Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] more music to grade by...

[Vern Green <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

Having been in the music business for a good many years, I can tell
you that every person does have somewhat of a say in what music gets
played.

Anymore it seems, and of course with everything there is an exception,
but the norm is to find something that works and go with it. The only
time something new comes along is when there is some new group, like
Nirvana, that is making huge noise in a certain market.

Nirvana, Kurt Cobain in particular, had no idea what he was getting
into. When he was playing in Seattle I am sure he was just playing the
kind of music he liked, but the people around him liked it too and it
started a stir. Enough of a stir to make an impact for some record
executive A&R weenie to spend a few dollars and take a look at them.

This is how it is done anymore, of course there are those that are
doing it because their mother or father are in the business, Jacob
Dylan, Lenny Kravitz both come to mind, but most other bands are
coming out with a proven track record before a company will ever
arrest them.

So how do you play into this? Well it's simple. If there is a local
group you like, you have to support them, call the radio stations and
have the station play them. If enough people are asking for and
supporting the group they will get noticed. That is how it works.
Bands now have to have a track record, if a group sells 10,000 copies
of their CD on their own, and are on a major local radio station in
regular rotation, then a record company exec will normally take a look
at them.

So get out there and support the local groups.


On Sat, 18 Dec 2004 23:46:30 -0600, Jonathan King
<EMAIL:PROTECTED> wrote:
> On Sat, 18 Dec 2004 22:52:10 -0600 (CST), Mike Miller
> <EMAIL:PROTECTED> wrote:
> > On Sat, 18 Dec 2004, Jonathan King wrote:
> >
> > >> Obviously, they don't know a good thing when they have one.  Right now
> > >> they have a stifling grip on the music business.
> > >
> > > You make no sense.  They ARE the (pre-recorded) music business.
> >
> > All I'm saying is that these companies used to be more innovative.  They
> > used to look for real musical talent to promote and they used to nurture
> > those artists.  The companies want Britney-Spears-type packages to sell
> > and they don't want to take chances with new ideas.
> 
> Ooh, stop it!  You're killing me!  I think the only part of this I
> could agree with is that they used to thin that they needed real
> musical talent to sell records.  Now, they still need (some of) this
> to sell to certain markets, but once they found the package sold
> better, that was all they needed to know.
> 
> > >> They don't want to take big chances with their money, so they work to
> > >> promote things that fit in with what is already popular.  The obvious
> > >> effect is to crush innovation and cause stagnation in popular music.
> > >
> > > Only in pre-recorded popular music on major labels.  To be honest, there
> > > is so much music out there these days that I can't understand the "crush
> > > innovation" comment much.  They don't promote innovation because it
> > > doesn't seem to sell, or sell as well as other stuff.
> >
> > That is not how it works.  Popular music is constantly changing.
> 
> The produced sound may change, and there are some broad trends that
> change (no hip hop in the 70s), but you'll note that the innovative
> stuff is picked up by majors well after it has become popular for the
> most part.  I think one of the few exceptions to this I can think of
> is Nirvana.  I think the intent was just to sell to Gen-X types and
> they did stumble on something more than that.
> 
> > People
> > like what they hear.  The "powers that be" have always been, as you point
> > out, but they are working the system differently today than they used to.
> > They used to pick talented, creative people and support them, helping them
> > to develop into stars.
> 
> No, I don't think so Mike.  The term "one hit wonder" is not a new
> one.  The support you got was usually only a function of having
> stronger initial sales than the average band they signed.  Once the
> cost of creating a new package act got low enough (or the rate of
> success high enough) the majors stopped doing this, at least for the
> biggest markets.
> 
> > Things are different now and there is much more
> > phony packaging and focusing on image.  If a group doesn't hit it big with
> > their first CD, they are usually dropped.
> 
> Dropping an act after their first album is and has always been the
> norm.  It is true that they have found better ways to *create* and
> package acts than they used to have, and that's what makes them all
> the more willing to dispose of what doesn't work.
> 
> > >> What can we do?  Don't buy popular CDs.  Listen to more free MP3s on
> > >> the web.  Support local bands.  I don't know how much we can do, but we
> > >> have to do something.
> > >
> > > But what you like and support what you like.  Expecting or hoping that
> > > everybody else will like it strikes me as a fairly hopeless endeavor,
> > > but there's lots of good stuff out there.  So tell people out there what
> > > seems to be good.
> >
> > That's always good advice, but these days we can shun the corporate music
> > industry altogether and we'll still be awash in a gazillion CDs.  Every
> > local band is making CDs these days, but they aren't getting heard.
> 
> Well, I'm not going to start feeling guilty that I can't go out to
> clubs and hear new acts.  I see no reason not to listen to something I
> like just because it's on a label you consider corporate.  And I see
> no reason to support a local band that sucks just because it's local.
> These days, the way I'm most likely to become aware of something new
> out there is to hear it myself on a station like KCOU (which amounts
> to a completely arbitrary and random sample of whatever they get sent
> :-)) or have somebody or thing recommend it to me based on knowing
> what I already like.
> 
> > Do we have any kind of Internet Top 40 for legal MP3 downloads?
> 
> So this may be the biggest disagreement we have.  I say: WHO CARES
> about what the Top 40 *anything* is unless it happens to coincide with
> your taste?  The beauty of the music scene these days is that I have
> an okay chance of finding something I do like despite the fact that
> it's not in anybody's Top 5000.
> 
> jking
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-- 
Thanks
F Vernon Green
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