MTV had it right. You don’t age with the audience, you pick your target demo and recreate your product to appeal to them. Otherwise, you die.

Of course MTV died anyway. Superseded by music video on the internet. But everything is time-stamped, don’t you know? But for a few decades there, MTV ruled not only music, but popular culture. The oldsters didn’t abandon the channel when it jettisoned the original VJs, it was shocked, shrugged, and stayed tuned in.

Who in the hell’s idea was it to have Conan O’Brien host the Oscars? I’ve got no problem with the orange-haired Harvard graduate, then again, the Lampoon hasn’t ruled anything in comedy other than SNL for years. Yet there are comedians all over YouTube, Netflix, who appeal to the younger generations. But I don’t think the Academy brass knows this. Because don’t you know that the internet and YouTube are the enemy? You’ve got to see a movie on the big screen, in a theatre. Just like you’ve got to read a physical book purchased in an indie bookstore. Even worse, the cohort of baby boomers is so large that it convinces itself that it’s in touch and right.

Hogwash.

My mother and her cronies went to the movies constantly. Because that’s what they grew up doing. If it was Saturday, they picked a flick. Any flick. It didn’t really matter, they were going. When was the last time you decided to go to the multiplex and bought a ticket for what was starting right then? Oh, maybe if you’re an oldster, but not if you’re a youngster. Youngsters live in an on demand culture. They do what they want when they want to. And if the schedule doesn’t comport with this, they don’t partake. This is why distribution is king. Content is not enough if it’s not on the right streaming channel and available 24/7.

And speaking of distribution, the Academy should have had a weekend wherein all nominated films were on a streaming service. At least then there’d be a chance that people would have seen the pictures. It’s not so much that the movies were bad, but that few have seen them. Make it easy, create excitement. But no, those in control of this telecast, this process, are not only afraid of technology, they still think the Oscars are a cultural rite.

But we haven’t had that spirit here since the last century. And that was TWENTY FIVE YEARS AGO!

Quick, ask a young ‘un if they’re going to watch the Oscars.

Of course not! Sit through a multi-hour telecast with all those commercials? If anything good happens, they’ll see the clips the next day and then forget about the whole damn thing. Quick, who won ANY Oscar last year? Can you remember? Today’s society moves so fast that everything is plowed under. Which is why you make the event stand alone and forget any gravitas. Gravitas is elusive, the public decides what lasts, and very little does. We live in a throwaway society.

And those are the films young people go to see, if any. As a matter of fact, Marvel movies and their ilk are declining in popularity. I mean once you’ve seen the trick… Would you be interested if a musical act made the same damn album over and over? This is what people say they want, but this is untrue. The public wants something new and different, innovative. They can’t tell you what it is, but when they find it they embrace it.

Why is it boomers want to keep intact traditions of the past? I mean it’s one thing to lobby for the preservation of edifices. But what’s next, the preservation of slang? Do we need to convince the younger generations that A Flock of Seagulls was cool? There were some great bands in the eighties, but a lot of schlock too.

So you roll out crusty actors as if they’re icons but to the younger generation these two-dimensional vessels are not heroes. The internet has eviscerated the power of actors, they can’t even open a flick, never mind a streaming TV show. No, to be revered by today’s younger generations you must evidence your identity. As a musician, as an influencer. Phony is anathema.

Kind of like the Oscar ceremony itself.

How about a dressed-down Oscars, like Zelensky.

But it’s all about the red carpet!

So why don’t you have fashion and beauty influencers interview those on the walkway, why not do something to entice the younger generations?

No, the Oscars would rather die. Sink like a ship. Whilst blaming the audience for being dumb and out of the loop.

No, it’s the Oscars that are dumb and out of the loop.

I don’t care if you watch. Enjoy it. I used to live for it, but no more. If I want to watch something at home…And I watch everything at home, what a pain the theatre experience is, you’ve got to drive there and wait for the flick to come and even worse it doesn’t start when you want it to! One of the reasons I gave up going to the theatre was because I’d sit there revved up from work and not be able to enjoy the picture, whereas at home the picture starts (and stops!) when I want it to…I watch a series. All the talk is about series. Because you can marinate in them, invest in them. Singles ruled until the Beatles made the album a statement. And now retro-thinking acts are so busy creating their albums that they’ve lost sight of the fact that in a fast-paced world you need a single to get people interested. Makes me crazy when musicians say they’ve got to make an album. Who’s got the time to listen to so much dreck. You’ve got to earn the audience’s attention!

And the Oscars have fumbled people’s attention for years. I don’t mind a long show, even younger generations love to binge series all weekend, but I’ve got no time for boring. If you’ve got my attention you’ve got to keep it, you’ve got to earn it.

And you’ve got to have a sense of humor about yourself, otherwise people don’t respect you. Enough about the power of movies, how many people are watching around the world. I’d rather hear jokes about how no one has seen the winners!

What I’ve written is heresy. Assuming you care. Which most people do not.

We live in an attention economy. To matter, you must get people’s attention. Most of the films themselves did not get people’s attention, why should they watch a show celebrating them? The whole thing looks like a circle jerk, if you pay attention at all!

I’m not saying visual entertainment is bad, lacking or history. As a matter of fact, it’s flourishing! It’s the heartbeat of the world more than ever. But the Oscars are out of time. They’re playing to a dying generation that remembers when.

I remember when…

But the real excitement is living in the present.

But most boomers and the Academy refuse to do so.

As for the studios… There’s no Robert Evans, there’s not even a Barry Diller, who made his name in TV anyway. We all know Reed Hastings, and most people know Ted Sarandos. But the head of a studio? We need DOGE for Hollywood, these puffed-up people make way too much money considering their output and success rate.

But orthodoxy persists. Just like Congress and Trump. You don’t want to speak the truth, you don’t want to cross the line. It’s groupthink 24/7 as the leader drives you off a cliff.

But people are hungry for the new and different, for honesty, for credibility.

GIVE IT TO THEM!

Spotify playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0g5Q91cZOhHEUWdmoS1C3N?si=89b7c7d59771476f

1

He was a survivor.

Until he wasn’t.

I won’t say he reinvented himself as much as Bowie or Madonna, then again Johansen was forced to, because nothing he seemed to do broke through, rained down cash.

So if you were a child of the sixties, you didn’t want to go into tech, never mind finance, you wanted to be in a rock and roll band. That was the highest goal. We’d all seen the Beatles, watched the scene mutate from the British Invasion to the Jefferson Airplane and Hendrix and Cream and we wanted some of that. The lifestyle, the fame…the women.

Now most people gave up. They couldn’t throw off their upbringing, couldn’t go all in on something with such low odds of success. Or else they played and realized they just weren’t that good. But some…some carried on.

David Johansen didn’t start as a scenester at the Mercer Arts Center, he worked his way up to that. From Staten Island to Manhattan. And in the mid-seventies, that’s where it was happening, New York City. Sure, there was the country rock scene in Los Angeles, inspired by the Byrds and culminating in the Eagles, but in New York it was dirtier. Everything happened late at night, whereas in L.A. everybody was already in bed. It was about being there, having the experience.

Or else being outside and looking in, as a result of the little press that leaked out.

Yes, there was this band playing at the Arts Center who dressed as women but everyone said were great. Then again, how many people actually saw them? This was not Max’s Kansas City, this was something new, something closer to the edge, the progenitors of punk, albeit inspired by the glam scene in England to push the fashion envelope.

Then the Mercer Arts Center collapsed. Just when the New York Dolls’ first LP was released, on one of the worst labels extant, Mercury. However, it was produced by Todd Rundgren, who was at the peak of his powers.

2

Now if you listen to the scuttlebutt of those who were there, in the band, Rundgren didn’t capture the excitement, the power of the Dolls on wax. We hear this all the time. Outsider band finally gets signed, they’re hooked up with a professional and when the album stiffs, it’s the producer’s fault.

But the truth is the Dolls’ first album was way ahead of the audience. It was noisy and in your face in an era where acts were growing their hair long and smoking dope and laying back. It was out of time, like in that Rolling Stones song. And it was still out of time when the Ramones pressed on, inspired by the sound. But then, punk exploded in the U.K. and it was fed back to us over here. But the truth is, punk didn’t really break through in America until Nirvana in the nineties.

So that very first album…

To succeed in the recording world you must have a hit. Something listeners can glom on to quickly, hopefully that radio will pick up on. But when Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers released their first LP in ’76 it was seen as too outside, classified as punk, and success had to happen over in England before the band was embraced first in Los Angeles, and then across the nation.

“Personality Crisis”?

If you were a hipster, if you were a denizen or observer of the scene, you got it. But despite everybody being against the Vietnam War at this point, there was a clear line between those in the know and those outside. In most of the nation the FM airwaves were dominated by meat and potatoes rock. “Personality Crisis” could not be understood.

And there were a few more tracks on the debut that deserve mention, like “Jet Boy” and “Looking for a Kiss” and “Lonely Planet Boy,” but either you were in the know or you were not, and most were not, and didn’t care a whit.

I went to see the Dolls at their first L.A. show, at the Whisky, promoting the album at the end of the summer of ’73. The venue was not full. Hipsters were checking them out, but L.A. hipsters are laid back and even though Johansen and company gave it their all, it didn’t resonate, it didn’t convert those who were not already converted. You can take the band out of New York City, but odds are outside the metropolis most people won’t get it. And they didn’t.

But there was a second album, produced by Shadow Morton, whose credits were with the Shangri-Las and Janis Ian. And, of course, the Vanilla Fudge, but was this a good fit for the Dolls?

OF COURSE NOT!

But Shadow was seen as dark. And the Dolls were dark. And you’ll find people who love the second album, but it had even less commercial impact than the debut. I enjoyed “Stranded in the Jungle,” but most people didn’t hear the album if they even knew it existed and then the Dolls were done. Bands without commercial success implode. And that’s what the Dolls did. Leaving their legend and recorded output to be discovered by future generations. Then again, the legacy of the Dolls is akin to that of the Ramones, the music has become secondary to the image, of testing the limits, of doing it your own way.

But what was David Johansen supposed to do?

Go solo.

3

What you’ve got to understand is most failed rockers have no options. They didn’t graduate from college, if they even went. Their business skills are limited. Which is why they keep trying, believing ultimately it will all work. Otherwise, what was it for?

We thought Johansen had disappeared. It had been four years since the last Dolls album. He’d gotten his shot, the Dolls were overseen by Leber and Krebs, the biggest managers on the east coast, with Aerosmith already in their stable. The music continued to evolve. Dressing up in women’s clothing was passé, there was no room for David Johansen. Or was there?

Now Johansen was managed by Steve Paul, who had his own label with Columbia, Blue Sky. And when Johansen’s solo debut was released…

Timing looked good.

David had left the glam behind. He was a straight ahead rocker now. You could fit him in with Elvis Costello and the rest of the new wave, conceptually anyway. Then again, he had that New York attitude.

But that’s what made the music so great.

The album started off with “Funky but Chic,” delivering on all the promise of the Dolls. If you were a fan, this was an elixir, this was what all the hype had been about.

“I got a pair of shoes I swear that somebody gave me

My mama thinks I look pretty fruity but in jeans I feel rockin’

I don’t wear nothin’ not too fussy or neat

I just want somethin’ baby to be able to walk down your street

Hey come on baby, let’s get on down to the boutique

Let’s bring back somethin’ that’s a funky but chic, I said now”

This was the flip side of “Saturday Night Fever.” Fashion counted, but there was no slickness involved. And certainly no disco. But ultimately radio never bit, so “Funky but Chic” became a fan favorite.

But the piece-de-resistance was the closer, “Frenchette,” the best thing David Johansen ever did.

“You call that love in French, but it’s just Frenchette

I’ve been to France, so let’s just dance

I get all the love I need in a luncheonette

In just one glance, so let’s just dance

I can’t get the kind of love that I want

Or that I need, so let’s just dance”

It was a different era, just because you were not educated, that did not mean you were not intelligent, that you did not have insight, and a sense of humor.

But “Frenchette” was too sophisticated for the hoi polloi. Yet if you were a David Johansen fan… This was all you needed.

4

But the follow-up, 1979’s “In Style,” co-produced with Mick Ronson, missed the target. It’s not that it was bad, it’s just that none of the tracks stood out and deserved attention. And honestly, if you were a fan, you were disappointed.

And in 1981 there was another Blue Sky album that got even less attention.

But then came the live album, “Live It Up.”

Sure, it had “Personality Crisis,” even “Stranded in the Jungle” and “Funky but Chic” and “Frenchette.” But despite the greatest hits lineup, it was the covers that delivered, and finally resonated with radio programmers, hip radio programmers in the city.

The Animals were a sixties curio, they’d been forgotten, but Johansen brought them right back with a medley of “We Gotta Get Out of this Place, “Don’t Bring Me Down” and “It’s My Life.” A killer trilogy. Then again, just “Don’t Bring Me Down” is enough to seal the deal. Johansen was a modern day Eric Burdon. With the same darkness and attitude. Man, was that medley great… It killed at the Roxy when I saw him. Yes, David Johansen still couldn’t sell any tickets. By this time many knew his name, but not many wanted to pay to see him.

The other gem on the live album was a cover of “Build Me Up Buttercup,” long before it became a movie staple later in the century. Johansen sped it up and added attitude and then…

That was it. There was another studio album, on indie Passport. And it was the heyday of MTV and there was no place for David Johansen.

So he reinvented himself as a lounge singer, the antithesis of his previous incarnation out on the ledge. Then again, Buster Poindexter had an edge. It was all a joke. Or was it? There was even a hit, “Hot Hot Hot,” that penetrated the consciousness of America, everybody knew it.

But most didn’t know who David Johansen used to be.

5

And to survive you’ve got to have relationships. David leveraged his to secure acting roles. He was a man about town in New York City, you saw him on TV, never mind movies. He was staying alive, which is the hardest thing to do as a musician.

And there were the lounge shows. And ultimately a Dolls reunion. Yes, some of the audience had caught up with what had happened decades before. But even though there was a new album, this was nostalgia. Because people grow up. And you can try to suspend disbelief, but you can’t. You can be young and dangerous, but very few can be old and dangerous. David Johansen grew up. And so did we. But since Johansen had morphed, just hadn’t repeated the same damn formula, he continued to be thought of, to be hip, he had a place in the firmament.

And then he died.

6

Music is a hard game. Sure, you hear about the money of the titans. Billy Joel could lose it all and then make it back.

But most people don’t make it in the first place.

And we all need money to live.

Most of Johansen’s contemporaries faded away into irrelevance, or died. But he soldiered on, figuring it out along the way.

Will he be remembered by the masses?

I don’t think so. I doubt he’ll be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, unless it’s in some special category.

But if you were there…

You were paying attention to the scene. I went to see the Dolls in ’73 because that’s the only way you could experience them. There was no TV, never mind internet. There was just a little bit of press.

And there were those of us who lived on the edge, who needed to know about the new acts, who had to check them out. And some of them broke through, and a ton of them did not. But still, we have our favorites.

Despite the brashness of his character in the Dolls David ended up beloved. And I think he knew that.

The circus lost another act yesterday.

But if you were there, you’ll never forget David Johansen.

The audience is hipper than the musicians.

The internet not only broke news, it broke music. First came the loss of ubiquity. You just can’t reach everybody. Kind of like the Democrats complaining that the Republicans are not reading the “New York Times.” THEY HAVE ALTERNATIVES! Ditto on cable news, never mind the endless niches purveyed online. Why should it be any different in music? IT”S NOT!

So what we’ve got in music is the three major labels selling the blandest, easiest to market music while stripping the number of new releases like a newspaper in a backwater trying to survive. There’s consolidation, a focus on the bottom line… Meanwhile, the aforementioned “New York Times” flourished by adding cooking and games and product advice…and now has 11.4 million subscribers. Meanwhile, the labels are focusing on superfans, a subset of the overall audience. They think it’s growth, but it’s really marginalization. Focusing on net, they’re forgoing gross.

But you’ve got to sell something the public wants to consume.

Doesn’t a diss war between Kendrick Lamar and Drake look quaint and out of touch today? The whole world is watching, as they did at the Super Bowl, and the supposed victory was Lamar putting the stake in the heart of the Canadian rapper. This is no different from the Marvel movies released by the major studios, who’ve marginalized themselves into irrelevance. Once again, fewer releases in fewer genres, overhyping material that most people don’t ever want to see. Meanwhile, after eradicating comedies because they don’t translate overseas, China’s market is now filled with domestic product, they’ve just had their highest grossing pic ever!

If you’re looking for the future, what’s happening, don’t go to the boardroom of an entertainment company, go to social media.

So music demand blew up with the Beatles and the ensuing tsunami professionalized the business. Money was rolling in in the seventies until the audience got sick of being served lowest common denominator crap, like corporate rock and mindless disco. The business crashed and then was resuscitated by MTV, an entirely new paradigm. But then hair bands came along like classic rock and despite indie rock and rap making inroads in the nineties the channel turned to half hour non-music shows, after all it was TELEVISION, not music. Television is long-form, music is bite-sized.

And then came the excitement of Napster. All the music you ever wanted, even that which was never sold commercially, was at your fingertips. Took ten years to figure out distribution, but Spotify ushered in the on demand streaming culture fifteen years ago and the music scene has been moribund ever since.

You see it’s now about software, i.e. music. And innovation is lacking. And it’s harder than ever to make a living period, never mind in music. So those who might have been innovative and testing boundaries are in other fields. They just don’t want to take the risk of being broke.

Meanwhile, there are singing competition shows. The lionization of no or little talents with brand extensions. The music is no longer the end result, but just a means to become a brand. And despite pledging fealty to the fans, acts can’t wait to separate themselves from them, flying private, showing off their wealth, illustrating rather than being just like the listeners, they’re completely different.

People keep asking whether they’ll be playing the music of today at the parties of tomorrow, how much of today’s music will last decades… Almost none of it! Heard Bobby Rydell recently? Fabian? Just because it sells once doesn’t mean it lasts forever.

Music is just like it was before the Beatles. A business, but not the cutting edge. Tripe sold to the brain dead.

But then came folk music. Which grew out of social consciousness.

But today’s generations are all disillusioned, and would rather focus on their screens than worry about the state of the nation.

Until they do.

Want to take the pulse of the nation? Just go on TikTok. Immediately after the Zelensky/Trump/Vance kerfuffle, there were videos on the platform. Where were the musicians? Silent! Or getting wardrobe fittings. Or complaining Spotify, et al, just don’t pay enough per stream. Meanwhile, these musicians don’t understand the payments just like MAGA doesn’t understand the facts. But it makes a good story! The U.S. sent $350 billion to Ukraine! Only the truth is it was less than half of that and Europe sent MORE!

In the folk music era it was about performance rather than sales too, just like today. And acts showed up everywhere for the cause. There was a pulse. Sure, people wanted to get paid, but not each and every time.

You see it was about hearts and minds. Uniting the audience and the performers. As I said above, now they’re separate.

And there’s no tradition. I may remember the sixties, but the frame of reference for those coming up today is Mariah Carey, or Maroon 5. Trifles. No nougat present.

So if you’re waiting for protest music…

It ain’t gonna be like it was in the sixties… Because the whole world is not listening to ANYBODY! And if everybody is not listening, the musicians don’t want to write and play it. And they’re not arbiters of truth, they’re just cottage industries trying to get rich.

The spark has to come from somewhere.

So just like Netflix stole Hollywood’s lunch, the public has stolen the power of music, the immediacy, the truth. That’s right, TikTok is more vital than today’s music. And it spreads to YouTube and Instagram Reels too. Everybody wants to play, unfiltered. Sure, there are moneygrubbing influencers, but there’s also a ton of truth.

So… Just like politics will be saved by spontaneous generation, the same thing will happen with music. Someday. Maybe not even for a long time. First and foremost it must be innovative and different. Which is anathema to the food chain, because there’s no instant cash. The outside takes a while to percolate before it gains traction.

As for the money…

It’s not about money, it’s about POWER!

Bezos, Zuckerberg, Musk…they blow with the wind. They’ve lost all credibility. All they’re worried about is their power.

Meanwhile, the “New York Times” has tons of power and its asset value is a fraction of Amazon or Facebook or Tesla…

If you’re getting into music to get rich…

You’ve got it wrong.

We want truth. The cash comes afterward, if at all.

Today you play and you see if your music catches on. If it doesn’t, change or give up. But the trophy for last place generation believes it’s entitled to attention and riches, that somehow it’s been screwed. No, you’re just not good enough, sorry.

And back in the day, in the sixties, you’d be stunned how few albums some of the legends sold. You’re complaining you can’t get paid, THEY NEVER GOT A ROYALTY, EVER!

So if you’re looking for music to lead in times of crisis… Keep looking, it ain’t gonna happen. Music is mini-moguls, and no one in the industry has a backbone, for fear of pissing off a potential customer. It’s more like General Mills than the Beatles.

So if you want to know which way the wind blows…

Go on social media.

Do not listen to a record, even though everybody in the music food chain will tell you you’re wrong.

Music blew up as a result of free thinking, individuals putting it all on the line, not holding back punches.

Today everybody holds back. The musicians, the Democrats. That’s part of Trump’s appeal, he lets it fly. You can too. That’s the modern game.

But you must have something to say and say it well.

And most people don’t.

But we’re looking for leaders.

AND WATCH THE PARKING METERS!

Tune in Saturday March 1st to Faction Talk, channel 103, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.

If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz