The surprising thing is it’s pretty good. Hudson’s got a serviceable voice, and Linda Perry is a virtuoso, but is anybody waiting for this album?

NO! That paradigm ended with the last century. You know, famous person makes an album with hitmakers, a lot of money is spent on publicity and promotion and then the label sees if it sticks to the wall or not. In most cases, it did not. Especially as years wore on. Although Don Johnson did have a hit.

So I’m listening to Howard Stern this morning and I hear Kate Hudson talking and the first thing that went through my mind is “I’m not interested in this.” But I’d already powered through all the news channels on SiriusXM on my way to get my blood drawn, so I decided to hang in there.

America’s sweetheart is an idiot. When she dropped “spiritual,” I about puked. What exactly does that word mean? She gave a pass to her biological father, it wasn’t much different from a pre-internet interview, but the internet blew up nearly thirty years ago.

And actors don’t mean anything anymore. Ryan Gosling couldn’t even open a well-reviewed movie. Because movie stars are two-dimensional, they play roles, whereas when music is done right, especially when the performer has written the song, it channels truth, people see the artist as three-dimensional, the song is coming from their heart.

Now in truth the “musicians” have abdicated this power in the search of dough, but unlike in the old days, people can get their heroes from many verticals, not only the silver screen. So Kate Hudson is famous. But so is Kim Kardashian, and she got booed at the Tom Brady roast, even though Netflix subsequently edited this out of the program.

You see people hate Kim K. Put me in that category. Overexposed. Too much plastic surgery. There’s no there there. Sure, some nitwits are fans, they even buy Skims, but the truth is more people don’t care or shrug at Kardashian than love her.

This is the opposite of the old paradigm, and the news business keeps employing the old paradigm. Running stuff up the flagpole that most people don’t care about whilst telling us it’s ubiquitous, everybody’s paying attention and involved. I can avoid anything these days, and so can you. In an on demand culture we only partake of that which we desire. And who desires to hear Kate Hudson’s new music?

Even worse, to the degree I’ve listened, and once is enough, time is too short, it doesn’t fit in with today’s hit genres. I mean at least try to imitate what’s in the Spotify Top 50. Then again, have you listened to the lauded Sabrina Carpenter’s hit? You’ll be appalled. It’s garbage. Especially if you have the context of the past.

Which is why most people aren’t listening. The Spotify Top 50 is just a slice of the market, a significant slice, but far from the entire pie. I mean did you hear Drake and Kendrick Lamar are in a rap war? Maybe you even know this, with the ubiquitous press. But who cares? I can’t seem to find anybody other than superfans of hip-hop, the rest of us are laughing, not only do we not care, we think it’s childish, so last century. Dissing each other in music? You can’t be more creative than that?

But that’s the world we live in. Where everybody can see Biden is old but those on the left can’t admit it. They’re doctrinaire. Believing if they keep everybody in line and no one talks about it no one will notice. I mean COME ON!

The truth is that being 44 is not a hindrance to Kate Hudson. But her lack of recent fame is. It’s not like she’s coming off of a hit movie. And TV shows move the culture more than movies anyway, more people see them.

Hudson’s star has been fading ever since “Almost Famous.” Who is hungry to hear her sing? Other than the people involved in this project, I can’t think of a single person.

And it requires an effort to listen. You’ve got to pull the music, the old days of push are history. Even her contemporaries, are they going to make the effort, with so many other options?

And speaking of options, like Sly Stone sang, today everybody is a star. And a lot of them are educated and articulate. Sure, we’ve got some imbecilic influencers, but no one said Sam Bankman-Fried was stupid. Nor Elon Musk. You might despise them for other reasons, but they’re educated, they’re smart. You might want to hear what they have to say. But Kate Hudson, a movie star? You’d have to be brain dead.

I’m aware there’s a great unwashed underclass who go for this lowbrow fodder, but in truth the winners in today’s world, and the public knows it, the younger audience even knows it, are the intelligent and educated.

Talk to a college student. They know how the game is played. They know how hard it is to make a living. They want to follow in the footsteps of those who are making bank. To a great degree, entertainment is left to the lower classes, who come from nowhere and even if they make it against long odds are willing to go back to nowhere. Never mind not being smart and worldly enough to make a stand against the system, which tells them what to do. Like the major labels who won’t even release your record if they don’t hear it as a hit, they’ll make you work with co-writers, do cover songs, and even if you can get away with resisting, chances are they won’t promote it, it’s too hard a slog, an uphill push. There’s not going to be some deejay in the middle of nowhere who’s going to spin it ad infinitum and turn it into a worldwide hit. The days of that kind of free-thinking conflagration are history. After all, just a few companies own all the radio stations and terrestrial radio means less than ever before.

So who is Kate Hudson’s album made for?

Maybe there’s a chance a track can catch on, never say never, but publicity, promotion, is no longer enough. I mean if Sam or Elon, even Bill Gates made a record, I’d check it out. But Kate Hudson?

Why is everybody operating in the past? Entertainment is fluid, and archaic systems keep being employed until they ultimately collapse. No studio is as powerful as Netflix. And it’s Netflix that had an extended comedy festival, taking programming risks all the while. Nobody else is doing this.

Needless to say record labels are not. They sit back and wait for something to resonate online and then they try to push it forward, they don’t make an artistic judgment, they don’t sign something that’s artistically good without the social numbers, all the rest of the indicators, that’s not the business they’re in.

And “The New Yorker” jacked its subscription price and is staying alive, people want it But “Entertainment Weekly” ceased publication. And the tabloids… “The National Enquirer” might be a feature of the Trump trial, but they can’t sell it. Gossip is online now. For free.

In truth, nobody from the old century wants to do the hard work. Find an act worth listening to, nurturing it and then building it from scratch. They used to say they wouldn’t put out your music unless they heard a single, now you literally have to create a hit single before they’ll even sign you!

And shortcuts, like making a record with a famous actor, no longer work.

It’s kind of like the Gaza protests. The Democrats are scared sh*tless about losing young people, yet every poll says Gaza is way down the list in terms of their voting priorities.

Never mind tuning in Fox News on the way to my appointment this morning and thinking I’m in an alternative universe. Trump is winning at trial, Stormy Daniels is a money-hungry deplorable. I mean if we can’t even get the straight news straight, what are the odds we can get entertainment news straight? Close to nil. Which is why the consumer base doesn’t even pay attention, they just go online and wait to hear what their friends say is worth their while.

Kate Hudson can make music all day long. Do I have to pay attention to her and her hype? I mean who gives a crap what Hudson has to say. As for reasonable singers, they’re a dime a dozen on TV, and they don’t break through. We’re looking for artistry, not product. There’s nothing to see here. Move on.

If you were even paying attention to begin with.

Mixer extraordinaire!

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/chris-lord-alge/id1316200737?i=1000655039432

https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/9ff4fb19-54d4-41ae-ae7a-8a6f8d3dafa8/episodes/616bd41e-eeb2-407e-a827-2bc4e3579175/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-chris-lord-alge

RE: Streaming Pays

You are absolutely right on this. My indie label has artists who we pay over a million dollars a year in streaming royalties. But more importantly, we have artists who we pay over $100,000 per year in streaming royalties….AS OPPOSED TO THE $5000 THAT I COULD PAY THEM ON CD SALES CAUSE THERE JUST WASN’T ROOM IN STORES FOR DEEP CATALOGUE. 

That is a really important point because if the music resonates, despite the genre, streaming allows folks to find it, save it and share it. So artists whose music couldn’t find an audience when limited to physical formats, now have a chance to find new fans!  And some, but not all of the DSPs offer tools to allow us to build those audiences.

I sympathize with artists who can’t get traction in the streaming world. But we spend every single day looking for and exploiting opportunities which we find at the DSPs (or in social media). It’s really hard for folks (artists) who aren’t following every single change at every DSP to keep up.  And there will always be some indie artists whose music resonates quickly and get success. But for the most part, it comes down to what record companies/artist managers always did: artist development.

Scroll down for trailer: http://www.chapmanproductions.ca/revival69

This is a fantastic movie. One that you will see if you were alive and conscious back in ’69, and one you will see even if you were not. Because it contains John Lennon. When he took the stage my heart skipped a beat.

But it also shows how the music and the business used to be different. Two twentysomething concert promoters flying by the seat of their pants. They concoct an oldies festival and ticket sales tank but instead of canceling the show, they go to the head of the local motorcycle gang for the money, who appears all warm and fuzzy fifty five years later, and doesn’t remember much, but he coughs up the dough.

And they’re off to the races.

Only they’re not. The 25k they got from the kingpin was for the Doors, but Jim Morrison got arrested for indecent exposure right after the deal was made and tickets still don’t move.

So the local deejay said to fly in Rodney Bingenheimer and Kim Fowley to scare up business. But that doesn’t work either.

This is not only the days before mobile phones, never mind smartphones, but faxes, everything was done by the landline. And the promoters are told the only way they can save the gig is by getting John Lennon.

Yeah, right.

Benefit shows are de rigueur these days. If you haven’t been approached to play for free, you’re not a star. But everybody on the inside knows the linchpin comes last, the superstar is not going to commit unless their fellow superstars are in. Then the dam falls.

But this Rock and Roll Revival is headlined by people playing clubs, they were stars once, but Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley and Gene Vincent and Little Richard are not a draw for the boomers now hooked on FM rock. Believe me, no one from that demo cared, these performers were oldsters who truly didn’t get respect for at least another fifteen years. But John Lennon was older, these were his heroes.

So the promoter calls Apple.

Just imagine it, someone you don’t know calling the Beatles’ camp and his proffer being considered realistically, a pipe dream. Two nobodies from the Great White North are going to get John Lennon?

No one believes it, not CHUM radio, not even the outlaw biker.

But Lennon comes.

How do I know this? This was news back in ’69. And ultimately there was an album, entitled “Live Peace in Toronto 1969,” which was most notable for a version of “Cold Turkey,” which got radio airplay. But in an era where you had to buy it to hear it, I didn’t, but a friend did, and I listened. I can still see the cover in my mind’s eye, the cloud in the sky.

But I had no idea there was footage.

Oh, they’ve combed the vaults for a zillion rock documentaries. Oftentimes giving them the imprimatur of life-changing when that’s questionable at best, like “Summer of Soul,” or even the recent “The Greatest Night in Pop.” Both great flicks, worth seeing, but not the essence of rock and roll, they say they capture the zeitgeist, but they don’t.

“Revival ’69” does.

This is what young ‘uns can’t understand, how it used to be different. Not only were promoters young renegades, the acts were their contemporaries. Everybody was making it up as they went along. There was no VIP, food was hot dogs and popcorn. Hell, the music was enough. No production, just the act on stage. And watching this film you get it.

So there are two stories, the backstory, about putting on the concert, and the concert itself.

And the concert itself… Chuck Berry. This is not the bitter man of later years, sure, he’s employing a pickup band, but he’s smiling, he’s into it. And up close and personal you can see how good-looking he is.

And there are no tape recorders on stage, never mind hard drives. Meaning the music is imperfect, which bothered no one back then, it was expected, we didn’t want a movie, we wanted a one of a kind live experience, that lifted us into the stratosphere.

I saw Bo Diddley at a dance back in ’66, with his square guitar, did not move me, I wanted to hear the cover band, which played a killer version of the Beatles’ “I Want to Tell You.”

Gene Vincent? He died in 1971. I don’t think young ‘uns even know who he is.

But Little Richard. Man, you get it. He won’t go on stage until the lights are right. Because he understands it’s showbiz, a performance, it’s more than the music. As do all the performers. Their sheer will, along with the music, is employed to get the audience into the palm of their hands.

Little Richard has got his pompadour, and he hits the keys…

And I’ll never get over that exposé on Jerry Lee Lewis in “Rolling Stone” back in the day, but people forgot the contents of that article and he was recast as being warm and fuzzy as opposed to a hothead who was dangerous. But this performance? Absolutely incredible. He comes on stage looking like he’s ready for a golf tournament, he speaks with a Louisiana accent most attendees have never been exposed to, but when he tickles the ivories…

And then comes Lennon.

Oh, there’s a bunch of fake gravitas at the end of the flick, saying Kim Fowley invented the tradition of holding up matches and lighters during a show, and that this is the gig that broke up the Beatles. Fowley had to get the idea from somewhere, then again if he were still here Kim would take credit, that’s the kind of guy he was. And there was tension in the Beatles long before this gig. Then again, it’s the first live gig for Lennon in so long, and it’s solo. You get it, he doesn’t have to worry about anybody else, he’s the star, he’s in control, and it’s palpable how freeing that must have been.

But in any event, this was a Beatle on stage. Before “Abbey Road” was released. Before the band broke up. One cannot fathom how big the Beatles were unless you were there. Statistics don’t tell the story. It was all about mind-set and mindshare. EVERYBODY knew the Beatles, and most everybody knew their songs. It was a phenomenon, it was mania, and to have a Beatle live and in person right in front of you on stage? That’s equivalent to seeing God.

And this was back when we still believed. I must say, watching Mick Jagger on stage at Jazzfest… I mean come on, you’re 80, can’t you act your age? Instead of dieting down to nothing, working out and moving like you did fifty years ago? We aged, why can’t you? Mick’s frozen in time.

But he’s not the only one. It’s a rare musician who is not. Bowie tried, and let’s be clear, not everything he did resonated with the audience. Do you remember Tin Machine? Did you even listen to Tin Machine?

People have success and they’re afraid to change, and they end up becoming caricatures. I hate to say it, but Trump is a bigger rock star than anybody making music today. Because he does what he wants and thinks the rules don’t apply to him, like all the stars of yore. They were beacons, against a hypocritical, moribund society. No, don’t see this as an endorsement, but one can analyze and see truth. Kind of like Jon Stewart at the Greek Theatre on Friday night:

“‘I know liberals say, “Don’t say Joe Biden is old” — don’t say what people see with their own eyes! You can say it, he can’t hear us,’ he joked. I know you know how f*cking old he is, and I know you don’t want to say it because Trump is so scary, but he’s so f*cking old,’ Stewart said, adding, ‘When you watch him on television, you’re nervous, aren’t ya? ‘”

“‘I’m not saying that Biden can’t contribute to society, he just shouldn’t be president,’ Stewart continued, acknowledging that Trump is just as old, but commenting that his supporters don’t live in reality, and he can lie his way out of most things.”

That’s how bad it’s gotten, you can’t even speak truth. My inbox is going to go wild now, you can’t go against the team. But that was the thing about the rockers of yore, each was an individual beholden to no one, they did what they felt, what they wanted to, and that’s why we believed in them.

And the music.

Now how many times have you seen “Woodstock”?

Certainly more than once. And you’re going to watch “Revival ’69” more than once. At least once it hits the flat screen. It opens on June 28th. Will you go to the theatre to see it? People won’t even go see “Fall Guy” in the theatre, and that’s got Ryan Gosling and good reviews!

Yes, lockdown is in the rearview mirror. It killed magazines, “Rolling Stone” is monthly and marginal, behind a paywall. “Businessweek” went from weekly to monthly, “Entertainment Weekly” stopped publishing all together. I’ve stopped renewing my magazines, I’ve been burned too many times when they’ve gone out of business, or become digital only.

The theatre is passé, expensive appointment viewing of cartoons that don’t move the culture? Hell, the roast of Tom Brady on Netflix had more cultural impact than “Fall Guy,” than almost any recent picture, because it was raucous and real.

But it wasn’t rock and roll.

And it certainly wasn’t John Lennon. Who showed up in Toronto on a whim. Even Allen Klein his manager said he wasn’t coming, after all, wouldn’t he know?

The truth is we all knew back then. If you wanted to know which way the wind blew you turned on the radio and listened to a record. And if you wanted the ultimate visceral experience you went to see your favorite acts live.

And this film documents all that.