“Rocky Mountain High”
John Denver

Love him or loathe him, if you’re not enamored of this song you’re not a friend of mine.

From the acoustic intro you’re immediately transported to a place of fresh air where your troubles have been left behind.

We all want to be born again, we all want to find the key to every door, and despite having such a poignant message, what really makes this track soar is the sound and the indelible chorus, with the way it gets quiet just before the title words are sung.

“Rocky Mountain High” is one of those tracks you can never burn out on, that you never tire of hearing, that makes you go out and buy the album containing it just to hear it, just to be able to play it over and over again.

I did.

“Rocky Mountain Way”
Joe Walsh

It looked like he was toast, that leaving the James Gang was a decision akin to Shelley Long leaving “Cheers,” his first album had “Turn To Stone,” but it got little airplay, Joe was in a funk and then he dropped this.

Spent the last year Rocky Mountain way

People who’d never been higher than sea level could and did sing every word. On this track alone, Joe was back and bigger than ever. Never argue with the power of a hit.

Or a riff.

This was the first track to popularize the use of the voice box, but it would have been gigantic without it, talk about capturing magic in a bottle.

“Colorado”
Linda Ronstadt

This Rick Roberts penned tune was on Linda’s first Asylum album, the one that was going to make her a star.

Alas, it did not happen, that didn’t occur until the next LP, which came out on her old label Capitol.

The LP has a genius version of Neil Young’s “I Believe In You,” a complete misreading of Randy Newman’s “Sail Away,” another take on “Love Has No Pride,” that Bonnie Raitt debuted, and one of the first covers of the Eagles’ “Desperado,” but I find this to be the most memorable track on the album.

But I’m tired of that race
It was much too fast a pace
And I think I’ve found my place
Colorado, I want to come home

This was still the seventies, pre Internet, pre airline deregulation, pre no cost long distance, Colorado was still off the grid, celebrities had not yet discovered Aspen, you could truly retreat to the Rocky Mountain state, slow down and live an alternative lifestyle.

“Boulder Skies”
Pure Prairie League

Colorado canyon girl could set me free

Never underestimate the power of Craig Fuller’s voice. It closes you immediately. And many baby boomers know this song by heart, because it followed “Amie” on side two of Pure Prairie League’s breakout album, “Bustin’ Out.”

It’s all about the sound.

Especially in the fast-paced world of today, we want something that puts our mind on the back porch of life with a beer in our hand, reflecting on what has happened and is yet to be.
“Boulder Skies” does this.

“Man Of Constant Sorrow”

I’ll say goodbye to Colorado
Where I was born and probably raised

Covered by everybody from Bob Dylan to Dan Tyminski (who, alas, changes it to “Kentucky”), my favorite version of “Man Of Constant Sorrow” is contained on Rod Stewart’s debut album.

This is not the prancing peacock of today, he was completely unknown in America when this album was released, and to drop the needle was a revelation, it was so intimate.

And who knew you pronounced it RAD instead of ROD.

I laughed at him, figured he was English and he didn’t know. But the truth is everybody who lives in the state pronounces it his way.

“Rocky Mountain Breakdown”
Poco

Jim was gone and Richie too, the act had not yet switched to ABC and had hits, but this is pure Poco and fans know it and it’s contained in Epic’s superb Poco compilation, “The Forgotten Trail.”

“Colorado Christmas”
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band

Written by the long forgotten but undeservedly so Steve Goodman, this is a Christmas song you might have never heard, but should.

But all along the Rockies you can feel it in the air
From Telluride to Boulder down below

Makes you want to hop a plane to the mountains immediately!

“The Bitch Is Back”
Elton John

Huh?

Don’t you remember, the album was named CARIBOU!

That’s right, that was the cool place to cut your LP back in the early seventies, at James William Guercio’s Caribou Ranch in Nederland, Colorado. Walsh recorded there, Joe’s producer Bill Szymczyk cut Rick Derringer’s “Rock & Roll Hoochie Koo” there too, Supertramp did “Even In the Quietest Moments,” and of course multiple Chicago LPs were constructed at that high altitude.

Meanwhile, this was a huge hit when I lived in the mountains. Albeit in the Wasatch, in Utah.

“Get Out Of Denver”

Made famous, of course, by Bob Seger, he and his manager are too ignorant to be on Spotify, so I’m including Dave Edmunds’s glorious take.

“Grand Junction”
Poco

Was it metaphorical or was it really about the western Colorado burg? I’m not sure!

But it tears right along on Poco’s fantastic initial LP.

“No More Buffalo”
James McMurtry

We headed south across those Colorado plains
Just as empty as the day

Not about the mountains, but the half of Colorado that’s flat, that people forget about, this track elicits the feeling of that landscape.

“I Know You Rider”
Grateful Dead

Most famously on the live album “Europe ’72,” many people have cut it and it contains the line:

I’d shine my light through cool Colorado rain

“When It’s Springtime In The Rockies”
Gene Autry

When it’s springtime in the Rockies
I’ll be coming back to you
Little sweetheart of the mountains
With your bonnie eyes of blue

Yes, Colorado and its topography have been inspiring songwriters for eons, even back to the Singing Cowboy. We all yearn for the simple life and the clean air.

And a multitude of acts have emanated from the state, from Lothar and the Hand People to the Samples to Big Head Todd to the Fray and…

I’m sure you’ve got your own favorites, but this is a start!

Rhinofy-Colorado Songs Primer

From: Irving Azoff
Subject: re: Buffett “sell a plane” quote and the digital space

“Vanity Fair” wrote:

“Moderator Irving Azoff, the owner of Azoff MSG entertainment responded with a zinger for Buffett, whom he told to ‘sell one of the planes.'”

In classic fashion, the press twisted words about getting paid by
selling planes rather than focusing on how hard it is to actually get
paid online as an artist. There’s no rewards program for frequent
streamer-miles yet….

The point I was trying to make was that guys my age and Jimmy Buffett’s age need to be looking at digital services as the future, not the present road for real money. We might need to sell some tangible assets if we want to keep playing in the streaming music space because it’s hard for today’s legacy artists to make a real buck in the digital space vs the touring business. I don’t think that’s going to change in the near term.

_______________________________________

From: Dan Navarro
Subject: Re: The Jimmy Buffett Dustup

What I never see mentioned in any account of the economics of the music business is that labels recoup off the artists’ share, not off the top.

That simple fact alone means that it is mathematically possible…even likely…that a record can be in profit, based on sales numbers and wholesale prices, but the artist remains unrecouped, which is then spun to imply that the label is not paid back for its investment.

It has also meant that managers go for the quick kill on the advance, since they know that, hit or not, they may never see another dime in royalties.

I can’t help but factor that into any opinion I have of the economics of the record business, and how much artists are paid. We’re not trying to get rich, we’re trying to get paid, accurately, fairly, in a timely manner.

_______________________________________

Re: Paul Revere

Thank You Bob
I am not good at saying goodbye! You did it for me. Of course I loved Paul and all the Raiders records!
Yes. Even us Brits got a taste of that fun band although we didn’t see the TV show! Thank you for saying good bye so beautifully!

Peter Noone

_______________________________________

Dear Bob
In response to your piece ”Napster would kill creation ” etc.

I have been a record producer since 1966, so i can speak with the experience of history. In spite of all the stories and myths about how unfair and horrible record companies were prior to the ”new” world of the internet and streaming, the old model, as flawed as it might have appeared was responsible for  facilitating the entire history of recorded music. From Louis Armstrong to Michael Jackson, it was the structure of discovery and development that defined the record business. The pecking order that was in place during these years made us all better at what we did. If you were going to make it, you had to have your s___ together. It drove the most talented, the hardest working, the best and the brightest to achieve the results that now comprise the catalogues of the streaming services. Somehow in spite of the snakes and hustlers that sometimes ran the business, what was created was a body of work of great value and beauty. What has the ”new ” model Created.

Stewart Levine
Record Producer

_______________________________________

“On the one hand information wants to be expensive.”

That’s the first half of the Stewart Brand quote that everybody forgets but the news media has embraced. Used to be reporters asked hard questions and revealed their answers in their newspapers and magazines, now they’ve all emulated the music business and taken their show on the road, it’s all about conferences baby, where the well-heeled overpay and the hoi polloi get crumbs from the people who can’t write and leave the best parts out.

Yesterday Jimmy Buffett asked Daniel Ek for more money at the “Vanity Fair” conference in San Francisco. What, you didn’t get an invitation? Of course not, because you don’t count, it’s a whole world of intelligentsia who are all about relationships and the only people you know are hanging at the bar.

And Jimmy Buffett stands up in all his glory and asks Daniel Ek for a raise. Why don’t you try the same thing. Why don’t you go into Lucian Grainge and talk about his pay and the money Universal is making and ask for a bonus. Even better, ask for a discount on the subway. Better yet, on your taxes. What Buffett is asking for is to throw out the rule of law, of contracts, and to have Spotify throw artists a few shekels out of the goodness of its corporate heart, although the last time I checked they didn’t have one, no corporation does, Apple doesn’t pay taxes and neither does U2. Everybody’s in in for themselves but since Buffett makes art, he gets to evade the rules. Huh?

Even better, how about Jimmy kicking back some of that live dough to his label. Ticket prices have far exceeded inflation for years, doesn’t Lucian Grainge get to dip down into the seaman’s pocket for some of that?

Actually, they do that today, with a 360 deal. Which you don’t have to sign.

You want the label to make you famous, you want it to employ its marketing power and relationships, and then you want to bitch that you’re just not getting rich. No one said you had to do it their way!

Bitch about something you can change. Elect a different congressperson, fight to ensure gay marriage or abortion, take to the courts, because jawboning hardly ever works, check it, the President rarely employs it.

I expected more from Jimmy, who’s a minor Gene Simmons, for all his affability Buffett is supremely confident, he thinks he knows everything. When his record sales started to tank he opened restaurants, put the pedal to the metal on merch, even got into the casino business. Once again, did he share a piece of this revenue with those who got him there? Of course not!

And no one beats up on Google, which started this problem, with YouTube, because Google is their friend, those guys are over forty, we all use Google every day, it’s an institution in this short term memory society.

But the wisest words were spoken by Tom Freston, who declared that music no longer drove society, tech did. This is the same guy who said MTV was no longer gonna show videos, that they’d become an on demand item online. But the artists complained about MTV’s U-turn until very recently, when they found out YouTube allows them to go directly to their audience whenever they want and get paid in the process. Come on, hear anybody bitching about the cable channel recently?

And they won’t be bitching about streaming services either.

But the truth is artists are dumb. Trotted out for entertainment. Unaware of how business really works. U2 will not recover from the stink of the Apple cram down forever, the same way Metallica has never fully recovered from the Napster fiasco, because in both cases they could not read the landscape. Napster died and was replaced with worse and piracy reigned and then streaming services reined piracy in. And U2 is the poster boy for aging out of touch rock stars which tech companies will now keep at arm’s length, because they’re only about the money, only about the promotional value, do you really think Tim Cook is gonna listen to Jimmy Iovine now?

Streaming revenues will go up.

And if you create something as good as the iPhone you will not be bitching about your income.

That’s right Jimmy, write a hit, you’ll make money in ways you never thought of, and you can whore it out to the corporations you bitch about, licensing it to the beer company or TV show or movie du jour, never mind playing corporates for seven figures.

But that’s much harder to do than complain.

“Jimmy Buffett Asks Spotify C.E.O. Daniel Ek for a Raise”

How did this happen?

They’re fighting to be on Howard Stern’s radio program. Today alone, he featured not only Chelsea Handler and Billy Idol, but Bill Murray, the ungettable get.

That’s right. Bill doesn’t even have an agent, he’s elusive, but he wanted to be on Howard’s show.

In an era where content providers are bitching everything’s free, how did Howard Stern not only charge, but build an entire distribution network around him known as Sirius Radio?

1. Longevity

We’re inundated with the work of the barely pubescent and the hype attendant thereto. But they’re never on Stern’s show, because they have nothing to SAY!

The truth is you get wiser as you get older, you learn from experience, and the only people who don’t believe Howard is better than ever are those addicted to scatology with the desire to go back to the high school locker room.

Howard is more comfortable in his skin. He displays his neuroses but is no longer fighting to get ahead, no longer telling us how great he is, how much he’s been slighted, he’s reveling in his success and it shows. He’s the comic book nerd uncomfortable in his skin who stayed in the game long enough to win.

2. Dedication

Howard prepares. Too many interview shows lack this element. And that is what is pushing Howard over the top, his interviews, his show is the go-to place to promote, because his audience is so loyal, and ultimately larger than that of the late night talk shows, despite the latter getting so much press. Howard really wants to know, the audience is eavesdropping, whereas on television the hosts are always playing to the network, always worried about their ratings and their contracts, whereas Howard knows he built Sirius and they don’t want to screw with him.

Letterman did the same on TV, but that was decades ago, and his show was so trendsetting and successful that everybody imitated it, that’s right, everybody on late night is doing Dave’s show, which is ultimately comedy. Dave loves Howard, but Dave can no longer put in the hard work, Dave could triumph once again if he did, if he was just more Dave, embraced his edge, but Dave’s tired. Being at the top of the heap for so long will do that to you, Howard’s just ascended into the stratosphere.

3. Personality

Everybody rubs off the rough edges, they believe if they don’t appeal to everybody, they’re not going to appeal to anybody. But the truth is long term careers are based on being unique, trailblazing in your own world. There’s an excellent article in Monday’s “Los Angeles Times” how Becky G worked with Dr. Luke and ended up sounding just like everybody else, how she lost her edge, and that’s what we’ve got in music, everybody sounds the same, except for those without enough talent. They’re afraid to go their own way, afraid radio won’t play them and the media won’t feature them. But unless you have the confidence to woodshed in the wilderness until you’re appealing to the masses you’ll never become a legend.

4. Embrace The Taboo

Once upon a time it was Butt Bongo and strippers, now Howard has graduated to asking the questions we all want to know and have never even thought of. Like exactly how did David Crosby impregnate Melissa Etheridge’s significant other? There are answers, and Howard elicits them, and what we learn is that so many of these celebrities are just like us, or even crazier than us, like Chelsea Handler peeing on the back of her boyfriend or Jason Biggs peeing upon her, never mind Stern employee Sal having a fascination with the urination fetish. We all have a fetish, you just don’t want to talk about yours, but on the Stern Show there are no limits. And on one hand you feel inadequate, comparing yourself with Chelsea Handler’s globetrotting lifestyle, on the other, the longer people talk the more screwed up you realize they are.

5. Time

Howard’s got hours, and he’ll go as long as you’ve got something interesting to say. This is not the pre-interview world of late night TV, wherein you distill a few stories and then tell them when the lights go on. When you’re done listening to a Stern interview you’re nearly exhausted, you feel tanked up, you’ve got as much information as you can handle in one day. It’s kind of like ending a conversation with a best friend, you’re burnt, for now it’s enough. You can see the clock on television. On Stern there’s enough time to delve into the nitty-gritty, and don’t go on unless you want to.

6. Promotional Power

You might get publicity that you’re hosting SNL, but no one bumps your product more than the Stern Show, which is why Neil Young is coming on to sell his new book. Howard’s fans are loyal, they believe he’s on their team, so they’ll buy what he’s selling, even if it’s the Squatty Potty.

That’s why almost all of these celebs go on these talk shows, to promote their latest projects. You can’t get them otherwise, and it used to be that Howard could not get them at all. But word has gotten out of the power of his show and now everybody is clamoring to come on. Even Robert Downey, Jr. And for those into music, people who never appear on the late night shows, like Joe Perry, who wears his animosity towards Steven Tyler on his sleeve.

7. The Move To Sirius

In retrospect, it was too soon. Before both YouTube and podcasting blew up. It marginalized Stern. And I don’t know how much his move was about money or freedom, but at this late date you have to say Howard was right about the freedom. It’s not that he can use profanity and talk about sex, it’s that he’s not looking over his shoulder for the censor or the FCC, he’s free. But only the hardest core moved over to satellite with him.

But this allowed him to refine his show in relative obscurity. The show today is different from the show yesterday. There’s very little shock, and mostly family information/squabbles, i.e. the personalities and interactions of the staffers, and interviews. It wasn’t that way in 2006, but now Howard knows what it is and has embraced it, he’s found his way, he’s like an old act that took three or four albums to find its voice and hit a groove.

And he garnered attention because of the “America’s Got Talent” connection. A brilliant move, it helped Howard more than the show. The show is worthless, but the brain dead media lemmings had to comment upon his inclusion and then they started trumpeting the gossip Howard broke on his own show and over the last few years, it turns out everyone’s listening to Stern.

That’s right, if you say you can’t afford it, if you say he’s juvenile, the joke’s on you. Because the movers and shakers listen to Howard, more than anything else. More than late night TV, more than the newspaper, more than sports, Stern is the epicenter, he’s the water cooler conversation, when everybody went BuzzFeed, boiling it down to the nugget for the supposedly short attention span public, Howard went deep, because the truth is people have endless time for something great, and Howard is great.

If you want to lunch with the heavyweights, if you want something to say to the celebrity, listen to Stern, it’s your number one outlet.

And all of this success is pissing off the hard core. Because they’re worried Howard is no longer theirs, the same way they questioned Letterman’s changes when he jumped from 12:35 to 11:35. Are you one of them or one of us?

Letterman’s flaw was changing his show for a theoretical audience, betraying those who believed. Howard has not done this. But unlike Dave, Howard is basking in his acceptance, they like him, they really like him. And the show is still good, but average listeners are wondering, have we lost him, to the Hamptons and Palm Beach, never mind to the rich and famous…

But Howard Stern just cannot believe it. How an unaccomplished wannabe broadcaster whose father told him he was incompetent succeeded through hard work and hewing to his own vision, refusing to adjust to others’ input.

That’s what everybody does, adjust. The stars get boob jobs. The comedians tone it down. But Howard has remained himself. With a bit of the aforementioned evolution, but it’s still certainly him, the guy who still wants to see boobies, who can still geek out on a superhero movie.

So he’s the antidote, the complete opposite of our phony culture.

And now everybody wants a piece of what he’s got.

It’s an American story. It warms your heart.

But it’s not easily replicated. Because life is about whittling down your personality, getting along. It takes incredible strength to maintain not only your identity, but your desire.

But the truth is that is exactly what we’re looking for, someone who goes their own way, who appeals to us with honesty in a nation full of duplicity.

Pay attention, because Howard Stern is the number one promotion platform in America, and if you don’t think the media runs on promotion, you’ve never turned on the TV, never mind clicked on the radio.

And yes, Howard is working in that antiquated medium. Proving once again, to paraphrase that old sage, it’s not about the medium but the MESSAGE!

“Becky G: Another female caught in pop’s cookie-cutter vortex”