Brindle Media

Posts Tagged ‘music’

In a recent article in The Sunday Times Magazine, Jon Bon Jovi is quoted as saying: “Kids today have missed the whole experience of putting the headphones on, turning it up to 10, holding the jacket, closing their eyes and getting lost in an album; and the beauty of taking your allowance money and making a decision based on the jacket, not knowing what the record sounded like, and looking at a couple of still pictures and imagining it. God, it was a magical, magical time. I hate to sound like an old man now, but I am, and you mark my words, in a generation from now people are going to say: ‘What happened?’. Steve Jobs is personally responsible for killing the music business.”

Former record label promotion executive and music industry blogger responded in his weekly blog to Bon Jovi’s comments with an open letter. Here are some excerpts from Steve’s letter:

“Dear Jon:
You’ve been making records a long time. In fact, when you had your first Billboard chart hit in 1984 (“Runaway,” which peaked at #39) CDs had already been in the retail music market two years.

Funny thing about CDs, I don’t ever remember any artists I worked with at the time complaining about the hefty royalty checks they were receiving as their catalog(s) were released in the new format and sold millions all over again. Not a one. Nope. It was a good time for the labels and all their artists as billions were generated in revenues just from re-releasing older albums on CD.”

You can read Steve’s entire letter at http://stevemeyer.webs.com/

So, what do you think? Do you agree with Bon Jovi or with Steve Meyer’s assessment of this situation?

Here’s some information that I thought you’d find useful or at least interesting:

BrandSavant, Tom Webster tells us that some radio friends in New Zealand are asking for our help. They’re not looking for monetary donations but are instead asking that we send voice messages of encouragement and support which they can play over the air to help boost the spirits of their countrymen as they cope with the devastation caused by last week’s earthquake.

All you need to do is record a quick MP3 file that gives your name, where you are from, and a short (5-10 seconds) message of hope, to tell the people of New Zealand that we are thinking of them during this very dark time. Please email those .MP3 files to Tom at a special email address he’s set up at : help_nz_audio@fastmail.fm. Tom will make sure he gets them, and that your voices ring out across the Land Of The Long White Cloud.

Skype simplifies cheap overseas calling from any phone.
http://mashable.com/2011/02/25/skype-overseas/

Linkedin Tool Visualizes Profile Updates in Your Network
http://mashable.com/2011/02/24/linkedin-profile-tool/

How music can boost your immune system
http://www.realage.com/tips/how-to-boost-your-immune-system-positive-mental-attitude?eid=1098931007&memberid=22592203

In late 2009, Augmented Reality was incorporated a book celebrating Michael Jackson’s career. Since then, I’m not aware that there’s been much buzz about AR in the music world. However, today I received this press release:

THE BLACK EYED PEAS DEBUT IN WORLD`S FIRST 360-DEGREE MOBILE MUSIC VIDEO CREATED BY will.i.apps

New “BEP360″ App for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch Takes Fans Inside “The Time (Dirty Bit)” with 360-Degree Motion Control and Augmented Reality Developed by Peas Front Man will.i.am

LOS ANGELES January 24, 2010 – Music industry pioneer and front man of The Black Eyed Peas, will.i.am, today announced the iTunes App Store launch of BEP360, an iPad, iPhone and iPod touch app that immerses fans in a 360 degree universe of the legendary music group. Featuring the world`s first 360-degree view music video (“The Time 360″), BEP360 features the song “The Time (Dirty Bit),” the first single from new CD, “The Beginning”, now available on Interscope Records.

“will.i.apps and the BEP360 app have been established to help artists tap into the potential of our hyper-connected mobile world and bring fans deeper inside the music far beyond a four minute audio recording. It`s a unique and completely new way to experience 360 degree music immersion that will bring artists and fans closer together,” said will.i.am.

Key Features of BEP360

· Point iPad, iPhone and iPod touch device at the cover artwork of the band`s latest album, The Beginning (Interscope Records) and watch augmented reality take form with BEP avatars dancing to the beat

· Direct a virtual photo session with Fergie, will.i.am, apl.de.ap & Taboo allowing users to capture their own shots and share them.

· Stay up to date on everything about the Peas via an aggregated Twitter feed

· Play an addictive Peas-inspired puzzle game

· View pictures and comments posted by other BEP360 app users on a virtual earth

The BEP360 app is available for $2.99 from the App Store on iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, or at: www.bit.ly/bep360app.

Image: As soon as you point your iPhone onto the CD a virtual 3D character appears and the music starts.

A demo of BEP360 app featuring The Black Eyed Peas and the making-of behind the scenes video can be seen at: www.williapps.com.

I’m going to be interested to follow this story over the next few weeks to learn how fans react and how the rest of the music industry responds.

Just so you’ll know, I’m not employed by a radio station nor an individual or company which owns radio stations, I am not related to anyone who works in radio, and I’m not a shareholder in any company which owns radio stations. Although many years of my career were spent in radio, I am not a water bearer for any company which owns music-oriented broadcast radio stations.

That said, I find AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka’s remarks at a recent musicFIRST Coalition press conference on Capitol Hill pretty offensive.
Trumka said: “The reckless greed that drives Wall Street is the same as the unconscionable greed that drives the handful of conglomerate corporate radio executives that control 75 percent of our nation’s radio stations. If you care about music, if you care about the right of Americans to get paid for their work, if you care about doing what is right, be a part of the good fight for our performing brothers and sisters.”

“The unconscionable greed that drive the handful of conglomerate corporate radio executives that control 75% of our nation’s radio stations”? Nice rhetoric, Mr.Trumpka but what about the unconscionable greed that drives the handful of foreign-based record companies that abuse their relationships with their artists?

Lets review some facts. There are a little over 11,000 commercially licensed radio stations in America. Around 20%, of those facilities are owned by companies which control 100 or more stations. Clear Channel’s controls 11% and the remaining 9% is split up among 7 or 8 other companies. In other words, 80% of American broadcast stations aren’t owned by companies which Rich Trumka and musicFIRST could describe as “conglomerate corporate radio”.

Chairman of the House Labor and Education Committee, George Miller (D-CA) said: “The important thing to remember is this: Passage of the Performance Rights Act will stop corporate radio from continuing to exploit the labor of working Americans – Americans who spend decades passionately honing their craft to produce works that resonate with our inner angels.”

Chairman Miller appears unaware that these radio stations which he accuses of exploiting musicians are actually investing millions of dollars in air time to promote the careers of musicians and providing FREE commercials by exposing those artists’ music to the audiences that these stations have invested millions of their marketing dollars to aggregate.

At this point, some reader will ask: “But don’t those radio stations limit the number of artists and songs that they play and isn’t that unfair?”

The stations limit the number of artists and songs that they play based on what their listeners want to hear. Research has shown that most radio listeners prefer a limited number of songs on a station’s playlist. The particular songs may change over time but the aggregate number of songs remains relatively constant. It’s even been noted that iPod and Pandora users eventually limit their playlists after their initial enthusiasm for discovery wanes.

Although I’m no longer involved with the radio industry, I did spend many years programming stations and being “worked” by record industry representatives to increase exposure on those songs which were most important to their labels. Increased exposure meant and still means increased revenues for the foreign-owned record companies who are, to quote Chairman Miller, “continuing to exploit the labor of working Americans.”

musicFIRST is at it again.

Yesterday, Dionne Warwick was in Washington trying to persuade Congress to pass the Performance Rights Act. According to Dionne, “This is a critical issue for not only those of us who have made music our careers, but for those who are trying to make a name for themselves in the business. Performers from every genre of music should be fairly compensated for their art. Thus far, radio is the only medium that fails to provide artists with fair compensation for the use of their music and we feel it is time for radio companies to join Satellite, Internet, and Cable music distributors in giving musical artists what they have worked so hard to earn.”

I’m sorry, Dionne but could we review your tax records for the past 45 years? I would suspect that a lot of money has flowed into your personal account primarily because of the FREE exposure and promotion you received from radio stations playing your songs in high rotations and on-air personalities reinforcing your brand by praising your talent. I’m sure that your contract with your record labels was designed more in their best interest than yours but that’s not radio’s fault. What all that FREE exposure on radio did for you, however, was increase audience awareness of your talent, increase your TV exposure, increase demand for your live performances and increase the fees you could demand for those performances. Seems to me that you profited nicely from all that FREE exposure.

And before someone posts the same lame comment about radio gets free use of our airwaves and we the people own the airwaves, it would be useful to remember that radio stations are granted short-term licenses to access those airwaves with the promise to operate in the public “interest, convenience and necessity”. Then, companies must invest millions of dollars in order to build their facilities, purchase the equipment, pay the electric bills (which can run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars a year), pay the personnel (on-air staff, engineers, support staff, sales people, management), pay a large
percentage of gross advertising revenues to music rights companies (BMI, ASCAP, SESAC) and pay local, state and federal taxes. If times are good and the station does a good job of serving its listeners, it can earn a nice profit. If times are tight, it can lose money even if it’s doing a good job of serving its audience. So, saying that radio gets “free” use of our airwaves is a bit misleading.

It amazes me that the artists who support musicFIRST’s efforts don’t understand that if the RIAA gets its way and forces radio to start paying for the right to play songs then fewer stations will choose to continue playing music and those stations that do continue to play music will become more selective about what they play. If a station is paying for songs, its budget will dictate that it choose the most cost-effective tunes which will be obvious hits by artists with established track records. Consequently, playlists will become even tighter. I’m not sure that’s the goal that the musicians supporting musicFIRST are trying to accomplish.

Whether you’re out of work, putting in extra hours to keep your job, dealing with financial issues, taking care of an elderly parent, or just trying to cope with information overload, it’s difficult to escape the negative physical and psychological effects of stress.

Natalie Angier wrote this article in last week’s New York Times about how your brain can actually reinforce your tendency towards self-defeating behaviors and how you can reverse the damage: http://tinyurl.com/stress-loop

In the July issue of Scientific American, Karen Schrock talks about how music can help your physical and emotional well-being: http://tinyurl.com/l64rrp

Have you had any real-life experiences that either prove or disprove these notions?