Dear Bob,
I like Tom Newsom. I think it's cool that he wants to go to Applebee's. Everyone is harshing his mellow. Uncool. Very uncool. This aggression will not stand, man. Dude doesn't want to pay that much. Everyone has their own economics. We never know how they feel about fees till we stand in their shoes. Plus Applebee's is a good place to meet people. One time I ate there and the busboy got me stoned in the back alley with some really good weed he bought from the dishwasher. Then he gave me a free hot fudge sundae. That was a savings of 11 dollars. Cheaper than seeing the dude from Yes. He also had a Bluetooth speaker so we listened to Rush and danced by the hostess stand. (It was a slow night)
So I hope I see Tom Newsom somewhere on the road when I'm touring. He will always have free tickets to my shows because I'm sick of all your readers picking on him.
In closing I'd like to say that Tom Newsom is my new guru and I like him better than Joe The Plumber.
Yours in Christ,
Steve Poltz
https://linktr.ee/stevepoltz
--
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
Saturday 23 March 2024
Friday 22 March 2024
Apple Antitrust/Streaming Future-SiriusXM This Week
Tune in Saturday March 23rd to Faction Talk, channel 103, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.
If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz
--
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
If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz
--
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
Thursday 21 March 2024
Paul Brady-This Week's Podcast
Singer-songwriter Paul Brady is an Irish icon whose songs have been covered by Tina Turner ("Steel Claw" and "Paradise Is Here"), Bonnie Raitt (the title song of her album "Luck of the Draw" as well as "Not the Only One" and "Steal Your Heart Away" and more), Brooks & Dunn ("The Long Goodbye"- co-written with Ronan Keating), Jimmy Buffett ("The World Is What You Make It")...the list goes on and on. This is Paul's story.
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-30806836/episode/paul-brady-160855803/
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/paul-brady/id1316200737?i=1000649970196
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5Qg1Co1WC1lPd9qckJtMYF?si=LvcE8BY-Q3q0kJHgCbqMBQ
https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/9ff4fb19-54d4-41ae-ae7a-8a6f8d3dafa8/episodes/0fa3aec2-d10d-423c-8e8c-f7355757b968/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-paul-brady
--
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
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-30806836/episode/paul-brady-160855803/
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/paul-brady/id1316200737?i=1000649970196
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5Qg1Co1WC1lPd9qckJtMYF?si=LvcE8BY-Q3q0kJHgCbqMBQ
https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/9ff4fb19-54d4-41ae-ae7a-8a6f8d3dafa8/episodes/0fa3aec2-d10d-423c-8e8c-f7355757b968/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-paul-brady
--
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
Wednesday 20 March 2024
The Gentlemen
Netflix trailer: https://tinyurl.com/bdzah3kr
RottenTomatoes: 70% Critics/86% Audience
That's about right. Meaning this is an enjoyable watch, but it fails to be a classic, to resonate in a way that you want to tell everybody about it.
Then again, the hoi polloi love it, my inbox is overflowing with fans of this show.
So what you've got here is a crime drama. And those who live outside the law are so interesting, because they play by different rules. Oh, the concepts of leverage and footprint/power still remain, but there is no court, no arbitrator keeping everyone honest.
However, unlike in real life in these crime dramas many times the manipulators who stand up to the bullies/enemies continue to live, when in truth if you play this game you might not make it out alive, you may be cut down long before your kids grow up.
So what we've got is an English family with a huge estate and cash flow problems. The patriarch dies and...
The lead character, Eddie Horniman, played by Theo James, is good, but he's not long on personality.
Unlike his mother, Joely Richardson, who appears briefly at first, but then more and more. She appears to be a flighty nitwit but ultimately she is extremely savvy and a mother who knows what is going on with all of her children. Ultimately, you want to see more and more of her.
Unlike her son, Freddy. Who's akin to Fredo in the "Godfather." Part of the family, but treated badly because he's not smart enough and worldly enough to know what is going on and is constantly screwing up. Unfortunately, there are many analogues in the world today. Especially rich, overlooked progeny, spending and messing up. But Freddy is too much of a one note character. You get sick of him.
But not Susie... Kaya Scodelario is one of those thirtysomething actresses you think you've seen before but probably have not. She's the star of the show, without chewing up the scenery. She's true to character. And she never breaks character, which is the case in most of these shows. You know, the gangster woman softens up, falls in love and loses her mind. Not Susie!
And not her father, cult actor Ray Winstone. Who is excellent as usual. He owns the character of the big boss.
And the head of the travelers. That guy is great. As is the Asian lady who sells the exotic automobiles.
So every episode there's a caper, a situation that has to be resolved. It gets predictable. Then again, the solution is always interesting.
But the show is too often dry. You're watching it as opposed to being involved in it. You admire the construction, the writing, but you are not on the edge of your seat, invested in the life of any of the characters.
It's akin to watching a puzzle.
Nowhere near in the league of "The Bureau." Why do I keep mentioning this French series? Because it plays like a big screen movie, you feel the tension, your mind never wanders, you're invested.
Like in the Israeli blueprint for "Homeland," "Prisoners of War," which has little production but is so gripping, so tense.
As is "Fauda" oftentimes. But Doron is three-dimensional in a way that Edward Horniman is not.
I was never taken away by "The Gentlemen," never suspended disbelief.
I guess I'm just the antidote to the buzz. I don't want you to watch this and even expect "Narcos." It's well put-together, and edgy, I admire it, but I didn't love it. I enjoyed seeing it, I don't want my time back, but if I'm going to recommend a streaming series, "The Gentlemen" would be nowhere near the top of the list. In other words, you're on your own.
But you won't hate it. You'll want to watch it. To marinate in the above-referenced performances and to find out how it all works out.
But somehow the directors/creators/scriptwriters/actors saw this more as math than something fuzzier.
Yet once again, I looked forward to watching it every night, but I wasn't enraptured.
--
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
RottenTomatoes: 70% Critics/86% Audience
That's about right. Meaning this is an enjoyable watch, but it fails to be a classic, to resonate in a way that you want to tell everybody about it.
Then again, the hoi polloi love it, my inbox is overflowing with fans of this show.
So what you've got here is a crime drama. And those who live outside the law are so interesting, because they play by different rules. Oh, the concepts of leverage and footprint/power still remain, but there is no court, no arbitrator keeping everyone honest.
However, unlike in real life in these crime dramas many times the manipulators who stand up to the bullies/enemies continue to live, when in truth if you play this game you might not make it out alive, you may be cut down long before your kids grow up.
So what we've got is an English family with a huge estate and cash flow problems. The patriarch dies and...
The lead character, Eddie Horniman, played by Theo James, is good, but he's not long on personality.
Unlike his mother, Joely Richardson, who appears briefly at first, but then more and more. She appears to be a flighty nitwit but ultimately she is extremely savvy and a mother who knows what is going on with all of her children. Ultimately, you want to see more and more of her.
Unlike her son, Freddy. Who's akin to Fredo in the "Godfather." Part of the family, but treated badly because he's not smart enough and worldly enough to know what is going on and is constantly screwing up. Unfortunately, there are many analogues in the world today. Especially rich, overlooked progeny, spending and messing up. But Freddy is too much of a one note character. You get sick of him.
But not Susie... Kaya Scodelario is one of those thirtysomething actresses you think you've seen before but probably have not. She's the star of the show, without chewing up the scenery. She's true to character. And she never breaks character, which is the case in most of these shows. You know, the gangster woman softens up, falls in love and loses her mind. Not Susie!
And not her father, cult actor Ray Winstone. Who is excellent as usual. He owns the character of the big boss.
And the head of the travelers. That guy is great. As is the Asian lady who sells the exotic automobiles.
So every episode there's a caper, a situation that has to be resolved. It gets predictable. Then again, the solution is always interesting.
But the show is too often dry. You're watching it as opposed to being involved in it. You admire the construction, the writing, but you are not on the edge of your seat, invested in the life of any of the characters.
It's akin to watching a puzzle.
Nowhere near in the league of "The Bureau." Why do I keep mentioning this French series? Because it plays like a big screen movie, you feel the tension, your mind never wanders, you're invested.
Like in the Israeli blueprint for "Homeland," "Prisoners of War," which has little production but is so gripping, so tense.
As is "Fauda" oftentimes. But Doron is three-dimensional in a way that Edward Horniman is not.
I was never taken away by "The Gentlemen," never suspended disbelief.
I guess I'm just the antidote to the buzz. I don't want you to watch this and even expect "Narcos." It's well put-together, and edgy, I admire it, but I didn't love it. I enjoyed seeing it, I don't want my time back, but if I'm going to recommend a streaming series, "The Gentlemen" would be nowhere near the top of the list. In other words, you're on your own.
But you won't hate it. You'll want to watch it. To marinate in the above-referenced performances and to find out how it all works out.
But somehow the directors/creators/scriptwriters/actors saw this more as math than something fuzzier.
Yet once again, I looked forward to watching it every night, but I wasn't enraptured.
--
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
Jöhan Rohr
"Mood music maker scores fifteen billion streams, and prompts yet another 'fake artists' debate - 'Fake artists' have become a talking point again after a Swedish newspaper highlighted how one musician is scoring billions of streams by recording tracks targeted at Spotify's mood music playlists under 656 different names.": https://tinyurl.com/btej6vec
THIS 'SECRET' COMPOSER IS BEHIND 650 FAKE ARTISTS ON SPOTIFY. HIS MUSIC HAS BEEN STREAMED 15BN TIMES ON THE PLATFORM (REPORT): https://tinyurl.com/bs682e36
Short skis suck. That was the mantra back in the seventies. The ski business was controlled by a very few companies selling iconic models to many. Like the Rossignol Strato. K2 started to make shorter skis, and then Olin, with its Mark IV. Good skiers were horrified. Because these short skis altered the shape of the moguls (bumps), giving them steep backsides thus making them harder to ski.
Well today, everybody skis on a shorter ski. A much shorter ski. Even the World Cup racers. Today's skis are shorter and fatter with deep sidecuts making them easier to turn, there used to be few experts on the hill, now there are many.
Furthermore, the general public adopted shorter, fatter skis with deep sidecuts long before the World Cup racers. But then Deborah Compagnoni switched to shaped skis and started to win everything, and the rest of the racers switched overnight.
Today the Rossignol Strato and its ilk are history. There is not one ski that dominates. And racing skis like the Strato aren't even stocked by most retailers. Furthermore, there are more manufacturers than ever. The revolution was started by Elan, a Yugoslavian company, and Rossignol was late to the party and its image, and market share, have never recovered.
And what does this have to do with the music business?
EVERYTHING!
There are fewer major labels than ever before, only three now. And Lucian Grainge is touted as a genius in every business publication known to man.
But don't confuse today's major labels with those of yore. Those of yore were expanding, those remaining today are contracting. Laying off staff, cutting expenses, putting out fewer records, believing they've cornered the market.
Only they haven't.
The major labels are selling Rossignol Stratos, and the indies are eating their lunch AND THEY DON'T LIKE IT!
So, they want everybody with fewer than a thousand streams not to be paid. Now a thousand streams doesn't pay much, but in the aggregate, all those small acts earn a pretty penny. But not anymore. The majors are using their clout to take that money back for themselves.
So what is the labels' leverage?
Their catalogs. Streaming services are nothing without them, so they kowtow.
But when it comes to new music, the paradigm has completely shifted.
It used to be about a limited number of acts broken on the radio. Now it's about hip-hop and pop acts broken on the radio. In a world of many niches, the majors are only playing in a couple of them, ceding the rest of the landscape to innovators.
The majors are not in Jöhan Rohr's business. They are not selling mood music to be played in the background. They could be, but they choose not to. They choose to be in fewer and fewer verticals when more and more verticals comprise the recorded music landscape, and rather than dive in, they say these composers are rigging the system and taking THEIR MONEY!
Believe me, the big ski brands are still a force. But there are more indies than ever before. As for catalog...
Ski companies have their brand. Many skiers are devoted to one or another company and continue to buy from that company alone. Warner, Sony and Universal? Those brands are irrelevant to the consumer, completely. Used to be the major was an imprimatur of quality, that's history. However, the acts have brand name quality. And despite their efforts, the majors don't own all exploitation of the brand, certainly not on their catalogs, which keep them alive.
Now the moguls never did return to their round shape. You see the future never looks exactly like the past, and to expect it to be so is fatuous.
Then again, there is slope grooming at a level there never was before. And high speed lifts... The game has completely changed, and as a result, smaller operators who have not invested in their product, in this case the ski areas themselves, have literally gone out of business. However, a brilliant outsider has now created the Indy Pass, a cheap alternative for fans of these smaller mountains.
You see nature abhors a vacuum. And some outsider always fills it.
Who says music needs to be highly-produced and heavily marketed? I mean there's a business in that, but in fact it is shrinking. People want something else. And rather than invest and create bunts and singles that in the aggregate add up to a pretty penny, the majors are trying to rig the system in their favor.
I mean what advantages to the majors have?
Used to be marketing, promotion and distribution. Now everybody can get distributed. And you can market yourself, for free online! And most of the old outlets mean very little these days. Late night TV? Moribund when it comes to music promotion. You can appear, but it won't move the needle. Ditto with the newspaper. Ironically, print only moves that which the majors are not interested in selling! Yes, records by adults singing about their personal lives/trauma, authentically. None of these acts will ever play the Super Bowl, but many will be able to tour until they die. These are not evanescent pop acts that run up the Spotify Top 50 chart and then disappear, having no real fans. These outsider acts are the future of the business. They might not be known by many, but they're known by enough. And they flourish live.
So the major labels are never going to die, because of their catalogs.
Then again... You never know when some hedge fund might buy one of the majors and shut down new music production. It's harder than ever to break an act, why not just do your best to maximize the old, already successful acts/records?
Used to be the majors were always creating new divisions, buying labels. Because they thought one company could not market and promote that many artists. Now, not only have they cut down on the labels, they've cut down on the artists!
This has already happened in the movie business. Not only has there been consolidation of the studios, they're all making fewer pictures and post-Covid box office has never returned, not at anywhere near the past level. And fewer and fewer movies are hits. And now the superhero paradigm is fading. Meanwhile, Netflix invested in production, a ton of production, and now owns the eyeballs. The major studios all thought they could compete easily with their own streaming services, but it turns out none of them can, at least so far. So the public doesn't want to pay to see most movies in the theatre and they want a plethora of product at home, on demand.
And we've got directors who abhor this, vehemently! Movies must be seen on a big screen! Music cannot be listened to as MP3s! Short skis suck!
But the public has voted. And the old powers are on the wrong side.
This mood music is akin to Napster. The labels couldn't see it, not whatsoever. They were so busy meeting Wall Street expectations that they missed what was in plain sight that a Swedish company took advantage of.
Either the major labels need to get in all genres of music or they need to become catalog houses.
All this hogwash about the stars driving the business. I'm not saying there are not stars, but they have less reach than ever before. Many people can't sing a single song by Taylor Swift, Drake, the Weeknd or Beyonce. But they do listen to music. Many quite a lot of it. But now that the internet has flattened distribution and everything is at your fingertips, they want something else!
How could the majors miss this? How could they think that by massaging and marketing a few records they could own the marketplace? There's no innovation whatsoever, just a repetition of last century's creaky formula. Polish a record that fits the Top Forty sound and market the hell out of it and try to turn it into a hit. Every record is a moonshot. What's happening here on Earth, that most people encounter, is ignored.
But rather than admit this, they blame others. Not only streaming services, but the indie acts who are successful on them!
No vision whatsoever, so they've been disrupted. In plain sight.
Kind of like the old companies who refused to invest in shaped skis. It's always outsiders who take the risk.
But the risk in music has never been smaller.
So what you've got here is a guy who is making music the public wants to hear. And sure, it might be on many playlists, but those are playlists people want to listen to. Maybe they never ever even listen to hit playlists or only infrequently. So we should discount this whole sphere? No, we should EMBRACE IT!
The public is, it's only the major labels who have not. The public wants more and varied music and the majors aren't providing it, so others are.
To tell you the truth, I don't think there's anybody capable of thinking at the majors. They're mostly lifers, and they've fired middle management, and they don't want to invest. They just want the past to continue without change. And that never happens.
Meanwhile, short shaped skis have revolutionized skiing, now the learning curve is much shorter and the experience is much more fun, skiing is not fully enjoyable for only a small cadre of experts.
And music is not only for a small cadre of hit acts.
Deny the future at your peril.
--
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
THIS 'SECRET' COMPOSER IS BEHIND 650 FAKE ARTISTS ON SPOTIFY. HIS MUSIC HAS BEEN STREAMED 15BN TIMES ON THE PLATFORM (REPORT): https://tinyurl.com/bs682e36
Short skis suck. That was the mantra back in the seventies. The ski business was controlled by a very few companies selling iconic models to many. Like the Rossignol Strato. K2 started to make shorter skis, and then Olin, with its Mark IV. Good skiers were horrified. Because these short skis altered the shape of the moguls (bumps), giving them steep backsides thus making them harder to ski.
Well today, everybody skis on a shorter ski. A much shorter ski. Even the World Cup racers. Today's skis are shorter and fatter with deep sidecuts making them easier to turn, there used to be few experts on the hill, now there are many.
Furthermore, the general public adopted shorter, fatter skis with deep sidecuts long before the World Cup racers. But then Deborah Compagnoni switched to shaped skis and started to win everything, and the rest of the racers switched overnight.
Today the Rossignol Strato and its ilk are history. There is not one ski that dominates. And racing skis like the Strato aren't even stocked by most retailers. Furthermore, there are more manufacturers than ever. The revolution was started by Elan, a Yugoslavian company, and Rossignol was late to the party and its image, and market share, have never recovered.
And what does this have to do with the music business?
EVERYTHING!
There are fewer major labels than ever before, only three now. And Lucian Grainge is touted as a genius in every business publication known to man.
But don't confuse today's major labels with those of yore. Those of yore were expanding, those remaining today are contracting. Laying off staff, cutting expenses, putting out fewer records, believing they've cornered the market.
Only they haven't.
The major labels are selling Rossignol Stratos, and the indies are eating their lunch AND THEY DON'T LIKE IT!
So, they want everybody with fewer than a thousand streams not to be paid. Now a thousand streams doesn't pay much, but in the aggregate, all those small acts earn a pretty penny. But not anymore. The majors are using their clout to take that money back for themselves.
So what is the labels' leverage?
Their catalogs. Streaming services are nothing without them, so they kowtow.
But when it comes to new music, the paradigm has completely shifted.
It used to be about a limited number of acts broken on the radio. Now it's about hip-hop and pop acts broken on the radio. In a world of many niches, the majors are only playing in a couple of them, ceding the rest of the landscape to innovators.
The majors are not in Jöhan Rohr's business. They are not selling mood music to be played in the background. They could be, but they choose not to. They choose to be in fewer and fewer verticals when more and more verticals comprise the recorded music landscape, and rather than dive in, they say these composers are rigging the system and taking THEIR MONEY!
Believe me, the big ski brands are still a force. But there are more indies than ever before. As for catalog...
Ski companies have their brand. Many skiers are devoted to one or another company and continue to buy from that company alone. Warner, Sony and Universal? Those brands are irrelevant to the consumer, completely. Used to be the major was an imprimatur of quality, that's history. However, the acts have brand name quality. And despite their efforts, the majors don't own all exploitation of the brand, certainly not on their catalogs, which keep them alive.
Now the moguls never did return to their round shape. You see the future never looks exactly like the past, and to expect it to be so is fatuous.
Then again, there is slope grooming at a level there never was before. And high speed lifts... The game has completely changed, and as a result, smaller operators who have not invested in their product, in this case the ski areas themselves, have literally gone out of business. However, a brilliant outsider has now created the Indy Pass, a cheap alternative for fans of these smaller mountains.
You see nature abhors a vacuum. And some outsider always fills it.
Who says music needs to be highly-produced and heavily marketed? I mean there's a business in that, but in fact it is shrinking. People want something else. And rather than invest and create bunts and singles that in the aggregate add up to a pretty penny, the majors are trying to rig the system in their favor.
I mean what advantages to the majors have?
Used to be marketing, promotion and distribution. Now everybody can get distributed. And you can market yourself, for free online! And most of the old outlets mean very little these days. Late night TV? Moribund when it comes to music promotion. You can appear, but it won't move the needle. Ditto with the newspaper. Ironically, print only moves that which the majors are not interested in selling! Yes, records by adults singing about their personal lives/trauma, authentically. None of these acts will ever play the Super Bowl, but many will be able to tour until they die. These are not evanescent pop acts that run up the Spotify Top 50 chart and then disappear, having no real fans. These outsider acts are the future of the business. They might not be known by many, but they're known by enough. And they flourish live.
So the major labels are never going to die, because of their catalogs.
Then again... You never know when some hedge fund might buy one of the majors and shut down new music production. It's harder than ever to break an act, why not just do your best to maximize the old, already successful acts/records?
Used to be the majors were always creating new divisions, buying labels. Because they thought one company could not market and promote that many artists. Now, not only have they cut down on the labels, they've cut down on the artists!
This has already happened in the movie business. Not only has there been consolidation of the studios, they're all making fewer pictures and post-Covid box office has never returned, not at anywhere near the past level. And fewer and fewer movies are hits. And now the superhero paradigm is fading. Meanwhile, Netflix invested in production, a ton of production, and now owns the eyeballs. The major studios all thought they could compete easily with their own streaming services, but it turns out none of them can, at least so far. So the public doesn't want to pay to see most movies in the theatre and they want a plethora of product at home, on demand.
And we've got directors who abhor this, vehemently! Movies must be seen on a big screen! Music cannot be listened to as MP3s! Short skis suck!
But the public has voted. And the old powers are on the wrong side.
This mood music is akin to Napster. The labels couldn't see it, not whatsoever. They were so busy meeting Wall Street expectations that they missed what was in plain sight that a Swedish company took advantage of.
Either the major labels need to get in all genres of music or they need to become catalog houses.
All this hogwash about the stars driving the business. I'm not saying there are not stars, but they have less reach than ever before. Many people can't sing a single song by Taylor Swift, Drake, the Weeknd or Beyonce. But they do listen to music. Many quite a lot of it. But now that the internet has flattened distribution and everything is at your fingertips, they want something else!
How could the majors miss this? How could they think that by massaging and marketing a few records they could own the marketplace? There's no innovation whatsoever, just a repetition of last century's creaky formula. Polish a record that fits the Top Forty sound and market the hell out of it and try to turn it into a hit. Every record is a moonshot. What's happening here on Earth, that most people encounter, is ignored.
But rather than admit this, they blame others. Not only streaming services, but the indie acts who are successful on them!
No vision whatsoever, so they've been disrupted. In plain sight.
Kind of like the old companies who refused to invest in shaped skis. It's always outsiders who take the risk.
But the risk in music has never been smaller.
So what you've got here is a guy who is making music the public wants to hear. And sure, it might be on many playlists, but those are playlists people want to listen to. Maybe they never ever even listen to hit playlists or only infrequently. So we should discount this whole sphere? No, we should EMBRACE IT!
The public is, it's only the major labels who have not. The public wants more and varied music and the majors aren't providing it, so others are.
To tell you the truth, I don't think there's anybody capable of thinking at the majors. They're mostly lifers, and they've fired middle management, and they don't want to invest. They just want the past to continue without change. And that never happens.
Meanwhile, short shaped skis have revolutionized skiing, now the learning curve is much shorter and the experience is much more fun, skiing is not fully enjoyable for only a small cadre of experts.
And music is not only for a small cadre of hit acts.
Deny the future at your peril.
--
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
Tuesday 19 March 2024
Mailbag
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
I hope I'm not the only person to tell you that the Applebee's "2 for $25" offer was for less than a month (they've run it previously though) and didn't include drinks, tip or taxes.
Ben Blackwell
___________________________________
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
Bob, people can't even write logical analogies:
Going to Applebees is more like seeing the local 80s music tribute band on NYE at the local club.
Still gonna have a ticket fee!
Lol. Applebees for date night…
Vial
___________________________________
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
Tom Newson! Ah, this now make so much more sense. If he thinks 8 meals at Applebee's is somehow equivalent to a quality show by an artist you admire, our values don't align. Have you been to an Applebee's lately? The last hanger-on of the late 80s/90s chain restaurants where no one questions the quality, just the bang for your buck. My last Applebee's experience was not by choice and immediately confirmed my reluctance in even the consideration of it as an option. (large group, offered carry out). Gross. In the words of Billy Porter, "No shade just facts."
But this isn't about Applebees. My partner and I just saw Jonathan Richman Saturday night at The Basement East in Nashville. All in the tickets (for 2) were under $60 total. On our way out we bought two tickets to see Donny Benet for exactly $50 total. On our way home we commented on how valuable the concert and our time with Jonathan was- $60 is a steal! Completely incomparable to whatever date night marketing Applebee's is doing. Experiencing live music by an interesting artist with other people who are digging it just as much is an emotional experience. We would have paid double and still felt like we got a deal. We eagerly spent $100 (for 2 tickets) to see Future Islands this summer at the Brooklyn Bowl. Samuel T. Herring on stage is memorizing in a way I've yet to experience from another artist.
Cheers,
Sarah Sylvester
Nashville, TN
___________________________________
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
This whole article is contradicted by the data. A simple look in Luminate (the old Soundscan) tells a different story. New music is not cannibalized by old music (I selfishly wish it were the case) and the only reason that music has become "investable" is that financial sponsors can make sense of it, i.e. consumption data is a bunch of rows and numbers that can be put into an Excel spreadsheet.
Finally, as much as we all like to take credit for being marketing geniuses who "revive" catalogs, I think that our real effort is to stem the inevitable decline that comes from generational change and the fragmentation of the audience into smaller and smaller niches.
Best,
Olivier Chastan
___________________________________
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
Thanks for the post on that private equity editorial. Your reaction was the same as mine. I even emailed Marc Hogan directly to refute a lot of what he wrote, making some of the same points you did.
There was another piece in the Times Editorial Section late last year about how Spotify is going to crater the book publishing business, and it used music as an example of artist decimation. I wrote that author as well about her obvious lack of knowledge about how streaming and royalties work.
The thing that bugs me the most about these pieces is they either don't understand or don't want to reveal how royalties work for streaming; and they always conflate master recording royalties and publishing royalties. Inevitably, all these pieces cite some artist or songwriter complaining about how they can't make a living in the streaming era. As you pointed out, when you actually do a cursory investigation into who these creatives are, you see that the artists many times aren't even indie popular, and the writers are in these camps writing songs with five to 10 other people.
The other thing that frustrates me is the numbers they throw out in these pieces. They always cite "1 million streams" as some sort huge number, when in reality it's not much. They also always write about how one percent or less than one percent of tracks or artists reach the million stream threshold or whatever big-seeming number they use. What they fail to mention is that 1 percent is a big number. It equates to 400K+ tracks getting at least 1 million streams in just a calendar year and more than 60,000 artists being in the group of artists that get 90% of the royalties on Spotify.
In the 90s, were there even 600 artists in the top tier of royalty earners? I mean, Chartmetric tracks 9.7 million artists! How many of those can these pundits legitimately expect to earn a living from music, let alone streaming?
My only gripe with streaming royalties is that they are unfair to publishers and songwriters from a percentage share standpoint, but as you know, that has nothing to do with what Spotify or Apple Music want and everything to do with how the rate splits were negotiated between the majors and streaming services at the beginning.
It may be too much to ask, but it would be great if these mainstream publications would champion journalists and opinion columnists who could educate the public, creatives, and lawmakers on how this stuff really works so real change could be made if the involved parties feel they're getting screwed.
Seth Keller
SKM ARTISTS
___________________________________
From: John Brodey
Subject: Re: Eric Carmen (& Karl Wallinger)
Again my favorite mortality quotes are: 'Everybody knows they're goiing to die,, they just don't believe it.'
And, 'Every hundred years, all new people'.
I'm the last year of the Greatest Generation ('45, pre boomer, how is that possible). I've been lucky so far. Can you count the number of times in your life where you could have easily died? I'll bet there were a few on a run or two. Sonny Bono wasn't so lucky.
We are pretty much like salmon, fighting the perilous journey to oblivion. I'm thankful everyday and am greatful to find numerous things everyday that bring me joy. Geffen may have his name on a few buildings but the majority of people have no idea who he is and he's still alive. Ultimately no one will care.
___________________________________
Subject: Weitzman-Winkler
It was 1965, I was a 10 year-old kid who spent summers at "sleepaway camp" inn the Poconos (Blue Mountain Camp, East Stroudsburg, PA.)
I was in bunk I-6, linked with bunk I-5. A dozen-plus kids who did everything together for eight weeks. Each bunk had a senior and a junior counselor. The senior counselor in bunk I-5 was a 20-year-old acting student from Yale University named Henry Winkler.Those 8 weeks were wonderful, and I still have vivid memories of myself and Henry bonding during the summer months. He did not return in 1966, but I did, and my senior counselor that year was a Jersey guy named Larry Gonsky. He went on to be the keyboard player in the band Looking Glass, who, with lead singer Elliot Lurie sold gazillions of singles with "Brandy (You're A Fine Girl".)
Back to Winkler, flash forward to 1977 or 78, and I was playing on Alice Cooper's Hollywood Vampires softball team.We played a game against the Happy Days team, and The Fonz was pitching. I remember I was a late inning replacement, and had a chance to hit. I got in the batters box, pointed my bat towards the pitching area and said "Blue Mountain Camp, 1965!? Henry lost it! I lost it! We had a good laugh, and that was it.
I loved following his career, and these recent years (decades) I have been immensely amused by his roles in "Arrested Development" and "Barrry."
I miss the innocence of summer camp, believing that a 10 year-old and a 20 year-old could bond and form a true friendship.I'm sure he didn't have the same feelings, but almost 60 years later I love to regale the memory of my summer with pre-Fonz!
Marc Nathan
Nashville, TN
___________________________________
Subject: Spotify/Streaming vs Physical Sales
Yes! I believe it is becoming more profitable (to both me and my artists) as time passes.
The magic is in the quantity of tracks (and I only have about 2,000 tracks) and the forever singles option.
In the age of Physical, simply put, labels needed a current release (or a popular catalog release) by an artist who would sell enough to be stocked and sell thru at a store. Remember most stores stocked approx 10,000 SKUs (= competition for rack space).
Hurdle 1: if you had an album that was not stocked, it could not be sold. It had to be special ordered (or by the end of the 90's or a little later, bought online). And someone REALLY had to want your album to take that next step.
Hurdle 2: How many people loved more than 1 or 2 songs on an album? And who wanted to pay $16.98 (or 12.99 if the album was on sale) for 2 or even 3 songs? This is why the retail "Single" was deleted as soon as the song was headed down the charts: Convert the demand for the single (= loss leader) into an album sale (=possibly profitable, TO THE LABEL/not the artist, after 100,000 or so sales).
Hurdle 3: Record store policies. Major labels did a great job of making themselves less profitable. They kept offering more competitive terms to the records stores (like they did with Payola at Radio) until the Record stores were getting: • 365 dating; • unlimited return rights (side note: I got returns of LONG BOX product 20 years after the long box was discontinued!!); • Deals (discounts just to take the record that often did NOT translate to a sale price); • Usually very costly Programs (some well over $10,000 for a few weeks) for listening stations, end caps, extra stock buys, co-op advertising (that made the store a profit); • IN STORE APPEARANCES (=very costly for the label and took a half day of band time while on tour).
Subtle Hurdle 4: This is one I changed in the industry. Labels made it hard to impossible for a band to sell their own albums at their concert dates. They would tie-in a record store (only if the band was big enough) to bring product from the retailer's inventory and the retailer's own STAFF to the venue to sell the album. When I sold The Samples' CDs at their concerts, my Major Label friends told me the Retailers would boycot my albums as revenge for selling at the shows. Instead, by selling at the shows, AND LEAVING the city the next day for another city, and having a great album, MORE fans went to the stores asking for The Samples. And retailers bought a LOT more albums. There's a lot more to my retail strategy that "broke" the rules and worked fabulously for another thread. Clearly, now almost all artists sell their albums at their shows. I'll save the funny remnant to this day of old major policy for a voice conversation (I would not want to ruin anything for artists by it getting out somehow in writing Haha!).
Some Hurdles I wrote about in the original email and some new ones: Manufacturing (before the 2000's films, masters, etc were all analog and expensive); Stocking; Shipping; increasingly complex warehouse management for many thousands of album titles and configurations (Album, cassette, CD); Sales teams; Wining and dining; POP; ticket buys for retailers; returns/processing; being paid in returns of (often) unrelated albums or singles; product manufactured in excess of demand (it was really hard to know how many to manufacture. And per unit prices went down sharply with higher manufacturing quantities, which lead often to many thousands, to over 100,000 in some cases, of unsold product destined for the cut out bin or the incinerator); And the opposite problem of running out of stock with small demand and high manufacturing costs to run small runs (this often lead to letting a title go out of print, but NOT deleting it, so it was "available' but you could not buy it); all the overhead G&A for all of these things…
OK…
DIgital.
For digital, we don't have to do (almost) any of those things above.
Initially… Well, initially the Majors killed Digital. I was talking with Geffen about digital sales in 1994 when I managed Lisa Loeb! And the itunes store took another decade to get off the ground.
So… Initially when iTunes (and others) came about, it was a singles model that agressively forced album sales. That was a decent start, as the labels could upload much (but not nearly all at the begging) of their catalog, including albums that were no longer selling at retail.
As labels eased up on the Album Only sales, singles started selling well, confirming that fans would rather buy the 1-2 songs they want to hear than extra album tracks. Side note: As you and I know, those album tracks were often the long term favorites…
But digital downloads were really supplemental and still cost the fan a decent amount (especially if they were buying songs they previously bught physically).
Almost another decade to 2011 and spotify comes to America. At first, OMG the cries of "unfair", "your are paying us LESS THAN A PENNY per stream?", etc.
Simultaneously, the labels uploaded most, if not all, of their catalogs (also to Apple Music, et al.). The obvious beauty of this was that once a title was uploaded the labels would collect money "forever". Yes Small amounts at first...
Now more than a decade later we have seen some interesting results:
Fans like the subscription model. And, now, with over 200 Million paid subscribers, the payments are becoming significant.
The big shifts have been: Fans listening to individual songs & Fans exploring new (and that includes a lot of OLD) music.
Artists who were forgotten or only heard on Pandora/Radio are getting Millions of monthly listeners. Let's start with the real classic artists. Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Debussy, etc. they have 8+/- Million monthly listeners. Their most streamed songs are in the 100-200+ million streams. WOW!
And then there are all the artists from the 20's to 80's. From Billie Holiday to Bread (4 Million monthly listeners each). The point is these 1/4 to 1/2 pennies are adding up for millions of artists who were left out of the Physical retailer world.
Even Comedy. Remember Stephen Lynch? He has been quietly enjoying his life for the last decade, occasionally playing some shows. I have been sending him quite large checks. The last 2 years payments have been consistent (within $50 of each other in some cases. That's pretty crazy).
I have not calculated recently, but I have seen anywhere from 1/4 to 2/3 of a penny per stream.
That took me a few days to write. I am sure I would have more observations. But I wanted to send this to you this year. Hah!
Best!!
Rob Gordon
I hope I'm not the only person to tell you that the Applebee's "2 for $25" offer was for less than a month (they've run it previously though) and didn't include drinks, tip or taxes.
Ben Blackwell
___________________________________
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
Bob, people can't even write logical analogies:
Going to Applebees is more like seeing the local 80s music tribute band on NYE at the local club.
Still gonna have a ticket fee!
Lol. Applebees for date night…
Vial
___________________________________
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
Tom Newson! Ah, this now make so much more sense. If he thinks 8 meals at Applebee's is somehow equivalent to a quality show by an artist you admire, our values don't align. Have you been to an Applebee's lately? The last hanger-on of the late 80s/90s chain restaurants where no one questions the quality, just the bang for your buck. My last Applebee's experience was not by choice and immediately confirmed my reluctance in even the consideration of it as an option. (large group, offered carry out). Gross. In the words of Billy Porter, "No shade just facts."
But this isn't about Applebees. My partner and I just saw Jonathan Richman Saturday night at The Basement East in Nashville. All in the tickets (for 2) were under $60 total. On our way out we bought two tickets to see Donny Benet for exactly $50 total. On our way home we commented on how valuable the concert and our time with Jonathan was- $60 is a steal! Completely incomparable to whatever date night marketing Applebee's is doing. Experiencing live music by an interesting artist with other people who are digging it just as much is an emotional experience. We would have paid double and still felt like we got a deal. We eagerly spent $100 (for 2 tickets) to see Future Islands this summer at the Brooklyn Bowl. Samuel T. Herring on stage is memorizing in a way I've yet to experience from another artist.
Cheers,
Sarah Sylvester
Nashville, TN
___________________________________
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
This whole article is contradicted by the data. A simple look in Luminate (the old Soundscan) tells a different story. New music is not cannibalized by old music (I selfishly wish it were the case) and the only reason that music has become "investable" is that financial sponsors can make sense of it, i.e. consumption data is a bunch of rows and numbers that can be put into an Excel spreadsheet.
Finally, as much as we all like to take credit for being marketing geniuses who "revive" catalogs, I think that our real effort is to stem the inevitable decline that comes from generational change and the fragmentation of the audience into smaller and smaller niches.
Best,
Olivier Chastan
___________________________________
Re: Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
Thanks for the post on that private equity editorial. Your reaction was the same as mine. I even emailed Marc Hogan directly to refute a lot of what he wrote, making some of the same points you did.
There was another piece in the Times Editorial Section late last year about how Spotify is going to crater the book publishing business, and it used music as an example of artist decimation. I wrote that author as well about her obvious lack of knowledge about how streaming and royalties work.
The thing that bugs me the most about these pieces is they either don't understand or don't want to reveal how royalties work for streaming; and they always conflate master recording royalties and publishing royalties. Inevitably, all these pieces cite some artist or songwriter complaining about how they can't make a living in the streaming era. As you pointed out, when you actually do a cursory investigation into who these creatives are, you see that the artists many times aren't even indie popular, and the writers are in these camps writing songs with five to 10 other people.
The other thing that frustrates me is the numbers they throw out in these pieces. They always cite "1 million streams" as some sort huge number, when in reality it's not much. They also always write about how one percent or less than one percent of tracks or artists reach the million stream threshold or whatever big-seeming number they use. What they fail to mention is that 1 percent is a big number. It equates to 400K+ tracks getting at least 1 million streams in just a calendar year and more than 60,000 artists being in the group of artists that get 90% of the royalties on Spotify.
In the 90s, were there even 600 artists in the top tier of royalty earners? I mean, Chartmetric tracks 9.7 million artists! How many of those can these pundits legitimately expect to earn a living from music, let alone streaming?
My only gripe with streaming royalties is that they are unfair to publishers and songwriters from a percentage share standpoint, but as you know, that has nothing to do with what Spotify or Apple Music want and everything to do with how the rate splits were negotiated between the majors and streaming services at the beginning.
It may be too much to ask, but it would be great if these mainstream publications would champion journalists and opinion columnists who could educate the public, creatives, and lawmakers on how this stuff really works so real change could be made if the involved parties feel they're getting screwed.
Seth Keller
SKM ARTISTS
___________________________________
From: John Brodey
Subject: Re: Eric Carmen (& Karl Wallinger)
Again my favorite mortality quotes are: 'Everybody knows they're goiing to die,, they just don't believe it.'
And, 'Every hundred years, all new people'.
I'm the last year of the Greatest Generation ('45, pre boomer, how is that possible). I've been lucky so far. Can you count the number of times in your life where you could have easily died? I'll bet there were a few on a run or two. Sonny Bono wasn't so lucky.
We are pretty much like salmon, fighting the perilous journey to oblivion. I'm thankful everyday and am greatful to find numerous things everyday that bring me joy. Geffen may have his name on a few buildings but the majority of people have no idea who he is and he's still alive. Ultimately no one will care.
___________________________________
Subject: Weitzman-Winkler
It was 1965, I was a 10 year-old kid who spent summers at "sleepaway camp" inn the Poconos (Blue Mountain Camp, East Stroudsburg, PA.)
I was in bunk I-6, linked with bunk I-5. A dozen-plus kids who did everything together for eight weeks. Each bunk had a senior and a junior counselor. The senior counselor in bunk I-5 was a 20-year-old acting student from Yale University named Henry Winkler.Those 8 weeks were wonderful, and I still have vivid memories of myself and Henry bonding during the summer months. He did not return in 1966, but I did, and my senior counselor that year was a Jersey guy named Larry Gonsky. He went on to be the keyboard player in the band Looking Glass, who, with lead singer Elliot Lurie sold gazillions of singles with "Brandy (You're A Fine Girl".)
Back to Winkler, flash forward to 1977 or 78, and I was playing on Alice Cooper's Hollywood Vampires softball team.We played a game against the Happy Days team, and The Fonz was pitching. I remember I was a late inning replacement, and had a chance to hit. I got in the batters box, pointed my bat towards the pitching area and said "Blue Mountain Camp, 1965!? Henry lost it! I lost it! We had a good laugh, and that was it.
I loved following his career, and these recent years (decades) I have been immensely amused by his roles in "Arrested Development" and "Barrry."
I miss the innocence of summer camp, believing that a 10 year-old and a 20 year-old could bond and form a true friendship.I'm sure he didn't have the same feelings, but almost 60 years later I love to regale the memory of my summer with pre-Fonz!
Marc Nathan
Nashville, TN
___________________________________
Subject: Spotify/Streaming vs Physical Sales
Yes! I believe it is becoming more profitable (to both me and my artists) as time passes.
The magic is in the quantity of tracks (and I only have about 2,000 tracks) and the forever singles option.
In the age of Physical, simply put, labels needed a current release (or a popular catalog release) by an artist who would sell enough to be stocked and sell thru at a store. Remember most stores stocked approx 10,000 SKUs (= competition for rack space).
Hurdle 1: if you had an album that was not stocked, it could not be sold. It had to be special ordered (or by the end of the 90's or a little later, bought online). And someone REALLY had to want your album to take that next step.
Hurdle 2: How many people loved more than 1 or 2 songs on an album? And who wanted to pay $16.98 (or 12.99 if the album was on sale) for 2 or even 3 songs? This is why the retail "Single" was deleted as soon as the song was headed down the charts: Convert the demand for the single (= loss leader) into an album sale (=possibly profitable, TO THE LABEL/not the artist, after 100,000 or so sales).
Hurdle 3: Record store policies. Major labels did a great job of making themselves less profitable. They kept offering more competitive terms to the records stores (like they did with Payola at Radio) until the Record stores were getting: • 365 dating; • unlimited return rights (side note: I got returns of LONG BOX product 20 years after the long box was discontinued!!); • Deals (discounts just to take the record that often did NOT translate to a sale price); • Usually very costly Programs (some well over $10,000 for a few weeks) for listening stations, end caps, extra stock buys, co-op advertising (that made the store a profit); • IN STORE APPEARANCES (=very costly for the label and took a half day of band time while on tour).
Subtle Hurdle 4: This is one I changed in the industry. Labels made it hard to impossible for a band to sell their own albums at their concert dates. They would tie-in a record store (only if the band was big enough) to bring product from the retailer's inventory and the retailer's own STAFF to the venue to sell the album. When I sold The Samples' CDs at their concerts, my Major Label friends told me the Retailers would boycot my albums as revenge for selling at the shows. Instead, by selling at the shows, AND LEAVING the city the next day for another city, and having a great album, MORE fans went to the stores asking for The Samples. And retailers bought a LOT more albums. There's a lot more to my retail strategy that "broke" the rules and worked fabulously for another thread. Clearly, now almost all artists sell their albums at their shows. I'll save the funny remnant to this day of old major policy for a voice conversation (I would not want to ruin anything for artists by it getting out somehow in writing Haha!).
Some Hurdles I wrote about in the original email and some new ones: Manufacturing (before the 2000's films, masters, etc were all analog and expensive); Stocking; Shipping; increasingly complex warehouse management for many thousands of album titles and configurations (Album, cassette, CD); Sales teams; Wining and dining; POP; ticket buys for retailers; returns/processing; being paid in returns of (often) unrelated albums or singles; product manufactured in excess of demand (it was really hard to know how many to manufacture. And per unit prices went down sharply with higher manufacturing quantities, which lead often to many thousands, to over 100,000 in some cases, of unsold product destined for the cut out bin or the incinerator); And the opposite problem of running out of stock with small demand and high manufacturing costs to run small runs (this often lead to letting a title go out of print, but NOT deleting it, so it was "available' but you could not buy it); all the overhead G&A for all of these things…
OK…
DIgital.
For digital, we don't have to do (almost) any of those things above.
Initially… Well, initially the Majors killed Digital. I was talking with Geffen about digital sales in 1994 when I managed Lisa Loeb! And the itunes store took another decade to get off the ground.
So… Initially when iTunes (and others) came about, it was a singles model that agressively forced album sales. That was a decent start, as the labels could upload much (but not nearly all at the begging) of their catalog, including albums that were no longer selling at retail.
As labels eased up on the Album Only sales, singles started selling well, confirming that fans would rather buy the 1-2 songs they want to hear than extra album tracks. Side note: As you and I know, those album tracks were often the long term favorites…
But digital downloads were really supplemental and still cost the fan a decent amount (especially if they were buying songs they previously bught physically).
Almost another decade to 2011 and spotify comes to America. At first, OMG the cries of "unfair", "your are paying us LESS THAN A PENNY per stream?", etc.
Simultaneously, the labels uploaded most, if not all, of their catalogs (also to Apple Music, et al.). The obvious beauty of this was that once a title was uploaded the labels would collect money "forever". Yes Small amounts at first...
Now more than a decade later we have seen some interesting results:
Fans like the subscription model. And, now, with over 200 Million paid subscribers, the payments are becoming significant.
The big shifts have been: Fans listening to individual songs & Fans exploring new (and that includes a lot of OLD) music.
Artists who were forgotten or only heard on Pandora/Radio are getting Millions of monthly listeners. Let's start with the real classic artists. Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Debussy, etc. they have 8+/- Million monthly listeners. Their most streamed songs are in the 100-200+ million streams. WOW!
And then there are all the artists from the 20's to 80's. From Billie Holiday to Bread (4 Million monthly listeners each). The point is these 1/4 to 1/2 pennies are adding up for millions of artists who were left out of the Physical retailer world.
Even Comedy. Remember Stephen Lynch? He has been quietly enjoying his life for the last decade, occasionally playing some shows. I have been sending him quite large checks. The last 2 years payments have been consistent (within $50 of each other in some cases. That's pretty crazy).
I have not calculated recently, but I have seen anywhere from 1/4 to 2/3 of a penny per stream.
That took me a few days to write. I am sure I would have more observations. But I wanted to send this to you this year. Hah!
Best!!
Rob Gordon
--
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
Monday 18 March 2024
Re-NY Times/Private Equity/Music
I liked the comparison between 5 guys and ticket fees.
I got a burrito and a bottle of water and paid $28 at the airport the other day. Then there is an add on for a tip shown to you that the cashier flips around for you to sign off on. Now I'm at $31.
In today's economy, you are right, Bob. $57 is a bargain to see a show that is 60 years in the making, that's how long Jon Anderson has been singing, give or take.
Bottom line, you are paying $57 and getting a breakdown of how it got there. Why all the heartache?
Concert tickets, like sports tickets, plane tickets - ALL have fees. Ask Avis or Hilton. You gonna sleep on a bench instead of a hotel over fees?
Buy your ticket, Tom, go to the show, and have a blast. You deserve it if you are paying for it.
See you at our show in Denver. His tickets are selling great, by the way, because it is a great show. You don't wanna miss this over fees.
Next time thru, this will be a bargain. That's the way it is.
Danny Zelisko
_______________________________________
We've been touring and making records since 1981. These days we "tour" one or two weekends a month. 3-4 gigs then go home for two weeks. It might not be the most efficient way to tour, but if we went out for 3-4 months, we'd probably end up hating each other. And, it's hard to sell tickets for a Tuesday show in Des Moines. Though we do still love each other, and enjoy playing together, we'd rather be home with our families and dogs when we can.
Our agent, Jerry Lima at Mint, basically doesn't even look for dates, he takes offers and if we like the money, the venue, town, routing, we take them. We have a $$ number we'll accept. Anything less, (unless it's Hawaii, Park City, Key West, Brazil etc..) we say no thanks. The guarantee decides what the ticket price is. Most of our shows are $50-$80 a ticket. 300-500 seat venues. Often multiple nights which we enjoy. We mostly play sit down, dinner clubs (City Winery, Birchmere types) and we sell out most of them, so there's usually a small back end. I'm 67 and though I don't go to many concerts anymore mostly because of the awful 24/7 tinnitus I suffer from years of being stupid with the stage volume, I'd prefer sitting down with table service to watch a show. If the band moves me to get up and dance, I do. If there's a band I really want to see, I don't care what the ticket price is. I'm happy to pay for it. After all, as a musician, it's a tax deduction.
Love your letters. I used them when I taught the business of music at our community college.
10,000 Thanks.
Steven Gustafson
Founding Member/Bassist
10.000 Maniacs
www.maniacs.com
_______________________________________
This article is ridiculous. Focusing on catalog sales and streaming payments somehow affects the entire music industry? I've lived long enough to know that, for me, any performers worth listening to get it done on the road.
Case in point: Billy Strings. Not a household name, but has a very passionate fan base and enough attendees to his shows that he plays multiple nights in some markets.
I could cite more examples, but I'm not the one writing a piece for the NYT.
Regards,
Chris Adams
_______________________________________
From the NY Times article: "Private equity firms have poured billions of dollars into music, believing it to be a source of growing and reliable income."
At first superficial sight, private equity is an easy target for spleen venting. However, the NY Times essayist's ire overlooks one key point, namely the source of the funds invested by the PE firms. Sure, PE executives usually co-invest in the companies in which they invest the funds that they have raised from institutional and private investors.
Those institutional investors of course frequently include pension funds. I suggest that many of those wailing and gnashing their teeth about private equity are simultaneously reaping the benefits of PE investments via their pensions.
Best wishes
Nick Shilton
London, UK
_______________________________________
The problem with consumers is, they hate profit. They have been conditioned by the media to be pissed off at any entity, especially a large entity, that makes a profit. ANY profit. They have no problem when a huge corporation loses money, but they just hate to see them have a successful year. They don't understand that without profit there is no business. No innovation, no new locations, no new products, no nothing. No jobs, either. It all relies on profit. Why don't people understand that? BECAUSE THE MEDIA NEVER TELLS THAT PART OF THE STORY.
Mike Blakesley
_______________________________________
We are less educated and more entitled, a population that is either in denial or delusional about where we really stand. Ultimately though, we are afraid to admit the reality that luck plays more a part of our good fortune which stems the tide of what should be an inherently natural altruistic mindset. We'll get what we deserve because the concept of deserving is an illusion and the driving force behind the misunderstanding of the reasons behind why things happen.
Marty W. Winsch
_______________________________________
The uniquely American quality of indefatigable pluck is vanishing.
We are now awash in a sea of victims and cry babies. Our grandparents would be shattered to know that they sacrificed so much, only for these people to devalue all of it.
Facts don't matter any more. Only emotions do. Here's what they think: "I feel disappointed, I must've been cheated. Facts be damned! They make no difference in how I feel. I want what I want and I deserve it. Now, who do I see about this injustice!"
If they weren't emotional about it, they'd have to admit that if, for instance, they wanted to go to a concert, the venues and the ticket services have to get paid as well as the artist. The problem is that in their minds, no matter what, it's their right to have whatever they want. Otherwise, it's an injustice. And their leaders join them in this puerile behavior.
And that's the biggest difference between Democratic politicians and Republicans — Dems are not making an emotional case. They are not connecting with people. They must wake up NOW and learn how to make an emotional connection to people's pain points. It's basic marketing for God's sake.
Bill Maher had on Ro Khanna, the Democratic California Congressman, who was going on and on with factual information, cogent arguments, reasonable thinking, and solutions to problems, begging politicians to work together. Throughout it all, he was sitting next to Nancy Mace, Republican Congresswoman from South Carolina, who spouted nothing but outrage-driven partisan baloney. When Maher asked her how she, a rape victim, could support a man found civilly guilty of sexual harassment for President, she instead talked about how George Stephanopolous was evil and insensitive to her when he asked her the same question with her daughter backstage. See? Emotional.
If Democrats don't start connecting with people emotionally ASAP, Trump and his henchmen will take over and destroy the country. HE'S SAYING SO! And they love it because they connect with him as a fellow cry baby.
When an American presidential candidate declares his admiration for Putin, Orban, Kim, Jinping, and HITLER, and lets you know he wants to be your dictator and strongman, and you cheer him on?
That's an emotional connection.
Paul Gigante
_______________________________________
Is this Tom Newsom even real? $67 to see a band favorite from a good seat and he doesn't take it? Smells like some bullsh*t here.
John Parikhal
_______________________________________
OK Bob, you win.
I definitely do not feel hate or disgust for LiveNation. How dare me question the price of a show for an 80 year old guy with a pickup band who I used to admire a lot despite his quirkiness in so many ways. My hate and disgust is now redirected.
I don't shop at Five Guys, but you can get a meal for 2 at Applebees for $25 (Date Night).
https://www.applebees.com/en/specials/2-for-25
I guess there is no show without fees. Perhaps no show without attendees either. I agree that $35 is cheap. Perhaps $57 plus parking, etc is not quite as cheap. And $114 for a date night is 4.6 Applebees.
Thanks for telling us what's really going on. I do enjoy your notes. I am sad indeed that the music industry has basically been taken from the artists by tech companies. But yes, this is the world we live in today.
"Even Siberia goes through the motions...."
or perhaps even better...
"I crucified my hate and held the word within my hand
There's you, the time, the logic, or the reasons we don't understand"
Tom Newsom
(p.s. if I used any more words I'd probably have to pay a fee!....)
--
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
I got a burrito and a bottle of water and paid $28 at the airport the other day. Then there is an add on for a tip shown to you that the cashier flips around for you to sign off on. Now I'm at $31.
In today's economy, you are right, Bob. $57 is a bargain to see a show that is 60 years in the making, that's how long Jon Anderson has been singing, give or take.
Bottom line, you are paying $57 and getting a breakdown of how it got there. Why all the heartache?
Concert tickets, like sports tickets, plane tickets - ALL have fees. Ask Avis or Hilton. You gonna sleep on a bench instead of a hotel over fees?
Buy your ticket, Tom, go to the show, and have a blast. You deserve it if you are paying for it.
See you at our show in Denver. His tickets are selling great, by the way, because it is a great show. You don't wanna miss this over fees.
Next time thru, this will be a bargain. That's the way it is.
Danny Zelisko
_______________________________________
We've been touring and making records since 1981. These days we "tour" one or two weekends a month. 3-4 gigs then go home for two weeks. It might not be the most efficient way to tour, but if we went out for 3-4 months, we'd probably end up hating each other. And, it's hard to sell tickets for a Tuesday show in Des Moines. Though we do still love each other, and enjoy playing together, we'd rather be home with our families and dogs when we can.
Our agent, Jerry Lima at Mint, basically doesn't even look for dates, he takes offers and if we like the money, the venue, town, routing, we take them. We have a $$ number we'll accept. Anything less, (unless it's Hawaii, Park City, Key West, Brazil etc..) we say no thanks. The guarantee decides what the ticket price is. Most of our shows are $50-$80 a ticket. 300-500 seat venues. Often multiple nights which we enjoy. We mostly play sit down, dinner clubs (City Winery, Birchmere types) and we sell out most of them, so there's usually a small back end. I'm 67 and though I don't go to many concerts anymore mostly because of the awful 24/7 tinnitus I suffer from years of being stupid with the stage volume, I'd prefer sitting down with table service to watch a show. If the band moves me to get up and dance, I do. If there's a band I really want to see, I don't care what the ticket price is. I'm happy to pay for it. After all, as a musician, it's a tax deduction.
Love your letters. I used them when I taught the business of music at our community college.
10,000 Thanks.
Steven Gustafson
Founding Member/Bassist
10.000 Maniacs
www.maniacs.com
_______________________________________
This article is ridiculous. Focusing on catalog sales and streaming payments somehow affects the entire music industry? I've lived long enough to know that, for me, any performers worth listening to get it done on the road.
Case in point: Billy Strings. Not a household name, but has a very passionate fan base and enough attendees to his shows that he plays multiple nights in some markets.
I could cite more examples, but I'm not the one writing a piece for the NYT.
Regards,
Chris Adams
_______________________________________
From the NY Times article: "Private equity firms have poured billions of dollars into music, believing it to be a source of growing and reliable income."
At first superficial sight, private equity is an easy target for spleen venting. However, the NY Times essayist's ire overlooks one key point, namely the source of the funds invested by the PE firms. Sure, PE executives usually co-invest in the companies in which they invest the funds that they have raised from institutional and private investors.
Those institutional investors of course frequently include pension funds. I suggest that many of those wailing and gnashing their teeth about private equity are simultaneously reaping the benefits of PE investments via their pensions.
Best wishes
Nick Shilton
London, UK
_______________________________________
The problem with consumers is, they hate profit. They have been conditioned by the media to be pissed off at any entity, especially a large entity, that makes a profit. ANY profit. They have no problem when a huge corporation loses money, but they just hate to see them have a successful year. They don't understand that without profit there is no business. No innovation, no new locations, no new products, no nothing. No jobs, either. It all relies on profit. Why don't people understand that? BECAUSE THE MEDIA NEVER TELLS THAT PART OF THE STORY.
Mike Blakesley
_______________________________________
We are less educated and more entitled, a population that is either in denial or delusional about where we really stand. Ultimately though, we are afraid to admit the reality that luck plays more a part of our good fortune which stems the tide of what should be an inherently natural altruistic mindset. We'll get what we deserve because the concept of deserving is an illusion and the driving force behind the misunderstanding of the reasons behind why things happen.
Marty W. Winsch
_______________________________________
The uniquely American quality of indefatigable pluck is vanishing.
We are now awash in a sea of victims and cry babies. Our grandparents would be shattered to know that they sacrificed so much, only for these people to devalue all of it.
Facts don't matter any more. Only emotions do. Here's what they think: "I feel disappointed, I must've been cheated. Facts be damned! They make no difference in how I feel. I want what I want and I deserve it. Now, who do I see about this injustice!"
If they weren't emotional about it, they'd have to admit that if, for instance, they wanted to go to a concert, the venues and the ticket services have to get paid as well as the artist. The problem is that in their minds, no matter what, it's their right to have whatever they want. Otherwise, it's an injustice. And their leaders join them in this puerile behavior.
And that's the biggest difference between Democratic politicians and Republicans — Dems are not making an emotional case. They are not connecting with people. They must wake up NOW and learn how to make an emotional connection to people's pain points. It's basic marketing for God's sake.
Bill Maher had on Ro Khanna, the Democratic California Congressman, who was going on and on with factual information, cogent arguments, reasonable thinking, and solutions to problems, begging politicians to work together. Throughout it all, he was sitting next to Nancy Mace, Republican Congresswoman from South Carolina, who spouted nothing but outrage-driven partisan baloney. When Maher asked her how she, a rape victim, could support a man found civilly guilty of sexual harassment for President, she instead talked about how George Stephanopolous was evil and insensitive to her when he asked her the same question with her daughter backstage. See? Emotional.
If Democrats don't start connecting with people emotionally ASAP, Trump and his henchmen will take over and destroy the country. HE'S SAYING SO! And they love it because they connect with him as a fellow cry baby.
When an American presidential candidate declares his admiration for Putin, Orban, Kim, Jinping, and HITLER, and lets you know he wants to be your dictator and strongman, and you cheer him on?
That's an emotional connection.
Paul Gigante
_______________________________________
Is this Tom Newsom even real? $67 to see a band favorite from a good seat and he doesn't take it? Smells like some bullsh*t here.
John Parikhal
_______________________________________
OK Bob, you win.
I definitely do not feel hate or disgust for LiveNation. How dare me question the price of a show for an 80 year old guy with a pickup band who I used to admire a lot despite his quirkiness in so many ways. My hate and disgust is now redirected.
I don't shop at Five Guys, but you can get a meal for 2 at Applebees for $25 (Date Night).
https://www.applebees.com/en/specials/2-for-25
I guess there is no show without fees. Perhaps no show without attendees either. I agree that $35 is cheap. Perhaps $57 plus parking, etc is not quite as cheap. And $114 for a date night is 4.6 Applebees.
Thanks for telling us what's really going on. I do enjoy your notes. I am sad indeed that the music industry has basically been taken from the artists by tech companies. But yes, this is the world we live in today.
"Even Siberia goes through the motions...."
or perhaps even better...
"I crucified my hate and held the word within my hand
There's you, the time, the logic, or the reasons we don't understand"
Tom Newsom
(p.s. if I used any more words I'd probably have to pay a fee!....)
--
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
NY Times/Private Equity/Music
"Same Old Song: Private Equity Is Destroying Our Music Ecosystem":
free link: https://shorturl.at/yHJR9
How could the "New York Times" print such horsesh*t?
This is my favorite e-mail of the week:
______
Subject: Fees
I read the post you found about concert fees a while back. I was surprised and enlightened. So I scaled back my hate and disgust and decided to be a good citizen and accept the realities of the modern concert world.
However....
I went to buy a ticket to see Jon Anderson with the Band Geeks ( I was a big Yes fan, and surprisingly the videos look decent). I found a $35 balcony ticket at the Paramount in Denver. Good venue, not a bad seat.
Well, when I went to check out, they added $22 to my $35 ticket. Yes, that's 63% of the ticket price for fees.
Hate and disgust has returned. And, I will live with memories of Jon and Yes. They can have 100% of my zero dollars.
Tom Newsom
_____
Sound reasonable, right?
OF COUSE NOT, IT'S INSANE!
Do you really expect that you can go to see Jon Anderson in concert for a flat $35? Been to Five Guys recently? It's going to cost you nearly twenty five bucks for a cheeseburger, fries and a shake. If you eat really slowly, maybe it'll take you a half hour to consume all that. But you should be able to see Jon Anderson, with a backing group and sound and lights for ninety minutes and it should only cost you ten dollars more?
I mean I wrote about all this, and this person, who is not the only one who e-mails me this nonsense, can't get it through their head that without the fees, there is no show! That most of, if not all of the face price goes to the act, but the act does play in a building, there is a ticketing service and if the promoter makes no money Jon Anderson can't play anywhere! Sure, the ticket price should be all-in, one final price, and Live Nation has said it is in favor of this. Who's against it? The acts! They want you to think that tickets are cheap and if it weren't for Ticketmaster you'd be paying a lot less.
Hogwash. The acts are guilty, once again.
And if I hear from one more manager complaining this isn't true...
Sure, when you come up you have little leverage, but as you ascend the ladder and can draw more people the power shifts. And don't forget, sans acts, the promoter has no business at all.
But as much as I hammer this, people refuse to believe it.
So this nitwit, who the "New York Times" didn't properly vet, asserts that the problem with music today is private equity.
Let's be clear, it's not the major labels who are selling to private equity, but individual rights holders! They may be famous, but they own those rights. To songs, to royalty streams... If you think this affects the new production of music, you have no idea how many songs are added to Spotify EVERY DAY!
Now it could be that the old music is better than the new music. Or that in today's cluttered, overwhelming society, it's hard to break a hit. And that's worth investigating. But NO! This outsider prick, just like the hoi polloi complaining about ticket prices, believes the system is rigged. Someone must be at fault, there must be an enemy responsible.
Like Biden and inflation. It's all his fault, don't you know! And gas prices too!
Talk about personal responsibility, isn't there a responsibility to divine the truth?
And if the "Times" can't get it right about music, it brings into question whether it can get it right about the more important topics, like the election, the wars in Ukraine and Gaza... Sure, this article is an opinion piece, but you don't get into the "Times" by accident, it must have resonated with someone with power at the paper.
And then you've got the closing canard about musicians not getting paid enough in the streaming era, two grandstanding politicians introducing a bill to raise remuneration.
That's right... Mercedes-Benzes are too expensive, let's let everyone buy one for twenty grand. I'm here, I drive, I'm entitled.
I mean you wake up one day and you call yourself an artist and you're entitled to make a living? THAT DOESN'T WORK IN ANY VERTICAL! You can go to three years of law school, owe hundreds of thousands of dollars and not be able to get a job. But some wanker who watches stars on TV thinks they're entitled to a living playing music.
Not to mention if you are any good, there are so many more ways to monetize than in the pre-internet era. And you can make your record cheaply with a computer and reach your fans for free online, even distribute on streaming services for a de minimis cost, but Spotify is the enemy? How about the public, that hasn't embraced your song!
As for other media... Some of the biggest streaming shows are not new, but catalog. Let's blame Netflix for that! But in truth, Netflix is making a ton of new programming. But someone has to be at fault.
Well, the old stuff got great distribution in an old world and it's hard to break new stuff, but not impossible. Look at "Squid Game." Ever seen anything like it? When's the last time you heard a new song that was equally different and worth your attention?
But some wannabe Drake or Taylor Swift deserves attention and a living? I mean come on.
As for private equity and songs... So this guy doesn't want a free market economy. He wants to tell all those writers/performers who slaved for decades that they are not entitled to the fruits of their labor.
I sold you my car, I see you put stickers on the back, you're ruining the highway driving experience. You sold it, you've got no rights! Or, you could make this a condition of the sale. But if someone pays, in many cases overpays, for your vehicle do you think you're entitled to have control over it?
So Primary Wave is doing an excellent job of maximizing their investment. This is anathema? Talk about backwards thinking. Someone does a good job promoting music and they're the enemy? One might ask what Primary Wave is doing that its competitors are not. And Primary Wave paid for those songs, it's not entitled to a return on its investment?
And Spotify, the so-called enemy... It gives the lion's share of its revenue to rights holders, the business doesn't scale, i.e. the larger it grows the more royalties it must pay, it struggles to make a profit yet the fact that some new musicians are struggling means they must pay them? From what pile of money? And the aforementioned Drake and Swift, uber-popular, must donate some of their earnings to self-declared wannabe artists? Why? You don't see the tech billionaires doing this. They may choose to give away some money, but they're under no obligation.
So what we've got here is an article that speaks to one's emotions, facts be damned.
Isn't this what this same newspaper says about Trump supporters? But why should we listen to the "Times" about Trump when it gets it so wrong about music, a minor cog in the system.
Yes, the "Times" sacrifices credibility when it prints dreck like this.
Meanwhile, everybody actually in the music business knows this is crap, part of the endless spew by the public, the press and the politicians that can't be combatted, no matter how many times they're confronted with the truth.
So the music business gives up explaining itself not only to the public, but to the media.
The "Times" wouldn't print an article about the negative effects of robotic surgery, the business losers... And when it's an important subject, they have fact-checkers and there are levels of review, close scrutiny, but that damn music business... It's an easy target and the readers will love it!
Speaking of readers, now Tom Newsom is going to come to my house and beat me up. I shouldn't shed any light on the truth, for my own safety if nothing else. Like all the sheep supporting Trump no matter what in Congress. They're afraid of losing their job, even their life.
So everybody goes with the flow, let's inaccuracies slip by, because the team is everything, irrelevant of whether it's right or wrong.
Yup, truth and justice, it's the American Way.
Maybe in Scandinavia, but not here in the good old U.S.
(Yup, I'm a commie socialist. But I've been to Scandinavia... In Denmark college is free, contrast that with John Oliver's exposé on student debt last night. Oh, that's right, I don't want to pay for your mistakes. But it's more complicated than that, but you don't want to listen, because it must be their fault and people have got to clean up their own messes. But don't we live in a society? I mean everybody should be entitled to food and shelter, never mind an education. But to make a living as a musician? NO!)
--
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
free link: https://shorturl.at/yHJR9
How could the "New York Times" print such horsesh*t?
This is my favorite e-mail of the week:
______
Subject: Fees
I read the post you found about concert fees a while back. I was surprised and enlightened. So I scaled back my hate and disgust and decided to be a good citizen and accept the realities of the modern concert world.
However....
I went to buy a ticket to see Jon Anderson with the Band Geeks ( I was a big Yes fan, and surprisingly the videos look decent). I found a $35 balcony ticket at the Paramount in Denver. Good venue, not a bad seat.
Well, when I went to check out, they added $22 to my $35 ticket. Yes, that's 63% of the ticket price for fees.
Hate and disgust has returned. And, I will live with memories of Jon and Yes. They can have 100% of my zero dollars.
Tom Newsom
_____
Sound reasonable, right?
OF COUSE NOT, IT'S INSANE!
Do you really expect that you can go to see Jon Anderson in concert for a flat $35? Been to Five Guys recently? It's going to cost you nearly twenty five bucks for a cheeseburger, fries and a shake. If you eat really slowly, maybe it'll take you a half hour to consume all that. But you should be able to see Jon Anderson, with a backing group and sound and lights for ninety minutes and it should only cost you ten dollars more?
I mean I wrote about all this, and this person, who is not the only one who e-mails me this nonsense, can't get it through their head that without the fees, there is no show! That most of, if not all of the face price goes to the act, but the act does play in a building, there is a ticketing service and if the promoter makes no money Jon Anderson can't play anywhere! Sure, the ticket price should be all-in, one final price, and Live Nation has said it is in favor of this. Who's against it? The acts! They want you to think that tickets are cheap and if it weren't for Ticketmaster you'd be paying a lot less.
Hogwash. The acts are guilty, once again.
And if I hear from one more manager complaining this isn't true...
Sure, when you come up you have little leverage, but as you ascend the ladder and can draw more people the power shifts. And don't forget, sans acts, the promoter has no business at all.
But as much as I hammer this, people refuse to believe it.
So this nitwit, who the "New York Times" didn't properly vet, asserts that the problem with music today is private equity.
Let's be clear, it's not the major labels who are selling to private equity, but individual rights holders! They may be famous, but they own those rights. To songs, to royalty streams... If you think this affects the new production of music, you have no idea how many songs are added to Spotify EVERY DAY!
Now it could be that the old music is better than the new music. Or that in today's cluttered, overwhelming society, it's hard to break a hit. And that's worth investigating. But NO! This outsider prick, just like the hoi polloi complaining about ticket prices, believes the system is rigged. Someone must be at fault, there must be an enemy responsible.
Like Biden and inflation. It's all his fault, don't you know! And gas prices too!
Talk about personal responsibility, isn't there a responsibility to divine the truth?
And if the "Times" can't get it right about music, it brings into question whether it can get it right about the more important topics, like the election, the wars in Ukraine and Gaza... Sure, this article is an opinion piece, but you don't get into the "Times" by accident, it must have resonated with someone with power at the paper.
And then you've got the closing canard about musicians not getting paid enough in the streaming era, two grandstanding politicians introducing a bill to raise remuneration.
That's right... Mercedes-Benzes are too expensive, let's let everyone buy one for twenty grand. I'm here, I drive, I'm entitled.
I mean you wake up one day and you call yourself an artist and you're entitled to make a living? THAT DOESN'T WORK IN ANY VERTICAL! You can go to three years of law school, owe hundreds of thousands of dollars and not be able to get a job. But some wanker who watches stars on TV thinks they're entitled to a living playing music.
Not to mention if you are any good, there are so many more ways to monetize than in the pre-internet era. And you can make your record cheaply with a computer and reach your fans for free online, even distribute on streaming services for a de minimis cost, but Spotify is the enemy? How about the public, that hasn't embraced your song!
As for other media... Some of the biggest streaming shows are not new, but catalog. Let's blame Netflix for that! But in truth, Netflix is making a ton of new programming. But someone has to be at fault.
Well, the old stuff got great distribution in an old world and it's hard to break new stuff, but not impossible. Look at "Squid Game." Ever seen anything like it? When's the last time you heard a new song that was equally different and worth your attention?
But some wannabe Drake or Taylor Swift deserves attention and a living? I mean come on.
As for private equity and songs... So this guy doesn't want a free market economy. He wants to tell all those writers/performers who slaved for decades that they are not entitled to the fruits of their labor.
I sold you my car, I see you put stickers on the back, you're ruining the highway driving experience. You sold it, you've got no rights! Or, you could make this a condition of the sale. But if someone pays, in many cases overpays, for your vehicle do you think you're entitled to have control over it?
So Primary Wave is doing an excellent job of maximizing their investment. This is anathema? Talk about backwards thinking. Someone does a good job promoting music and they're the enemy? One might ask what Primary Wave is doing that its competitors are not. And Primary Wave paid for those songs, it's not entitled to a return on its investment?
And Spotify, the so-called enemy... It gives the lion's share of its revenue to rights holders, the business doesn't scale, i.e. the larger it grows the more royalties it must pay, it struggles to make a profit yet the fact that some new musicians are struggling means they must pay them? From what pile of money? And the aforementioned Drake and Swift, uber-popular, must donate some of their earnings to self-declared wannabe artists? Why? You don't see the tech billionaires doing this. They may choose to give away some money, but they're under no obligation.
So what we've got here is an article that speaks to one's emotions, facts be damned.
Isn't this what this same newspaper says about Trump supporters? But why should we listen to the "Times" about Trump when it gets it so wrong about music, a minor cog in the system.
Yes, the "Times" sacrifices credibility when it prints dreck like this.
Meanwhile, everybody actually in the music business knows this is crap, part of the endless spew by the public, the press and the politicians that can't be combatted, no matter how many times they're confronted with the truth.
So the music business gives up explaining itself not only to the public, but to the media.
The "Times" wouldn't print an article about the negative effects of robotic surgery, the business losers... And when it's an important subject, they have fact-checkers and there are levels of review, close scrutiny, but that damn music business... It's an easy target and the readers will love it!
Speaking of readers, now Tom Newsom is going to come to my house and beat me up. I shouldn't shed any light on the truth, for my own safety if nothing else. Like all the sheep supporting Trump no matter what in Congress. They're afraid of losing their job, even their life.
So everybody goes with the flow, let's inaccuracies slip by, because the team is everything, irrelevant of whether it's right or wrong.
Yup, truth and justice, it's the American Way.
Maybe in Scandinavia, but not here in the good old U.S.
(Yup, I'm a commie socialist. But I've been to Scandinavia... In Denmark college is free, contrast that with John Oliver's exposé on student debt last night. Oh, that's right, I don't want to pay for your mistakes. But it's more complicated than that, but you don't want to listen, because it must be their fault and people have got to clean up their own messes. But don't we live in a society? I mean everybody should be entitled to food and shelter, never mind an education. But to make a living as a musician? NO!)
--
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
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)