Could it be that Dr. Dre is so credible, the godfather, the most respected man in hip-hop, because he HASN’T SOLD OUT?  Hasn’t endorsed champagne, hasn’t had a clothing line?

$400 headphones.  I hope Monster is writing him a fat check, because they’re certainly not going to sell many.  Can you say PRICE POINT?  You have to spend $400 to get bass?  Shit, most people’s STEREOS don’t cost $400.  Never mind their iPods, which they use to listen to music.  The only people who can afford these are the boomers, who hate rap.

As for branching out into speakers and surround-systems…  That’s what I think of when Dre comes to mind, TECHNOLOGY!  I can see Dre at home, reading old issues of "Popular Electronics", doodling, coming up with new ways for music to sound better, a regular Henry Kloss, or Amar Bose.  Isn’t this like Steve Jobs making a record because he sells a shitload of tracks at the iTunes Store?

I’m not saying you can’t grow from music into another business.  It’s happened.  Occasionally.  Sure, Jimmy Dean sold sausage.  But what about the Beastie Boys and their clothing line and magazine and…  And could it be that turning themselves into corporations, with non-music elements, has killed the big time rappers’ careers?  Have you looked at Jay-Z’s sales figures?  People aren’t showing him the love, not in prodigious numbers.

Would Jay-Z have sold more albums if there were no Internet?

Probably.

But that wouldn’t solve his radio problem.  Radio’s a closed shop that no one listens to controlled by people beholden to advertisers who say they care about music and the public.  Hogwash.

So Dre’s got a new album coming out.  I fear for him, in light of his label’s best efforts to destroy compensation for recorded music.  Yup, Universal has single-handedly held back the future.  Doug Morris has even gone on record about it.  He couldn’t FIND someone to help him!  They’ve employed talent scouts forever, to find hit acts in nooks and crannies, but they can’t find one fucking technologist, one fucking geek?  Hey, ASK YOUR CHILDREN!

But it seems that Jimmy Iovine has gotten out of the recorded music game.  Thrown up his hands and declared they must monetize elsewhere.  As if Tommy Hilfiger suddenly decided to create an airline.  Or Britney Spears decided to compete with Amgen.  Seems Jimmy only cares about money.  Art?  That was back in the twentieth century!

Dre’s a musician.  A fabulous producer.  You’ve got to focus on your assets.  License your tunes if you want more money.  Don’t go into areas you’re unfamiliar with.  The public’s not going to follow you.  Certainly not at these prices.

I think it’s hysterical that the major labels are so fucked up that they need 360 deals encompassing the world.  Wanting to whore their acts out to anybody who’ll pay.  Decimating careers in the process.

If Dre’s pissed about economic conditions, he shouldn’t go into business with Jimmy Iovine, he should SUE HIM!  For restraint of trade.  Throw the book at him.  A cartel fucked up music monetization.  That’s the story, not that consumers are thieves and everybody in music must find a new line of work.

But what I find most hilarious here is that years ago, this story in the L.A. "Times" would have been news, everybody in the music business would have known about it.  But not one person forwarded it to me.  Because mainstream media doesn’t have the clout it used to.  So, when you say equivocal things in a fawning press, which loves access, your business partners may be happy, but the public remains ignorant, out of the loop.

Fuck branding.  Fuck turning yourself into a corporation.  Focus on music.  There’s a ton of money to be made in music.  If only you’d stop listening to the usual suspects who’ve got no idea what’s truly going on because they don’t have Facebook or MySpace pages and they don’t surf the Web 24/7.  They don’t have their ears to the ground.  But the people do.  And they’re looking for good music.  They want to own it, they want to remix it, they want to sync it to slideshows and videos.  They want to see it live.  They will adore you and give you all their money if they believe in you.  If you’re in bed with the man and not them, odds are they’re gonna give up on you.

Don’t listen to the usual suspects.  Music is healthy.  There are opportunities galore.  But they’re different from before.

And let’s start by stopping lawsuits and licensing everybody with an idea.  Monetizing as we uncover what the public wants.  Stop trying to get the people to buy music the way you want to and try selling it to them the way they want it.  Stop fighting Apple.  If you think licensing DRM-free tracks to Amazon is gonna hurt Apple, still selling locked tracks, you know nothing about convenience, you know nothing about stupidity.  Hell, look at the tens of thousands of people who paid for the Radiohead album online this week when they could have gotten it from the band itself, months before, essentially FOR FREE! 

Come on.  Stop saying your hands are tied.  Start seeing the future as opportunities instead of closed doors.  Hell, if you want revenue from those draconian 360 deals then you’ve got to make the acts hit.  Which requires that people be able to acquire and hear the music cheaply.  Which side are you on, the future’s or the past’s?

New lines of work for Dr. Dre, Iovine