“Gliders Over Hollywood: Airships, Airplay, And The Art Of Rock Promotion”: https://rb.gy/l4m82v

This is the best book about how it used to be.

And it certainly ain’t that way anymore.

Sometime early in this century everybody started to say the record business was no longer fun.

This book tells the story of when it was fun. When there was seemingly unlimited money and the bands that were broken were household names.

Rap grows up in the burbs of Southern California and is bitten by the music bug, he gets a guitar, he plays in a band… WE ALL DID! We saw the Beatles on TV and said THIS IS IT!

Actually, we started before that, with nylon-stringed acoustic guitars, to be part of the folk scene. All anybody seems to remember from that era is Bob Dylan, but there were a plethora of acts telling stories about life in this world and the music was so popular that there even was a TV show, “Hootenanny.” The Beatles killed all that, that’s what Dylan at Newport was all about. Bob crawled from the wreckage into a brand new car, everybody else shook their fist and was left in the dust. Actually, it’s akin to Napster and Spotify. Either you got on board or you were left behind. And those whose cheese was moved are still bitter.

Anyway, kids weren’t at home on their computers, they were outside, playing sports, playing music, going to dances. And Rap was there, on stage. Every community had bands, even battles of the bands, now there are robot wars.

So at UCLA Rap is a prankster at the fraternity and a friend comes up and tells him he should be the college rep for Columbia Records.

Rap is fearful of selling out to the  man, but he takes the job and ultimately becomes a full time employee of the company and 33 1/3 years ensue and tales are told.

Now if you’re of a certain vintage, if you were in the business, you’ll recognize a ton of names. Not only the bands, but the players, people like Harvey Leeds and Jim McKeon…this list goes on and on. Actually, it’s interesting to see the transition from the old days, the unknowns who pre-dated the Beatles and then moved on so that the boomers could build up this business. These new employees lived for the music, it was everything to them.

But they were handsomely paid and had the time of their lives in the process.

Yes, all the stars and their stories are included.

Yes, we get Springsteen, at the Roxy and elsewhere.

Bob Geldof singling out radio and paying the price in return. Also pissed that his band was competing with the Fabulous Poodles.

You get characters like Bruce Allen, and the breaking of Loverboy.

You get a spat between Scott Muni and Bill Curbishley, the former won’t play one of Bill’s acts on WNEW because Bill threw him out of a party…and Bill says justifiably!

All the inside dope on Pink Floyd. Even stories about Paul McCartney himself. And the Stones too!

And Rap is not just an observer, he’s a participant. Doing the coke, staying up all night, involved in the food fights…

Yes, everybody seems kind of adolescent. Or as Harvey Leeds said when he won a Pollstar award…you can grow up, but you can be immature forever! And the bands are mercurial. And one thing is for sure, the labels make the bands successful, and it’s all done via radio.

And Rap comes up with one innovative promotion after another. Whether it be a laser cannon for Blue Öyster Cult or a blimp for Pink Floyd.

There’s reference to the pressure to deliver, a report card every Tuesday, that was the pain that came with the gig, that kept you up at night. It was all about the numbers in “Radio & Records”…do young ‘uns even know what that was?

And it’s definitely different today. Terrestrial radio comes last. The labels still have radio promotion staffs, because they don’t know what else to do. The public, via internet platforms, is in charge of creating hits. Maybe the label can amplify them, maybe it can’t.

And there is not a constant juggernaut of superstars. The labels have slimmed down both their employee and artist rosters. It’s not an endless money machine. The labels used to dominate the business, now they can’t even afford more than a handful of tickets to the show, where they’re treated as second-class citizens by the promoter.

I’ve known Rap for decades. First met him at a radio conference. Yes, that used to be a thing. Labels had suites in the hotel and you didn’t walk out the front door until the sun was up.

He was there. For all the shenanigans, for the high life.

This book is extremely readable, unlike the plethora of tomes written by those who can no longer work about the old days they lived through. You’ll have a hard time putting it down. But as you approach the end…

You’ll get depressed. Because all of this is in the rearview mirror. And you are too. Rap was born in ’48, he’s in his late seventies. And if you were around to experience all this you’re probably a septuagenarian too, or close.

This is the only book I can remember that truly details what it was like inside the star factory. What it was like to be a worker bee, a well-compensated worker bee who was working around the clock because it was both fun and what was expected.

If you were around back then, you definitely want to read it.

If you weren’t…READ IT AND WEEP!