For anyone interested in music industry news and commentary, I would highly suggest checking out the blog and email newsletter of Bob Lefsetz.
Who is Bob Lefsetz?
"Bob Lefsetz is the author of "The Lefsetz Letter." Famous for being beholden to no one and speaking the truth, Lefsetz addresses the issues that are at the core of the music business: downloading, copy protection, pricing and the music itself.
His intense brilliance captivates readers from Steven Tyler to Rick Nielsen to Bryan Adams to Quincy Jones to EVERYBODY who’s in the music business.
Never boring, always entertaining, Bob’s insights are fueled by his stint as an entertainment business attorney, majordomo of Sanctuary Music’s American division and consultancies to major labels.
–Rhino
"The Lefsetz Letter" has been publishing for over 25 years. First as hard copy, most recently as an email newsletter and now, for the first time, in blog form." --From the blog The Lefsetz Letter
Bob recently posted some very fitting commentary about so-called 'oldsters,' who at one time created classic hits, but stumble in modern day by clinging to the big business practices of the past. Although this article is specifically mentioning David Bowie, I think this is also very fitting for many veteran artists seeking a 2013 comeback... such as Jason Newsted, Soundgarden, Alice In Chains, etc.
"First he needed to go on the road, playing small venues at fair prices that you couldn’t get in. That would generate real publicity. For what happened as opposed to what’s coming. And if you’ve got something real, the fans do the work for you. They tweet, they Instagram, they spread the word. Instead, Bowie’s caught up in the mainstream echo chamber.
Second, you put out a new track that kills. And “Where Are We Now?” does not. It needed to be upbeat, it needed to be one listen. Not something that you might like over time, not when the whole world is watching.
Third, leave the audience hanging, waiting for more.
Instead of the album, drip out the singles. Create cutting edge videos. Keep the excitement going. Keep your name in circulation.
But NO, David Jones shows his age by doing it the old way, getting a check from Sony and trying to drive something down our throats that we don’t want." --Bob Lefsetz
read more over at http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
Also, worth mentioning on the topic of the music industry, is an excellent book I recently received as a gift, "How Music Works," by prolific artist David Byrne.
"How Music Works is David Byrne’s remarkable and buoyant celebration of a subject he has spent a lifetime thinking about. In it he explores how profoundly music is shaped by its time and place, and he explains how the advent of recording technology in the twentieth century forever changed our relationship to playing, performing, and listening to music.
Acting as historian and anthropologist, raconteur and social scientist, he searches for patterns—and shows how those patterns have affected his own work over the years with Talking Heads and his many collaborators, from Brian Eno to Caetano Veloso. Byrne sees music as part of a larger, almost Darwinian pattern of adaptations and responses to its cultural and physical context. His range is panoptic, taking us from Wagnerian opera houses to African villages, from his earliest high school reel-to-reel recordings to his latest work in a home music studio (and all the big studios in between).
Touching on the joy, the physics, and even the business of making music, How Music Works is a brainy, irresistible adventure and an impassioned argument about music’s liberating, life-affirming power." --From the description via Amazon.com
Book review from The Guardian:
So far, the book is living up to its positive reviews quite well... a very enjoyable read.
No comments:
Post a Comment