MILO Confronts the Panel | Overtime with Bill Maher (HBO)

If Jimmy Carter is our best ex-President…

Larry Wilmore is our best ex-talk show host.

I’m a fan of Jon Stewart but I rarely watched the “Daily Show.” However I’m addicted to John Oliver’s “Last Week Tonight,” wherein the British comedian speaks truth to power via research, a sharp contrast to the opinions bloviated on all the supposed hard news stations. I do believe these late night news/comedy programs have great influence. Sure, not everybody watches them, but we’re all looking for gurus, we’re all looking for explanations, and in a world where all the straight news outlets got it wrong and we’ve lost faith in the purveyors, why not believe in comedians who seem closer to you and me and are not busy cozying up to elected officials, thinking access is everything. Remember when musicians were outsiders? Now that role is being played by comedians. And never forget, it was a quip at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner that got Trump to run. Nothing hurts more than a joke that hits home. The harder you laugh, the truer it is.

So, if Oliver could break out from the “Daily Show,” couldn’t Wilmore?

Can’t say I watched him much, but he was too busy being funny.

He wasn’t funny on Bill Maher’s program.

Obama was too busy being Jackie Robinson, so fearful of being the angry black man that he didn’t stand up and get intense when he should have. In light of the ascendance of Bernie Sanders and the election of Donald Trump we must now acknowledge we live in a new era where people can handle both the truth and edge. Of course, Trump trades in subterfuge, but his acolytes believe it, and despite committing one faux pas after another, touching the third rail again and again, he won.

If you watched last Friday’s “Real Time” you saw that Wilmore was not champing at the bit. He waited for the holes and inserted well-reasoned truth in a show that’s often too nice, as if we’re all friends here and anybody living in Trump’s America knows we are not, we are utterly divided.

It was like Wilmore was chucking a spear into a Girl Scout camp.

Oops, that’s an Al Campanis moment. I can’t put “spear” and a black man in the same sentence. But Trump proved I can. But the point is we’re so busy trying not to offend that we rarely speak the truth.

Wilmore spoke the truth to Milo Yiannopolous.

Bill Maher is taking a victory lap, saying he was the catalyst for Milo’s demise. I believe he’s overstating the case. For Bill didn’t challenge him the way…

Larry Wilmore did.

It’s just that some people are stars and some people are not. And when someone fails publicly we believe they do not have it, that something extra that allows you to succeed on television. But the truth is Larry Wilmore was miscast, he was so busy trying to be late night funny on Comedy Central that he buried his essence, which is to be razor sharp, chucking that spear.

He uses the F-word and takes down Milo so efficiently all you can do is sit there and smile. End of story. Case closed.

One moment can turn you into a star.

It happened to Amy Schumer, roasting Charlie Sheen.

And it happened to Larry Wilmore Friday night.

I just finished reading “Norwegian By Night,” by Derek B. Miller. Written in English but originally published in Norwegian, there’s a lot of wisdom in this genre book, and none struck me more than the following:

“‘I remember when Harry James hit that C note above high C at Carnegie Hall in 1938. It was Benny Goodman’s orchestra. No one was sure if jazz deserved that level of respectability – if those musicians were serious enough to deserve Carnegie Hall. And then that one note. The city went wild.'”

There you have it. Your brilliance can shine and you can close somebody instantly.

I was closed by Larry Wilmore Friday night. He deserves another chance. He needs to be used properly. As the voice of wisdom and reason. We need someone serious who does not appear biased, who has no dog in the hunt, who can throw down lightning and stop us in our tracks with their veracity. Someone who can wow us and entertain us at the same time. Someone who can wait his turn, but can kill ’em when he gets the opportunity.

Furthermore, he looks just like my father, it’s uncanny.

P.S. Be sure to hang in with this clip to 4:16, where Larry tells Milo to go…

Who cares?

How did America’s go-to awards show, the creme de la creme, lose touch with its audience?

Let’s start with the movies themselves. Not only is the human touch that built Hollywood purveyed now on television, but the fantasy/superhero flicks that are made to play around the world are not honored by the Academy. It’d be like having a kid go to community college but attending graduation at Harvard, the disconnect is palpable.

But the media cannot stop trumpeting the story. You’d think the L.A. “Times” was on the studios’ payroll. But this has been the narrative for the past fifteen years, the media controlled by baby boomers trumpets old paradigms while the youngsters disconnect and then the media itself loses control. It happened in politics and it’s happening in culture. Yesterday the “Wall Street Journal” had a feature on the failure of NASCAR, TV ratings have nearly halved, they’re down 45% in a decade. Wasn’t rednecks driving around in a circle supposed to be the future of sports? But only half of 18 year olds now get a driver’s license and it won’t be long before no one drives themselves at all, but the wankers in Hollywood still think it’s about acquiring status iron, busy tooting around in their Teslas telling us how green they are.

That’s another disconnect. The stars used to be royalty we paid fealty to. Now they’re two-dimensional icons we make fun of. And our country is so divided that when Meryl Streep weighs in on the state of our nation, half the country laughs and refutes her message. How did we get here?

This resembles nothing so much as the youthquake of the sixties, wherein parents lost touch with their children who ultimately took over the culture. And that was a good thing, the late sixties and seventies were not only a heyday for music, they were the last golden era in film, before it became about the blockbuster.

But the dirty little secret is there’s not that much money in film anymore.

Quick, name the heads of the studios! Hell, can you even name the studios themselves?

I doubt it.

But you used to.

Used to be the studio chiefs were lords of Tinseltown. Today that honor goes to Evan Spiegel of Snapchat, whose IPO may be overvalued, but is gonna mint more millionaires than the movie business has in eons.

As for the agencies that fed off the studio system…

They too have detached. CAA and WME are deep into sports. There’s just not that much  money in filmed entertainment these days. Not that we’re so sure about the monetization of YouTube, but we do know there’s something fresh on the Google service that’s missing from filmdom.

Remember when going to the movies was de rigueur?

Remember when you had to go in order to function in the culture, when films were the main topic of conversation amongst your peers?

Now people talk about television. But mostly they talk about themselves, on social media.

As for going to the theatre…

In an on demand culture who wants to show up at an appointed time and overpay to endure twenty minutes of commercials, talking and texting people and crying babies? Certainly not me.

Nobody has seen these flicks. This is like watching the World Series unaware of the teams. Where’s the drama in that, when you’ve got no investment?

No wonder ratings keep sinking.

But people will tune in. To see the dresses, for the spectacle.

Because the truth is in today’s Tower of Babel society we’re looking for unification, we’re looking to connect, be a member of the group. So, if we watch the show we can bitch about it with our friends, be part of the discussion, but this has nothing to do with the movies themselves.

And the show itself is so disconnected from reality that you’ve got to laugh. It’s a mash note to an industry that’s mired in the last century. Sure, there’s nothing like going to see a great movie in a dark theatre, but how many of those are there?

Not many.

The vaunted “La La Land”… Some of the worst buzz on the planet. Rarely does it get a ringing endorsement from the hoi polloi, they shrug their shoulders and say it’s o.k. as Hollywood continues to lose credibility. Because when your must-see is not, it’s hard to get people out for the next flick.

And then there’s the broken business model. Movies think they’re different, that they’re immune. But in an attention economy all the hype is front-loaded for the theatrical release, which few attend, and then months later the VOD and paid streaming releases occur. To tell you the truth, if I could pay and see it right away I’d be much more interested the movies, I’d check more out. Not only is the hype fresh and the desire stoked, it allows me to be part of the conversation, as stated above, it allows me to belong.

But no, that can’t happen. You’ve got to save the business model. Theatres must be protected. EVERYTHING should be day and date, for the health of the industry itself. Steve Jobs moved music into the twenty first century and then Daniel Ek cemented the modern paradigm whereas movies have no solutions whatsoever. It’s not only about the business model, but maintaining pricing, when the truth is most of these flicks are worthless anyway.

We’re hungry for story, we’re hungry for humanity, which Hollywood once specialized in. But the studios jumped the track, because there’s not enough money in not only drama, but comedy. Nobody wants bunts, everybody wants home runs, but the end result is more strikeouts. Come on, look at the grosses on Monday, one flick wins and the rest lose, this is a business?

So I’m flabbergasted when I see endless stories about the host and the parties and the handicapping.

Yes, I cared…

IN THE SEVENTIES!

Used to be I went to a party and filled out my ballot, even in the eighties.

The last two years I’ve been on the road and missed all but ten minutes of each program and the truth is I didn’t miss a thing. I felt no loss. There’s no FOMO with the Oscars.

So, they’ll continue to fade away. Because the Academy, the whole industry, does not understand the concept of disruption. Nor Clayton Christensen’s theory that you’ve got to start with a clean sheet of paper, making little money, but then the new enterprise becomes good enough and all the cash ends up there.

Which is what YouTube and social media are all about.

Kids don’t want to be actors on the big screen, they want to be stars on the handset. And they’re very savvy. They know how much PewDiePie makes, and they see him in control of his own destiny as opposed to being bossed around by the man.

There’s your generation gap right there.

Kids don’t care about the Oscars. And this bodes poorly for the show. Kinda like Cadillac, which was eclipsed by not only Mercedes-Benz and BMW, but Lexus, never mind Lincoln, which can’t convince anybody under fifty to buy one.

Sure, this is about the Oscars, but even more this is about our society!

We want it now at a cheap price. We want to participate. We want to share.

And the movie business delivers on none of those desires.

So when you’re sitting at home watching HBO instead, when you turn on the TV the next day and see all the fawning on the morning shows, don’t think you’ve been left out. It’s they who are out of the picture, they who are out of the loop. They’re the last bastions of a dying economy, hawking faded products.

The first decade of this century was about hardware, that’s where the technological breakthroughs were evidenced.

Now it’s about software.

What’s happening on your mobile device is much more exciting, much more riveting than anything that’s happening in the theatre.

You can see it.

But Hollywood and the media are blind.

Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation – CNN

My favorite Van Halen track is “And The Cradle Will Rock…”

It used to be “Runnin’ With The Devil,” but I got hooked on the remastered version of “And The Cradle Will Rock…” on 1996’s “Best Of Volume 1.” I drove around in my BMW with the Alpine changer in the trunk and the ADS speakers all around and cranked it up and it made me feel so good when I had more questions than answers. And the funny thing about Van Halen records is when you hear them you can’t stop playing them, kind of like “Unchained.” Which was featured in the CNN clip above, I had to pull it up in Spotify and now I can’t turn it off.

Change, nothing stays the same

Ain’t that the theme of the day.

But a great record, when done right, is FOREVER! Even if poorly recorded and heard through the speaker in the dashboard, when the magic is encapsulated on wax you can’t resist it. Which is why classic rock maintains. But the Beatles were in the sixties, Zeppelin the seventies, but by time we hit the eighties, the rock saviour was…

Van Halen.

Which is kind of surprising. It’s not like they were a secret, they played at the Starwood endlessly. Gene Simmons even cut a demo. But it wasn’t until they got signed by Warner Brothers and got hooked up with Ted Templeman that they became a household word.

And never underestimate the cheekiness of David Lee Roth’s lyrics. But what puts Van Halen over the top, makes them sensational, is Eddie Van Halen’s guitarwork (and keyboards too, come on “Jump”!) And when Eddie wanted to donate 75 guitars to the Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation, I felt the two worlds Felice and I grew up in, from “Moon River” to “Eruption,” had finally come full circle and were complete.

So, when I was talking to producer Ben Bamsey in the green room at CNN before an appearance and he told me he wanted to feature musicians talking about charity I told him about Eddie and Felice.

It was the easiest pitch I ever made. Ben was all over it. And last night they did it.

And the funny thing is you think you know everything and then you learn something new. I didn’t know that Eddie and Alex played on the boat over from Holland. And you see we want to know everything about our heroes, we want to fill in all the holes, for they are family members.

And when I’m on CNN I hear from some people tuned in.

But when they featured Eddie and the Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation, donations started to come in, the rock press covered it in droves, because that’s the power of Eddie Van Halen, that’s the power of music.

The thing about music is it’s limitless, it allows you to express your innermost feelings, your angst, your happiness, your questions, your answers, you can do all that through your instrument.

And in a world where we’re told what to do every damn day, who to be, to color inside the lines, that’s positively a revelation.

Which is why the arts are so important. They set souls free.

But we live in a country where the bottom line now rules. Music is seen as expendable. But it’s the most powerful force other than sex, just look at social media, it’s ruled by players.

And I had no plans to write this, but when I clicked on “Unchained”…

The first thing I had to do was turn it up.

And then I thought how the guitar in the intro sounded like a sweet chainsaw.

And when Eddie started throwing off those notes at 1:49 and Dave was asked for a break I felt like my whole life wasn’t wasted, dedicating it to this music.

It’s a long way to the top if you wanna rock and roll.

And when I talk to Eddie and he still evidences the same intensity of yore, is still passionate about the sound, it gives me hope.

These are our leaders. Not the bloviators in D.C. Nor the billionaires eviscerating our jobs. But the musicians. With the power of their playing who transport us into the stratosphere, even though our rear ends are firmly planted, who set our minds free, who illustrate the possibilities, who give us hope.

No, I don’t ask for permission
This is my chance to fly
Maybe enough ain’t enough for you
But it’s my turn to try

LET’S FLY!

Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation

“Unchained“

P.S. The above CNN video plays best in Chrome or Firefox, but if you must watch it in Safari, read this:

Fix for SnappyTV issues in Safari

“Vail Resorts to buy Vermont’s Stowe ski area for $50 million”

This is a story of disruption.

Ideas are everything, but execution is key. Rob Katz, Chairman and CEO of Vail Resorts, retweeted Guy Kawasaki’s link to a story about this just a day before the deal closed:

“Sorry But Successful People Don’t Care About Your Brilliant Idea”

Ideas are a dime a dozen, but what are you doing about them?

Rob Katz worked for Apollo, in New York City, and then the twin towers fell and his wife said no mas, so they moved to Boulder, Colorado, where he sat on the board of Vail Resorts, an Apollo asset, which they picked up in the bankruptcy of its previous owner.

Then they gave Rob the executive reins.

Skiing is a moribund sport. Burgeoning in the heyday of the baby boomers, skier days have remained essentially constant for years. Now it’s about market share.

But those running the resorts are old school, they’re too deep in their vertical, they’ve got no vision.

Sound like the record business?

And the old paradigm had hit a wall. The old paradigm was make it on real estate, like the record industry made it on CDs. But the real estate market crashed back in ’08 and hasn’t fully recovered. There’s little new construction in resorts.

So Rob Katz came up with a new plan. He was gonna make it on lift tickets.

And the key was volume.

Now mountains cannot be standardized, but services can. What Vail does is buy your resort, throw a ton of money at infrastructure and upgrade the experience. To the point where others can’t compete. Because once you’ve ridden modern high speed lifts, slow ones are anathema.

But the linchpin of Vail’s success has been the lowering of lift ticket prices.

Used to be a season pass was nearly 2k.

Now you can buy unlimited skiing at all Vail’s properties for under a grand.

The Epic Pass started less than a decade ago at under $500. Now it’s in the $800 ballpark. Because when you provide something people need, they’ll endure price hikes.

This is what those in recorded music can’t understand. That prices go up after people are hooked, and you make it up on volume.

Vail Resorts sold 650,000 passes this year. Eclipsing the number of all its competitors COMBINED!

So, after lowering the price for a season’s pass, Katz went on a buying spree. Not only legendary resorts like Park City, but molehills in the midwest. And the biggest ski resort in Australia. Because…

If you can ski on the same pass for free out west, that’s an incentive to buy one!

That’s right, Your Afton Alps or Perisher pass, thousands of miles from Tahoe, Colorado or Utah, works at Vail’s resorts in those other locations. It’s a no-brainer.

And break even is less than five visits. So, if you’re gonna make a trip to Vail or Breckenridge or Whistler, all Vail resorts, you might as well buy a season’s pass, you’ll save money, and if you want to take another trip during the season, where are you gonna go?

Because lift tickets are expensive. Over a hundred bucks at any resort of size.

But they’re highest at Vail Resorts. $189 a day during peak season at Vail itself. Because Katz wants to incentivize you to buy the season’s pass, he wants to lock you in.

And of course there are other revenue streams. There’s food, and retail.

But the essence is lift tickets. Which get you to the mountain and get you to pay more for the extras, like ski school. Furthermore, you lock your money in before the season begins, so if it’s a bad one…you take the risk and Vail Resorts survives.

Because the ski industry is littered with bankruptcies, weather can be fickle.

Now this sell low and make it up on volume theory was hiding in plain sight.

It’s just that Rob Katz had education and experience where his competitors did not. They were operators. They couldn’t see beyond their noses.

So what we’ve learned here is outsiders can triumph, because their perspective is different. This is what happened in the music business. If you’re criticizing Daniel Ek, you’re missing the point. He had a vision and executed it. That’s what disruption is all about, that’s what making money is all about. The usual suspects are usually too inured to the old ways.

And the other resorts hate Vail. And the denizens of the other resorts hate Vail too.

But Epic Pass buyers, season pass holders, LOVE Vail.

And no one is stepping up to compete. No one is rolling up ski areas and creating a competing offer. And now it’s like the web, where one company gets 70% of the market and dominates, like Google, like Amazon.

So as you sit there at home know that you too can compete.

But it takes brains.

And the power of analysis.

This is what education is supposed to teach. You can look up the facts, but how do you put them together? Most people don’t know. They read the book, but they don’t analyze the concepts.

And everybody will say you’re doing it wrong, that you’ll fail.

But you soldier on despite the naysayers.

And of course there’s risk, but you’ve learned from experience not to do it the wrong way. There was a previous roll-up in skiing, at the end of the last century, but Les Otten’s American Skiing Company died as a result of too much debt and too much reliance on real estate, which Katz has avoided.

So even if you don’t ski, this is the future. Of not only online, but brick and mortar too. Don’t forget, McDonald’s eviscerated the local burger shop and Wal-Mart wiped out downtowns and…

You may lament those interlopers. But they’ve been eclipsed by Shake Shack/Five Guys, i.e. upscale burgers, and Amazon. Because the wheel keeps turning, you’re never safe resting on your laurels.

And I’m not sure what the future of skiing holds in an era of climate change.

But I do know smart people are going to continue to revolutionize industries while those presently in charge claim sour grapes.

Don’t be one of those complaining.

Be one of those disrupting.