As usual by Bob Lefsetz. Subscribe to his newsletter below.
Ed
Used to be, no one could make as much money as a rock star.
Baseball players were hobbled by the reserve clause. Basketball hadn't known Larry or Magic, Dr. J was not ubiquitous. As for football...the players were expendable, and coaches didn't make the money, but owners. Hedge funds had not been invented yet. Or, if they had, they were not the domain of thirtysomething whiz kids, but old farts no one wanted to hang around with, who worked at brokerage houses. As for the CEO... He might end up with a cool million come tax time, but he could never get rich. To be wealthy you had to be an entrepreneur, or a rock star.
The rock star was usually uneducated. He did not listen to his parents and prepare for the future. He smoked cigarettes and skipped school. Stealing what he needed to pursue his passion, music. If he was talented, and lucky, he got a deal with a label, and after slaving in the studio for mere hours, the end product was brought to the radio station, where in a matter of weeks, if not days, the musician could become world famous, a star.
This path appealed to not only downtrodden Englishmen, but Americans too. The fact that you could pick up a guitar and suddenly become king caused musical instrument sales to skyrocket. Everybody wanted a chance at this lottery, akin to the California gold rush.
And the public paid attention. Not only was the music vital, the personalities were outsized. These were the real James Deans. Doing whatever they pleased. Not worried about convention. Drinkin' and druggin' and ***in'... Everybody wanted to play.
Your father might not know who Led Zeppelin was, but the band could sell out arenas from coast to coast, taking home millions for its efforts. The pull was so strong that tours added stadium dates. 55,000 people would show up to partake of the seamy goodness that was rock and roll, with the ragtag bunch of society's losers as cheerleaders. Yes, the losers had become winners... Who wouldn't smile at that?
With the profits came the conglomerates. Elektra and Atlantic joined the corporate fold. A formula, known as corporate rock, was defined and acts sold millions until the whole scene imploded but was then rescued by MTV, which generated sales heretofore unknown.
But the culture was the station, not the act. The product was the single, not the album. The value was what was on the screen as much as what entered your ears. Despite the gargantuan sales, aided by the introduction of CDs, the kernel, the core, the essence of the music was lost. It was like the rope tying the boat to the dock had slipped free, but we couldn't yet see the impending disaster, it took years to find out we were adrift.
Which we are.
You might rail against the profiteers in the financial community, but they're keeping the money, they're not giving it back. And a small cadre of executives, who sit on each other's boards, have run up executive compensation to a height no mere musician can reach. And sports stars might have brief careers, but they rival the length of most musicians' salad days, if they don't exceed them. Suddenly, it's all topsy-turvy, musicians have gone from the top of the heap to the bottom. Players are court jesters once again. Tools of the man. Fighting for evanescent scraps.
This would be fine if the oldsters didn't still exist. If their classic records were not still encased in wax, in 0's and 1's, fully playable. It's easy to see how it once was, to realize what has been lost. Those still raking in the bucks, at this point, only the corporate infrastructure, the label heads and the agents, say that nothing has changed, that today's music is just as vital, that the scene is healthy. But music is a reflection of society. And ours is one of instant fame, of money-grubbing. Nothing lasts, we don't take anything too seriously. We want to pull our stars down into the hole we're in.
But maybe the pinball machine is on tilt. Maybe someone has hit the reset button. Maybe all those exotic financial products have fallen by the wayside. It's even cheaper to record than it was in the heyday, and distribution might be a vast maze, but the tools are in the hands of the musicians. Maybe, the heyday can return.
If it's about the music. And the drugs. And the women. If we can revere our stars as rebels, not tools of the man. If the music is not made for the radio, but for the audience. If the easy way is the road less taken.
I'd say that Keith Richards posing for a Louis Vuitton ad is the end of the world as we know it, but it just shows that the money has superseded the music. That Keith's given up.
They can foist a movie upon us. The Stones can play the Super Bowl, badly. But we know we've been abandoned, that the contract has been broken. We need to believe, and we can't believe in someone in bed with our enemy, big business which has oppressed us, saying we need their products to play, to compete, when nothing could be further from the truth.
There's an underclass in America. Fighting for recognition, fighting to get ahead. Its playground is no longer Top Forty radio, not even underground FM, but the Internet. I'd like to tell you I can foresee the future, but alas, all I can see is the possibilities.
They say everybody sells out today. That you can't make it without the man. I say no one is offering the customer an endorsement deal. That your only hope of success is to get in bed with your customer. This requires honesty, and excitement. It requires you to be a role model. Maybe of debauchery, but someone your audience can look up to nonetheless.
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
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=646e58a474464ad106bda3bfbd0b562c
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment