I bought it.
This was the breakthrough Kindle moment, not that you've seen any press about it. I doubt there's enough physical inventory in stores. They're gonna run out...if they're not reprinting right now. This is the world we used to live in in music. All that money wasted on printing and supply chain, shipping, returns, it's gone with digital. Along with gatefold covers and credits, but you lose something in every revolution, the march forward is always imperfect.
And no one talks about record stores anymore. For so long every magazine had an owner lamenting the passing of his dream. I remember a story in "Newsweek," where the owner said selling records was the only thing he was good at. Better prepare for the future, because it involves change. And if you don't adjust, you're gonna be left behind. The truth is they're making new people every day, and those people need jobs, and they've got fewer encumbrances and newer knowledge and the fact that you've got experience...doesn't always trump them.
So I didn't have to go to the store to buy "Fire and Fury." Thank god. Do I really want to get in my car, fight the traffic, park, and then hopefully find the book in stock when I can just click to download it?
This is like when a musician dies. Most famously Elvis. He was on the back nine, no one was paying attention, he passes and there's no inventory. Now when someone dies their tracks zoom up the Spotify chart. And I'd be stunned if this isn't one of the best selling Kindle titles ever. Not that we can get that info. Funny how the music business is moving towards transparency, you can see the exact number of plays on Spotify, but the number of books sold?
Good luck.
But it's much lower than you think. And the publishers don't want this info out there. But obfuscation always hurts your business. Which is why transparent Silicon Valley gets all the money.
So, no one proofread "Fire and Fury." You start hitting misspellings and missing words almost from the get-go. And the truth is you find these mistakes in most new books, which speaks to the fact that no one reads them before publication. Send one to me, I could mark it up easily. Not that I'm the only one. The author is mesmerized, in the zone, he misses the mistakes, but couldn't anybody at Henry Holt give it a read?
Of course they did, they decided to publish it. A lawyer(s) was worried about lawsuits.
But first and foremost a book is to read. And forgetting about the mistakes above, "Fire and Fury" is absolutely riveting. You cannot put it down. Because Michael Wolff can write.
I liked the old Michael Wolff better. Before the suits, before the divorce, when he didn't take himself so seriously. I loved "Burn Rate." But now he wants to be just like those he chronicles and it doesn't wear well on him. He's a scrapper. And everybody hates him for it. But he's doing God's work here.
Because the written word rules.
Yes, he who writes down history owns it.
The world runs on gossip, but the final version is printed, and Wolff is the ultimate arbiter.
This is not about left and right, this is not about working the refs. This is insight into what truly happened, and whether it's true or false, it's the best account we've got. Janice Min testified that she was at that dinner with Ailes and Bannon, she says every quote is true, are we really gonna undercut and denigrate a woman in this instance, one who started off in gossip and then became a publishing majordomo? You can come from nowhere and make it in America, and if you don't wish you were in that room where it happened, you're lying.
But the reason the book works is because of ego.
People can't help but talk.
Which is why David Geffen's image was tarnished forever, by agreeing to a biography by Tom King.
Same deal with Jann Wenner. He just couldn't handle it that he'd fade away, he needed someone to write his history, and then Joe Hagan did and he didn't like it.
At least Steve Jobs died. Otherwise he'd be bitching about Walter Isaacson's account of his life.
The big winners can't help themselves. They're incomplete, they need the accolades. Admire those who hold back, who never do press. Like Jerry Perenchio, who you still don't know, who recently died. If you worked for him and spoke to the press you were fired. Because the talent was the driver and the press was not on your side.
Who agreed to let Wolff into the White House?
It appears nobody.
Proving once again that despite all the security, if you just show up, you can go so far. Kinda like the people bitching their photos were stolen from Apple's servers. No, there was no "hacking," the perpetrator just guessed your weak passwords. It's somebody else's fault, never your own.
So Trump is a bozo. This book is definitive. Argue all you want, but we're no longer listening.
Although he still is President. But for how long?
That's the story here. Trump is gonna go or be neutered, it can't go on like this.
Just like Bannon had to talk, the attrition will get to Trump. Everybody expects things to happen overnight. But that rarely occurs. The weight just keeps being lifted onto the camel's back until it collapses. That's a big lesson here. Be patient, play for the long term, it's coming.
Also, it's astounding how the press has reacted to Wolff's book. Very few people read it, they reported on the penumbra. And soon they'll be on to something else. They're all about eyeballs, not about substance. But substance always rules in the end. He or she who puts in the time succeeds. And what you find out is Trump never put in the time, never.
But he won.
Why did he win?
It's the power of television, the power of celebrity, the juice of America.
But also, despite being the consummate insider, he takes the position of an outsider, and in a world where everybody feels screwed over a great percentage of the public wanted to turn over the table, try anything new, they were sick of business as usual. Yup, you get that in "Fire and Fury," Trump is nobody's man, and this maverick spirit can be found appealing.
Furthermore, reading "Fire and Fury" it's reinforced how we live in a two-tiered society, one of insiders and outsiders. Never have we known more about what the insiders' lifestyles, but really we know nothing.
We read about private jets, island vacations, but we're not privy to the conversations, where the overlords cut up the country and share the spoils. Ailes and Murdoch think they run this world.
As for Bannon, he's the interloper with a brain who thinks he can succeed.
But he's propped up by the Mercers' money. Who've seemingly abandoned him now. But it's too late, because money pales beside power. Sometimes they're one and the same, frequently they are not. Bannon is a household name these days. He can reach his constituency via the internet, assuming he's not forced into the slow lane by the FCC.
Don't look at this as a snapshot, but a movie. We're past the halfway mark. The spikes and lulls should not be overinterpreted, stop listening to the bloviating nitwits on cable news.
And you can stop listening to those with an agenda.
You've just go to read this book and know...
We've hit a turning point.
P.S. I just checked on Amazon, the hardcover is sold out, they're saying new orders will be shipped in 2 to 4 weeks, but you can have the Kindle edition...RIGHT NOW!
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Friday 5 January 2018
Thursday 4 January 2018
Jimmy Leaves Apple
There's only room for one majordomo, and it's not him.
People forget that Jimmy was an independent, a record producer, who ultimately teamed with Ted Field to start a label, i.e. Interscope. And ask someone under thirty if they know who Field is, I doubt it, he's a footnote, although Ted did have a great run in the movie business and did lay down the money for the label and hired Jimmy and got out of his way.
And never forget that Interscope Records was Doug Morris's pet project. And when Warner excommunicated it, and Doug himself got bounced, they both reemerged over at MCA/Universal, an also-ran now nearly the only-ran. That's right, Doug Morris saw talent. You always invest in executives in the music business. And one of the problems we have is so few have anything at risk/stake anymore. It's only when you've scrambled to put food on your plate that you truly understand the game. Which is why the music biz's lunch is repeatedly eaten by outsiders, the insiders are now rarely entrepreneurs but managers, to their detriment.
But Jimmy gets sick of being a label guy. He's got bigger ambitions. He tries them. And people forget that so many of his endeavors failed, from QSound to the Farm Club to... Then again, isn't that the mantra of Silicon Valley, you fail until you succeed?
Jimmy did with Beats.
And he wanted to cash out. You have to know when to take money off the table. Your stake rarely goes up and up, it plateaus, and if you're looking to only sell at the peak the joke is oftentimes upon you, you don't wait for every last dollar, you go.
Not that Jimmy's Beats Music was going in the right direction. It was the Tidal of yesteryear, only with less cash.
So a deal was made.
Now you must realize this deal was not done with Steve Jobs. Jobs and Iovine are alike, they're hustlers. Jimmy tried to get Steve to buy Beats forever, but Steve said no, because it didn't make sense, a me-too product, i.e. headphones, as for the streaming service, Jobs wasn't yet convinced.
And then Steve died, and there was only one boss at Apple, but he was a supply chain savant, a key element of corporate success, but far from a visionary product guy was Tim Cook. So Apple was rudderless, run by design, i.e. Jony Ive and trusted lieutenants, i.e. Eddy Cue and Phil Schiller, and they missed streaming completely, talk about hubris, so they were open to Jimmy's offer, a deal was made.
But there still was no foresight. Amazon just canceled its locker service, Apple is still in the MP3 game with an app that's still confusing. This from the company where they were famous for eliminating ports?
So Jimmy's in charge.
But he's not. Because you don't come in from outside and have power. Especially if you don't have the DNA, the roots. In Silicon Valley you want to know how to code, you want to know about roadmaps and organization and although one can draw a parallel to music production, the details are really quite different. Furthermore, outsiders don't like newbies in their business. Remember when Andy Lack went to Sony Music? A disaster that was.
So Jimmy starts to sell. Only Jimmy's expertise is selling from the outside, being the renegade, and Apple's as establishment as they come.
And Jimmy's got no feel for the digital landscape. Everything he does backfires. Like the U2 promotion/distribution. Jimmy's about subterfuge, paying back friends, loyalty, tech is about transparency, with the best software winning, and no one thought the U2 album was cutting edge, even great.
So...
Now Jimmy becomes the mouthpiece of the music industry.
But he's a distributor. How does that make sense?
It doesn't.
Jimmy's gonna save the industry, make sure everybody is properly compensated. This is the mantra of musicians, but Apple customers could care less, all they keep reading about is how rich the musicians are, about their lifestyle, meanwhile Iovine is donating money and...
There's no sympathy.
So Jimmy becomes further and further isolated. At Apple it's about keeping your head down, leading with success. But Beats 1 radio was and still is a disaster, no one is listening.
So Jimmy turned to his relationships, he'd build success on exclusives.
The only thing is this was to the detriment of the business, you don't want to confuse the customer, Lucian Grainge put the kibosh on that and suddenly Jimmy's hands were tied, he could no longer pull a rabbit out of the hat, he could just inch along, and Jimmy's all about the big play, planning for supernova, but there is none at Apple Music, only hard work.
His job is done.
It's about the money, which is why he hasn't gone earlier.
But this is a good thing, for both Apple and Jimmy.
Jimmy never benefited Apple as a spokesman. The product is supposed to be the star. The problem is no one is testifying about Apple Music, all they're hearing is Jimmy bitching about YouTube and free tiers. Now Apple can focus on integration with voice and try to make people wanna subscribe to Apple Music based on its performance as opposed to the sizzle.
As for Jimmy...
He never should have worked at Apple to begin with, he can't work for anybody else, he can work WITH people...as long as they respect him, as long as they do it his way.
So he's got to find another playground. Very few go back to where they once belonged. Richard Palmese went back to promotion after being President of MCA Records, but oftentimes the ego is just too big.
As for going back inside...
We look to the lesson of Irving Azoff, who also chafed under the collar of the company. Irving left Live Nation and is now in new enterprises with Jim Dolan and Tim Leiweke. What new ventures could Jimmy engage in?
Or is he tapped out?
Kinda like his hero David Geffen, the most feared man in Hollywood, that's why he was so lionized in the press. Tom King wrote that book about him and Geffen took a step back, he assured the financial futures of Spielberg and Katzenberg and now he's a philanthropist, pulling the strings behind the scenes. But Geffen always played that role, he always shunned the spotlight, even when he got it.
But Jimmy craves it.
So what we have here is an American story. "What Makes Sammy Run." Jimmy Iovine is not satisfied with impacting the culture, producing some of the greatest records of the era, he needs more, he needs money. But when he gets his money, he loses his power. You don't have to fear Jimmy Iovine anymore. Most people have already stopped listening.
Meanwhile, Apple will continue to engage in battle.
Long live the king.
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People forget that Jimmy was an independent, a record producer, who ultimately teamed with Ted Field to start a label, i.e. Interscope. And ask someone under thirty if they know who Field is, I doubt it, he's a footnote, although Ted did have a great run in the movie business and did lay down the money for the label and hired Jimmy and got out of his way.
And never forget that Interscope Records was Doug Morris's pet project. And when Warner excommunicated it, and Doug himself got bounced, they both reemerged over at MCA/Universal, an also-ran now nearly the only-ran. That's right, Doug Morris saw talent. You always invest in executives in the music business. And one of the problems we have is so few have anything at risk/stake anymore. It's only when you've scrambled to put food on your plate that you truly understand the game. Which is why the music biz's lunch is repeatedly eaten by outsiders, the insiders are now rarely entrepreneurs but managers, to their detriment.
But Jimmy gets sick of being a label guy. He's got bigger ambitions. He tries them. And people forget that so many of his endeavors failed, from QSound to the Farm Club to... Then again, isn't that the mantra of Silicon Valley, you fail until you succeed?
Jimmy did with Beats.
And he wanted to cash out. You have to know when to take money off the table. Your stake rarely goes up and up, it plateaus, and if you're looking to only sell at the peak the joke is oftentimes upon you, you don't wait for every last dollar, you go.
Not that Jimmy's Beats Music was going in the right direction. It was the Tidal of yesteryear, only with less cash.
So a deal was made.
Now you must realize this deal was not done with Steve Jobs. Jobs and Iovine are alike, they're hustlers. Jimmy tried to get Steve to buy Beats forever, but Steve said no, because it didn't make sense, a me-too product, i.e. headphones, as for the streaming service, Jobs wasn't yet convinced.
And then Steve died, and there was only one boss at Apple, but he was a supply chain savant, a key element of corporate success, but far from a visionary product guy was Tim Cook. So Apple was rudderless, run by design, i.e. Jony Ive and trusted lieutenants, i.e. Eddy Cue and Phil Schiller, and they missed streaming completely, talk about hubris, so they were open to Jimmy's offer, a deal was made.
But there still was no foresight. Amazon just canceled its locker service, Apple is still in the MP3 game with an app that's still confusing. This from the company where they were famous for eliminating ports?
So Jimmy's in charge.
But he's not. Because you don't come in from outside and have power. Especially if you don't have the DNA, the roots. In Silicon Valley you want to know how to code, you want to know about roadmaps and organization and although one can draw a parallel to music production, the details are really quite different. Furthermore, outsiders don't like newbies in their business. Remember when Andy Lack went to Sony Music? A disaster that was.
So Jimmy starts to sell. Only Jimmy's expertise is selling from the outside, being the renegade, and Apple's as establishment as they come.
And Jimmy's got no feel for the digital landscape. Everything he does backfires. Like the U2 promotion/distribution. Jimmy's about subterfuge, paying back friends, loyalty, tech is about transparency, with the best software winning, and no one thought the U2 album was cutting edge, even great.
So...
Now Jimmy becomes the mouthpiece of the music industry.
But he's a distributor. How does that make sense?
It doesn't.
Jimmy's gonna save the industry, make sure everybody is properly compensated. This is the mantra of musicians, but Apple customers could care less, all they keep reading about is how rich the musicians are, about their lifestyle, meanwhile Iovine is donating money and...
There's no sympathy.
So Jimmy becomes further and further isolated. At Apple it's about keeping your head down, leading with success. But Beats 1 radio was and still is a disaster, no one is listening.
So Jimmy turned to his relationships, he'd build success on exclusives.
The only thing is this was to the detriment of the business, you don't want to confuse the customer, Lucian Grainge put the kibosh on that and suddenly Jimmy's hands were tied, he could no longer pull a rabbit out of the hat, he could just inch along, and Jimmy's all about the big play, planning for supernova, but there is none at Apple Music, only hard work.
His job is done.
It's about the money, which is why he hasn't gone earlier.
But this is a good thing, for both Apple and Jimmy.
Jimmy never benefited Apple as a spokesman. The product is supposed to be the star. The problem is no one is testifying about Apple Music, all they're hearing is Jimmy bitching about YouTube and free tiers. Now Apple can focus on integration with voice and try to make people wanna subscribe to Apple Music based on its performance as opposed to the sizzle.
As for Jimmy...
He never should have worked at Apple to begin with, he can't work for anybody else, he can work WITH people...as long as they respect him, as long as they do it his way.
So he's got to find another playground. Very few go back to where they once belonged. Richard Palmese went back to promotion after being President of MCA Records, but oftentimes the ego is just too big.
As for going back inside...
We look to the lesson of Irving Azoff, who also chafed under the collar of the company. Irving left Live Nation and is now in new enterprises with Jim Dolan and Tim Leiweke. What new ventures could Jimmy engage in?
Or is he tapped out?
Kinda like his hero David Geffen, the most feared man in Hollywood, that's why he was so lionized in the press. Tom King wrote that book about him and Geffen took a step back, he assured the financial futures of Spielberg and Katzenberg and now he's a philanthropist, pulling the strings behind the scenes. But Geffen always played that role, he always shunned the spotlight, even when he got it.
But Jimmy craves it.
So what we have here is an American story. "What Makes Sammy Run." Jimmy Iovine is not satisfied with impacting the culture, producing some of the greatest records of the era, he needs more, he needs money. But when he gets his money, he loses his power. You don't have to fear Jimmy Iovine anymore. Most people have already stopped listening.
Meanwhile, Apple will continue to engage in battle.
Long live the king.
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Festival Lineups
Are they headliner dependent? And is every American festival turning into Glastonbury, an institution where the flavor of the moment appears? Then again, Glastonbury is famous for comebacks.
Coachella started as a genre festival. Lollapalooza too, at least in its traveling incarnation. Bonnaroo was a jam band gathering. Now they all have the same headliners, there's no reason to travel far, you can see the hitmakers in your own backyard, or do you want to?
I'm not sure, but I've been thinking a lot about it since Governors Ball announced its three headliners would be Eminem, Jack White and Travis Scott. Em's a legend, it's his turn. But Jack White is a press darling who appeals to an older generation and Travis Scott appeals to youngsters and...is it the same audience that wants to see all three and does anybody NEED to see all three?
Used to be that's why you went, you NEEDED to be there, at a happening.
Now it's just another show. Albeit with better food and worse bathrooms.
In the music business we always believe we're going forward, that no rearward steps will be taken. That the act will continue to have hits, that the shows will continue to sell, and then we're stunned when nobody shows up after the album flops.
Nobody showed up at Bonnaroo in 2016, so Live Nation, its new owner, bought insurance, loaded the bill with heavyweights, i.e. U2. But could it be that camping in Tennessee in the middle of summer ain't such a great experience? Used to be a badge of honor to go, not so much anymore.
Coachella is a rite of passage for Southern California teenagers. There aren't enough hipsters to fill the polo field. But they love to dress scantily and dance. EDM lives forever in SoCal, like Oingo Boingo and Depeche Mode. Do you give the people what they need or what they want? Are you curating a cultural event with meaning or just selling tickets?
The canard has been that these festivals have meaning, but that now appears to be untrue.
But Coachella is equivalent to spring break, it will never die.
Nor will Lollapalooza in Chicago, it's too good a location. Kinda like JazzFest. The music is just one element of an overall vacation.
And you can throw in Outside Lands and Austin City Limits but after that, how many of these festivals are cool and needed? Sure, you want an east coast location, but you also have to deal with the weather.
But, once again, that's about selling tickets. A promoter will service everybody who comes.
But last year people decided not to come and some festivals were canceled.
So suddenly the festival world wakes up and realizes we're living in an era of hip-hop, but does it dominate financially the way it does on Spotify? And what's the live experience like? The truth is indie hip-hop festivals are burgeoning. And who wants to go see the same old tired rock acts. But do we just switch headliners and everything goes along swimmingly?
We're at an inflection point. And it's not only the changing of the guard at festivals, but the music itself. Hip-hop triumphed by embracing the internet. But new sounds will follow its pathway. Not the old sounds, but new twists. And if these festivals are so hip, why don't they mix it up with country acts, who rap too? Why not give the audience everything?
But the truth is all the major festivals are rearguard events celebrating the past. Once upon a time they tried to usher in the future, when their proprietors were young and thought they knew better, now they're inured to their lifestyle and the bottom line reigns.
So maybe it's the same as it ever was, hell David Byrne is gonna play Coachella, to very few I'm sure. Maybe the festival is bigger than the acts on the bill. Maybe in this era of experiences everybody's got to leave the house.
But the idea of a cutting edge enterprise where you go to experience what you should know?
That's dead and gone.
The festival is no different from Google, Facebook or Snapchat.
You're the star.
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Coachella started as a genre festival. Lollapalooza too, at least in its traveling incarnation. Bonnaroo was a jam band gathering. Now they all have the same headliners, there's no reason to travel far, you can see the hitmakers in your own backyard, or do you want to?
I'm not sure, but I've been thinking a lot about it since Governors Ball announced its three headliners would be Eminem, Jack White and Travis Scott. Em's a legend, it's his turn. But Jack White is a press darling who appeals to an older generation and Travis Scott appeals to youngsters and...is it the same audience that wants to see all three and does anybody NEED to see all three?
Used to be that's why you went, you NEEDED to be there, at a happening.
Now it's just another show. Albeit with better food and worse bathrooms.
In the music business we always believe we're going forward, that no rearward steps will be taken. That the act will continue to have hits, that the shows will continue to sell, and then we're stunned when nobody shows up after the album flops.
Nobody showed up at Bonnaroo in 2016, so Live Nation, its new owner, bought insurance, loaded the bill with heavyweights, i.e. U2. But could it be that camping in Tennessee in the middle of summer ain't such a great experience? Used to be a badge of honor to go, not so much anymore.
Coachella is a rite of passage for Southern California teenagers. There aren't enough hipsters to fill the polo field. But they love to dress scantily and dance. EDM lives forever in SoCal, like Oingo Boingo and Depeche Mode. Do you give the people what they need or what they want? Are you curating a cultural event with meaning or just selling tickets?
The canard has been that these festivals have meaning, but that now appears to be untrue.
But Coachella is equivalent to spring break, it will never die.
Nor will Lollapalooza in Chicago, it's too good a location. Kinda like JazzFest. The music is just one element of an overall vacation.
And you can throw in Outside Lands and Austin City Limits but after that, how many of these festivals are cool and needed? Sure, you want an east coast location, but you also have to deal with the weather.
But, once again, that's about selling tickets. A promoter will service everybody who comes.
But last year people decided not to come and some festivals were canceled.
So suddenly the festival world wakes up and realizes we're living in an era of hip-hop, but does it dominate financially the way it does on Spotify? And what's the live experience like? The truth is indie hip-hop festivals are burgeoning. And who wants to go see the same old tired rock acts. But do we just switch headliners and everything goes along swimmingly?
We're at an inflection point. And it's not only the changing of the guard at festivals, but the music itself. Hip-hop triumphed by embracing the internet. But new sounds will follow its pathway. Not the old sounds, but new twists. And if these festivals are so hip, why don't they mix it up with country acts, who rap too? Why not give the audience everything?
But the truth is all the major festivals are rearguard events celebrating the past. Once upon a time they tried to usher in the future, when their proprietors were young and thought they knew better, now they're inured to their lifestyle and the bottom line reigns.
So maybe it's the same as it ever was, hell David Byrne is gonna play Coachella, to very few I'm sure. Maybe the festival is bigger than the acts on the bill. Maybe in this era of experiences everybody's got to leave the house.
But the idea of a cutting edge enterprise where you go to experience what you should know?
That's dead and gone.
The festival is no different from Google, Facebook or Snapchat.
You're the star.
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Wednesday 3 January 2018
Taylor Ticket Sales
They blew it.
Show business is about perception, not reality. And the perception is that Taylor Swift is a self-satisfied performer who needs to be the biggest and the baddest and is not.
You don't want to be able to get a ticket.
If I hear one more promoter talk about slow ticketing I'm gonna puke. This is the end game of what they've created, a world with no transparency where the secondary market scoops up too many profits and the greedy acts hide behind the ticketing company. You like the money, you want to live the lifestyle you flaunt all over the internet, why can't you admit it? Instead of blaming Ticketmaster for fees, instead of bitching about the brokers, either go paperless or charge what the tickets are worth.
But you don't want to do this. You want to appear to be a friend of the consumer while at the same time ripping them off. Tell me how that's gonna work again?
So, to solve this problem, we've got the slow-ticketing phenomenon. Otherwise called flex-pricing. Trying to extract the most money from the customer, get the highest gross. But this has really only worked for the Stones, who are running on fumes playing oldies to a crowd that's afraid Keith Richards is gonna die, whereas Taylor Swift is not yet a heritage act, she's selling new music, she needs people to believe she's happening, the hottest act in the business, but when you can buy tickets for her show at the last minute is she?
Of course she's not.
Paul McCartney used to buy independent radio promotion. I don't care who you are, how big you are, you're starting over with every record. And the thing about the Stones... They never sold that many records to begin with, they're kinda like the Dead, sui generis, other than those two it's a game of...
What have you done for me lately.
And Taylor Swift hasn't done much.
She's continuing to feud with the world, only this time her posse has abandoned her.
And other than her initial single, which tried to evidence a sense of humor but didn't, because she has none, every subsequent release went straight to the dumper. Live by the hit, die by the hit.
But they were doubling-down before the album even came out. With this insane boost phenomenon. Since you're gonna be unable to get a ticket, you're gonna jump through hoops to get one. Only in this case, she's playing stadiums and that's a lot of tickets, and ticketing is so obtuse that many of the best tickets never hit the general marketplace, they're spoken for. Taylor Swift thought the rules didn't apply to her, that she could set her own course.
But no, the rules apply to everybody. Even Adele, who stayed off streaming and sold a lot of tickets but became irrelevant to everybody who wasn't at the show.
They've been lying about attendance and grosses since the Roman era, before that. Which is why you buy extra tickets to lay off on Craigslist or StubHub and then find out you can't get rid of them. THE SHOW WAS NEVER SOLD OUT TO BEGIN WITH! But only insiders know this. You read ads congratulating the act on going clean, but if you think those ads are vetted by their displayers, you probably haven't gotten a spam e-mail or junk phone call today. There's no law about this, not one being enforced.
But if you think you can't get a ticket, you're gonna rush and buy one.
But if you think you can...
You're gonna wait for the price to drop.
Come on, this ain't Barbra Streisand. Taylor Swift is appealing to a very young generation, ever go to the grocery store with them? They've got to have it right now, and if they don't they oftentimes forget about it. This strategy was not the right one for Swift.
Then again, it's all being made up in the aftermath.
They expected tickets to sell better. This slow-ticketing thing is just an excuse. An explanation. And if you're buying it...
Forget "Billboard" and the other elements of the music-industrial complex being bullied into printing falsehoods.
The story is Taylor Swift ain't that damn hot, and it's her own damn fault.
It doesn't matter how much money she rakes in, unless you think money is everything, the Dixie Chicks sold out arenas before they were dead. Then again, those tickets were all sold before Natalie Maines attacked George Bush.
All these pop acts that have failed, they don't understand the game. They stepped up to the plate and barely bunted. Whereas the rappers realized if one track fails, you just line up another, they test tracks out with mixtapes, they understand the culture, but Taylor Swift does not.
Your image is not rehabilitated in the press, but in the hearts and minds of your audience. Swift made an album for the inside, not her fans, she lost them. Look at Gaga, she hasn't had a hit for eons, but she's decided to get out of the game, work with Tony Bennett. Even John Mayer got out of the hit game. But Taylor Swift has to win at everything. And people hate people like this. As Eric Clapton said..."It can't always be up - for anybody." (http://rol.st/2AlulPJ)
So Clapton broke up the band, went to work with Delaney & Bonnie. Made a solo record, formed the Dominos, did acoustic work. He didn't follow trends, he went on his own hejira, and his hard core stuck with him and the penumbra waxed and waned depending upon whether he hit pay dirt.
That's a musician.
But Taylor Swift is too busy being a celebrity.
But we've got the press tsunami, talking about sales in an era of streaming, all kinds of facts, but deep in their hearts the fans know...
There's something off.
Taylor could admit this. Blow out the shows at cheap prices. Give back. Create new music only for her fans, forget about the album cycle.
But she can't. Because she had a plan. Which needs to be stuck to.
"Reputation" will come and go. You'll hear varying opinions.
But one thing's for sure. In show business your image is everything, perception trumps reality. You want people to PERCEIVE you're the biggest and the brightest star, that's the manipulation your team is in service to, not your gross, this ain't Wall Street, this is closer to Main Street. This is bedrooms, this is people, this is soul-fulfillment. Who cares if you make an extra hundred million, it doesn't change the songs, it doesn't change what they mean to people.
They don't teach this in books. There's no school. Which is why the music business constantly repopulates with new people, usually uneducated, scrappers who do it in a new way and have their finger on the pulse.
A great manager is the quarterback who protects the act at all costs. When done right management is forever, the act should be able to tour until it dies.
But this requires constant adjustment, and being a slave to the audience, not the bank.
Because the audience decides whether or not to give you their money.
And it's very hard to quantify their whims.
But one thing's for sure, if they can't get in...
THEY WANNA GO!
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--
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Show business is about perception, not reality. And the perception is that Taylor Swift is a self-satisfied performer who needs to be the biggest and the baddest and is not.
You don't want to be able to get a ticket.
If I hear one more promoter talk about slow ticketing I'm gonna puke. This is the end game of what they've created, a world with no transparency where the secondary market scoops up too many profits and the greedy acts hide behind the ticketing company. You like the money, you want to live the lifestyle you flaunt all over the internet, why can't you admit it? Instead of blaming Ticketmaster for fees, instead of bitching about the brokers, either go paperless or charge what the tickets are worth.
But you don't want to do this. You want to appear to be a friend of the consumer while at the same time ripping them off. Tell me how that's gonna work again?
So, to solve this problem, we've got the slow-ticketing phenomenon. Otherwise called flex-pricing. Trying to extract the most money from the customer, get the highest gross. But this has really only worked for the Stones, who are running on fumes playing oldies to a crowd that's afraid Keith Richards is gonna die, whereas Taylor Swift is not yet a heritage act, she's selling new music, she needs people to believe she's happening, the hottest act in the business, but when you can buy tickets for her show at the last minute is she?
Of course she's not.
Paul McCartney used to buy independent radio promotion. I don't care who you are, how big you are, you're starting over with every record. And the thing about the Stones... They never sold that many records to begin with, they're kinda like the Dead, sui generis, other than those two it's a game of...
What have you done for me lately.
And Taylor Swift hasn't done much.
She's continuing to feud with the world, only this time her posse has abandoned her.
And other than her initial single, which tried to evidence a sense of humor but didn't, because she has none, every subsequent release went straight to the dumper. Live by the hit, die by the hit.
But they were doubling-down before the album even came out. With this insane boost phenomenon. Since you're gonna be unable to get a ticket, you're gonna jump through hoops to get one. Only in this case, she's playing stadiums and that's a lot of tickets, and ticketing is so obtuse that many of the best tickets never hit the general marketplace, they're spoken for. Taylor Swift thought the rules didn't apply to her, that she could set her own course.
But no, the rules apply to everybody. Even Adele, who stayed off streaming and sold a lot of tickets but became irrelevant to everybody who wasn't at the show.
They've been lying about attendance and grosses since the Roman era, before that. Which is why you buy extra tickets to lay off on Craigslist or StubHub and then find out you can't get rid of them. THE SHOW WAS NEVER SOLD OUT TO BEGIN WITH! But only insiders know this. You read ads congratulating the act on going clean, but if you think those ads are vetted by their displayers, you probably haven't gotten a spam e-mail or junk phone call today. There's no law about this, not one being enforced.
But if you think you can't get a ticket, you're gonna rush and buy one.
But if you think you can...
You're gonna wait for the price to drop.
Come on, this ain't Barbra Streisand. Taylor Swift is appealing to a very young generation, ever go to the grocery store with them? They've got to have it right now, and if they don't they oftentimes forget about it. This strategy was not the right one for Swift.
Then again, it's all being made up in the aftermath.
They expected tickets to sell better. This slow-ticketing thing is just an excuse. An explanation. And if you're buying it...
Forget "Billboard" and the other elements of the music-industrial complex being bullied into printing falsehoods.
The story is Taylor Swift ain't that damn hot, and it's her own damn fault.
It doesn't matter how much money she rakes in, unless you think money is everything, the Dixie Chicks sold out arenas before they were dead. Then again, those tickets were all sold before Natalie Maines attacked George Bush.
All these pop acts that have failed, they don't understand the game. They stepped up to the plate and barely bunted. Whereas the rappers realized if one track fails, you just line up another, they test tracks out with mixtapes, they understand the culture, but Taylor Swift does not.
Your image is not rehabilitated in the press, but in the hearts and minds of your audience. Swift made an album for the inside, not her fans, she lost them. Look at Gaga, she hasn't had a hit for eons, but she's decided to get out of the game, work with Tony Bennett. Even John Mayer got out of the hit game. But Taylor Swift has to win at everything. And people hate people like this. As Eric Clapton said..."It can't always be up - for anybody." (http://rol.st/2AlulPJ)
So Clapton broke up the band, went to work with Delaney & Bonnie. Made a solo record, formed the Dominos, did acoustic work. He didn't follow trends, he went on his own hejira, and his hard core stuck with him and the penumbra waxed and waned depending upon whether he hit pay dirt.
That's a musician.
But Taylor Swift is too busy being a celebrity.
But we've got the press tsunami, talking about sales in an era of streaming, all kinds of facts, but deep in their hearts the fans know...
There's something off.
Taylor could admit this. Blow out the shows at cheap prices. Give back. Create new music only for her fans, forget about the album cycle.
But she can't. Because she had a plan. Which needs to be stuck to.
"Reputation" will come and go. You'll hear varying opinions.
But one thing's for sure. In show business your image is everything, perception trumps reality. You want people to PERCEIVE you're the biggest and the brightest star, that's the manipulation your team is in service to, not your gross, this ain't Wall Street, this is closer to Main Street. This is bedrooms, this is people, this is soul-fulfillment. Who cares if you make an extra hundred million, it doesn't change the songs, it doesn't change what they mean to people.
They don't teach this in books. There's no school. Which is why the music business constantly repopulates with new people, usually uneducated, scrappers who do it in a new way and have their finger on the pulse.
A great manager is the quarterback who protects the act at all costs. When done right management is forever, the act should be able to tour until it dies.
But this requires constant adjustment, and being a slave to the audience, not the bank.
Because the audience decides whether or not to give you their money.
And it's very hard to quantify their whims.
But one thing's for sure, if they can't get in...
THEY WANNA GO!
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
http://www.twitter.com/lefsetz
--
If you would like to subscribe to the LefsetzLetter,
http://www.lefsetz.com/lists/?p=subscribe&id=1
If you do not want to receive any more LefsetzLetters, http://lefsetz.com/lists/?p=unsubscribe&uid=0eecea7b60b461717065cbde887c8e25
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Dandy
http://spoti.fi/2lSDGdt
We used to live in darkness. It's hard to explain. Everything was the same but we weren't so connected. We took the telephone for granted, but it wasn't until you were in your late teens that you became addicted, and really it was more women than men, can I say that, boys and girls, that a rite of passage for a girl was a Princess telephone straight from AT&T into her bedroom, hopefully on her own separate line, but oftentimes that was not the case and you'd hear people yelling throughout the house GET OFF THE PHONE!, long before call-waiting, when we didn't assume we'd get someone on the first ring.
School never started before Labor Day. And it was hot, too hot, there was no A/C, and then it was cold. But never inside, they always overheated the buildings, long before anybody worried about energy depletion, never mind the prices.
And you'd ride your bike right up to Thanksgiving, albeit freezing, with your fall jacket on, you had a series of jackets, your Yankees jacket for the spring and summer, a nylon one for when it was just a bit cooler and a fall jacket that was not lined and then your winter jacket for the worst weather. And flannel-lined jeans. We became too hip for them, but I wish I had them today, they were so warm. And there was no water-repellence, never mind Gore-Tex, you got wet and you stayed wet. When you walked home from school, which we all did, when you went out and played in the snow, when you tobogganed.
We did that, a lot. We had a multitude of snow conveyances. Of course the Flexible Flyer, and what made that sled so good was it was truly flexible, you could steer it. And then the flying saucer, an aluminum pan that got dented the first time you used it, that you slid down the hill upon. And then the toboggan. We had two in our house. One with two seats and one with seven. And the trick with toboggans, or maybe the deficiency, was it was very hard to keep them going straight. You'd start out straight, but then the tail end would start to slip and you'd be going sideways and sometimes the whole thing would tip over and sometimes people would fall off and if you were lucky enough to be in front, with your feet tucked under the curl, you were along for the ride with no power, you got the biggest thrills, but the greatest injury. Oh, did I mention that sometimes you went over a bump? And then everybody came off in midair? But this was when we still got snow and you weren't so worried about getting hurt.
And if it snowed, you went out and played. Even at night. Especially the first storm of the year. You liked being in what was coming down.
But most nights you were in your room, with the transistor, doing homework. Usually math. Why is it we were always doing math homework?
Of course there was television. But you did not have a set in your bedroom and you could not watch all night. You had to bargain with your parents how much you could view before you went upstairs.
And if you were lucky you had your own bedroom.
And the music was always playing. But it was not a cacophony of sound, it was the only sound.
Now I can't overstate the impact of the arrival of the Beatles. Suddenly everybody was into music, just like everybody got into AOL in '95. It existed before, but now it was a revolution. And the songs being played were no longer ditties, they had meaning. Oh, they might appear quaint today, but they were bleeding edge limit-testers back then. And so many came from the U.K., where it may not have snowed, but there was precipitation and darkness.
That's what you avoid in Los Angeles, America's hottest spot right now, precipitation and darkness. It does rain, but rarely, and it's sunny nearly every day, and this does wonders for your mood. But when it rains, when it snows, when it's gray, your mind starts to drift, especially when the records come on, it's like your world is broadened, you gain insight, you get a feel for what the world is like and who you are.
I got this feeling last night.
I'd watched enough Netflix. I wanted to read and I wanted to listen to music so I did both, which is harder to do these days, especially if I want to concentrate.
And I'm reading a novel and listening to the hits of '67 on Amazon Music. Not '68, because that was sunny and upbeat. But '67, when it was still dark, when "Purple Haze" was released. Most people didn't hear it until the following year, but Jimi was there, if you had friends, if you listened to FM, if you were in the know.
But most people were still listening to AM radio, and that's where they heard "There's A Kind Of Hush (All Over The World)," by Herman's Hermits.
They get a bad rap. But if you go back and listen to those tunes...
"I'm Into Something Good" has gotten its victory lap, mostly from the inclusion in 1988's "Naked Gun," I know that's a long time ago, but the film still plays on TV and streaming services and look at the bump the "Sopranos" gave "Don't Stop Believin'" and the one "Wayne's World" gave "Bohemian Rhapsody"... One good placement can ensure legendary status.
And once you get past the unjustly maligned "Henry VIII," which was a joke back then, I don't know why you need to make fun of it today, you get to some truly fulfilling cuts that bring me back to that era, like "Listen People," "A Must To Avoid" and "There's A Kind Of Hush."
It came up on the Amazon playlist.
And then I needed to hear "Dandy."
I'm more of a late period Kinks fan, when everybody abandoned them. I prefer "20th Century Man" and "Preservation" but I owned the initial greatest hits album, it was an excellent value, I knew those songs by heart. And when I play them today...
Goosebumps.
That's right, I played "Tired Of Waiting" just last week. I could picture myself on the steps of the high school, singing with my friend. We used to do this, before everybody rapped.
And the Kinks' original version of "Dandy" was a hit overseas, but the single in America was by Herman's Hermits. So most people have never heard the original. But you need to, it's the same, but...
Different.
"Dandy, dandy
Where you gonna go now
Who you gonna turn to"
The amazing thing is they could play these songs. There's a BBC album online that's revelatory, it sounds like the Kinks, not a pale imitation, and what immediately grabs you is the acoustic guitar, listen to the Hermits' instrumentation, it's so close but not the same, there's a jagged rhythm in the Kinks' original that enthralls you.
But not as much as Ray Davies's SNEER!
He was never anybody's man (or woman!) To this day he's sui generis, not a member of the group, an outsider who seems to know more of what's going on inside than those ensconced therein.
"You're chasing all the girls
They can't resist your smile
Oh, they long for dandy, dandy"
It's not Ray. From back when musicians were social commentators and not the story themselves.
"Checkin' out the ladies
Tickling their fancy
Pouring out your charm
To meet all your own demands
And turn it off at will
Oh, they long for dandy, dandy"
He's manipulative, he thinks it's all about him, but it's not.
"Dandy you know you're moving much too fast
And dandy, you know you can't escape the past
Look around you and see the people settle down
And when you're old and grey you will remember what they said
That two girls are too many, three's a crowd and four you're dead"
Too much of a good thing...
Is not a good thing.
We've been taught that excess is part of success. But you get caught up in it and you lose yourself. You need to be called on your faux pas. That's what musicians used to do.
But it's the sound of the record that not only piques your curiosity, but keeps you riveted. Where is it cut, who are these people? This is not something you can see on Facebook Live. There isn't any video. You have to know someone, you can't get there. Still... If you were just a fly on the wall you'd know you were in the aura of excellence but you could not connect, the Kinks would not be friendly, the engineer would not give you the time of day, it was all somehow removed.
That's what the amazing thing about this music was. It was right up front and center, ubiquitous, it meant everything to us, we needed to get closer to it, but WE COULDN'T! At best we could let it inhabit our own minds and create our own memories based on mood.
And when I hear "Dandy" I'm brought back to the midsixties. The pictures become clear, even though there are no photographs. I can remember what I felt. And it doesn't seem like yesterday...
It seems like today.
P.S. We were a generation of Peter Pans. We never wanted to grow up. And even though some of us got married, had children and even bought houses and Teslas, we grow our hair long, don ponytails, jeans and leather and try to make like we're still who we once were. But the joke is on us:
"Oh dandy, dandy
When you gonna give up
Are you feeling old now
You will always be free
You need no sympathy
A bachelor you will stay
And dandy, you're all right
You're all right
You're all right
You're all right
You're all right
You're all right"
OR ARE YOU?
We used to live in darkness. It's hard to explain. Everything was the same but we weren't so connected. We took the telephone for granted, but it wasn't until you were in your late teens that you became addicted, and really it was more women than men, can I say that, boys and girls, that a rite of passage for a girl was a Princess telephone straight from AT&T into her bedroom, hopefully on her own separate line, but oftentimes that was not the case and you'd hear people yelling throughout the house GET OFF THE PHONE!, long before call-waiting, when we didn't assume we'd get someone on the first ring.
School never started before Labor Day. And it was hot, too hot, there was no A/C, and then it was cold. But never inside, they always overheated the buildings, long before anybody worried about energy depletion, never mind the prices.
And you'd ride your bike right up to Thanksgiving, albeit freezing, with your fall jacket on, you had a series of jackets, your Yankees jacket for the spring and summer, a nylon one for when it was just a bit cooler and a fall jacket that was not lined and then your winter jacket for the worst weather. And flannel-lined jeans. We became too hip for them, but I wish I had them today, they were so warm. And there was no water-repellence, never mind Gore-Tex, you got wet and you stayed wet. When you walked home from school, which we all did, when you went out and played in the snow, when you tobogganed.
We did that, a lot. We had a multitude of snow conveyances. Of course the Flexible Flyer, and what made that sled so good was it was truly flexible, you could steer it. And then the flying saucer, an aluminum pan that got dented the first time you used it, that you slid down the hill upon. And then the toboggan. We had two in our house. One with two seats and one with seven. And the trick with toboggans, or maybe the deficiency, was it was very hard to keep them going straight. You'd start out straight, but then the tail end would start to slip and you'd be going sideways and sometimes the whole thing would tip over and sometimes people would fall off and if you were lucky enough to be in front, with your feet tucked under the curl, you were along for the ride with no power, you got the biggest thrills, but the greatest injury. Oh, did I mention that sometimes you went over a bump? And then everybody came off in midair? But this was when we still got snow and you weren't so worried about getting hurt.
And if it snowed, you went out and played. Even at night. Especially the first storm of the year. You liked being in what was coming down.
But most nights you were in your room, with the transistor, doing homework. Usually math. Why is it we were always doing math homework?
Of course there was television. But you did not have a set in your bedroom and you could not watch all night. You had to bargain with your parents how much you could view before you went upstairs.
And if you were lucky you had your own bedroom.
And the music was always playing. But it was not a cacophony of sound, it was the only sound.
Now I can't overstate the impact of the arrival of the Beatles. Suddenly everybody was into music, just like everybody got into AOL in '95. It existed before, but now it was a revolution. And the songs being played were no longer ditties, they had meaning. Oh, they might appear quaint today, but they were bleeding edge limit-testers back then. And so many came from the U.K., where it may not have snowed, but there was precipitation and darkness.
That's what you avoid in Los Angeles, America's hottest spot right now, precipitation and darkness. It does rain, but rarely, and it's sunny nearly every day, and this does wonders for your mood. But when it rains, when it snows, when it's gray, your mind starts to drift, especially when the records come on, it's like your world is broadened, you gain insight, you get a feel for what the world is like and who you are.
I got this feeling last night.
I'd watched enough Netflix. I wanted to read and I wanted to listen to music so I did both, which is harder to do these days, especially if I want to concentrate.
And I'm reading a novel and listening to the hits of '67 on Amazon Music. Not '68, because that was sunny and upbeat. But '67, when it was still dark, when "Purple Haze" was released. Most people didn't hear it until the following year, but Jimi was there, if you had friends, if you listened to FM, if you were in the know.
But most people were still listening to AM radio, and that's where they heard "There's A Kind Of Hush (All Over The World)," by Herman's Hermits.
They get a bad rap. But if you go back and listen to those tunes...
"I'm Into Something Good" has gotten its victory lap, mostly from the inclusion in 1988's "Naked Gun," I know that's a long time ago, but the film still plays on TV and streaming services and look at the bump the "Sopranos" gave "Don't Stop Believin'" and the one "Wayne's World" gave "Bohemian Rhapsody"... One good placement can ensure legendary status.
And once you get past the unjustly maligned "Henry VIII," which was a joke back then, I don't know why you need to make fun of it today, you get to some truly fulfilling cuts that bring me back to that era, like "Listen People," "A Must To Avoid" and "There's A Kind Of Hush."
It came up on the Amazon playlist.
And then I needed to hear "Dandy."
I'm more of a late period Kinks fan, when everybody abandoned them. I prefer "20th Century Man" and "Preservation" but I owned the initial greatest hits album, it was an excellent value, I knew those songs by heart. And when I play them today...
Goosebumps.
That's right, I played "Tired Of Waiting" just last week. I could picture myself on the steps of the high school, singing with my friend. We used to do this, before everybody rapped.
And the Kinks' original version of "Dandy" was a hit overseas, but the single in America was by Herman's Hermits. So most people have never heard the original. But you need to, it's the same, but...
Different.
"Dandy, dandy
Where you gonna go now
Who you gonna turn to"
The amazing thing is they could play these songs. There's a BBC album online that's revelatory, it sounds like the Kinks, not a pale imitation, and what immediately grabs you is the acoustic guitar, listen to the Hermits' instrumentation, it's so close but not the same, there's a jagged rhythm in the Kinks' original that enthralls you.
But not as much as Ray Davies's SNEER!
He was never anybody's man (or woman!) To this day he's sui generis, not a member of the group, an outsider who seems to know more of what's going on inside than those ensconced therein.
"You're chasing all the girls
They can't resist your smile
Oh, they long for dandy, dandy"
It's not Ray. From back when musicians were social commentators and not the story themselves.
"Checkin' out the ladies
Tickling their fancy
Pouring out your charm
To meet all your own demands
And turn it off at will
Oh, they long for dandy, dandy"
He's manipulative, he thinks it's all about him, but it's not.
"Dandy you know you're moving much too fast
And dandy, you know you can't escape the past
Look around you and see the people settle down
And when you're old and grey you will remember what they said
That two girls are too many, three's a crowd and four you're dead"
Too much of a good thing...
Is not a good thing.
We've been taught that excess is part of success. But you get caught up in it and you lose yourself. You need to be called on your faux pas. That's what musicians used to do.
But it's the sound of the record that not only piques your curiosity, but keeps you riveted. Where is it cut, who are these people? This is not something you can see on Facebook Live. There isn't any video. You have to know someone, you can't get there. Still... If you were just a fly on the wall you'd know you were in the aura of excellence but you could not connect, the Kinks would not be friendly, the engineer would not give you the time of day, it was all somehow removed.
That's what the amazing thing about this music was. It was right up front and center, ubiquitous, it meant everything to us, we needed to get closer to it, but WE COULDN'T! At best we could let it inhabit our own minds and create our own memories based on mood.
And when I hear "Dandy" I'm brought back to the midsixties. The pictures become clear, even though there are no photographs. I can remember what I felt. And it doesn't seem like yesterday...
It seems like today.
P.S. We were a generation of Peter Pans. We never wanted to grow up. And even though some of us got married, had children and even bought houses and Teslas, we grow our hair long, don ponytails, jeans and leather and try to make like we're still who we once were. But the joke is on us:
"Oh dandy, dandy
When you gonna give up
Are you feeling old now
You will always be free
You need no sympathy
A bachelor you will stay
And dandy, you're all right
You're all right
You're all right
You're all right
You're all right
You're all right"
OR ARE YOU?
--
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Harvey's Tune
http://spoti.fi/2CiMdwq
http://bit.ly/2lQ3W87
I was watching "Better Call Saul" and they played "Season Of The Witch."
Does anybody know the original five minute Donovan cut today? Never mind the Al Kooper "Super Session" remake they used on this television show?
It was not a hit, but it was a standard in its original Donovan incarnation. There was the hypnotic groove, the emphatic vocal, and the indelible chorus. Made by someone denigrated by Dylan but with substance nonetheless, track down Howard Stern's interview of a few years back, you'll be utterly fascinated, desirous of having lived through the sixties yourself.
But the "Super Session" iteration is even slower, and more than twice as long, its eleven minute rendition was the most famous cut on the LP and dominated the nascent FM underground radio format.
You see "Super Session" uttered in the jam era. Players had done this forever, Kooper's genius was to record it. Subsequently we got Moby Grape's "Grape Jam" and ultimately the third record of George Harrison's "All Things Must Pass" package. And at this late date, "Super Session" is legendary for its first side, including the playing of the long gone Michael Bloomfield. And back then playing this exquisite was plentiful, but when you listen to Bloomfield pick your jaw will drop, it's a revelation, you wonder where all of today's players went.
They don't exist.
Or they're imitating.
They're not innovating.
It all came from the blues. They were the foundation of sixties rock and roll. They've been thrown overboard. Do we need to get back to the garden, do we need a blues revival to inspire a younger generation, not only bring rock back but infuse a whole swath of youngsters with soulfulness? The blues infected AM radio, but mostly they served to explode in the format known as album rock. You stretched out, you laid down your feelings, in a thirty to forty minute opus.
So when the show was done, I went to my phone, I pulled up "Super Session."
And that's when I saw "Harvey's Tune." The final track. An add-on to finish the LP.
Harvey Brooks was and still is a legendary bassist. Played with everyone from the aforementioned Dylan to Miles Davis.
And I love this tune. So I pulled it up in the darkness.
It's dreamy, it sounds like nothing on the hit parade, nothing else on the LP. It reminded me of how broad our tastes were back then. How we had an affinity for melody, how music was about setting our minds free. Back when real horns, never mind real drums and bass, were featured on records.
This is music. A tiny slice of life. Barely two minutes long.
And it made me wonder how we got so far from the garden.
And whether we could get back.
You see there didn't used to be so much money in music. It was just a business. One made up of hustlers and dreamers. Musicians wanted to play and enjoy the lifestyle, not get up early, stay up late and get high and blow.
Now everybody's a mini-corporation, when they're not bitching they are not.
There's a lot more to classic rock than the Beatles and Led Zeppelin. It's been fifty years, maybe it's time for a comeback. Time to jump off from where we once were, after a revival, akin to the ones in folk and blues back then. Go back to the roots, the essence, and see if we can go down a new path of enrichment and fulfillment.
"Season Of The Witch": http://spoti.fi/2E1bU52
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http://bit.ly/2lQ3W87
I was watching "Better Call Saul" and they played "Season Of The Witch."
Does anybody know the original five minute Donovan cut today? Never mind the Al Kooper "Super Session" remake they used on this television show?
It was not a hit, but it was a standard in its original Donovan incarnation. There was the hypnotic groove, the emphatic vocal, and the indelible chorus. Made by someone denigrated by Dylan but with substance nonetheless, track down Howard Stern's interview of a few years back, you'll be utterly fascinated, desirous of having lived through the sixties yourself.
But the "Super Session" iteration is even slower, and more than twice as long, its eleven minute rendition was the most famous cut on the LP and dominated the nascent FM underground radio format.
You see "Super Session" uttered in the jam era. Players had done this forever, Kooper's genius was to record it. Subsequently we got Moby Grape's "Grape Jam" and ultimately the third record of George Harrison's "All Things Must Pass" package. And at this late date, "Super Session" is legendary for its first side, including the playing of the long gone Michael Bloomfield. And back then playing this exquisite was plentiful, but when you listen to Bloomfield pick your jaw will drop, it's a revelation, you wonder where all of today's players went.
They don't exist.
Or they're imitating.
They're not innovating.
It all came from the blues. They were the foundation of sixties rock and roll. They've been thrown overboard. Do we need to get back to the garden, do we need a blues revival to inspire a younger generation, not only bring rock back but infuse a whole swath of youngsters with soulfulness? The blues infected AM radio, but mostly they served to explode in the format known as album rock. You stretched out, you laid down your feelings, in a thirty to forty minute opus.
So when the show was done, I went to my phone, I pulled up "Super Session."
And that's when I saw "Harvey's Tune." The final track. An add-on to finish the LP.
Harvey Brooks was and still is a legendary bassist. Played with everyone from the aforementioned Dylan to Miles Davis.
And I love this tune. So I pulled it up in the darkness.
It's dreamy, it sounds like nothing on the hit parade, nothing else on the LP. It reminded me of how broad our tastes were back then. How we had an affinity for melody, how music was about setting our minds free. Back when real horns, never mind real drums and bass, were featured on records.
This is music. A tiny slice of life. Barely two minutes long.
And it made me wonder how we got so far from the garden.
And whether we could get back.
You see there didn't used to be so much money in music. It was just a business. One made up of hustlers and dreamers. Musicians wanted to play and enjoy the lifestyle, not get up early, stay up late and get high and blow.
Now everybody's a mini-corporation, when they're not bitching they are not.
There's a lot more to classic rock than the Beatles and Led Zeppelin. It's been fifty years, maybe it's time for a comeback. Time to jump off from where we once were, after a revival, akin to the ones in folk and blues back then. Go back to the roots, the essence, and see if we can go down a new path of enrichment and fulfillment.
"Season Of The Witch": http://spoti.fi/2E1bU52
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Tuesday 2 January 2018
News You Can Use
Embrace streaming. Complaining about it, forwarding stories about it, getting caught up in the minutiae of it is a rearguard action that is only hurting yourself.
Either swing for the fence or own your marginality. It's about influence. You can be on Patreon with 100 fans keeping you alive or you can try to reach millions. Just don't be the one on Patreon with a miniscule audience bitching that you're not reaching more and preaching that you make a difference. If you can sustain yourself, more power to you. But the game is in mass. To deny this is to delude yourself. Not only do you want to make money, you want to have an impact.
The money comes with a price. Art is about freedom of expression. Anybody who invests in you will compromise that vision. If you need to do it your way do it independently. Or amass enough juice that you can write your own contract. If you're just a cog in the system, take the cash.
The more credibility you have the longer your career. You can take the sponsorship, but it'll shorten your shelf life. If you're just using music as a springboard to further riches, by all means sell out. But if you're first and foremost a musician...
Derivative is death. That's what killed rock. Which is why Greta Van Fleet is doing so well. It sounds like Led Zeppelin, instead of sounding like a mutation of what once was.
Exposure is trumped by quality. This is what Amazon has wrought, you're only as good as your reviews. Prior to the internet you could snooker the public, have a turntable hit, but now everybody knows the truth.
Sour grapes is a reflection upon you. No, they're not keeping you down, you're just not good enough, you haven't figured out a way to make it work.
Find what you do best, followers fail.
There is no music business authority. "Billboard" has blinked and gone consumer and Pitchfork is too inside and the best and the brightest don't write about music anyway. And those who do are influenced by the powers-that-be, all that hogwash about Taylor Swift's shows being successful because of the pricing and not selling out. THEN WHY ARE THE CHEAP SEATS STILL AVAILABLE???
Forget the faux pas. Mistakes are plowed under by the relentless tsunami of information. Ignore those calling foul, don't even respond.
People are looking for an enemy, because they feel powerless. Apple was killing their old phones, all kinds of hogwash. I'm not saying the corporation is always right, but the public is never satisfied, it always believes it's being screwed.
You're not as big as you think you are, no one is. When you read that someone's a superstar take it with a grain of salt. We are going to have more ubiquitous superstars in the future, within the next five years, it's part of the inexorable march of consolidation, but we are not there yet. If you're playing the long game, learn how to write, sing and play, and if you can do none of these three, GET OUT!
Social media is overrated. It's a playground for the wannabes. Sure, people want to be able to find out information about you, but if you're a musician, focus on the music.
Those talking about Blockchain are those who can't make hit records in the new economy. Nothing wrong with a tracking system in the future, but it's a diversion now. Music is inherently fuzzy. That's why it's hard to capture.
You're either a businessman or an artist. Decide which one. They're two different personalities and they rarely merge. If unsure, follow the money if it's most important to you as a businessman, or walk into the wilderness as an artist.
There are no guarantees. You can put in all the time and still fail. You can be great and still fail. Own this.
Life is long. Winners know this. If you're tattooing the name of today's hit band on your arm...you're gonna have regrets in the future. Winners keep their options open.
U2's album has already failed. They got usual suspect press, but fail to realize they're out of synch with the times. When time passes you by you retreat to who you once were, you become sui generis, you don't follow trends. We live in a world where Tom Waits has more credibility than Bono, because Tom Waits is always sure who he is and never veers from it.
You can miss the festival. None of them are must-see anymore. It's more like a vacation, going to summer camp, getting high, having an experience. As for the acts, no band has ever broken from a festival.
You don't have to leave the house for entertainment. This has hurt burgeoning live music. Who wants to go to a bar to hear overloud unknown music? Don't shoot the messenger, I'm contemplating this. But the key is not to bitch about this truism, it'd be like those complaining about MTV airing no music videos.
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Either swing for the fence or own your marginality. It's about influence. You can be on Patreon with 100 fans keeping you alive or you can try to reach millions. Just don't be the one on Patreon with a miniscule audience bitching that you're not reaching more and preaching that you make a difference. If you can sustain yourself, more power to you. But the game is in mass. To deny this is to delude yourself. Not only do you want to make money, you want to have an impact.
The money comes with a price. Art is about freedom of expression. Anybody who invests in you will compromise that vision. If you need to do it your way do it independently. Or amass enough juice that you can write your own contract. If you're just a cog in the system, take the cash.
The more credibility you have the longer your career. You can take the sponsorship, but it'll shorten your shelf life. If you're just using music as a springboard to further riches, by all means sell out. But if you're first and foremost a musician...
Derivative is death. That's what killed rock. Which is why Greta Van Fleet is doing so well. It sounds like Led Zeppelin, instead of sounding like a mutation of what once was.
Exposure is trumped by quality. This is what Amazon has wrought, you're only as good as your reviews. Prior to the internet you could snooker the public, have a turntable hit, but now everybody knows the truth.
Sour grapes is a reflection upon you. No, they're not keeping you down, you're just not good enough, you haven't figured out a way to make it work.
Find what you do best, followers fail.
There is no music business authority. "Billboard" has blinked and gone consumer and Pitchfork is too inside and the best and the brightest don't write about music anyway. And those who do are influenced by the powers-that-be, all that hogwash about Taylor Swift's shows being successful because of the pricing and not selling out. THEN WHY ARE THE CHEAP SEATS STILL AVAILABLE???
Forget the faux pas. Mistakes are plowed under by the relentless tsunami of information. Ignore those calling foul, don't even respond.
People are looking for an enemy, because they feel powerless. Apple was killing their old phones, all kinds of hogwash. I'm not saying the corporation is always right, but the public is never satisfied, it always believes it's being screwed.
You're not as big as you think you are, no one is. When you read that someone's a superstar take it with a grain of salt. We are going to have more ubiquitous superstars in the future, within the next five years, it's part of the inexorable march of consolidation, but we are not there yet. If you're playing the long game, learn how to write, sing and play, and if you can do none of these three, GET OUT!
Social media is overrated. It's a playground for the wannabes. Sure, people want to be able to find out information about you, but if you're a musician, focus on the music.
Those talking about Blockchain are those who can't make hit records in the new economy. Nothing wrong with a tracking system in the future, but it's a diversion now. Music is inherently fuzzy. That's why it's hard to capture.
You're either a businessman or an artist. Decide which one. They're two different personalities and they rarely merge. If unsure, follow the money if it's most important to you as a businessman, or walk into the wilderness as an artist.
There are no guarantees. You can put in all the time and still fail. You can be great and still fail. Own this.
Life is long. Winners know this. If you're tattooing the name of today's hit band on your arm...you're gonna have regrets in the future. Winners keep their options open.
U2's album has already failed. They got usual suspect press, but fail to realize they're out of synch with the times. When time passes you by you retreat to who you once were, you become sui generis, you don't follow trends. We live in a world where Tom Waits has more credibility than Bono, because Tom Waits is always sure who he is and never veers from it.
You can miss the festival. None of them are must-see anymore. It's more like a vacation, going to summer camp, getting high, having an experience. As for the acts, no band has ever broken from a festival.
You don't have to leave the house for entertainment. This has hurt burgeoning live music. Who wants to go to a bar to hear overloud unknown music? Don't shoot the messenger, I'm contemplating this. But the key is not to bitch about this truism, it'd be like those complaining about MTV airing no music videos.
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Americanah
http://amzn.to/2A6ow8S
I've been on a streak of disappointing books.
I finished the David Yaffe's Joni Mitchell tome, but tired of his analysis of her lyrics, someone who didn't live through the era and had no context. Having said that, if you're a Joniphile you'll be stunned to learn so many tidbits, like the woman who drowned herself in "Song For Sharon" was Jackson Browne's wife, metaphorically, of course. Mitchell has a real bug up her ass about Browne. Then again, anybody who has ever dealt with the woman knows she's incredibly difficult. Then again, you don't want to meet your heroes, not usually.
More simplistic but more interesting was Steve Katz's autobiography. Yes, the guy from the Blues Project and Blood, Sweat & Tears. He's so BITTER! He can't stop saying negative things about Al Kooper and it's been fifty years. David Clayton Thomas too. But this book is fascinating in how it all ultimately dries up. You can't make a living from music, fewer people know who you are, and then you're headed for the dustbin. To a great degree Steve has been subsisting on the artwork of his wife, not the first, but the one with the longest tenure. Everybody's got a story, there are no miracles.
But the problem with both of the above books is they're non-fiction.
If you really want to learn about real life you've got to read fiction.
As for those reading business books... If one more person recommends Ray Dalio's b.s. book I'm gonna explode. So the guy made a lot of money, so what? Age and you learn that everyone is an individual, and you can only maximize what is special to yourself. To try to imitate the career of someone else is futile. But we're all looking for answers in a world where there are fewer of them. We all want to believe we're on the right path, when the truth is we're in the wilderness, looking for exactly that, truth.
On paper "Americanah" is not my kind of book. Then again, I didn't read it on paper, I read it on the Kindle. Bookstores keep going out of business, Amazon is picking up the slack, but the publishing industry and its greatest acolytes, aged baby boomers, believe they've turned back the tide of digital and saved the physical book. What next, the 8-track and the cassette? Oh, that's right, the same backward-looking press talking about print says those formats are coming back too, which they absolutely are not. Have you even got a cassette player? But the news is controlled by oldsters eager to return to a simpler time, to retreat from the chaos when anybody who ever survived knows the only way out is forward.
Why am I so angry?
Because of the schism. The baby boomers who think they rule who don't. I told everybody they needed the big iPhone and my inbox was cluttered with deniers. All telling me the same thing, they TALK on the damn phone. Connect with someone a bit younger, they never ever talk on the phone, it's a COMPUTER! Until you see your device as a computer as opposed to a telephone you're part of the problem and not part of the solution but the thing about self-satisfied boomers and Gen-X'ers is they have to believe they know everything and are part of the solution, otherwise their inner core is threatened.
And because of the disinformation. Never in the history of my lifetime has conventional wisdom been so wrong. Forget the people trying to spread falsehoods, too many people are clueless as to what is happening, which is why I retreat into art, that disconnected from the machine, and when it rings true I'm elated and connected even though there might be no one else in the room.
Like when I read "Americanah."
It's about a woman from Nigeria. Yup, intrigued you right there, didn't I. You're mousing to Amazon right now, not.
And they speak English, which no one in America seems to know.
And they're black but they don't feel racism, which Americans can't comprehend.
But the government is corrupt and there are strikes and you just can't get ahead.
So Ifemelu moves to the United States.
That's right, that's her name. Yes, it'd be easier if her name was Jennifer, but they use real Nigerian names, deal with it, read the subtitles on the foreign movie.
But she leaves behind the love of her life.
It's a love story. It's social parable.
It's life.
There's more truth about relationships in this book than a year of HBO.
I don't want to give away the plot, but I am gonna quote a few passages I highlighted and illuminate these concepts.
"basking in the attention her face drew but flattening her personality so that her beauty did not threaten."
You've got to know who you are, you've got to adjust, you don't just get to go through life willy-nilly. If you're at a party and everybody's poor, even middle class, you cannot ramble on about flying on the private jet. Furthermore, however rich and advantaged you are there's always someone better off. To get ahead, the beautiful have to be non-threatening. But they pay a price, you're just so envious of their status you don't know it.
"He made her like herself. With him she was at ease."
Admit it. On a regular basis you hate yourself. You don't have to say it out loud, you can even deny it, but deep inside you know it's true. What you're looking for is to feel comfortable, that you're all right, that you have value. That's what you're looking for in a love relationship.
"She was terrified to spend money."
I still am. Ever since I crapped out twenty five years ago. I'm not convinced more will come in. I've never ever seen this expressed in a book before. You're living, you're spending, and you can't make any money, what is end game? Usually bad, as it is in this book.
"It was as if he believed that they shared a series of intrinsic jokes that did not need to be verbalized."
Now that's love.
"Still, she had had other crushes since then, minor compared to the strike on the train..."
Yup, Ifemelu gets a crush on a guy on the New Haven Railroad, going up to Yale. It always happens like this, when you least expect it. And you never ever forget it. People are powerful, even those not trying to evidence their power, you're in their aura and you become infected, veritably lovesick. Sometimes you hopscotch to a new person, sometimes your infatuation fades, but it's the nature of being alive, bouncing from connection to connection, it's why you should play, it's exciting.
"and she thought that the romance novelists were wrong and it was men, not women, who were the true romantics."
BINGO! Women are practical, they can cope. They might verbalize their feelings, but they soldier on, men get stuck.
"His friends were like him, sunny and wealthy people who existed on the glimmering surface of things."
Do you know anybody too wealthy to work? I do. They're exactly like this. Always smiling, always happy, and it's nearly impossible to pierce their surface, reveal their hopes and dreams, if they've got any. They're so busy appearing marvelous that they've sacrificed part of their humanity. So worried about being less than and not included that they air kiss and get along with everybody.
"She was from the generation of the bewildered, who did not understand what had happened to Nigeria but allowed themselves to be swept along."
That's life in Trump's America. I'm bewildered, aren't you? What do we do, protest all day long or just try to get along? And if we don't stand up for what's right are we relinquishing our power to do so forevermore?
"It puzzled her the ability of romantic love to mutate, how quickly a loved one could become a stranger."
Whew! You've been at it for years, and then there's a rupture, something said or done and you just can't reconnect. You're different. Ifemelu is living with a man and then there's an inflection point...the relationship never recovers.
"But she was jealous of the emotional remnants that existed between him and Paula."
We hate that they had a history before us. We try not to be jealous, but we are.
"It was this that drew Ifemelu, the absence of apology, the promise of honesty."
Stop being mealy-mouthed and have a backbone, have the courage of your convictions.
"Because he had last known her when she knew little of the things she blogged about, he felt a sense of loss, as though she had become a person he would no longer recognize."
Yes, Ifemelu blogs about race, it becomes her business, she makes a living, speaks at conferences. I was stunned to come across this plotline, very weird to see yourself in a book.
"she was a literal person who did not read, she was content rather than curious about the world - but he felt grateful to her, fortunate to be with her."
You think it's about looks, about wealth, but it's truly about personality. Want to hook someone of substance? Live, be curious, be open. Her old flame married the icon. As beautiful as they come. But she did not read, she went through the motions, does he have a duty to stay with her?
Duty... The boomers left their spouses for something better and rarely found it.
Today's educated class sees marriage as merger. Combining assets. Meanwhile, the poor just have babies and don't get married at all.
This is what popular culture does worst, illustrate love. It's all about looks when the truth is it's something indescribable that you feel. Which used to be captured in music, before the coarsening of society, when money trumped love, and is most eloquently detailed in the written word, in books.
So, do you live up to your obligation or do you jump ship?
That ultimately becomes the question in "Americanah."
And I'd like to tell you it's unputdownable. Perfect. But it's not that great, but it is very good, and delivers for the time invested, which few books do anymore, because reading a novel means removing yourself from the fast-paced world of the internet. You've got to be plugged in, it's like we're all living in an episode of "Black Mirror," wondering how it will all turn out. But there are no robotic dogs, no orgasmatron, many things are the same as they always were. Like people. Like love. Like life.
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I've been on a streak of disappointing books.
I finished the David Yaffe's Joni Mitchell tome, but tired of his analysis of her lyrics, someone who didn't live through the era and had no context. Having said that, if you're a Joniphile you'll be stunned to learn so many tidbits, like the woman who drowned herself in "Song For Sharon" was Jackson Browne's wife, metaphorically, of course. Mitchell has a real bug up her ass about Browne. Then again, anybody who has ever dealt with the woman knows she's incredibly difficult. Then again, you don't want to meet your heroes, not usually.
More simplistic but more interesting was Steve Katz's autobiography. Yes, the guy from the Blues Project and Blood, Sweat & Tears. He's so BITTER! He can't stop saying negative things about Al Kooper and it's been fifty years. David Clayton Thomas too. But this book is fascinating in how it all ultimately dries up. You can't make a living from music, fewer people know who you are, and then you're headed for the dustbin. To a great degree Steve has been subsisting on the artwork of his wife, not the first, but the one with the longest tenure. Everybody's got a story, there are no miracles.
But the problem with both of the above books is they're non-fiction.
If you really want to learn about real life you've got to read fiction.
As for those reading business books... If one more person recommends Ray Dalio's b.s. book I'm gonna explode. So the guy made a lot of money, so what? Age and you learn that everyone is an individual, and you can only maximize what is special to yourself. To try to imitate the career of someone else is futile. But we're all looking for answers in a world where there are fewer of them. We all want to believe we're on the right path, when the truth is we're in the wilderness, looking for exactly that, truth.
On paper "Americanah" is not my kind of book. Then again, I didn't read it on paper, I read it on the Kindle. Bookstores keep going out of business, Amazon is picking up the slack, but the publishing industry and its greatest acolytes, aged baby boomers, believe they've turned back the tide of digital and saved the physical book. What next, the 8-track and the cassette? Oh, that's right, the same backward-looking press talking about print says those formats are coming back too, which they absolutely are not. Have you even got a cassette player? But the news is controlled by oldsters eager to return to a simpler time, to retreat from the chaos when anybody who ever survived knows the only way out is forward.
Why am I so angry?
Because of the schism. The baby boomers who think they rule who don't. I told everybody they needed the big iPhone and my inbox was cluttered with deniers. All telling me the same thing, they TALK on the damn phone. Connect with someone a bit younger, they never ever talk on the phone, it's a COMPUTER! Until you see your device as a computer as opposed to a telephone you're part of the problem and not part of the solution but the thing about self-satisfied boomers and Gen-X'ers is they have to believe they know everything and are part of the solution, otherwise their inner core is threatened.
And because of the disinformation. Never in the history of my lifetime has conventional wisdom been so wrong. Forget the people trying to spread falsehoods, too many people are clueless as to what is happening, which is why I retreat into art, that disconnected from the machine, and when it rings true I'm elated and connected even though there might be no one else in the room.
Like when I read "Americanah."
It's about a woman from Nigeria. Yup, intrigued you right there, didn't I. You're mousing to Amazon right now, not.
And they speak English, which no one in America seems to know.
And they're black but they don't feel racism, which Americans can't comprehend.
But the government is corrupt and there are strikes and you just can't get ahead.
So Ifemelu moves to the United States.
That's right, that's her name. Yes, it'd be easier if her name was Jennifer, but they use real Nigerian names, deal with it, read the subtitles on the foreign movie.
But she leaves behind the love of her life.
It's a love story. It's social parable.
It's life.
There's more truth about relationships in this book than a year of HBO.
I don't want to give away the plot, but I am gonna quote a few passages I highlighted and illuminate these concepts.
"basking in the attention her face drew but flattening her personality so that her beauty did not threaten."
You've got to know who you are, you've got to adjust, you don't just get to go through life willy-nilly. If you're at a party and everybody's poor, even middle class, you cannot ramble on about flying on the private jet. Furthermore, however rich and advantaged you are there's always someone better off. To get ahead, the beautiful have to be non-threatening. But they pay a price, you're just so envious of their status you don't know it.
"He made her like herself. With him she was at ease."
Admit it. On a regular basis you hate yourself. You don't have to say it out loud, you can even deny it, but deep inside you know it's true. What you're looking for is to feel comfortable, that you're all right, that you have value. That's what you're looking for in a love relationship.
"She was terrified to spend money."
I still am. Ever since I crapped out twenty five years ago. I'm not convinced more will come in. I've never ever seen this expressed in a book before. You're living, you're spending, and you can't make any money, what is end game? Usually bad, as it is in this book.
"It was as if he believed that they shared a series of intrinsic jokes that did not need to be verbalized."
Now that's love.
"Still, she had had other crushes since then, minor compared to the strike on the train..."
Yup, Ifemelu gets a crush on a guy on the New Haven Railroad, going up to Yale. It always happens like this, when you least expect it. And you never ever forget it. People are powerful, even those not trying to evidence their power, you're in their aura and you become infected, veritably lovesick. Sometimes you hopscotch to a new person, sometimes your infatuation fades, but it's the nature of being alive, bouncing from connection to connection, it's why you should play, it's exciting.
"and she thought that the romance novelists were wrong and it was men, not women, who were the true romantics."
BINGO! Women are practical, they can cope. They might verbalize their feelings, but they soldier on, men get stuck.
"His friends were like him, sunny and wealthy people who existed on the glimmering surface of things."
Do you know anybody too wealthy to work? I do. They're exactly like this. Always smiling, always happy, and it's nearly impossible to pierce their surface, reveal their hopes and dreams, if they've got any. They're so busy appearing marvelous that they've sacrificed part of their humanity. So worried about being less than and not included that they air kiss and get along with everybody.
"She was from the generation of the bewildered, who did not understand what had happened to Nigeria but allowed themselves to be swept along."
That's life in Trump's America. I'm bewildered, aren't you? What do we do, protest all day long or just try to get along? And if we don't stand up for what's right are we relinquishing our power to do so forevermore?
"It puzzled her the ability of romantic love to mutate, how quickly a loved one could become a stranger."
Whew! You've been at it for years, and then there's a rupture, something said or done and you just can't reconnect. You're different. Ifemelu is living with a man and then there's an inflection point...the relationship never recovers.
"But she was jealous of the emotional remnants that existed between him and Paula."
We hate that they had a history before us. We try not to be jealous, but we are.
"It was this that drew Ifemelu, the absence of apology, the promise of honesty."
Stop being mealy-mouthed and have a backbone, have the courage of your convictions.
"Because he had last known her when she knew little of the things she blogged about, he felt a sense of loss, as though she had become a person he would no longer recognize."
Yes, Ifemelu blogs about race, it becomes her business, she makes a living, speaks at conferences. I was stunned to come across this plotline, very weird to see yourself in a book.
"she was a literal person who did not read, she was content rather than curious about the world - but he felt grateful to her, fortunate to be with her."
You think it's about looks, about wealth, but it's truly about personality. Want to hook someone of substance? Live, be curious, be open. Her old flame married the icon. As beautiful as they come. But she did not read, she went through the motions, does he have a duty to stay with her?
Duty... The boomers left their spouses for something better and rarely found it.
Today's educated class sees marriage as merger. Combining assets. Meanwhile, the poor just have babies and don't get married at all.
This is what popular culture does worst, illustrate love. It's all about looks when the truth is it's something indescribable that you feel. Which used to be captured in music, before the coarsening of society, when money trumped love, and is most eloquently detailed in the written word, in books.
So, do you live up to your obligation or do you jump ship?
That ultimately becomes the question in "Americanah."
And I'd like to tell you it's unputdownable. Perfect. But it's not that great, but it is very good, and delivers for the time invested, which few books do anymore, because reading a novel means removing yourself from the fast-paced world of the internet. You've got to be plugged in, it's like we're all living in an episode of "Black Mirror," wondering how it will all turn out. But there are no robotic dogs, no orgasmatron, many things are the same as they always were. Like people. Like love. Like life.
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Monday 1 January 2018
Chappelle On Netflix
What kind of crazy fucked-up world do we live in where a comedian has more impact than a musician?
One in which the comedians function as individuals concerned with the truth and the musicians are mini-corporations infighting for attention in an ever-dwindling pool that the public is overwhelmed by and sneers at.
I'm not that big a fan. Didn't watch his TV show that much. Didn't cotton to the last Netflix specials.
But I wanted to hear what he had to say. I was fascinated by his gigs with John Mayer, who needs to get props to. How does Mayer get shafted by the hit parade and end up bigger than them all? He dates Katy Perry, is angry he doesn't have hits, fires his manager, and now is on a path to tour forever, a member of the firmament, wasn't he supposed to be tarnished forever by his comments in "Playboy"? PLAYBOY, WHAT'S THAT?
Life is long and the goal is to last. And few in music do. Most who have got pumped up by the apparatus that has been eviscerated by the internet. That's right, Coldplay was built by VH1. And Jay Z and Eminem got MTV airplay. Meanwhile, the labels have been asleep. Tell me one point of innovation in the last fifteen years. No, they've been led kicking and screaming into the future with a plan not radically different from what's come before. Invest heavily in marketing and lean on radio. Sure, they're more digitally-savvy, but all innovation has come from outside, mixtapes, streaming... There's no leadership in music. Other than in Spotify, which hauled the entire enterprise into the twenty first century, but scratch a musician and they say they HATE IT! They want to go back to files, to CDs, as if you could still buy an iPod Classic and load it up with overpriced tracks.
But comedians LOVE Netflix. Because the distributor pays and delivers access. This ain't no HBO, giving deals to few and making it hard to see the work. No, every week Netflix has a new special and you can pull them up at anytime and the biggest stars in the world are having huge impact and making beaucoup bucks. Screw playing music, you make much more money as a comedian, come on, you show up with a microphone and take ALL THE MONEY!
So the generation before was all about selling out to the sitcom. But there's little money in that anymore and even less internal satisfaction, you've got to compromise who you are to get the show and the suits won't let you be who you are. You're a STANDUP! Seinfeld got that right, his show was one and done. Telling jokes is his skill. With insight.
And it's Chappelle's too.
So I'm fumbling with the remote at 2 AM to see what Dave has to say. And he starts off slowly, and he laughs at his own jokes, but then he gets into it.
He's attacking Trump.
That's right, he's taking a stand. In an era where everybody with anything to risk does not.
Don't tell me about nobodies standing up, tell me about somebodies. Especially in music. They're afraid of alienating potential audience members, their sponsors, they don't understand that personal truth bonds people to you. You said THAT?!!
And there are some zingers. Everybody giving Caitlyn Jenner a pass on changing her gender but up in arms about Cassius Clay changing his name.
There's doubling-down on being black. You're supposed to be cowered by the pushback, but no, the color of your skin in racist America marks you, and Chappelle is just being honest about it.
Like the stupid things Trump says.
And save me the blowback, the right wing wingnuts who think if they just hassle the refs we'll all shut up. It's not working with Chappelle. And Chappelle has much more influence than you do. Everybody's got Netflix and everybody knows his name and the young and impressionable are gonna watch and be impacted. This is how we got out of Vietnam, only in that case it was musicians instead of comedians. There's something happening here and you don't know what it is, do you Mr. Jones?
And then there's the Louis CK stuff. I HAVEN'T EVEN SEEN IT! I didn't know there were two specials until I checked my phone at 3 AM and then I decided to crash. But the internets were blowing up with what Dave had to say. You see he pushed back at snowflakes, a woman who didn't hang up as Louie masturbated.
That's right, that's what we're talking about, masturbation, even though you now have to stop reading.
And my point here is not to defend what Chappelle had to say, but to emphasize that HE SAID IT! Every male in America has been silent. Afraid to weigh in. But not Chappelle. And we need to have a discussion. Where is the line, what is the punishment. Isn't it funny that a comedian brings this to light.
So that's where we are in 2018. Music is for morons. Nitwit youngsters who believe life is how you look and oldsters who remember what it was and don't realize that you must capture the zeitgeist to succeed. But we were here in '63 too, before the Beatles, before the Airplane, before the table was turned over.
Doesn't matter if you watch Chappelle on Netflix. Just matters if those who are inheriting the country who can be influenced do. And they will.
Chappelle alone has more impact than a season of SNL. Because SNL is a tired formula, trying to attack a wide spectrum of society and life in a world where there's no cohesion and we do not get the references.
But we know what Chappelle is talking about. The big issues.
Why do poor trash whites buy the b.s. He's rich, he knows the people oppressing them.
You can't say that on television, BUT DAVE CHAPPELLE JUST DID!
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One in which the comedians function as individuals concerned with the truth and the musicians are mini-corporations infighting for attention in an ever-dwindling pool that the public is overwhelmed by and sneers at.
I'm not that big a fan. Didn't watch his TV show that much. Didn't cotton to the last Netflix specials.
But I wanted to hear what he had to say. I was fascinated by his gigs with John Mayer, who needs to get props to. How does Mayer get shafted by the hit parade and end up bigger than them all? He dates Katy Perry, is angry he doesn't have hits, fires his manager, and now is on a path to tour forever, a member of the firmament, wasn't he supposed to be tarnished forever by his comments in "Playboy"? PLAYBOY, WHAT'S THAT?
Life is long and the goal is to last. And few in music do. Most who have got pumped up by the apparatus that has been eviscerated by the internet. That's right, Coldplay was built by VH1. And Jay Z and Eminem got MTV airplay. Meanwhile, the labels have been asleep. Tell me one point of innovation in the last fifteen years. No, they've been led kicking and screaming into the future with a plan not radically different from what's come before. Invest heavily in marketing and lean on radio. Sure, they're more digitally-savvy, but all innovation has come from outside, mixtapes, streaming... There's no leadership in music. Other than in Spotify, which hauled the entire enterprise into the twenty first century, but scratch a musician and they say they HATE IT! They want to go back to files, to CDs, as if you could still buy an iPod Classic and load it up with overpriced tracks.
But comedians LOVE Netflix. Because the distributor pays and delivers access. This ain't no HBO, giving deals to few and making it hard to see the work. No, every week Netflix has a new special and you can pull them up at anytime and the biggest stars in the world are having huge impact and making beaucoup bucks. Screw playing music, you make much more money as a comedian, come on, you show up with a microphone and take ALL THE MONEY!
So the generation before was all about selling out to the sitcom. But there's little money in that anymore and even less internal satisfaction, you've got to compromise who you are to get the show and the suits won't let you be who you are. You're a STANDUP! Seinfeld got that right, his show was one and done. Telling jokes is his skill. With insight.
And it's Chappelle's too.
So I'm fumbling with the remote at 2 AM to see what Dave has to say. And he starts off slowly, and he laughs at his own jokes, but then he gets into it.
He's attacking Trump.
That's right, he's taking a stand. In an era where everybody with anything to risk does not.
Don't tell me about nobodies standing up, tell me about somebodies. Especially in music. They're afraid of alienating potential audience members, their sponsors, they don't understand that personal truth bonds people to you. You said THAT?!!
And there are some zingers. Everybody giving Caitlyn Jenner a pass on changing her gender but up in arms about Cassius Clay changing his name.
There's doubling-down on being black. You're supposed to be cowered by the pushback, but no, the color of your skin in racist America marks you, and Chappelle is just being honest about it.
Like the stupid things Trump says.
And save me the blowback, the right wing wingnuts who think if they just hassle the refs we'll all shut up. It's not working with Chappelle. And Chappelle has much more influence than you do. Everybody's got Netflix and everybody knows his name and the young and impressionable are gonna watch and be impacted. This is how we got out of Vietnam, only in that case it was musicians instead of comedians. There's something happening here and you don't know what it is, do you Mr. Jones?
And then there's the Louis CK stuff. I HAVEN'T EVEN SEEN IT! I didn't know there were two specials until I checked my phone at 3 AM and then I decided to crash. But the internets were blowing up with what Dave had to say. You see he pushed back at snowflakes, a woman who didn't hang up as Louie masturbated.
That's right, that's what we're talking about, masturbation, even though you now have to stop reading.
And my point here is not to defend what Chappelle had to say, but to emphasize that HE SAID IT! Every male in America has been silent. Afraid to weigh in. But not Chappelle. And we need to have a discussion. Where is the line, what is the punishment. Isn't it funny that a comedian brings this to light.
So that's where we are in 2018. Music is for morons. Nitwit youngsters who believe life is how you look and oldsters who remember what it was and don't realize that you must capture the zeitgeist to succeed. But we were here in '63 too, before the Beatles, before the Airplane, before the table was turned over.
Doesn't matter if you watch Chappelle on Netflix. Just matters if those who are inheriting the country who can be influenced do. And they will.
Chappelle alone has more impact than a season of SNL. Because SNL is a tired formula, trying to attack a wide spectrum of society and life in a world where there's no cohesion and we do not get the references.
But we know what Chappelle is talking about. The big issues.
Why do poor trash whites buy the b.s. He's rich, he knows the people oppressing them.
You can't say that on television, BUT DAVE CHAPPELLE JUST DID!
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Sunday 31 December 2017
The Disinformation Society
Blame it on distribution.
This is the year we discovered Facebook and Google were the enemy. We were taught for so long that content was king that we forgot he or she who presents the news is the ultimate arbiter. And what we've got is a skewed picture.
Meanwhile, the traditional news organizations impacted society greatly, after they were completely written off. The "New York Times" starting the #MeToo movement by exposing Harvey Weinstein and the "Washington Post" preventing the election of Roy Moore by the amplification of the stories of the women he abused.
Where does this leave us?
In a country where the will of the people does not prevail. 80% are for net neutrality yet it is scrapped. They want health care and it is decimated. Meanwhile, the fake news of those perpetrating these crimes against humanity are amplified.
That's the story of Brexit. That's the story of the United States. How falsehoods were given sunlight and the public was snookered.
Brexit was gonna save the NHS. Trump was gonna drain the swamp. Untruths have existed for all time, but in the internet era the waters are muddied and what is not true is perceived to be.
We are in a crisis of truth.
Isn't that funny, wasn't digital supposed to eliminate the fudge? Make it so we got accurate numbers? But it turns out paper ballots were more accurate than voting machines and the story of the coming year is this gap between truth and falsehood and who will arbiter it.
Not that the internet is only a source for bad. It amplified the obfuscation in the Grammy process. Who is the secret committee and how do they decide what is ultimately nominated?
But the Grammys are just a representation of the country at large. Elite groups usually comprised of men snookering the rest of us believing we will not find out, never mind care. They keep telling us it's for our best.
Not that I want to lionize the underclass, which is most of the rest of us.
The poor and uneducated are just that. They can't discern the truth.
And the educated believe they are better, know everything and are entitled. We are no longer a country of sacrifice, but me too.
So where to start?
Once again, laud the traditional news outlets. I.e. the newspapers, with boots on the ground. There are really only two left, the aforementioned NYT and WaPo. The rest have all shuttered their staffs in pursuit of profitability, and now their margins are preserved but they've got no impact, like the "Los Angeles Times." As for TV, it's all opinion all the time, and we've got enough of that, we want facts. But facts are expensive. But the truth is facts have impact. If only news outlets didn't seem to have the need to be as profitable as banks. Everybody wants to be as profitable as banks. So the news outlets have been calling foul on Trump, the liar, and this is a good sign, and a big difference from what came before, the era of false equivalencies is over, or at least dying.
But when it comes to the internet, we must understand what we've heard for years is true, we are the product. Neither Facebook nor Google exists without us. There's no there there. They're trying to build video businesses, but right now those are a de minimis part of the profits. No, it's your posted content that keep them alive. And they are truly evil. Because they pursue profits over people, and we are a nation of humans. Between them they control 80% of online advertising. They know more about you than your mother, your brother and sister, and you sit idly by as they say you are their friend.
As for Amazon... It killed the mall this year. Physical retail is dying. Those who say otherwise are those who believe in radio. But best not to shoot the messenger. Amazon knows the future, which is we love convenience and will pay for it. Anybody who lobbies against this, especially liberals demanding the return of manufacturing and Main Street, should be ignored. At some point Amazon will become too powerful, it's not quite there yet, but keep this in mind.
As for Apple... This is the gang that can't shoot straight, it will burn out by itself. It's great that the Cupertino company is pursuing privacy, but the problem is its days of dominance died with the iPod. And we live in an era of dominance.
So what should you do?
Educate yourself. Gather information from both sides. Trust sources. That's another thing the internet has eviscerated, experts, who were puffed up and feeling infallible until the internet revealed their flaws. Yes, we've pulled them down from their thrones but the truth is those who pay their dues and live in the trenches are worth listening to more than the playful pundit who is looking for likes.
We all can't be liked. Truth is more important than accolades.
So as we enter 2018 know that everything is up for grabs. A lot of what you've been told is untrue. The government is good for you. You drive on the roads and appreciate your building doesn't collapse and the fire department shows up upon conflagration, right? The newspapers are not going to die, just most of them. And everything will not be free online, if anything we're moving to an era where you pay, and those who don't become second class citizens.
You built Facebook. You built Google. You built Instagram. They were fun for a while, but they've turned upon you. With the profits their owners have hollowed out society. Adolescent bros with no concept of society have turned it topsy-turvy, made it into their own special playground, while you somnambulantly played along.
I'd say it's every person for themselves, but this is untrue. There is power in people, in groups. That's the story of the coming year. How the will of the people has impact. It may be something you feel more than read about, but it is real. Consolidation and income inequality have left us with the short end of the stick. We are looking for not only a voice, but protection. And the only people who are going to give it to us are ourselves.
Your life is not about the pursuit of happiness, but the pursuit of survival. That's what's on the line, the American way of life. And it's not a rural no-think world, but a cohesive society where everyone has a voice and everyone is equal. Where the will of the people is heard.
But that's hard to do in this era of disinformation.
That's the challenge.
But we're up to it.
I hope.
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This is the year we discovered Facebook and Google were the enemy. We were taught for so long that content was king that we forgot he or she who presents the news is the ultimate arbiter. And what we've got is a skewed picture.
Meanwhile, the traditional news organizations impacted society greatly, after they were completely written off. The "New York Times" starting the #MeToo movement by exposing Harvey Weinstein and the "Washington Post" preventing the election of Roy Moore by the amplification of the stories of the women he abused.
Where does this leave us?
In a country where the will of the people does not prevail. 80% are for net neutrality yet it is scrapped. They want health care and it is decimated. Meanwhile, the fake news of those perpetrating these crimes against humanity are amplified.
That's the story of Brexit. That's the story of the United States. How falsehoods were given sunlight and the public was snookered.
Brexit was gonna save the NHS. Trump was gonna drain the swamp. Untruths have existed for all time, but in the internet era the waters are muddied and what is not true is perceived to be.
We are in a crisis of truth.
Isn't that funny, wasn't digital supposed to eliminate the fudge? Make it so we got accurate numbers? But it turns out paper ballots were more accurate than voting machines and the story of the coming year is this gap between truth and falsehood and who will arbiter it.
Not that the internet is only a source for bad. It amplified the obfuscation in the Grammy process. Who is the secret committee and how do they decide what is ultimately nominated?
But the Grammys are just a representation of the country at large. Elite groups usually comprised of men snookering the rest of us believing we will not find out, never mind care. They keep telling us it's for our best.
Not that I want to lionize the underclass, which is most of the rest of us.
The poor and uneducated are just that. They can't discern the truth.
And the educated believe they are better, know everything and are entitled. We are no longer a country of sacrifice, but me too.
So where to start?
Once again, laud the traditional news outlets. I.e. the newspapers, with boots on the ground. There are really only two left, the aforementioned NYT and WaPo. The rest have all shuttered their staffs in pursuit of profitability, and now their margins are preserved but they've got no impact, like the "Los Angeles Times." As for TV, it's all opinion all the time, and we've got enough of that, we want facts. But facts are expensive. But the truth is facts have impact. If only news outlets didn't seem to have the need to be as profitable as banks. Everybody wants to be as profitable as banks. So the news outlets have been calling foul on Trump, the liar, and this is a good sign, and a big difference from what came before, the era of false equivalencies is over, or at least dying.
But when it comes to the internet, we must understand what we've heard for years is true, we are the product. Neither Facebook nor Google exists without us. There's no there there. They're trying to build video businesses, but right now those are a de minimis part of the profits. No, it's your posted content that keep them alive. And they are truly evil. Because they pursue profits over people, and we are a nation of humans. Between them they control 80% of online advertising. They know more about you than your mother, your brother and sister, and you sit idly by as they say you are their friend.
As for Amazon... It killed the mall this year. Physical retail is dying. Those who say otherwise are those who believe in radio. But best not to shoot the messenger. Amazon knows the future, which is we love convenience and will pay for it. Anybody who lobbies against this, especially liberals demanding the return of manufacturing and Main Street, should be ignored. At some point Amazon will become too powerful, it's not quite there yet, but keep this in mind.
As for Apple... This is the gang that can't shoot straight, it will burn out by itself. It's great that the Cupertino company is pursuing privacy, but the problem is its days of dominance died with the iPod. And we live in an era of dominance.
So what should you do?
Educate yourself. Gather information from both sides. Trust sources. That's another thing the internet has eviscerated, experts, who were puffed up and feeling infallible until the internet revealed their flaws. Yes, we've pulled them down from their thrones but the truth is those who pay their dues and live in the trenches are worth listening to more than the playful pundit who is looking for likes.
We all can't be liked. Truth is more important than accolades.
So as we enter 2018 know that everything is up for grabs. A lot of what you've been told is untrue. The government is good for you. You drive on the roads and appreciate your building doesn't collapse and the fire department shows up upon conflagration, right? The newspapers are not going to die, just most of them. And everything will not be free online, if anything we're moving to an era where you pay, and those who don't become second class citizens.
You built Facebook. You built Google. You built Instagram. They were fun for a while, but they've turned upon you. With the profits their owners have hollowed out society. Adolescent bros with no concept of society have turned it topsy-turvy, made it into their own special playground, while you somnambulantly played along.
I'd say it's every person for themselves, but this is untrue. There is power in people, in groups. That's the story of the coming year. How the will of the people has impact. It may be something you feel more than read about, but it is real. Consolidation and income inequality have left us with the short end of the stick. We are looking for not only a voice, but protection. And the only people who are going to give it to us are ourselves.
Your life is not about the pursuit of happiness, but the pursuit of survival. That's what's on the line, the American way of life. And it's not a rural no-think world, but a cohesive society where everyone has a voice and everyone is equal. Where the will of the people is heard.
But that's hard to do in this era of disinformation.
That's the challenge.
But we're up to it.
I hope.
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