https://spoti.fi/40mDPaC
"School"
Supertramp
"Smokin' In the Boys Room"
Brownsville Station
"School's Out"
Alice Cooper
"Teacher I Need You"
Elton John
"Kodachrome"
Paul Simon
"Rock 'n' Roll High School"
Ramones
"Be True to Your School"
The Beach Boys
"New Girl In School"
Jan & Dean
"Getting Better"
The Beatles
"My Old School"
Steely Dan
"No Such Thing"
John Mayer
"Teacher"
Jethro Tull
"Maggie May"
Rod Stewart
"Another Brick In the Wall, Pt. 2"
Pink Floyd
"Walk This Way"
Aerosmith
"The Future's So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades"
Timbuk3
"Don't Stand So Close to Me"
The Police
"Charlie Brown"
The Coasters
"School Days"
Chuck Berry
"Hot for Teacher"
Van Halen
"The Homecoming Queen's Got a Gun"
Julie Brown
"Jeremy"
Pearl Jam
"Wonderful World"
Herman's Hermits
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
Listen to the podcast:
-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
-Apple: https://apple.co/2ndmpvp
--
http://www.twitter.com/lefsetz
--
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Saturday 4 February 2023
Musicares-Berry Gordy & Smokey Robinson
It's the music business's greatest night.
As for the music...
That's right, you can do a year's worth of business in one night. Because EVERYBODY is there. Well, not everybody, but a ton of movers and shakers, and a bunch of overdressed nobodies. That's how you can tell they're not in the business, by the clothes they wear. The men are in tuxes and the women in ball gowns, overdressed, as per the black tie invitation. Everybody else knows it's just another night in Hollywood, and the acts may be fashionistas, but the people who actually control this world are anything but.
So we're on the precipice of a dividing line, a changing of generations. It's finally here folks, the classic rock generation is heading into the sunset. Their heroes are passing, dropping like flies, from Christine McVie to Jeff Beck, and their music no longer dominates, not even Motown.
Remember the Motown revival of "Ally McBeal"? Yes, a revival, OVER TWO DECADES AGO! How many times can Motown come back? One thing's for sure, not with the original singers/players/writers.
As for Berry Gordy... He's 93 and was one of the most youthful cats in the joint. Smiling, wearing a knit hat, he was having fun. Because that's what the business used to be about. Talk to anybody who was around back then. The fun has been squeezed out by business. And the youngsters populating the stage are more familiar with economics than they are the arts.
So the Temptations took the stage and it was...AWFUL! Sad. Not even worthy of a Vegas lounge, if they even have those anymore. There was supposedly one original member there. And the outfits and dance moves were representative of the era, but the singing? It made me wince. It was a poor facsimile of the original sound, the one embedded in our brains. Magic was caught on wax, as for last night...if you were there then you didn't want to be there now.
The lead singer of the Four Tops was a bit better, closer to Levi Stubbs, but come on... Believe me, as long as people will line up and pay, there will be Temptations and Four Tops in the 22nd century, but I hope not. Let the records remain. Then again, there are Civil War re-enactors...
As for fighting for Black liberation...
Can we finally honor a rapper, a hip-hop artist, someone young? This is the transition I'm talking about. The music changed years ago, even the Super Bowl woke up and acknowledged this. But the Grammys...are still living in the past, with the old white people.
Yes, Gordy and Robinson are Black, but the music was whitewashed long ago. Furthermore, this was the music of revolution. Of the rights of Blacks. Of the sixties. Motown aided integration more than Washington. That's the power of art. A power that's been abdicated in the music today, where it's all entrepreneurship all the time, all money, and art has been kicked to the curb. There was a moment there, a couple of decades back, when the Grammys meant something. When MTV turned music into a monoculture and an outsider ran the organization. Yes, Mike Greene, unlike the other Grammy toppers, was a rock star. Tussling with the mayor of New York. Not worried about his cronies in the business. Outsiders make change, ever since Greene it's been insiders, keeping the waters calm and missing the point.
Which is how the Grammys missed classic rock in the first place. It was outsider music, and the insiders wanted nothing to do with it.
As for hip-hop... Who wants to be honored by an organization that won't include you. As for all the insiders saying it should be Beyoncé's night... Does anybody acknowledge that "Renaissance" was a relative stiff? Not exactly a turntable hit, but compare the streams to other top LPs. And doesn't she have enough awards? And it's about success, not awards anyway. And no one remembers who wins. And if Beyoncé sweeps, that's fine with me, but it's also fine if she loses. I mean who cares what a group of aged wankers has to say anyway?
So the stars of last night...
Were the alta-kachers.
Valerie Simpson killed! But I doubt most of the people in the audience knew who she was, giving a standing O to the Temptations evidencing their brain dead artistic sensibilities.
And Dionne Warwick! It won't be long before these two are gone, they seem not to have lost a step. Catch them while they're still here.
And Ronnie Isley, who everybody talked during. He's an absolute icon. The song the Isleys performed was not a known-by-all classic, but man, he could still do his thing. And knows how to perform, too!
Brandi Carlile? The new Bonnie Raitt of the Grammys. They found her, anointed her, and they're never going to let her go. She always delivers, and she delivered last night.
As for the rest... I won't even bother to mention their names.
Even Stevie Wonder disappointed. Oh, he was Stevie... Then again, he wrote most of his best material.
And Smokey... He's still got his pipes too. I thought he'd do a medley of his greatest hits, instead we got a one tune tribute to Gordy that underwhelmed.
But there was a video clip, with the two of them driving around the streets of Detroit in the back of an aged Thunderbird, laughing like school kids, that was better than most of the performances. But when the clips come on, people talk.
And talk I did. To so many. Who knew Coran Capshaw loved to read? He just finished "Demon Copperhead," and devoured "The Overstory." And is helping rebuild his hometown of Charlottesville, with housing for the less than fortunate.
On the way in I ran into the manager of Phoebe Bridgers. He knew I wasn't a fan, but all that b.s. is thrown overboard at Musicares. Good guy, got me interested.
And Lee Zeidman talked about the frustrations of dealing with the city government.
And it was one person after another. Not only catching up after Covid... You see the music business is centered in Los Angeles, the TOURING BUSINESS is centered in Los Angeles. So once a year everybody makes the pilgrimage and...
It's like any other business, you're either in or you're out.
And the sword is laid down. After all, a lot of these people worked together at previous companies.
And Joe Berchtold told us about testifying in Congress and we all had a laugh as to the fact that they ganged up on him and didn't get it.
You see it's an insider business.
And last night we were all inside.
As for the music...
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
Listen to the podcast:
-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
-Apple: https://apple.co/2ndmpvp
--
http://www.twitter.com/lefsetz
--
If you would like to subscribe to the LefsetzLetter,
http://www.lefsetz.com/lists/?p=subscribe&id=1
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To change your email address http://lefsetz.com/lists/?p=preferences&uid=0eecea7b60b461717065cbde887c8e25
As for the music...
That's right, you can do a year's worth of business in one night. Because EVERYBODY is there. Well, not everybody, but a ton of movers and shakers, and a bunch of overdressed nobodies. That's how you can tell they're not in the business, by the clothes they wear. The men are in tuxes and the women in ball gowns, overdressed, as per the black tie invitation. Everybody else knows it's just another night in Hollywood, and the acts may be fashionistas, but the people who actually control this world are anything but.
So we're on the precipice of a dividing line, a changing of generations. It's finally here folks, the classic rock generation is heading into the sunset. Their heroes are passing, dropping like flies, from Christine McVie to Jeff Beck, and their music no longer dominates, not even Motown.
Remember the Motown revival of "Ally McBeal"? Yes, a revival, OVER TWO DECADES AGO! How many times can Motown come back? One thing's for sure, not with the original singers/players/writers.
As for Berry Gordy... He's 93 and was one of the most youthful cats in the joint. Smiling, wearing a knit hat, he was having fun. Because that's what the business used to be about. Talk to anybody who was around back then. The fun has been squeezed out by business. And the youngsters populating the stage are more familiar with economics than they are the arts.
So the Temptations took the stage and it was...AWFUL! Sad. Not even worthy of a Vegas lounge, if they even have those anymore. There was supposedly one original member there. And the outfits and dance moves were representative of the era, but the singing? It made me wince. It was a poor facsimile of the original sound, the one embedded in our brains. Magic was caught on wax, as for last night...if you were there then you didn't want to be there now.
The lead singer of the Four Tops was a bit better, closer to Levi Stubbs, but come on... Believe me, as long as people will line up and pay, there will be Temptations and Four Tops in the 22nd century, but I hope not. Let the records remain. Then again, there are Civil War re-enactors...
As for fighting for Black liberation...
Can we finally honor a rapper, a hip-hop artist, someone young? This is the transition I'm talking about. The music changed years ago, even the Super Bowl woke up and acknowledged this. But the Grammys...are still living in the past, with the old white people.
Yes, Gordy and Robinson are Black, but the music was whitewashed long ago. Furthermore, this was the music of revolution. Of the rights of Blacks. Of the sixties. Motown aided integration more than Washington. That's the power of art. A power that's been abdicated in the music today, where it's all entrepreneurship all the time, all money, and art has been kicked to the curb. There was a moment there, a couple of decades back, when the Grammys meant something. When MTV turned music into a monoculture and an outsider ran the organization. Yes, Mike Greene, unlike the other Grammy toppers, was a rock star. Tussling with the mayor of New York. Not worried about his cronies in the business. Outsiders make change, ever since Greene it's been insiders, keeping the waters calm and missing the point.
Which is how the Grammys missed classic rock in the first place. It was outsider music, and the insiders wanted nothing to do with it.
As for hip-hop... Who wants to be honored by an organization that won't include you. As for all the insiders saying it should be Beyoncé's night... Does anybody acknowledge that "Renaissance" was a relative stiff? Not exactly a turntable hit, but compare the streams to other top LPs. And doesn't she have enough awards? And it's about success, not awards anyway. And no one remembers who wins. And if Beyoncé sweeps, that's fine with me, but it's also fine if she loses. I mean who cares what a group of aged wankers has to say anyway?
So the stars of last night...
Were the alta-kachers.
Valerie Simpson killed! But I doubt most of the people in the audience knew who she was, giving a standing O to the Temptations evidencing their brain dead artistic sensibilities.
And Dionne Warwick! It won't be long before these two are gone, they seem not to have lost a step. Catch them while they're still here.
And Ronnie Isley, who everybody talked during. He's an absolute icon. The song the Isleys performed was not a known-by-all classic, but man, he could still do his thing. And knows how to perform, too!
Brandi Carlile? The new Bonnie Raitt of the Grammys. They found her, anointed her, and they're never going to let her go. She always delivers, and she delivered last night.
As for the rest... I won't even bother to mention their names.
Even Stevie Wonder disappointed. Oh, he was Stevie... Then again, he wrote most of his best material.
And Smokey... He's still got his pipes too. I thought he'd do a medley of his greatest hits, instead we got a one tune tribute to Gordy that underwhelmed.
But there was a video clip, with the two of them driving around the streets of Detroit in the back of an aged Thunderbird, laughing like school kids, that was better than most of the performances. But when the clips come on, people talk.
And talk I did. To so many. Who knew Coran Capshaw loved to read? He just finished "Demon Copperhead," and devoured "The Overstory." And is helping rebuild his hometown of Charlottesville, with housing for the less than fortunate.
On the way in I ran into the manager of Phoebe Bridgers. He knew I wasn't a fan, but all that b.s. is thrown overboard at Musicares. Good guy, got me interested.
And Lee Zeidman talked about the frustrations of dealing with the city government.
And it was one person after another. Not only catching up after Covid... You see the music business is centered in Los Angeles, the TOURING BUSINESS is centered in Los Angeles. So once a year everybody makes the pilgrimage and...
It's like any other business, you're either in or you're out.
And the sword is laid down. After all, a lot of these people worked together at previous companies.
And Joe Berchtold told us about testifying in Congress and we all had a laugh as to the fact that they ganged up on him and didn't get it.
You see it's an insider business.
And last night we were all inside.
As for the music...
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
Listen to the podcast:
-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
-Apple: https://apple.co/2ndmpvp
--
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
To change your email address http://lefsetz.com/lists/?p=preferences&uid=0eecea7b60b461717065cbde887c8e25
Friday 3 February 2023
The Billboard Power 100
https://www.billboard.com/h/billboard-2023-power-100-executives-list/
The paper of record is as out of touch as the Grammys!
Never have the labels and the people who run them had less power. But there they are at the top of the chart, as if it were still the 1990s and the internet was something old men were unaware of and Napster hadn't yet made inroads.
The most fascinating statistic today?
The major labels' market share is SHRINKING!
From today's Music Ally Bulletin:
"Here's one nugget from the filing: music licensed to Spotify by the three major labels and indie licensing agency Merlin accounted for around 75% of Spotify streams in 2022. We wondered how that has changed over time, so we went back to past filings to find out.
"What we found was that this percentage has been falling steadily. In 2017 the majors and Merlin accounted for 87% of Spotify's total streams, but that proportion fell to 85% in 2018; 82% in 2019; 78% in 2020; 77% in 2021 and now 75% in 2022.
"This trend isn't a surprise: we know that the sector of DIY artists working through distributors has been growing. It's just useful to have it quantified from a big DSP.
"Last year, Midia Research estimated that self-releasing 'artists direct' saw their recorded music revenues grow by 25% to $1.5bn in 2021, with the increase in streaming share a key factor in that trend."
No wonder Lucian Grainge is lobbying for a larger share of streaming revenue for Universal's artists, the company's control of the market is going in the wrong direction, as in DOWN!
This is a live business. Touring is where it's at.
And new acts develop on TikTok.
Michael Rapino is the most powerful person in the music business today. BECAUSE HE PAYS THE ARTISTS!
All this hogwash about Ticketmaster obscures the fact that it is concert promoters who are keeping the artists alive, not record labels. Sign a record deal and you may get...nothing. All the money your contract delineates goes to recording and associated expenses. Good luck buying a Hyundai (although Hyundai is a damn good car today, almost all cars are good, and in truth most musicians are driving used cars, if they own an automobile at all).
And as you move up the economic scale... Haven't you heard, it's been in the news for twenty years, big acts make most of their money on the road. And it's not only the classic ones, but the new ones too! Believe me, Beyoncé is going to make more on the road than she did from her last album "Renaissance."
The pulse of new music development?
TikTok!
So there you have it, major labels mean less, but even worse, their number one focus, terrestrial radio, also means less. It's like investing in buggy whips. Sure, most people are using the horse and wagon, but adoption of the car...there's a tipping point, which seems almost instant. Like with digital photography, which erased film, and the iPod/iPhone, that killed the CD. (Oh, don't quote CD, vinyl and cassette sales figures, they're de minimis compared to streaming, if you do you're as myopic as "Billboard" itself.)
In other words, oftentimes you can see change on the horizon, assuming you're looking for it, and there comes a day when the landscape flips. But the old entities attached to the old ways refuse to adjust, they believe in holding back the future, staying rooted in the past, to their detriment, because the public is not controlled by them.
You don't have to tune in radio to hear your favorite song, you can hear it for free on YouTube. And what has Lyor Cohen done there? NOTHING! A lame, late launch of YouTube Music, whose numbers are inflated by people subscribing to eliminate commercials in videos. There's been absolutely no progress at YouTube, the site is moribund. And if a track is popular, Spotify numbers alone exceed those of YouTube, never mind the other streaming outlets.
And the same doofuses focusing on labels are doing cartwheels over Spotify's recent numbers/troubles/losses in podcasting. Talk about ignorance... Spotify is your number one account, the company that pays you most (other than your promoter), you want Spotify to be healthy, rolling in dough. Spotify declares bankruptcy and you lose out, just like when retail chains went under. And I'm not saying that Spotify is headed that way, but you can't squeeze blood from a stone, Spotify has to make a profit FOR THE GOOD OF ARTISTS!
That'll make the uneducated's heads spin.
And Merck belongs right behind touring royalty like Rapino and Marciano. Why? Because he revolutionized the business and he's PAYING ARTISTS!
Come on, that's a bigger story than Lucian Grainge, who got a big payout when Universal went public...but what has he done for us lately?
I mean what's going to happen with Hipgnosis? Especially with high interest rates? Is Blackstone gonna end up owning it all? Think about that, Spotify is going DIY and publishing is going corporate! What happens when banks get ownership, does it squeeze the soul from the industry or does it cause new, outside the box thinking?
And now it's not only alta kachers. Justin Bieber sold his rights. Who else is going to do this, probably leaving these same cash poor acts ultimately penniless in the future (unless the promoters keep them alive!)
Music has an exposure issue. The market share of new music keeps going down. Where is the innovation at the labels? IT'S NONEXISTENT! They've ceded music discovery to the public, which is ultimately uncontrollable. Is this any way to run a business? NO!
And let's get to the root of all this. You can record cheaply for free at home, you can distribute online for almost free and you can promote yourself online for free!
Even worse, social media stars who neither sing nor play, never mind dance, are more popular than most of the musicians!
As the Grammys lionize acts like we're still living in the 1950s.
We fought over free for fifteen years and now everybody thinks the problems are solved but distribution is only one of them. And the most important question today is what goes through that pipe!
And look at corporations from the car manufacturers to P&G. They make products for everyone, rich and poor, whatever their predilection. But the labels? It's all hip-hop and pop. They aren't developing acts outside those genres, not to any significant degree, which is why the DIY universe is growing. Nature abhors a vacuum.
The labels keep telling us how innovative they are. Well, they've slimmed the ranks so much that...there's not enough manpower to come up with ideas and execute them. What we've got is high-paid CEOs and underpaid worker bees!
This is no different from Hollywood being asleep at the switch. As streaming ate its lunch. A completely outside company, Netflix, revolutionized the industry.
Follow the money. And in recordings, most of the money goes to the label honchos and the corporation itself.
Whereas in live, most of the money goes to the acts.
And on Spotify, if you own your recordings, you get sixty plus percent of the revenue, as opposed to the piddly amount you'll get if you're signed to the label.
And Spotify is not the only digital outlet that pays. Nor exposes. Come on, there's a plethora of outlets.
"Billboard" has its head in the sand. But what do you expect from a rudderless outfit run by the second and third tier. Music writing is a piss-poor gig. The internet has killed the reviewer game and as far as trade publications...it's all positive all the time, cheerleading for those who pay the bills, the corporations.
But most people don't care about "Billboard," they don't care who distributes the recordings they listen to or the concerts they go to.
The public has never had this much power, was never this uncontrolled (except for during the Napster era, of course). Own the new reality, adjust to it. And if you're a musical act, hone your live act and GO ON THE ROAD!
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
Listen to the podcast:
-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
-Apple: https://apple.co/2ndmpvp
--
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
To change your email address http://lefsetz.com/lists/?p=preferences&uid=0eecea7b60b461717065cbde887c8e25
The paper of record is as out of touch as the Grammys!
Never have the labels and the people who run them had less power. But there they are at the top of the chart, as if it were still the 1990s and the internet was something old men were unaware of and Napster hadn't yet made inroads.
The most fascinating statistic today?
The major labels' market share is SHRINKING!
From today's Music Ally Bulletin:
"Here's one nugget from the filing: music licensed to Spotify by the three major labels and indie licensing agency Merlin accounted for around 75% of Spotify streams in 2022. We wondered how that has changed over time, so we went back to past filings to find out.
"What we found was that this percentage has been falling steadily. In 2017 the majors and Merlin accounted for 87% of Spotify's total streams, but that proportion fell to 85% in 2018; 82% in 2019; 78% in 2020; 77% in 2021 and now 75% in 2022.
"This trend isn't a surprise: we know that the sector of DIY artists working through distributors has been growing. It's just useful to have it quantified from a big DSP.
"Last year, Midia Research estimated that self-releasing 'artists direct' saw their recorded music revenues grow by 25% to $1.5bn in 2021, with the increase in streaming share a key factor in that trend."
No wonder Lucian Grainge is lobbying for a larger share of streaming revenue for Universal's artists, the company's control of the market is going in the wrong direction, as in DOWN!
This is a live business. Touring is where it's at.
And new acts develop on TikTok.
Michael Rapino is the most powerful person in the music business today. BECAUSE HE PAYS THE ARTISTS!
All this hogwash about Ticketmaster obscures the fact that it is concert promoters who are keeping the artists alive, not record labels. Sign a record deal and you may get...nothing. All the money your contract delineates goes to recording and associated expenses. Good luck buying a Hyundai (although Hyundai is a damn good car today, almost all cars are good, and in truth most musicians are driving used cars, if they own an automobile at all).
And as you move up the economic scale... Haven't you heard, it's been in the news for twenty years, big acts make most of their money on the road. And it's not only the classic ones, but the new ones too! Believe me, Beyoncé is going to make more on the road than she did from her last album "Renaissance."
The pulse of new music development?
TikTok!
So there you have it, major labels mean less, but even worse, their number one focus, terrestrial radio, also means less. It's like investing in buggy whips. Sure, most people are using the horse and wagon, but adoption of the car...there's a tipping point, which seems almost instant. Like with digital photography, which erased film, and the iPod/iPhone, that killed the CD. (Oh, don't quote CD, vinyl and cassette sales figures, they're de minimis compared to streaming, if you do you're as myopic as "Billboard" itself.)
In other words, oftentimes you can see change on the horizon, assuming you're looking for it, and there comes a day when the landscape flips. But the old entities attached to the old ways refuse to adjust, they believe in holding back the future, staying rooted in the past, to their detriment, because the public is not controlled by them.
You don't have to tune in radio to hear your favorite song, you can hear it for free on YouTube. And what has Lyor Cohen done there? NOTHING! A lame, late launch of YouTube Music, whose numbers are inflated by people subscribing to eliminate commercials in videos. There's been absolutely no progress at YouTube, the site is moribund. And if a track is popular, Spotify numbers alone exceed those of YouTube, never mind the other streaming outlets.
And the same doofuses focusing on labels are doing cartwheels over Spotify's recent numbers/troubles/losses in podcasting. Talk about ignorance... Spotify is your number one account, the company that pays you most (other than your promoter), you want Spotify to be healthy, rolling in dough. Spotify declares bankruptcy and you lose out, just like when retail chains went under. And I'm not saying that Spotify is headed that way, but you can't squeeze blood from a stone, Spotify has to make a profit FOR THE GOOD OF ARTISTS!
That'll make the uneducated's heads spin.
And Merck belongs right behind touring royalty like Rapino and Marciano. Why? Because he revolutionized the business and he's PAYING ARTISTS!
Come on, that's a bigger story than Lucian Grainge, who got a big payout when Universal went public...but what has he done for us lately?
I mean what's going to happen with Hipgnosis? Especially with high interest rates? Is Blackstone gonna end up owning it all? Think about that, Spotify is going DIY and publishing is going corporate! What happens when banks get ownership, does it squeeze the soul from the industry or does it cause new, outside the box thinking?
And now it's not only alta kachers. Justin Bieber sold his rights. Who else is going to do this, probably leaving these same cash poor acts ultimately penniless in the future (unless the promoters keep them alive!)
Music has an exposure issue. The market share of new music keeps going down. Where is the innovation at the labels? IT'S NONEXISTENT! They've ceded music discovery to the public, which is ultimately uncontrollable. Is this any way to run a business? NO!
And let's get to the root of all this. You can record cheaply for free at home, you can distribute online for almost free and you can promote yourself online for free!
Even worse, social media stars who neither sing nor play, never mind dance, are more popular than most of the musicians!
As the Grammys lionize acts like we're still living in the 1950s.
We fought over free for fifteen years and now everybody thinks the problems are solved but distribution is only one of them. And the most important question today is what goes through that pipe!
And look at corporations from the car manufacturers to P&G. They make products for everyone, rich and poor, whatever their predilection. But the labels? It's all hip-hop and pop. They aren't developing acts outside those genres, not to any significant degree, which is why the DIY universe is growing. Nature abhors a vacuum.
The labels keep telling us how innovative they are. Well, they've slimmed the ranks so much that...there's not enough manpower to come up with ideas and execute them. What we've got is high-paid CEOs and underpaid worker bees!
This is no different from Hollywood being asleep at the switch. As streaming ate its lunch. A completely outside company, Netflix, revolutionized the industry.
Follow the money. And in recordings, most of the money goes to the label honchos and the corporation itself.
Whereas in live, most of the money goes to the acts.
And on Spotify, if you own your recordings, you get sixty plus percent of the revenue, as opposed to the piddly amount you'll get if you're signed to the label.
And Spotify is not the only digital outlet that pays. Nor exposes. Come on, there's a plethora of outlets.
"Billboard" has its head in the sand. But what do you expect from a rudderless outfit run by the second and third tier. Music writing is a piss-poor gig. The internet has killed the reviewer game and as far as trade publications...it's all positive all the time, cheerleading for those who pay the bills, the corporations.
But most people don't care about "Billboard," they don't care who distributes the recordings they listen to or the concerts they go to.
The public has never had this much power, was never this uncontrolled (except for during the Napster era, of course). Own the new reality, adjust to it. And if you're a musical act, hone your live act and GO ON THE ROAD!
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
Listen to the podcast:
-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
-Apple: https://apple.co/2ndmpvp
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School Songs-SiriusXM This Week
Tune in tomorrow, Saturday February 4th, to Faction Talk, channel 103, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.
Phone #: 844-686-5863
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If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz
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Thursday 2 February 2023
Howard Jones-This Week's Podcast
"What Is Love?," "Things Can Only Get Better," "No One Is to Blame"...we explore Howard Jones's career from yesterday to today!
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-30806836/episode/howard-jones-108207644/
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/howard-jones/id1316200737?i=1000597698286
https://open.spotify.com/episode/7x60auvlPMWZt3g2qHVDil?si=3We4OdFTToi_BDGYP6PT0g
https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/9ff4fb19-54d4-41ae-ae7a-8a6f8d3dafa8/episodes/f324ebb1-c2eb-4e76-97bb-fd2dce98d543/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-howard-jones
https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast/episode/howard-jones-211456528
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https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-30806836/episode/howard-jones-108207644/
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/howard-jones/id1316200737?i=1000597698286
https://open.spotify.com/episode/7x60auvlPMWZt3g2qHVDil?si=3We4OdFTToi_BDGYP6PT0g
https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/9ff4fb19-54d4-41ae-ae7a-8a6f8d3dafa8/episodes/f324ebb1-c2eb-4e76-97bb-fd2dce98d543/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-howard-jones
https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast/episode/howard-jones-211456528
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Monday 30 January 2023
Grammy Appearances
They can't get anyone to do the show.
Used to be the airwaves were flooded with CBS touting the stars who were going to appear on the Grammys. Not this year. Because most of the superstars won't commit!
Because they don't need it.
Yes, the script has flipped. Used to be the stars needed the show for exposure. Now the fans of the mostly young acts dominating the Spotify chart (ignore "Billboard," it's manipulated and inaccurate, only for the industry and the sycophantic press that prints it) don't watch network TV. And certainly don't want to sit through commercials. And they know if anything good happens they can watch it subsequently online (assuming CBS allows the clips to be posted on YouTube, which it usually doesn't, meaning you have to go to the network's homepage, which is not one of your usual stops, find the clip, click and watch the ad and...why bother). And the truth is today's acts have a plethora of video online, who needs one more clip?
Artists used to spend a fortune on production (or their labels...) for the show. Now that's a waste of money. We learned that late night TV appearances didn't move the needle, now we know awards shows with their tanking ratings don't either, so why bother to show up!
All this hogwash about the Grammys alienating the artists... Well, it's true, but it's not the main reason the acts aren't appearing, it's just not to their career benefit. Ever try to get an artist to do something? YOU think it's a slam dunk, the good charity, this or that, but it's nearly impossible to get them unless you're personally related/involved. It's their career, they don't see the benefit, and they're all time-challenged, and unless you're paying... Yes, a million and a half is the standard price for a private these days. It's moved up from a million. And true superstars get multiple millions. And you want them to show up for free? Not gonna happen.
I mean if CBS were going to pay the acts...
That ain't in the budget.
As for the budget...that's how the Academy makes their nut every year, through the CBS payment for the show. Do you think CBS is going to continue to lay out big bucks for a show with low ratings that doesn't even feature stars? Well, the term has a while to run, but as for renewal...
So the boys club Recording Academy implodes, and no one there saw it coming, even though everybody outside did.
Women... Corporations are bending over backwards to place and elevate women. What does the Academy do? Hire a woman and fire her, because she wanted change too fast! Do you think the oldsters have forgotten? And the youngsters never cared about the Academy and its bogus awards show anyway. As for the trophy... Who remembers who won? It was all about the appearance. The trophy only matters to those who are niche artists who put it on their resumé. A true star does not display their Grammys, of if they do, they're in the bathroom. You see their fellow artists put them down for it!
But at least music still has true stars. As for film and TV...they're soulless regular people.
It's not like you couldn't see the train coming down the track. Network ratings dropping in general. Young people not listening to terrestrial radio. Streaming being king (whereas the Academy members are all against streaming, I won't even bother to get into the economics, but Spotify allows everyone to see how piss-poor their streams are). Evolve or die. And the Academy and the antique and minor acts dominating it want to live in the past. I bet a bunch of them drive Teslas... How come they can't apply this same thinking to their organization?
And music is inherently organization averse. That's what makes music so powerful, it's the anti. With no inherent criteria. So you break out, throw the rules of society overboard, and then you want to conform and get into bed with these overlords? I don't think so.
It's not only the Grammys. And it's not only awards shows. More then twenty years have gone by since Napster, a whole generation. Young people have no idea what happened in the nineties and before, and they don't care. They don't even have a CD player, never mind buy CDs. Music is plentiful, not scarce. And why would anybody steal music, when for ten bucks a month you can get it all?
Music moves so fast and the self-congratulatory Academy so slow.
I could point out how to try and save it, but why bother, it deserves to die.
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Used to be the airwaves were flooded with CBS touting the stars who were going to appear on the Grammys. Not this year. Because most of the superstars won't commit!
Because they don't need it.
Yes, the script has flipped. Used to be the stars needed the show for exposure. Now the fans of the mostly young acts dominating the Spotify chart (ignore "Billboard," it's manipulated and inaccurate, only for the industry and the sycophantic press that prints it) don't watch network TV. And certainly don't want to sit through commercials. And they know if anything good happens they can watch it subsequently online (assuming CBS allows the clips to be posted on YouTube, which it usually doesn't, meaning you have to go to the network's homepage, which is not one of your usual stops, find the clip, click and watch the ad and...why bother). And the truth is today's acts have a plethora of video online, who needs one more clip?
Artists used to spend a fortune on production (or their labels...) for the show. Now that's a waste of money. We learned that late night TV appearances didn't move the needle, now we know awards shows with their tanking ratings don't either, so why bother to show up!
All this hogwash about the Grammys alienating the artists... Well, it's true, but it's not the main reason the acts aren't appearing, it's just not to their career benefit. Ever try to get an artist to do something? YOU think it's a slam dunk, the good charity, this or that, but it's nearly impossible to get them unless you're personally related/involved. It's their career, they don't see the benefit, and they're all time-challenged, and unless you're paying... Yes, a million and a half is the standard price for a private these days. It's moved up from a million. And true superstars get multiple millions. And you want them to show up for free? Not gonna happen.
I mean if CBS were going to pay the acts...
That ain't in the budget.
As for the budget...that's how the Academy makes their nut every year, through the CBS payment for the show. Do you think CBS is going to continue to lay out big bucks for a show with low ratings that doesn't even feature stars? Well, the term has a while to run, but as for renewal...
So the boys club Recording Academy implodes, and no one there saw it coming, even though everybody outside did.
Women... Corporations are bending over backwards to place and elevate women. What does the Academy do? Hire a woman and fire her, because she wanted change too fast! Do you think the oldsters have forgotten? And the youngsters never cared about the Academy and its bogus awards show anyway. As for the trophy... Who remembers who won? It was all about the appearance. The trophy only matters to those who are niche artists who put it on their resumé. A true star does not display their Grammys, of if they do, they're in the bathroom. You see their fellow artists put them down for it!
But at least music still has true stars. As for film and TV...they're soulless regular people.
It's not like you couldn't see the train coming down the track. Network ratings dropping in general. Young people not listening to terrestrial radio. Streaming being king (whereas the Academy members are all against streaming, I won't even bother to get into the economics, but Spotify allows everyone to see how piss-poor their streams are). Evolve or die. And the Academy and the antique and minor acts dominating it want to live in the past. I bet a bunch of them drive Teslas... How come they can't apply this same thinking to their organization?
And music is inherently organization averse. That's what makes music so powerful, it's the anti. With no inherent criteria. So you break out, throw the rules of society overboard, and then you want to conform and get into bed with these overlords? I don't think so.
It's not only the Grammys. And it's not only awards shows. More then twenty years have gone by since Napster, a whole generation. Young people have no idea what happened in the nineties and before, and they don't care. They don't even have a CD player, never mind buy CDs. Music is plentiful, not scarce. And why would anybody steal music, when for ten bucks a month you can get it all?
Music moves so fast and the self-congratulatory Academy so slow.
I could point out how to try and save it, but why bother, it deserves to die.
--
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--
Listen to the podcast:
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Sunday 29 January 2023
Mailbag-Ticketing, Crime Songs & More!
TICKETING
Lets start with fees. This is a problem I never see being fixed. Fans love to pay fees. There might be some fans out there that are loud and complain but they still buy the tickets and majority do not complain. Agents, managers and artists want 85%, 90%, 100% of the profit from the door where else will a promoter make their money especially if they do not own the room. The promoter is also not going to say no to the artist or agent if they want to add on to the fee of the ticket for their benefit. As long as the Artists, the managers and the agents have the ticketing companies to hide behind and the fans do not boycott high fees or even crazy priced tickets nothing will ever change. Actually like you mentioned high ticket prices are here forever that will not change. Even your local band gets $20 for a ticket. Americans pay fees for everything, hotel fees, travel fees buy a car pay a handling fee it is the easiest way to squeeze money out of someones pocket without feeling guilty. Soon there will be a Lefsetz fee. Owning the ticketing company, the management company and being the promoter that is a separate issue.
Jon Topper
______________________________________
I have a hard time believing as a fan that all in ticketing is the answer. It would be great for the promoter and ticketing company but then a band that should only be charging $20 for a ticket is now charging $30 or $50 for a ticket is $65 makes it look like the artist is completely calling the final price. I have said it before for the most part the fans do not care about the fees or the ticketing price. Americans love to pay fees and bitch about it but they pay.
Personal example of fans not caring, I once did a promotion with LN to put the first 1000 tickets of 2500 seat venue on sale with no fees for a limited time. My thinking was that the fans going to the show are your best marketers to other fans. The way I structured the deal was half of the fees came from the Artist guarantee the second half came from the marketing budget for the show. I took half from the Artist guarantee because Rapino said to me that the Artist wants the promoter to take the chance and not put any of the risk on the Artist. We advertised it sent out emails to the artist's fans really pushed it hard, When it was all said and done the on sale sold around 400 tickets which is normal for this artist and only about 550 of the no fees sold by the time the promotion was up. The venue ended up selling out by doors but everyone else paid fees. FYI this was not the first time the venue had sold out.
I personally think the answer for less fees and lower ticket prices would be way more income sharing all around. All expenses and profits both from the Artist side and promoters side being put on the table.
Jon Topper
______________________________________
The bit at the end, where Vito says ask fans how they feel about ticket pricing and availability, is something called "consumer welfare." As you may know, the last 40 years of American antitrust law is dominated by that line of thinking. Monopoly and monopsony power are okay to allow as regulators so long as the buyers (former) or sellers (latter) get better pricing. This is how American conservatives and market-focused liberals think about competition policy. It's two generations of economics-dominated, math-based argumentation spearheaded by Robert Bork himself. USDOJ AT Division, the FTC, the FCC, and state regulations at the Public Utility Commissions have staff and leaders filled with this philosophy.
Instead, I'm a proponent of a "public interest" standard for regulation. The idea is that the net trade-offs to society are not positive for many of these mergers, even if some pinheads can make the pricing math work in a model. Amazon is not in favor of the public good because they can make prices go down by introducing their own Amazon Basics lookalike or deploy tens of thousands of gig workers to deliver in 2 hours from the trunk of their Civic.
We need a modern antitrust act to deal with all those internet platform monopolies, but Congress is out to lunch on this. Lina Kahn at FTC is the right woman for the right job at the right time, though.
Gordon Chaffin
______________________________________
The problem described in Vito's PS is scarcity - if there was a central inventory API that all competitors could sell from, they would have to compete on service, not on exclusivity. Similar to how music streaming services more or less serve the same content. But then you couldn't have all of the shady kickback deals going on…
Stefan Hartmann
______________________________________
All great points. I go to a lot of shows and I am in a few Facebook groups for artists who have had sales recently that went poorly. (Meaning well for the artist.) The people complaining in these groups just don't get it. They see the few seats that are somehow $5000 and assume that's what Jimmy Buffett is charging everyone. Meanwhile, tickets that had quickly sold out are now going for about $200 with fees. For a bucket list type show. Of course, the uninformed are blaming the artists, I know Springsteen's taken a huge hit on his reputation, not that it affected ticket sales.
Here in Orlando, there was a Garth Brooks show last year. Garth keeps his ticket prices pretty low, and I checked after about a month and it was completely sold out. But massive amounts of tickets on resale sites. I bought tickets the day of the show for $12. The scalpers bet and lost on that one. Felt nice.
Dave Arbiter
Davenport, FL
______________________________________
Bob,
I waited to see if anyone called out your egregious error but it seems I'm the only one who gets it. The big issue with Ticketmaster is that they are ALSO in the "scalper" secondary ticket market!!! They are DOUBLING up on fees with their "verified" resales. Resales? WAIT!! How can the primary seller also be a secondary market reseller? WTF? Seems like a very slippery slope towards corruption.
In addition, no one is talking about the "Platinum" tickets. Ok, hide behind the facade of platinum tickets are the best tickets so you have to pay a premium to get them but search this out. Phish at the Greek Theater in Berkeley, Ca is 100% GA. However, after 10 minutes of regular ticket sales, PLATINUM tickets popped up!! Oh, and are still up!!! The $95 GA tickets can now be purchased for $250 plus charges. HUH? WTF is Platinum? How can a 100% GA house have "Platinum" tickets? Why did any member of congress not question that today? Ticketmaster realizes what the devil is and is trying their best to cast their white angel wings and quash it only to have the blood of anti-trust and greed stain their snowy white feathers deep red.
Mitch Dorf
______________________________________
"Ticket Prices Surging as James Closes in on Abdul-Jabbar Record
LeBron James is set to break the all-time career scoring record in the coming weeks.
Tickets to the possible record-breaking games have increased up to 305%."
https://bit.ly/3HiIwcR
I demand a Congressional hearing.
Dan Millen
______________________________________
Appreciate your informative recent pieces on ticketing. Thought you'd appreciate this letter to the editor in today's Star Tribune.
Thanks,
Lisa
TICKETMASTER
Other crises can wait, apparently
"We cannot talk about Social Security, we cannot hold meaningful discussions on fixing our debt and deficit problems and we cannot fund our schools correctly, but I am so glad we can work on the Taylor Swift tour ticket issue ("Taking on Ticketmaster's showstopper fees," Jan. 25). This is in the U.S. Senate. Our senior senator, whom I adore, should truly be ashamed for this clear pandering, softball issue getting press and hearing time. Rome burns and on this one, Amy fiddles. No tickets required.
MARK A. RONNEI, Pequot Lakes, Minn."
Lisa Dahlseid
______________________________________
______________________________________
ZACH BRYAN
Hi Bob,
Zach Bryan's music has been predominantly featured for a couple of seasons now on Yellowstone. He also performed a few songs as himself in a County Fair segment of an episode that aired this past December (Season 5). Easy YouTube search if you are interested.
That is where I first heard his songs. Became an instant fan because of the exposure on Yellowstone. He is a fantastic artist and it is great show. Definitely binge worthy.
Sandra Laidlaw
______________________________________
From: Ally Fell
Hi Bob,
I happened to read your October 19 post "Zach Bryan At The Wiltern" though I had never heard of him. I was curious and desperate for some new music so based on your writing, I took a few minutes to explore his songs. I do not consider myself a fan of contemporary Country Music, but I loved and connected with him immediately. The last time I can recall that happening with an artist was when I first heard King Princess. I avoid going to the Wiltern but I was super sad to have missed Zach's LA show by less than a day. So I checked his remaining tour dates and wishfully noted on my calendar that he was playing Red Rocks two weeks later.
The next week I listened to him nonstop, and eventually decided to get to the Red Rocks show one way or another. I missed live music for so long due to Covid, I deserved this. My Colorado bestie was onboard and I found a roundtrip ticket on Frontier for $87. An Angel was able to get us tickets to one of the most unforgettable shows I've ever been to. I've seen plenty of crazy weather, lightning storms, hail and rainbows at Red Rocks, but have never been buried in snow during a show there. The cowboy hats around us had at least 3" of snow on their brims. I can't describe how incredible it was, but for anyone who cares, they've seen the videos and listened to the live album he released not long after.
Now, I don't even think he is Country, he's just my favorite. I put down $1 each for the chance to buy tickets to 6 dates on the upcoming tour. I don't even want the refund, I'm just happy to support this process, and hopefully will make it to one of the shows! Thanks for tipping me off to him in the first place.
______________________________________
______________________________________
DAVID CROSBY
Around 2005, my mother drove down from Oregon to visit me in LA when I was still living and working there as a session drummer. I put her up at The Sportsman's Lodge in Sherman Oaks as it was just across the boulevard from my place. The day I dropped her off, David Crosby was walking around the grounds with a group of people. As you know, living there and working in the industry immunizes you from star-struckism, as you run into these people while perusing varieties of ice cream at the grocery store, but I couldn't believe he was there. I wanted so badly to break protocol and go make an ass of myself. A few days later, at dinner with mom, she offered up this little nugget. "Oh hey… I rode the elevator up to the room with David Crosby this morning after breakfast. He's a great guy." I looked at her like she'd just smacked me in the forehead with a 2x4. "Uh… what?" "Yeah," she said. "He asked me if I wanted to come up to his suite for an evening of music tonight." I freaked - "What the hell are you doing here then? You mean we could be hanging out with David fucking Crosby right now????" She says, "Well, honey…… I didn't drive 24 hours from Corvallis to hang out with David Crosby!!!"
Parents are so hard to raise.
Deanne Ogden
______________________________________
February 2019. We were promoting a David Crosby concert in an intimate (800seat) venue in a converted church in (a pro Trump) Vero Beach, Florida. He walked on stage, reflected on where he was and who he was, looked at the audience and opened with "can you believe I'm here?" What he didn't know was that we had given a block of tickets to 40 vets who had served in Korea and Viet Nam. He, his band and the audience settled in and the next 90 minutes were pure Croz.
He decided to close with Ohio..Standing in the wings, I was watching to see how this group was going to respond as the song and his performance became more anti war. One of the older vets got up from his seat, stood quietly and watched. In a moment that still moves me, he quietly lowered his head and raised his fisted arm. One by one the remaining vets did the same, as did the rest of the audience.
When the song ended, Croz stood there and smiled. A blue moment in a red state.
Rusty Young
MusicWorks
musicworksconcerts.com
______________________________________
Several years ago, I was managing Reid Genauer and Reid had the amazing opportunity to do a solo acoustic opener for a run of shows with David Crosby on the northeast spur of his CPR tour.
Needless to say, we were pretty over the moon about the opportunity. I had seen David in various forms many times and had obsessively listened (as I still do) to If I Could Only Remember My Name and Four Way Street. Having the chance to be in his orbit was literally a dream come true.
David had a sort of notorious reputation for being a bit bristly and of course we wanted to be on our best behavior and not do anything that would draw negative attention to ourselves.
One night somewhere, Reid was on stage and had his dog Maple locked in the dressing room.
Or so we thought.
In reality, Maple had been roaming around the backstage until he found an open door to the unoccupied star dressing room, where he helped himself to David Crosby's rider. All over the floor, furniture. A total disaster.
The next part of this story is sort of a blur to me due to the terror I endured waiting for one of my musical heroes to show up and tear us a new one.
But I do remember the ending: It turns out David Crosby loved dogs and was really missing his own rascally pups while he was out on the road. He gave Maple some head scratches, laughed it off and paid Reid some fine compliments. Tragedy narrowly averted.
That was the first time but not the last time I got to work with him. Each time was one of the high honors of my life.
Bob Kennedy
Bowery Presents
______________________________________
______________________________________
JERRY HARRISON PODCAST
Wow! Best episode yet. A super smart autodidact with a fabulous memory. And I love all his music so the backstories are fascinating. Thank you --
David Meerman Scott
______________________________________
Great podcast. He's obviously brilliant & we knew the Heads were brainy but…
Steve Tipp
______________________________________
And (producer) of Elliott Murphy Night Lights album!
Best,
Elliott
______________________________________
I really enjoyed hearing Jerry on your podcast. Very interesting and deeply revealing!
Keep up the good work.
Chris Frantz
______________________________________
______________________________________
WYNONNA JUDD PODCAST
From: Jason Cilo
My wife and I (both 53) and our 11-year-old daughter had a long drive up to Massachusetts last week. Over my daughter's demands for Hits 1 on Sirius I claimed my right as the driver to select what I listened to. I chose your Wynonna podcast. Fantastic. Fascinating. And REAL while still having that veneer of showbiz, of celebrity, of the stuff that makes the magic. And yet she was so honest about the pain behind it all and her own mercenary/egotistical attraction to the fame, the money, the lifestyle...all with very few platitudes, and what I can hear as sobriety in her responses. And "Robert Weir" she mentioned maybe 3 or 4 times before I realized she's talking about Bob Weir! Somehow that's so perfect, that she calls him "Robert Weir" as nobody else does. And then I'm streaming the Nugs.tv broadcast of Dead & Company's Playing In The Sand concert this weekend and....there she is. And she was GREAT. I've been a Deadhead for 30 years and it's hard to step onstage with any iteration of the Dead and find a place to fit in. Maggie Rogers did it recently. But many have flailed. But she brought it and a sense of fun to the proceedings. When she was singing, she was interior...in a way your podcast illuminated. When she bantered, she came alive...in the way your podcast illuminated. Perhaps the highest praise was our 11-year-old, having pretended not to be listening...kept mentioning Wynonna all weekend....she was hooked! Kudos.
Wynonna & Dead & Company "Ramble On Rose": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hf-Z5K1VfMU
______________________________________
______________________________________
JEFF BECK
My Jeff Beck story;
When I was in my 20's playing bars around Nashville, I played a lot of gigs with Jimmy Hall. He had just sang on Ambitious with Jeff Beck and was getting ready to do his tour. We had a gig at a funky little bar on Nolensville Road when Jeff came to town to go over material with Jimmy for the upcoming tour.
So, naturally, he came out to the gig to sit in. I was of course, losing my mind thinking I would have a chance to play with Jeff. This was long before I had ever played with anyone of note, and was just getting into playing a few publishing demos in the studio scene, but mostly just playing bar gigs. So, Jeff gets up to play, he's standing right next to me on this little stage, this was around the time he was just moving into the phase of using the whammy bar and playing with his fingers, a sound he would develop over the next 20 years of his career, a style so completely original, I've never heard anything like it. Needless to say, on that stage that night, as I watched him play, about a foot away from me, it was like watching a savant, he just bemusedly looked down at the guitar, playing shit that completely blew my mind. It was total genius. I suggested we play Rock My Plimsoul, from his Truth record. I had learned that solo note for note sitting in my apartment practicing. So, we bust into that song, Jeff plays a solo, like, some unbelievable whammy bar future blues from outer space, and he nods at me to take a solo. I play his solo note for note from the record (or honestly, a fair approximation of it) he looks at me and kicks me…. affectionately. Ok, so I'm thinking, "Jeff Beck just kicked me" but in an endearing way. It felt to me like a nod of approval. This was huge for a young unknown guitar player like me.
He played maybe 4 or 5 songs total. It was the complete highlight of my life. But, there's more..
At one point he broke a string and played my spare guitar. After the gig, I asked him to sign the guitar. He said, "Mate, get me a couple warm beers and a knife and I'll carve my name in it." Amazingly, there was a biker I vaguely knew with a buck knife, I asked to borrow it, even more amazingly he said yes, I grabbed a couple Guinness beers and headed back to the dressing room. We sat and chatted for about an hour as he ornately carved his name in my strat. At one point I said jokingly, hey Jeff if you hang around here ,you might get to play on some country records. His response was "haha, I'd love to" as he stopped carving for a minute and, just with the guitar unplugged in the dressing room, began playing blazingly fast, articulate bluegrass and country licks, kind of ala Albert Lee, but still sounding unmistakably like Jeff. All of us in the dressing room were sitting there(including my buddy Warner Hodges from Jason and the Scorchers) with our mouths open, like, ok you just put us all in our place. That's it, that's my Jeff Beck story. Still to this day, one of the greatest nights of my life.
Kenny Greenberg
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LUCIAN'S LETTER
From: Dave Dederer
"Trust nobody in entertainment, they're all out for themselves. If you're generating revenue, they're your best friend, if you're not..."
Bob,
Truer words were never spoken!
We were heavily courted by every major label except Interscope in the mid 90s (how many were there then...8,9?).
We signed with Columbia because we trusted Donnie Ienner.
By "trusted," I mean we trusted him to act in accord with the credo cited above with full commitment and transparency.
He wasn't going to pretend. He wasn't going to BS. He was straight up. And it was a great partnership.
He was true to his word -- told us in May 1995 that if we signed the final long-form agreement by mid-June, he would have the record out in mid-July. We agreed and he delivered. Anyone in the business knows that setting up a release in two months was just not done in the physical era, much less without a deal signed until a few weeks before the release date.
When we were selling 60,000 records a week, I could typically get him on the phone within five minutes.
When we were selling 6,000 a week, maybe get a call back in a few days, probably never.
No offense taken. That's how business works.
The bounds and rules of the relationship were clear. Good fences make good neighbors!
dave
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"Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"
AC/DC
Alex Skolnick
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1952 Vincent Black Lightning ……….just sayin
Richard Thompson
Bill Nelson
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Smooth Criminal - Michael Jackson
Bill Waliewski
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Whodunnit
Tavares
1977 mid-Top 40 & #1 Soul ditty co-written/produced by legendary hitmaker Freddie Perren - which name-checks a string of iconic mid-70s TV crime series!
Tim Hanlon
Lake Forest, IL
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Here are some of my additions to your "Crime Songs Playlist:"
Tom Dooley
Kingston Trio
Jailhouse Rock
Elvis
Stagger Lee
Lloyd Price
Gallows Pole
Led Zeppelin
House of the Rising Sun
The Animals
Smugglers Blues
Glenn Fry
Folsom Prison Blues
Johnny Cash
Rocky Racoon
Beatles
Hey Joe
Jimi Hendrix Experience
All the Best,
Bob Jameson
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What about Family Snapshot by Peter Gabriel?
Shane Cadman
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I Fought The Law: The Crickets
Doug Thompson
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The Equals "Police On My Back": https://bit.ly/3wFvzVE
The Clash covered this on Sandinista.
Both versions are so infectious.
Nick Petropoulos
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Indiana Wants Me - R. Dean Taylor
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_Wants_Me
John Garabedian
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What about
Robbery, Assault and Battery
Genesis
(from A Trick of The Tail)
Best,
Ian Penman
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No Folsom Prison Blues?
Marc Reiter
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Pittsburgh Stealers
The Kendalls
Michael Craig
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Folsom Prison Blues-Johnny Cash
Momma Tried - Merle Haggard
Mark Morrisey
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Krokus
Midnight Maniac
LD Glover
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Old Judge Jones
Les Dudek
Crime in The City
Neil Young
Benjamin Hunter
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1. Hurricane, Bob Dylan
~ Living in So Florida, I haven't met anyone who knows this song and it should be iconic given its name, right!?!? I think it's because the radio market is so tuned into Latin music, and there's only one rock station that ONLY plays the 'super' hits where I've heard the same songs nearly 10k times. Whhyyyy :(
Hurricane is a song about racism, violence and betrayal. I used to sing that song with a live band in the 90s, after having a few beers of course! Now I'm in my 50s , not sure I could remember all the lyrics, but I still remember the impact that story had on me then, as a white, midwesterner (woman). Tyre's story is no different- it's just now more people have access to it.
~DebTurner
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A crime song list without Alice Cooper?
Thomas Quinn
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4A3gcDg5M3M
A little Canadian Crime by The Box.
Michael Greggs.
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Nice... cruising and listening... I would have added Ellis Unit One by Steve Earle...from the Dead Man Walking Soundtrack which is really quite underrated IMO... cheers
Todd Devonshire
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What about Maxwell's Silver Hammer? HA
Jeff Weicher
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Outlaw Man
Eagles
Cash On The Barrelhead
Louvin Brothers
Thirty Days
Chuck Berry
Ballad Of Thunder Road
Mark Collie
Julie + Lucky
Dan Baird
Everglades
Kingston Trio
In State
Kathleen Edwards
(I Washed My Hands In) Muddy Water
Johnny Rivers
John Besanko
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Watching The Detectives
Elvis Costello
Whose Side Are You On
Matt Bianco
David Boloten
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The Curse of Millhaven - Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds
Don't Take Your Guns To Town - Johnny Cash
A Criminal Mind - Gowan
David Harley's Son and Suicidewinder and In the Trunk of a Black Lexus - Ridley Bent (debut album - Blam)
They may or may not fit your criteria, but all, in my opinion, immensely entertaining
Kevin Young
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Being from Indiana - "Indiana Wants Me" - R Dean Taylor
Rob Evans
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Murder In My Heart For The Judge
Moby Grape
Ballad of a Well Known Gun
Elton John
Scott Sechman
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Copperhead Road, Steve Earle
A tale of 3 generations of criminals
could have topped the list
J.Cole - OG
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Down By The River - Neil Young
Mark Johnson
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Lock and Key
Rush
John Virant, Jr.
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A Week In a Country Jail
Tom T Hall
Alice's Restaurant
Arlo Guthrie
One Piece at A Time
Johnny Cash
Folsom Prison Blues
Johnny Cash
Jeff Lysyczyn
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I remain especially fond of this one:
"The Holdup: David Bromberg: https://bit.ly/3WNmkx6
Corey Bearaj
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I love this playlist! Adding Tweeter and the Monkey Man…
Robyn Gould
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Tom waits "day after tomorrow "
Steve Earle " Jerusalem "
Mitchell Greenbaum
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Uriah Heep - Stealin'.....
Donald Bartenstein
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What no Jailbreak?
Mick Wall
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?Bohemian Rhapsody Queen
?Gotta Get A Message To You Bee Gees
Wrick Wolff
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You forgot Smugglers Blues.
Greg Robson
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Great list, Bob.
Surprised to see, huge Zeppelin fan that you are, that Gallows Pole, was omitted. No worries though, will love listening to this playlist.
Mark Haar
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?For What It's Worth
Buffalo Springfield
Ohio
Crosby Stills Nash and Young
Hey Joe
Jimi Hendrix
Down by the River
Neil Young
RUNNIN' WITH THE DEVIL
Van Halen
Riders On The Storm
The Doors
Swingin'
Tim Petty and the Heartbreakers
Guns, Guns, Guns
The Guess Who
The End
The Doors
Drugs in Me Pocket
The Monks
Laugh At the Judge
The Grease Band
Bank Job
Barenaked Ladies
Murder She Wrote
Chair Demus & Pliers
Jailhouse Rock
Elvis
Arrested For Driving While Blind
ZZ Top
I Fought the Law
The Clash
Bankrobber
The Clash
Anarchy in the UK
Sex Pistols
Riot in Cell Block Number Nine
Blues Brothers
Gimme Back My Bullets
Lynyrd Skynyrd
Olie Kornelsen
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Bohemian Rhapsody?
David Stopps
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Crime In The City (Sixty to Zero Pt. 1)
Neil Young
One of the best.
Jordan Holman
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Bob,
Rubber Bullets 10cc
Steve Langford
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Murder incorporated
Bruce Springsteen
Jeff Gabriels
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I love the list. Here's an incredible song that you might want to put on the next time - The Road Goes on Forever - by Robert Earl Keen. It has to be the live version, though, with the crowd singing along and the two-minute jam session.
JP Lavin
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Murder Incorporated - Bruce Springsteen
Chris Xynos
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whenever kindness fails - robert earl keen
Robert Earl Keen
Denise Mello
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Folsom Prison Blues (Johnny Cash)
https://open.spotify.com/track/0LTSNmOLBt25GMjHlxp9OR?si=KQXepUHKRtSIRqr9cgOaqg
Mama Tried (Grateful Dead; Merle Haggard original I think)
https://open.spotify.com/track/10qdw6uxpYd2dAXnlbPIa6?si=gwbmY6LYRPuUNNkR2BGNsg
Send Me To The 'lectric Chair (David Bromberg; Bessie Smith original I think)
https://open.spotify.com/track/1jhPmKe9YrY6UlnZrvqae3?si=UxdwwWwjRQCP91KNvT8jnA
Indiana Wants Me (R. Dean Taylor; original?)
https://open.spotify.com/track/1zgV5ZYh7uYJXbK7yjuyj8?si=nfTF1-y4QaWFD0QoMHldkA
DG G
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Parchman Farm
Mose Allison
In Germany Before The War
Randy Newman
Take a Message to Mary
The Everly Brothers
El Paso
Marty Robbins
Don't Take Your Guns To Town
Johnny Cash
Hey Joe
Jimi Hendrix
Russ Titelman
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Great list! Feels like the album or a song from Nick Cave's Murder ballads would fit right in.
Cheers,
Christophe Carvenius
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Mr. Policeman… by Brad Paisley… such a silly fun song…!
Marc Lohrmer
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Send Me To the 'Lectric Chair
Bessie Smith
Lauri Perason
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Indiana wants me!
Peter Wagner
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Big Iron
Marty Robbins
Bruce Gordon
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You forgot Me and My Uncle by the Grateful Dead.
Stefanie Lacoff
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Hey joe
Stalag 17.- Ansel Collins: https://bit.ly/3wEDoe8
Jeff Lorber
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"Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde": https://bit.ly/3HF8o3X
Georgie Fame
I'm roughly your age…I love this song!
Tom Clark
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You're missing most of Nebraska
Merck Mercuriadis
Lets start with fees. This is a problem I never see being fixed. Fans love to pay fees. There might be some fans out there that are loud and complain but they still buy the tickets and majority do not complain. Agents, managers and artists want 85%, 90%, 100% of the profit from the door where else will a promoter make their money especially if they do not own the room. The promoter is also not going to say no to the artist or agent if they want to add on to the fee of the ticket for their benefit. As long as the Artists, the managers and the agents have the ticketing companies to hide behind and the fans do not boycott high fees or even crazy priced tickets nothing will ever change. Actually like you mentioned high ticket prices are here forever that will not change. Even your local band gets $20 for a ticket. Americans pay fees for everything, hotel fees, travel fees buy a car pay a handling fee it is the easiest way to squeeze money out of someones pocket without feeling guilty. Soon there will be a Lefsetz fee. Owning the ticketing company, the management company and being the promoter that is a separate issue.
Jon Topper
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I have a hard time believing as a fan that all in ticketing is the answer. It would be great for the promoter and ticketing company but then a band that should only be charging $20 for a ticket is now charging $30 or $50 for a ticket is $65 makes it look like the artist is completely calling the final price. I have said it before for the most part the fans do not care about the fees or the ticketing price. Americans love to pay fees and bitch about it but they pay.
Personal example of fans not caring, I once did a promotion with LN to put the first 1000 tickets of 2500 seat venue on sale with no fees for a limited time. My thinking was that the fans going to the show are your best marketers to other fans. The way I structured the deal was half of the fees came from the Artist guarantee the second half came from the marketing budget for the show. I took half from the Artist guarantee because Rapino said to me that the Artist wants the promoter to take the chance and not put any of the risk on the Artist. We advertised it sent out emails to the artist's fans really pushed it hard, When it was all said and done the on sale sold around 400 tickets which is normal for this artist and only about 550 of the no fees sold by the time the promotion was up. The venue ended up selling out by doors but everyone else paid fees. FYI this was not the first time the venue had sold out.
I personally think the answer for less fees and lower ticket prices would be way more income sharing all around. All expenses and profits both from the Artist side and promoters side being put on the table.
Jon Topper
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The bit at the end, where Vito says ask fans how they feel about ticket pricing and availability, is something called "consumer welfare." As you may know, the last 40 years of American antitrust law is dominated by that line of thinking. Monopoly and monopsony power are okay to allow as regulators so long as the buyers (former) or sellers (latter) get better pricing. This is how American conservatives and market-focused liberals think about competition policy. It's two generations of economics-dominated, math-based argumentation spearheaded by Robert Bork himself. USDOJ AT Division, the FTC, the FCC, and state regulations at the Public Utility Commissions have staff and leaders filled with this philosophy.
Instead, I'm a proponent of a "public interest" standard for regulation. The idea is that the net trade-offs to society are not positive for many of these mergers, even if some pinheads can make the pricing math work in a model. Amazon is not in favor of the public good because they can make prices go down by introducing their own Amazon Basics lookalike or deploy tens of thousands of gig workers to deliver in 2 hours from the trunk of their Civic.
We need a modern antitrust act to deal with all those internet platform monopolies, but Congress is out to lunch on this. Lina Kahn at FTC is the right woman for the right job at the right time, though.
Gordon Chaffin
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The problem described in Vito's PS is scarcity - if there was a central inventory API that all competitors could sell from, they would have to compete on service, not on exclusivity. Similar to how music streaming services more or less serve the same content. But then you couldn't have all of the shady kickback deals going on…
Stefan Hartmann
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All great points. I go to a lot of shows and I am in a few Facebook groups for artists who have had sales recently that went poorly. (Meaning well for the artist.) The people complaining in these groups just don't get it. They see the few seats that are somehow $5000 and assume that's what Jimmy Buffett is charging everyone. Meanwhile, tickets that had quickly sold out are now going for about $200 with fees. For a bucket list type show. Of course, the uninformed are blaming the artists, I know Springsteen's taken a huge hit on his reputation, not that it affected ticket sales.
Here in Orlando, there was a Garth Brooks show last year. Garth keeps his ticket prices pretty low, and I checked after about a month and it was completely sold out. But massive amounts of tickets on resale sites. I bought tickets the day of the show for $12. The scalpers bet and lost on that one. Felt nice.
Dave Arbiter
Davenport, FL
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Bob,
I waited to see if anyone called out your egregious error but it seems I'm the only one who gets it. The big issue with Ticketmaster is that they are ALSO in the "scalper" secondary ticket market!!! They are DOUBLING up on fees with their "verified" resales. Resales? WAIT!! How can the primary seller also be a secondary market reseller? WTF? Seems like a very slippery slope towards corruption.
In addition, no one is talking about the "Platinum" tickets. Ok, hide behind the facade of platinum tickets are the best tickets so you have to pay a premium to get them but search this out. Phish at the Greek Theater in Berkeley, Ca is 100% GA. However, after 10 minutes of regular ticket sales, PLATINUM tickets popped up!! Oh, and are still up!!! The $95 GA tickets can now be purchased for $250 plus charges. HUH? WTF is Platinum? How can a 100% GA house have "Platinum" tickets? Why did any member of congress not question that today? Ticketmaster realizes what the devil is and is trying their best to cast their white angel wings and quash it only to have the blood of anti-trust and greed stain their snowy white feathers deep red.
Mitch Dorf
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"Ticket Prices Surging as James Closes in on Abdul-Jabbar Record
LeBron James is set to break the all-time career scoring record in the coming weeks.
Tickets to the possible record-breaking games have increased up to 305%."
https://bit.ly/3HiIwcR
I demand a Congressional hearing.
Dan Millen
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Appreciate your informative recent pieces on ticketing. Thought you'd appreciate this letter to the editor in today's Star Tribune.
Thanks,
Lisa
TICKETMASTER
Other crises can wait, apparently
"We cannot talk about Social Security, we cannot hold meaningful discussions on fixing our debt and deficit problems and we cannot fund our schools correctly, but I am so glad we can work on the Taylor Swift tour ticket issue ("Taking on Ticketmaster's showstopper fees," Jan. 25). This is in the U.S. Senate. Our senior senator, whom I adore, should truly be ashamed for this clear pandering, softball issue getting press and hearing time. Rome burns and on this one, Amy fiddles. No tickets required.
MARK A. RONNEI, Pequot Lakes, Minn."
Lisa Dahlseid
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ZACH BRYAN
Hi Bob,
Zach Bryan's music has been predominantly featured for a couple of seasons now on Yellowstone. He also performed a few songs as himself in a County Fair segment of an episode that aired this past December (Season 5). Easy YouTube search if you are interested.
That is where I first heard his songs. Became an instant fan because of the exposure on Yellowstone. He is a fantastic artist and it is great show. Definitely binge worthy.
Sandra Laidlaw
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From: Ally Fell
Hi Bob,
I happened to read your October 19 post "Zach Bryan At The Wiltern" though I had never heard of him. I was curious and desperate for some new music so based on your writing, I took a few minutes to explore his songs. I do not consider myself a fan of contemporary Country Music, but I loved and connected with him immediately. The last time I can recall that happening with an artist was when I first heard King Princess. I avoid going to the Wiltern but I was super sad to have missed Zach's LA show by less than a day. So I checked his remaining tour dates and wishfully noted on my calendar that he was playing Red Rocks two weeks later.
The next week I listened to him nonstop, and eventually decided to get to the Red Rocks show one way or another. I missed live music for so long due to Covid, I deserved this. My Colorado bestie was onboard and I found a roundtrip ticket on Frontier for $87. An Angel was able to get us tickets to one of the most unforgettable shows I've ever been to. I've seen plenty of crazy weather, lightning storms, hail and rainbows at Red Rocks, but have never been buried in snow during a show there. The cowboy hats around us had at least 3" of snow on their brims. I can't describe how incredible it was, but for anyone who cares, they've seen the videos and listened to the live album he released not long after.
Now, I don't even think he is Country, he's just my favorite. I put down $1 each for the chance to buy tickets to 6 dates on the upcoming tour. I don't even want the refund, I'm just happy to support this process, and hopefully will make it to one of the shows! Thanks for tipping me off to him in the first place.
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DAVID CROSBY
Around 2005, my mother drove down from Oregon to visit me in LA when I was still living and working there as a session drummer. I put her up at The Sportsman's Lodge in Sherman Oaks as it was just across the boulevard from my place. The day I dropped her off, David Crosby was walking around the grounds with a group of people. As you know, living there and working in the industry immunizes you from star-struckism, as you run into these people while perusing varieties of ice cream at the grocery store, but I couldn't believe he was there. I wanted so badly to break protocol and go make an ass of myself. A few days later, at dinner with mom, she offered up this little nugget. "Oh hey… I rode the elevator up to the room with David Crosby this morning after breakfast. He's a great guy." I looked at her like she'd just smacked me in the forehead with a 2x4. "Uh… what?" "Yeah," she said. "He asked me if I wanted to come up to his suite for an evening of music tonight." I freaked - "What the hell are you doing here then? You mean we could be hanging out with David fucking Crosby right now????" She says, "Well, honey…… I didn't drive 24 hours from Corvallis to hang out with David Crosby!!!"
Parents are so hard to raise.
Deanne Ogden
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February 2019. We were promoting a David Crosby concert in an intimate (800seat) venue in a converted church in (a pro Trump) Vero Beach, Florida. He walked on stage, reflected on where he was and who he was, looked at the audience and opened with "can you believe I'm here?" What he didn't know was that we had given a block of tickets to 40 vets who had served in Korea and Viet Nam. He, his band and the audience settled in and the next 90 minutes were pure Croz.
He decided to close with Ohio..Standing in the wings, I was watching to see how this group was going to respond as the song and his performance became more anti war. One of the older vets got up from his seat, stood quietly and watched. In a moment that still moves me, he quietly lowered his head and raised his fisted arm. One by one the remaining vets did the same, as did the rest of the audience.
When the song ended, Croz stood there and smiled. A blue moment in a red state.
Rusty Young
MusicWorks
musicworksconcerts.com
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Several years ago, I was managing Reid Genauer and Reid had the amazing opportunity to do a solo acoustic opener for a run of shows with David Crosby on the northeast spur of his CPR tour.
Needless to say, we were pretty over the moon about the opportunity. I had seen David in various forms many times and had obsessively listened (as I still do) to If I Could Only Remember My Name and Four Way Street. Having the chance to be in his orbit was literally a dream come true.
David had a sort of notorious reputation for being a bit bristly and of course we wanted to be on our best behavior and not do anything that would draw negative attention to ourselves.
One night somewhere, Reid was on stage and had his dog Maple locked in the dressing room.
Or so we thought.
In reality, Maple had been roaming around the backstage until he found an open door to the unoccupied star dressing room, where he helped himself to David Crosby's rider. All over the floor, furniture. A total disaster.
The next part of this story is sort of a blur to me due to the terror I endured waiting for one of my musical heroes to show up and tear us a new one.
But I do remember the ending: It turns out David Crosby loved dogs and was really missing his own rascally pups while he was out on the road. He gave Maple some head scratches, laughed it off and paid Reid some fine compliments. Tragedy narrowly averted.
That was the first time but not the last time I got to work with him. Each time was one of the high honors of my life.
Bob Kennedy
Bowery Presents
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JERRY HARRISON PODCAST
Wow! Best episode yet. A super smart autodidact with a fabulous memory. And I love all his music so the backstories are fascinating. Thank you --
David Meerman Scott
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Great podcast. He's obviously brilliant & we knew the Heads were brainy but…
Steve Tipp
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And (producer) of Elliott Murphy Night Lights album!
Best,
Elliott
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I really enjoyed hearing Jerry on your podcast. Very interesting and deeply revealing!
Keep up the good work.
Chris Frantz
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WYNONNA JUDD PODCAST
From: Jason Cilo
My wife and I (both 53) and our 11-year-old daughter had a long drive up to Massachusetts last week. Over my daughter's demands for Hits 1 on Sirius I claimed my right as the driver to select what I listened to. I chose your Wynonna podcast. Fantastic. Fascinating. And REAL while still having that veneer of showbiz, of celebrity, of the stuff that makes the magic. And yet she was so honest about the pain behind it all and her own mercenary/egotistical attraction to the fame, the money, the lifestyle...all with very few platitudes, and what I can hear as sobriety in her responses. And "Robert Weir" she mentioned maybe 3 or 4 times before I realized she's talking about Bob Weir! Somehow that's so perfect, that she calls him "Robert Weir" as nobody else does. And then I'm streaming the Nugs.tv broadcast of Dead & Company's Playing In The Sand concert this weekend and....there she is. And she was GREAT. I've been a Deadhead for 30 years and it's hard to step onstage with any iteration of the Dead and find a place to fit in. Maggie Rogers did it recently. But many have flailed. But she brought it and a sense of fun to the proceedings. When she was singing, she was interior...in a way your podcast illuminated. When she bantered, she came alive...in the way your podcast illuminated. Perhaps the highest praise was our 11-year-old, having pretended not to be listening...kept mentioning Wynonna all weekend....she was hooked! Kudos.
Wynonna & Dead & Company "Ramble On Rose": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hf-Z5K1VfMU
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JEFF BECK
My Jeff Beck story;
When I was in my 20's playing bars around Nashville, I played a lot of gigs with Jimmy Hall. He had just sang on Ambitious with Jeff Beck and was getting ready to do his tour. We had a gig at a funky little bar on Nolensville Road when Jeff came to town to go over material with Jimmy for the upcoming tour.
So, naturally, he came out to the gig to sit in. I was of course, losing my mind thinking I would have a chance to play with Jeff. This was long before I had ever played with anyone of note, and was just getting into playing a few publishing demos in the studio scene, but mostly just playing bar gigs. So, Jeff gets up to play, he's standing right next to me on this little stage, this was around the time he was just moving into the phase of using the whammy bar and playing with his fingers, a sound he would develop over the next 20 years of his career, a style so completely original, I've never heard anything like it. Needless to say, on that stage that night, as I watched him play, about a foot away from me, it was like watching a savant, he just bemusedly looked down at the guitar, playing shit that completely blew my mind. It was total genius. I suggested we play Rock My Plimsoul, from his Truth record. I had learned that solo note for note sitting in my apartment practicing. So, we bust into that song, Jeff plays a solo, like, some unbelievable whammy bar future blues from outer space, and he nods at me to take a solo. I play his solo note for note from the record (or honestly, a fair approximation of it) he looks at me and kicks me…. affectionately. Ok, so I'm thinking, "Jeff Beck just kicked me" but in an endearing way. It felt to me like a nod of approval. This was huge for a young unknown guitar player like me.
He played maybe 4 or 5 songs total. It was the complete highlight of my life. But, there's more..
At one point he broke a string and played my spare guitar. After the gig, I asked him to sign the guitar. He said, "Mate, get me a couple warm beers and a knife and I'll carve my name in it." Amazingly, there was a biker I vaguely knew with a buck knife, I asked to borrow it, even more amazingly he said yes, I grabbed a couple Guinness beers and headed back to the dressing room. We sat and chatted for about an hour as he ornately carved his name in my strat. At one point I said jokingly, hey Jeff if you hang around here ,you might get to play on some country records. His response was "haha, I'd love to" as he stopped carving for a minute and, just with the guitar unplugged in the dressing room, began playing blazingly fast, articulate bluegrass and country licks, kind of ala Albert Lee, but still sounding unmistakably like Jeff. All of us in the dressing room were sitting there(including my buddy Warner Hodges from Jason and the Scorchers) with our mouths open, like, ok you just put us all in our place. That's it, that's my Jeff Beck story. Still to this day, one of the greatest nights of my life.
Kenny Greenberg
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LUCIAN'S LETTER
From: Dave Dederer
"Trust nobody in entertainment, they're all out for themselves. If you're generating revenue, they're your best friend, if you're not..."
Bob,
Truer words were never spoken!
We were heavily courted by every major label except Interscope in the mid 90s (how many were there then...8,9?).
We signed with Columbia because we trusted Donnie Ienner.
By "trusted," I mean we trusted him to act in accord with the credo cited above with full commitment and transparency.
He wasn't going to pretend. He wasn't going to BS. He was straight up. And it was a great partnership.
He was true to his word -- told us in May 1995 that if we signed the final long-form agreement by mid-June, he would have the record out in mid-July. We agreed and he delivered. Anyone in the business knows that setting up a release in two months was just not done in the physical era, much less without a deal signed until a few weeks before the release date.
When we were selling 60,000 records a week, I could typically get him on the phone within five minutes.
When we were selling 6,000 a week, maybe get a call back in a few days, probably never.
No offense taken. That's how business works.
The bounds and rules of the relationship were clear. Good fences make good neighbors!
dave
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"Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap"
AC/DC
Alex Skolnick
______________________________________
1952 Vincent Black Lightning ……….just sayin
Richard Thompson
Bill Nelson
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Smooth Criminal - Michael Jackson
Bill Waliewski
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Whodunnit
Tavares
1977 mid-Top 40 & #1 Soul ditty co-written/produced by legendary hitmaker Freddie Perren - which name-checks a string of iconic mid-70s TV crime series!
Tim Hanlon
Lake Forest, IL
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Here are some of my additions to your "Crime Songs Playlist:"
Tom Dooley
Kingston Trio
Jailhouse Rock
Elvis
Stagger Lee
Lloyd Price
Gallows Pole
Led Zeppelin
House of the Rising Sun
The Animals
Smugglers Blues
Glenn Fry
Folsom Prison Blues
Johnny Cash
Rocky Racoon
Beatles
Hey Joe
Jimi Hendrix Experience
All the Best,
Bob Jameson
______________________________________
What about Family Snapshot by Peter Gabriel?
Shane Cadman
______________________________________
I Fought The Law: The Crickets
Doug Thompson
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The Equals "Police On My Back": https://bit.ly/3wFvzVE
The Clash covered this on Sandinista.
Both versions are so infectious.
Nick Petropoulos
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Indiana Wants Me - R. Dean Taylor
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_Wants_Me
John Garabedian
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What about
Robbery, Assault and Battery
Genesis
(from A Trick of The Tail)
Best,
Ian Penman
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No Folsom Prison Blues?
Marc Reiter
______________________________________
Pittsburgh Stealers
The Kendalls
Michael Craig
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Folsom Prison Blues-Johnny Cash
Momma Tried - Merle Haggard
Mark Morrisey
______________________________________
Krokus
Midnight Maniac
LD Glover
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Old Judge Jones
Les Dudek
Crime in The City
Neil Young
Benjamin Hunter
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1. Hurricane, Bob Dylan
~ Living in So Florida, I haven't met anyone who knows this song and it should be iconic given its name, right!?!? I think it's because the radio market is so tuned into Latin music, and there's only one rock station that ONLY plays the 'super' hits where I've heard the same songs nearly 10k times. Whhyyyy :(
Hurricane is a song about racism, violence and betrayal. I used to sing that song with a live band in the 90s, after having a few beers of course! Now I'm in my 50s , not sure I could remember all the lyrics, but I still remember the impact that story had on me then, as a white, midwesterner (woman). Tyre's story is no different- it's just now more people have access to it.
~DebTurner
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A crime song list without Alice Cooper?
Thomas Quinn
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4A3gcDg5M3M
A little Canadian Crime by The Box.
Michael Greggs.
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Nice... cruising and listening... I would have added Ellis Unit One by Steve Earle...from the Dead Man Walking Soundtrack which is really quite underrated IMO... cheers
Todd Devonshire
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What about Maxwell's Silver Hammer? HA
Jeff Weicher
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Outlaw Man
Eagles
Cash On The Barrelhead
Louvin Brothers
Thirty Days
Chuck Berry
Ballad Of Thunder Road
Mark Collie
Julie + Lucky
Dan Baird
Everglades
Kingston Trio
In State
Kathleen Edwards
(I Washed My Hands In) Muddy Water
Johnny Rivers
John Besanko
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Watching The Detectives
Elvis Costello
Whose Side Are You On
Matt Bianco
David Boloten
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The Curse of Millhaven - Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds
Don't Take Your Guns To Town - Johnny Cash
A Criminal Mind - Gowan
David Harley's Son and Suicidewinder and In the Trunk of a Black Lexus - Ridley Bent (debut album - Blam)
They may or may not fit your criteria, but all, in my opinion, immensely entertaining
Kevin Young
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Being from Indiana - "Indiana Wants Me" - R Dean Taylor
Rob Evans
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Murder In My Heart For The Judge
Moby Grape
Ballad of a Well Known Gun
Elton John
Scott Sechman
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Copperhead Road, Steve Earle
A tale of 3 generations of criminals
could have topped the list
J.Cole - OG
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Down By The River - Neil Young
Mark Johnson
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Lock and Key
Rush
John Virant, Jr.
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A Week In a Country Jail
Tom T Hall
Alice's Restaurant
Arlo Guthrie
One Piece at A Time
Johnny Cash
Folsom Prison Blues
Johnny Cash
Jeff Lysyczyn
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I remain especially fond of this one:
"The Holdup: David Bromberg: https://bit.ly/3WNmkx6
Corey Bearaj
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I love this playlist! Adding Tweeter and the Monkey Man…
Robyn Gould
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Tom waits "day after tomorrow "
Steve Earle " Jerusalem "
Mitchell Greenbaum
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Uriah Heep - Stealin'.....
Donald Bartenstein
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What no Jailbreak?
Mick Wall
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?Bohemian Rhapsody Queen
?Gotta Get A Message To You Bee Gees
Wrick Wolff
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You forgot Smugglers Blues.
Greg Robson
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Great list, Bob.
Surprised to see, huge Zeppelin fan that you are, that Gallows Pole, was omitted. No worries though, will love listening to this playlist.
Mark Haar
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?For What It's Worth
Buffalo Springfield
Ohio
Crosby Stills Nash and Young
Hey Joe
Jimi Hendrix
Down by the River
Neil Young
RUNNIN' WITH THE DEVIL
Van Halen
Riders On The Storm
The Doors
Swingin'
Tim Petty and the Heartbreakers
Guns, Guns, Guns
The Guess Who
The End
The Doors
Drugs in Me Pocket
The Monks
Laugh At the Judge
The Grease Band
Bank Job
Barenaked Ladies
Murder She Wrote
Chair Demus & Pliers
Jailhouse Rock
Elvis
Arrested For Driving While Blind
ZZ Top
I Fought the Law
The Clash
Bankrobber
The Clash
Anarchy in the UK
Sex Pistols
Riot in Cell Block Number Nine
Blues Brothers
Gimme Back My Bullets
Lynyrd Skynyrd
Olie Kornelsen
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Bohemian Rhapsody?
David Stopps
______________________________________
Crime In The City (Sixty to Zero Pt. 1)
Neil Young
One of the best.
Jordan Holman
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Bob,
Rubber Bullets 10cc
Steve Langford
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Murder incorporated
Bruce Springsteen
Jeff Gabriels
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I love the list. Here's an incredible song that you might want to put on the next time - The Road Goes on Forever - by Robert Earl Keen. It has to be the live version, though, with the crowd singing along and the two-minute jam session.
JP Lavin
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Murder Incorporated - Bruce Springsteen
Chris Xynos
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whenever kindness fails - robert earl keen
Robert Earl Keen
Denise Mello
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Folsom Prison Blues (Johnny Cash)
https://open.spotify.com/track/0LTSNmOLBt25GMjHlxp9OR?si=KQXepUHKRtSIRqr9cgOaqg
Mama Tried (Grateful Dead; Merle Haggard original I think)
https://open.spotify.com/track/10qdw6uxpYd2dAXnlbPIa6?si=gwbmY6LYRPuUNNkR2BGNsg
Send Me To The 'lectric Chair (David Bromberg; Bessie Smith original I think)
https://open.spotify.com/track/1jhPmKe9YrY6UlnZrvqae3?si=UxdwwWwjRQCP91KNvT8jnA
Indiana Wants Me (R. Dean Taylor; original?)
https://open.spotify.com/track/1zgV5ZYh7uYJXbK7yjuyj8?si=nfTF1-y4QaWFD0QoMHldkA
DG G
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Parchman Farm
Mose Allison
In Germany Before The War
Randy Newman
Take a Message to Mary
The Everly Brothers
El Paso
Marty Robbins
Don't Take Your Guns To Town
Johnny Cash
Hey Joe
Jimi Hendrix
Russ Titelman
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Great list! Feels like the album or a song from Nick Cave's Murder ballads would fit right in.
Cheers,
Christophe Carvenius
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Mr. Policeman… by Brad Paisley… such a silly fun song…!
Marc Lohrmer
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Send Me To the 'Lectric Chair
Bessie Smith
Lauri Perason
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Indiana wants me!
Peter Wagner
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Big Iron
Marty Robbins
Bruce Gordon
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You forgot Me and My Uncle by the Grateful Dead.
Stefanie Lacoff
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Hey joe
Stalag 17.- Ansel Collins: https://bit.ly/3wEDoe8
Jeff Lorber
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"Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde": https://bit.ly/3HF8o3X
Georgie Fame
I'm roughly your age…I love this song!
Tom Clark
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You're missing most of Nebraska
Merck Mercuriadis
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