WHOLE PAYCHECK

I had lunch at Whole Foods yesterday.

Don’t know if you’ve been following the story on this market.  It’s in trouble.  One of its main suppliers of meat was sold, switched processors and the chain’s customers became very ill.  Bad press if you’re perching yourself at the top of the market, as the healthy choice.  And speaking of the top of the market…  It’s hard to sustain your business when the economy is tanking.

If this were the music business, Whole Foods would start insulting its customers.  So, you got some bad music, boo-hoo.  It’s a big bad world out there.  As for prices, you must buy music, it’s in the Constitution, so don’t complain.  I’m entitled to my private jet lifestyle.

Although none of this is true.  You earn your customers every day.

Which is why there was endless sampling in my Whole Foods yesterday.  Grilled salad, salmon, dips, water, carne asada…  I’d say they hired new people to man these stands, but I noticed only one guy behind the fish counter, only two behind the prepared foods case.  It’s as if the marketing guys suddenly went to visit the retail store and started explaining the merits of their records.  Whole Foods knows it’s in trouble, it’s taking action.  Will it succeed?  We’ll see.

But throughout the entire Napster crisis to this present day, the record business has reacted like it’s entitled.  And the consumer knows it, and is fed up.  The consumer knows record royalty rates are abysmal, that executives live a lifestyle only they can dream of…  They’re struggling to put gas in their cars, and Lyor Cohen is building a mansion in the Hamptons (this has been all over the Web this week).  The battle for the industry’s customers’ hearts and minds has been lost.  Forever.  Only new, trustworthy entities will be able to regain it.

I’d say if the majors wanted to survive, and they won’t, not as a dominant force, they need to force out all the so-called experts and hire young-uns.  But that probably wouldn’t work either.  That’s like trying to make a good Chrysler.  The 300 couldn’t even save that company.

HARMONY

I became a fan of the Dirt Band when I heard "Tennessee Stud" on "Will The Circle Be Unbroken".  I continued to buy their albums.  Especially since I found them in the promo bin at my local record store.

I won’t tell you you need to buy "Make A Little Magic", but I will tell you there’s a sweet song buried in side two, "Harmony".  Which was unavailable legally until very recently.

I surfed P2P sites for the better part of a decade.  Constantly looking for it.  Two days ago I found it.  As a result of new Web techniques, I’ve now found all my digital rarities.  Stuff like Lenny LeBlanc’s "Breakthrough", recorded for Muscle Shoals Sound/Capitol, and Leo Sayer’s "Living In A Fantasy".  Each contained tracks I couldn’t live without, that I heard too rarely on vinyl.  But now I’ve got them.  Now I’ve got everything I was ever looking for.

Now what?

Used to be I lived at the record store.  Coursing through the bins, looking for a hit, looking to uncover a gem.  Now that everything I want to hear is available for free online, it’s just not the same experience.  I don’t save up my pennies for one record, which I play incessantly, I download music by the gross, and don’t go much deeper than the single, the track I love.

Oldsters lament the loss of the way it used to be.  That’s the wrong way to look at it.  Files have won.  If you don’t know this, you’re probably Doug Morris, lost in the last century.  Radio, if not dead, is as irrelevant as the network news, a sideshow for those too poor, too uninformed to tune in cable or surf the Web.  MTV is "The Hills", need I say more?  We don’t live in a monoculture, but a realm of niches.  It’s hard for both executives and acts to accept this.  That playing music isn’t an instant road to riches.  It’s even more confusing for the consumer, who doesn’t know what to listen to.  Except for the young ‘uns, who only want the evanescent hits or the classics.

What if I told you there was no major league?  That you’re sentenced to a life in the minors?  That, at best, you can be Nuke La Loosh.  Would you still want to play music then?  Would you still want to be in the business?  You’d better be, because that’s the world we’re living in.

There are vast opportunities in concierge services, however inexpensive to the consumer they might be.  The new king will tell the listener what to hear.  And the listener will be thrilled.  This new entity won’t be the rip-off label or some lame Pandora/Last FM service.  It will be run by humans and trustworthy.

The old business is dead and gone.  A new one will replace it.  And no one has any idea what the new business will look like exactly.  All we know is it won’t be Universal or Live Nation, but an entity run by someone young that in hindsight will appear simple and brilliant.

Long ago the brothers fought
But still the tears are shed
So here we stand no wiser than before

You’d think music is politics, a two party system.  With the record companies competing against the consumers.  With Live Nation a third party force.  Instead of coherence, the last decade has only generated dissonance, and anger.

Whether I’m right or I’m wrong
Too weak or strong
Sure seems plain to me
Too young or old
Too shy or bold
We all need help
Just to move the stone

We’re going to get out of this together.  Read David Carr’s article from last Monday’s "New York Times".  NBC can’t fight YouTube, it must respect the audience, which now gathers the news itself.

"All of Us, the Arbiters of News"

How long (sha-la-la-la-la-la-la)
Sing it sweet need the harmony
Brother it’s taken too long
(Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la)
What makes it shine is the harmony

That’s what we had way back when, the harmony.  We went to the gig to feel like we belonged.  If we want to belong today, we go to Facebook.  The gig is a place to be ripped-off, an adversarial world you go to only if you truly, deeply, madly want to see the act.  Which puts on a show, not a concert.

The jam bands have it right.  It’s about the scene.  Prices must be reasonable.  People must feel like they belong.  What makes it shine is the harmony.

LIKE SUICIDE

Now we’ve come to the part of the program where the masses e-mail to insult me, tell me what a buffoon I am.  For being out of the loop.

We’re all out of the loop.  That’s the problem.  We’ve all got expertise that’s deep and matches with that of almost none of our compatriots here on this mortal coil.

I was sitting at a light pushing XM buttons and I came across a number on Lucy that sounded so good.  It was entitled "Like Suicide", by Soundgarden.  From "Superunknown", released in 1994.

My excuse?

I gave up on Soundgarden long before.  Didn’t dislike them, just had enough of them after "Louder Than Love".  "Badmotorfinger" left me cold.  As for "Superunknown"…that’s when left field band sells out and goes commercial and I laugh, because I’m no longer interested.  I don’t ever need to hear "Spoonman".

But I’ve finally become enamored of "Black Hole Sun" on Rock Band, needing to get the notes right.  And now, this album cut, that was never on MTV, never crossed my path, has enraptured me.

It’s a bookend to Alice In Chains’ "Rooster".  Faster, not quite as good, but coming from the same dark place.  You hear shit this good and you scratch your head and wonder why they’re not making stuff like this today.  OR WONDER WHY YOU’RE NOT HEARING THE STUFF IF IT EXISTS!

I thought Chris Cornell would make it solo.  He did not and has not.  As for that ridiculous supergroup he was in, the less said, the better.

Music is supposed to make you writhe, involuntarily.  Just before "Like Suicide" dies, when the music slows down and Chris Cornell emotes, you’re playing air guitar on the INSIDE!  You can’t help but fire it up again.

And then, when you go to steal it, you find there’s an acoustic take which is the same, but different.  And suddenly, you want to go see the band, but you can’t.

A MOVIE SCRIPT ENDING

Here’s where I admit that even though I love "I Will Possess Your Heart", I haven’t given the rest of Death Cab’s new album a decent shot.  Because you can only listen to one album at one time, and since I didn’t pay for it, since I had so much at my fingertips, I jumped to something else.

Actually, "A Movie Script Ending" isn’t from "Narrow Stairs".  It’s from "The Photo Album", released on Barsuk back in 2001.  I heard it on XM’s Loft.  This is when you get into moody music, stuff that’s more than a ditty, when you’re driving along uninterrupted, a captive audience, with your mood drifting.

Now even that’s gone, with everybody talking on the damn phone.  Or listening to their iPod, not ever being surprised.  But they’re missing out on one of the great joys of life, music DISCOVERY!

SIMPLE MAN

Richard Pachter went to see the original Bad Company’s one off gig in Florida, which they did to protect their name.  And in his e-mail to me, he referenced a briefly-released live album, cut back in ’76.

This was no reunion gig, this was when the band was at its peak.

I did a little Web work and was ultimately stunned, this was no audience tape, this was quality, from Albuquerque.

Yes, Bad Company played Albuquerque.  Can anybody but a star or a club band play Albuquerque anymore?

I never saw Bad Company.  Even though I bought their debut the day it came out, even though I’m a huge fan, even though I turned so many on to them.  You see I was an itinerant freestyle skier, never in one place too long, certainly sans bucks.  And, Bad Company might have played Albuquerque, but not Salt Lake City…

I bought a pair of skis last week.  I wasn’t intending to.  I was just asking Billy whether I needed something for the Back Bowls, something fat, that would float and plow through the crud.  He said he had a pair of Dynastar Legend Pro Riders that he’d sell me for $300.  That cheap, below wholesale, because someone had left them in the back room in Aspen and had forgotten about them.  And they’d changed the model.  But they were brand new, unmounted, last year’s edition.  He said Legend Pro Riders were all you saw in the Snowbird tram.

I’ve spent many a day in the Snowbird tram.  When you go over the first tower, it swings back and forth like a pendulum.  Until you get used to it, you’re sure the 125 passenger car is going to fall.

And, if you want to show off, you head right under the lift and ski Great Scott, to evidence your cojones.  But, if you’re a bit more adventurous, you take the catwalk behind the Cirque, waste a ton of vertical, cut through the trees, to the top of Mach Schnell, to ski the Wave.

Halfway down Mach Schnell’s double diamond, you cut to the left, where there’s a giant cornice.  Only this cornice is sideways, the wind has blown across the ridge leaving a narrow piste on the left and a drop-off on the right.  The key is to stay on this oh-so-narrow piste, only a dozen feet wide, skiing right down to the top of Wilbere.

But the skiing is almost secondary to the view.  After emerging from the trees, you’re confronted with the great expanse of Little Cottonwood Canyon, from an eagle’s nest, from an exclusive perch.  And whenever I think of that spot, I think of Bad Company’s "Simple Man".

I am just a simple man, working on the land
Oh it ain’t easy

That’s what a skier is.  A laborer.  Only he’s not tilling the soil, but the snow.  And, it ain’t easy, but even more rewarding than seeing one’s crops grow.

I am just a simple man, working with my hands
Oh believe me

That’s what I do.  My fingers dance across this keyboard, they render the story of my life.  It’s the only thing I’ve ever wanted to do.  Read this review of a new book wherein a writer went to Harvard Business School:

What I Learned at Harvard Business School

You can make money, but that doesn’t mean you’re going to live a fulfilling life.  Actually, playing it safe yields no rewards.

Freedom is the only song, sing a song for me
Oh we’re gonna make it

That’s what your music represents to me, freedom.  That’s why I want you untainted, that’s why I don’t want you to do a sponsorship deal, not to take any endorsements.  Because I need to believe in you and your music.  It’s my only way out when I’ve got more questions than answers.  I listen and believe there must be a better way.  That you’ve risked in pursuit of your passion, and I can too.

I am just a simple man, trying to be me
Oh it ain’t easy

They don’t want you to be you.  They want you to be just like them.  The pressure to conform is evidenced in our younger generation, where being a member of the group is the sole badge of honor.  Iconoclasts barely exist.  It’s not sixties souls trying to test the limits, but obese kids trying to brave the big bad world by cocooning together.  It’s only when you reveal yourself, warts and all, that you have a chance of people opening up to you.

I am just a simple man, trying to be free
Oh believe me

That’s when I feel most free.  In the mountains.  On two boards.
You may not understand it, but that’s probably because you’ve never done it.  Maybe you’re afraid of the big bad world, the mountains, maybe you’re afraid of getting hurt.  But without risk, there’s no reward.  Soaring down an open slope is like flying.  Nailing the bumps is like poetry.  And it’s got nothing to do with traditional criteria, your SAT scores, what kind of car you drive.  It’s just you and nature.  As primal as it’s ever been.

Freedom is the only thing means a damn to me

I’ll own that.  Our President gives it lip service, then bans habeas corpus, all in the name of keeping us free…  Huh?  Makes you want to move to the wilderness and retire, leave this crazy, fucked up world behind.

Whenever I hear this line, I’m instantly jetted to the Wave at Snowbird.  And that makes me feel good.

"Simple Man" was not the hit.  You don’t know it unless you’re a fan.  The rendition on this live album is every bit as good as the studio take.  It’s mesmerizing.  It brings me right back to who I used to be, and who I want to become.

BARNSTORM

One more and I’m gonna go.

I downloaded "Fast Times", "Feats Don’t Fail Me Now" and Neil Young’s debut.  But the album that made my fingers stop hitting the keys, that made me sit here and listen, dumbstruck, was Joe Walsh’s solo debut, "Barnstorm".

I was a big fan.  I play the James Gang debut to this day.

But I didn’t buy this solo debut, because I couldn’t afford it.

And I know most of it, own most of it, but hearing it in its entirety thirty five years later is awe-inspiring.  Because of the mood.

The record was not cut with a single.  It’s solely about what Joe felt.  And it’s not the mugging Joe of today, but the serious musician of yesteryear.  It’s soft as opposed to loud.  It lifts you to 8,600 feet, to Caribou Ranch, where it was cut.

How did stuff like this exist?  And how can it be gone now?

Now, you either want a hit, or want to record something so outside that unless a listener is a member of the club, you can’t get it.

Or maybe we need to blame punk rock.  Which insinuated that anybody could play.  Which is patently untrue.  There’s merit in simplicity, the Ramones were both an artistic statement and good.  But too many people with too few skills and lousy voices have followed in their footsteps.  And they’re not writing lyrics as good as Bob Dylan’s either.  Whereas it used to be about becoming a virtuoso, and then writing, making a statement.

The album starts with "Here We Go" and ends with "Comin’ Down" and includes between the eventual radio staple, "Turn To Stone".  But it’s the way the album opens and closes with these numbers, is a self-contained work, without endless filler tracks, that gets under your skin.  It’s like reading a novel, but one which is fulfilling with each succeeding reading.

Whatever Joe Walsh was shooting for here has been eviscerated from the landscape.  But maybe it’s exactly what’s coming back.  Without radio back in 1972, Joe Walsh could get no traction.   Whereas an album like "Barnstorm" comes out today and fans start spreading the word far and wide online.  It never gets on radio, certainly not on television, but that doesn’t matter.

Those are false goals.  That ubiquity, that fame.  In an era where a nitwit can be on a reality TV show and be famous for nothing.  In an era where the celebrity gossips focus on no-talents.  It’s almost as if those possessing talent should renounce the system.  Instead of selling out to get in, they should wear their outsider status as a badge of honor.

The old days may be gone, but the albums from that era are etched in stone.  If you play "Barnstorm" on a Saturday afternoon, from start to finish and then over again, while you clean the house, read the newspaper, do the puzzle, you’ll know exactly what it was like.
It’s not like the formula’s been hidden.  Just fat cats interested in getting rich have obscured it, it doesn’t benefit them.  But it benefits the musicians and the listeners.  The future is about the musicians and the listeners.  It’s time for the tail to wag the dog.  Then again, the executives were always the tail, the musicians were always the head, and the listeners were stuck in the middle, an integral part.

I’m stuck in the middle with you and Joe Walsh and it feels so good.