineties country music has to play by today's rules, or be relegated to the dustbin. Sure, he can sell concert tickets, but so can Def Leppard and Styx, and you don't see them anywhere on the chart. Which is fine if you want to ride the road to retirement, but if you're young you've got to still put points on the board, via recordings.
Money changes everything. It'll get people to work against their interests. Exclusives may put cash in your pocket, but they hurt your career. Music is a mass medium, and if the masses are left out, you're toast.
So, Apple knows how to distribute. But it is not the dominant player. The majors saw the MTV movie, which is why they invested in Spotify and wanted a competitor to it at the same time. But MTV faded away and the majors remained. Because distribution is not enough. It's about investing in acts, developing them, exposing them. Sure, you can take the cream off the top. But there's very little cream and then the froth evaporates. The music landscape is littered with that which hit today and is forgotten tomorrow. Lucian Grainge and his merry band of executives have longer careers than almost all the acts Universal has ever signed, remember that.
So, Frank Ocean is not a harbinger of what's to come. No more than acts doing direct deals with Wal-Mart were last decade. He's an outlier. A momentary blip. And to the degree "Blond" punched a hole in the dam, it's being plugged as I write this.
As for disruption...
It's about music, not systems. Want to own the world, change the landscape? Write a hit tune that sounds nothing like what's on the chart and then dominate. That's the story of the Beatles, that's the story of classic rock. It wiped the deck clean of the old players, not only acts, but executives. And then Peter Grant employed his leverage to make live a 90/10 split, in favor of Led Zeppelin. All the change came from young 'uns, not the established players. Kind of like music discovery lives on Spotify, with its algorithms, Discover Weekly and Release Radar. Jimmy pays lip service to discovery, doing it the old way, via hand, but Spotify wins, it's running circles around Apple because it's run by the young not inured to old ways.
The enemy is not the major label. And it's not the streaming service either. The enemy is you, your brain, which prevents you from thinking different, which believes doors are closed and you're constricted. The music business has been and forever will be one of leverage. He with hits writes his own rules. And he who controls more hits changes the game.
Don't bitch about minor skirmishes, don't fight wars that cannot be won or are irrelevant. Spotify payments suck if you're no one, they're gargantuan if you're someone.
So be someone.
That's your challenge. If you're trying to win via subterfuge, via contracts, you'll never succeed. But if you're emerging victorious via art, you write your own ticket.
--
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Virtual Reality How To
You're gonna want to be sitting down.
Daniel Glass wanted to know if I'd seen the "New York Times" VR video of the retaking of Fallujah. Alas, I'd thrown the viewer out when it came with the paper way back when. Didn't know I was doing that, but realized it after the fact, when the "Times" kept advertising its content and I couldn't see it.
I don't know whether virtual reality is the future or the next Google Glass. I do know all the techies are talking about it and most people are left out. So, I want to give you a primer, a little help.
You need a viewer.
I assume you've got a smartphone, Apple or Android, doesn't matter.
So, go to knoxlabs.com Not to Amazon, it's actually more expensive there.
Click on "Products" on the top line.
You want the Knox V2 on the resulting page. Buy it, it's only ten bucks, they'll charge you another $2.65 for shipping, but that's a bargain, to get in the door, to see what's going on.
Everything has a hurdle. And those who've jumped it care not a whit about those left behind. If anything, they ridicule them. Most people still don't seem to know that you can synch streaming tracks for offline use. Every day I get e-mail from people decrying data charges and complaining about lack of coverage, they want their music 24/7, and you can have it, assuming you pay the $ 10 a month, just synch it to your handset and as long as you have juice, you can listen.
But this is about VR.
I didn't dip my toe. I was turned off by the hype. I followed the stories, about Oculus Rift first and foremost, raising money on Kickstarter and then selling to Facebook, but I could sit on the sideline just fine.
Reminds me of the first computer era, back at the turn of the decade, from the seventies to the eighties, when the Apple II was infiltrating law firms and I was still using pen and paper, believing the IBM Selectric with memory was good enough.
But when I started my newsletter and loaded up on Apple equipment I was stunned, I entered a whole new world with tons of functionality.
But that was back when there were still manuals, instructions. I follow orders, I'll take the time to read.
VR comes with no instructions. Which is why I'm helping you out here.
So, you've got your smartphone. And you've ordered your viewer. Do this, please. So we're all on the same page, so we can talk intelligently, it's less than the cost of a movie, and the unboxing and first experiences are worth the price of admission.
So, it'll take you a week to get your Knox viewer.
And when it comes, you'll be excited and flummoxed.
Be VERY careful opening the box. Because this thing IS cardboard and you can ruin it quite easily.
But after you unbox it you'll be too scared to make your next move, which is why I point you to this YouTube video, "Hands-On with Google Knox V2 - Google I/O 2015 - I AM CARDBOARD 2.0": goo.gl/DskxeC This will teach you how to extract the viewer from its case, which is intuitive, yet it's in its sleeve so tight you're afraid you'll break something removing it.
And then...
You're at the mercy of the instructions on the viewer itself, which are poorly done and might as well be in Greek, despite being pictures. Bottom line? Fold the flaps back towards the lenses and then secure them with the Velcro tabs. I wish I could be more explicit, if you're confused I'm sure there's a video for it.
And then...
You need content.
The Knox viewer comes with a little pamphlet and implores you to download an app. DON'T DO THIS FIRST! I did, and was mightily confused.
So then I went searching on the "New York Times." I discovered you've got to download a virtual reality app, search on "NYT VR" and download it. But don't do this first either!
No, what you want to do first is download the Google Cardboard app, even if you're using an iPhone, it's platform independent.
So now, after you've downloaded Google Cardboard...launch it and click for the demo.
If this is the future, Google owns it, because at least they give a few instructions, like where to put your phone in the viewer and how to close the cardboard to hold it in place. (Just to be clear, you put your phone into the viewer on the backside of the lens holes, close the cardboard flap and secure the Velcro tab to hold the phone in place, or you can do this with your hands for easy, ongoing accessibility, which you'll need.)
Now, for you oldsters out there...
You're gonna need your reading glasses to download and launch the apps, but you're not gonna use them when looking into the viewer. Got that?
Oh crap, I can't get back to where I started, and I'm trying to tell you how to do it!
Bottom line, first I saw birds and... There was a white dot and I couldn't figure out what to do with it.
Turns out the Knox cardboard box has a button, on the upper right side, you push down to select, this is everything, try it!
And then, to go to different VR movies in the Google app you turn the cardboard box sideways and click on what you want.
Now this is getting too complicated, but it's somewhat intuitive, I know you can do it and...
I didn't do it this way. I started off with the Knox-approved app and couldn't make anything work.
And then I went to the "New York Times," and I knew enough to know that you turn your head to see multiple views and I wanted to see behind me and got up and promptly lost my balance, which is not good, I'm still recovering from shoulder surgery.
So, like I said up top, you're gonna want to be sitting down.
And you're gonna want to use the Google app first, because when you fly like a bird...IT'S VERY COOL!
So then I jumped back to the "Times" and the movies kept stalling.
I've got a speedy connection, but it turns out you're best off downloading movies in the "Times" app.
And the "Times" app is not quite as intuitive as the Google one. You download it, launch it, click on a movie and employ the option to download it and then you're confronted with two choices, two pictures, one for "GOOGLE CARDBOARD" and one for "SMARTPHONE," choose "GOOGLE CARDBOARD," that's the one that works with the Knox viewer. Otherwise, you can just watch the movie on your phone and pan...but it's not the same thing.
So now I'm thinking I've overloaded you, confused you, you're throwing your hands up like you don't care.
But you do. And you will get the hang of this. You've just got to take the plunge.
So, once again, go to knoxlabs.com and buy a viewer, it's easy, go for it.
And then, when it arrives and you've unboxed the viewer and installed the apps you're 90% there, you're on your way home, it's only then you'll have to fumble a bit, but by this time you'll be excited, you'll see stuff through the viewer, you'll be part of the new paradigm, on your own adventure into the future.
Oh, one more thing!
Use headphones. Preferably Bluetooth ones, but any old wired ones will do, even the pods that came with your phone. It's not necessary, but it's a much better experience.
P.S. Once you're up and running you can go to the App Store and search on "Paul McCartney" and download the app to watch his VR movie, along with one about Jack White. However, it worked at first for me and now the content won't download. I just checked the speed in the house and it was 100 Mbps down, so who knows what's going on, maybe it'll work for you, but it's glitches like this that hold new technologies back, we need an AOL for VR, then again, do we really need VR? I'm still not sure...
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Daniel Glass wanted to know if I'd seen the "New York Times" VR video of the retaking of Fallujah. Alas, I'd thrown the viewer out when it came with the paper way back when. Didn't know I was doing that, but realized it after the fact, when the "Times" kept advertising its content and I couldn't see it.
I don't know whether virtual reality is the future or the next Google Glass. I do know all the techies are talking about it and most people are left out. So, I want to give you a primer, a little help.
You need a viewer.
I assume you've got a smartphone, Apple or Android, doesn't matter.
So, go to knoxlabs.com Not to Amazon, it's actually more expensive there.
Click on "Products" on the top line.
You want the Knox V2 on the resulting page. Buy it, it's only ten bucks, they'll charge you another $2.65 for shipping, but that's a bargain, to get in the door, to see what's going on.
Everything has a hurdle. And those who've jumped it care not a whit about those left behind. If anything, they ridicule them. Most people still don't seem to know that you can synch streaming tracks for offline use. Every day I get e-mail from people decrying data charges and complaining about lack of coverage, they want their music 24/7, and you can have it, assuming you pay the $ 10 a month, just synch it to your handset and as long as you have juice, you can listen.
But this is about VR.
I didn't dip my toe. I was turned off by the hype. I followed the stories, about Oculus Rift first and foremost, raising money on Kickstarter and then selling to Facebook, but I could sit on the sideline just fine.
Reminds me of the first computer era, back at the turn of the decade, from the seventies to the eighties, when the Apple II was infiltrating law firms and I was still using pen and paper, believing the IBM Selectric with memory was good enough.
But when I started my newsletter and loaded up on Apple equipment I was stunned, I entered a whole new world with tons of functionality.
But that was back when there were still manuals, instructions. I follow orders, I'll take the time to read.
VR comes with no instructions. Which is why I'm helping you out here.
So, you've got your smartphone. And you've ordered your viewer. Do this, please. So we're all on the same page, so we can talk intelligently, it's less than the cost of a movie, and the unboxing and first experiences are worth the price of admission.
So, it'll take you a week to get your Knox viewer.
And when it comes, you'll be excited and flummoxed.
Be VERY careful opening the box. Because this thing IS cardboard and you can ruin it quite easily.
But after you unbox it you'll be too scared to make your next move, which is why I point you to this YouTube video, "Hands-On with Google Knox V2 - Google I/O 2015 - I AM CARDBOARD 2.0": goo.gl/DskxeC This will teach you how to extract the viewer from its case, which is intuitive, yet it's in its sleeve so tight you're afraid you'll break something removing it.
And then...
You're at the mercy of the instructions on the viewer itself, which are poorly done and might as well be in Greek, despite being pictures. Bottom line? Fold the flaps back towards the lenses and then secure them with the Velcro tabs. I wish I could be more explicit, if you're confused I'm sure there's a video for it.
And then...
You need content.
The Knox viewer comes with a little pamphlet and implores you to download an app. DON'T DO THIS FIRST! I did, and was mightily confused.
So then I went searching on the "New York Times." I discovered you've got to download a virtual reality app, search on "NYT VR" and download it. But don't do this first either!
No, what you want to do first is download the Google Cardboard app, even if you're using an iPhone, it's platform independent.
So now, after you've downloaded Google Cardboard...launch it and click for the demo.
If this is the future, Google owns it, because at least they give a few instructions, like where to put your phone in the viewer and how to close the cardboard to hold it in place. (Just to be clear, you put your phone into the viewer on the backside of the lens holes, close the cardboard flap and secure the Velcro tab to hold the phone in place, or you can do this with your hands for easy, ongoing accessibility, which you'll need.)
Now, for you oldsters out there...
You're gonna need your reading glasses to download and launch the apps, but you're not gonna use them when looking into the viewer. Got that?
Oh crap, I can't get back to where I started, and I'm trying to tell you how to do it!
Bottom line, first I saw birds and... There was a white dot and I couldn't figure out what to do with it.
Turns out the Knox cardboard box has a button, on the upper right side, you push down to select, this is everything, try it!
And then, to go to different VR movies in the Google app you turn the cardboard box sideways and click on what you want.
Now this is getting too complicated, but it's somewhat intuitive, I know you can do it and...
I didn't do it this way. I started off with the Knox-approved app and couldn't make anything work.
And then I went to the "New York Times," and I knew enough to know that you turn your head to see multiple views and I wanted to see behind me and got up and promptly lost my balance, which is not good, I'm still recovering from shoulder surgery.
So, like I said up top, you're gonna want to be sitting down.
And you're gonna want to use the Google app first, because when you fly like a bird...IT'S VERY COOL!
So then I jumped back to the "Times" and the movies kept stalling.
I've got a speedy connection, but it turns out you're best off downloading movies in the "Times" app.
And the "Times" app is not quite as intuitive as the Google one. You download it, launch it, click on a movie and employ the option to download it and then you're confronted with two choices, two pictures, one for "GOOGLE CARDBOARD" and one for "SMARTPHONE," choose "GOOGLE CARDBOARD," that's the one that works with the Knox viewer. Otherwise, you can just watch the movie on your phone and pan...but it's not the same thing.
So now I'm thinking I've overloaded you, confused you, you're throwing your hands up like you don't care.
But you do. And you will get the hang of this. You've just got to take the plunge.
So, once again, go to knoxlabs.com and buy a viewer, it's easy, go for it.
And then, when it arrives and you've unboxed the viewer and installed the apps you're 90% there, you're on your way home, it's only then you'll have to fumble a bit, but by this time you'll be excited, you'll see stuff through the viewer, you'll be part of the new paradigm, on your own adventure into the future.
Oh, one more thing!
Use headphones. Preferably Bluetooth ones, but any old wired ones will do, even the pods that came with your phone. It's not necessary, but it's a much better experience.
P.S. Once you're up and running you can go to the App Store and search on "Paul McCartney" and download the app to watch his VR movie, along with one about Jack White. However, it worked at first for me and now the content won't download. I just checked the speed in the house and it was 100 Mbps down, so who knows what's going on, maybe it'll work for you, but it's glitches like this that hold new technologies back, we need an AOL for VR, then again, do we really need VR? I'm still not sure...
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