www.spotify.com/lefsetz

WHAT TO DO

Click on the above link, enter your e-mail address and wait for an invite in your inbox.

I’ve got a ton, but I don’t have one for everybody. So I’d suggest signing up right now, telling your friends, telling your mother, because these are gonna evaporate.

I’m gonna hold off for a couple of hours putting the link on Twitter, because then they’ll dwindle like Lady Gaga ducats on Ticketmaster.

WHAT YOU GET

Six months free. Streaming on your computer. With ads, although there aren’t many at this point. If you upgrade to a paid tier the ads disappear, and with Premium you get not only mobile compatibility, but 320kbps quality. After six months there will be some restrictions as to overall quantity and plays per track with the free service, but I won’t bore you with the details right now.

WHY YOU SHOULD SIGN UP NOW

Because you’re a cutting edge superstar knowledgeable about all things hip and you don’t want to be left out, you want to be the first on your block to demonstrate the coolest music service ever to all of your friends.

Furthermore, Spotify is the future. You’re in this business. Don’t make the mistake the labels did with Napster, refusing to use it and shutting it down. Fire this baby up and see how it all plays out, with everything available to everybody, benefiting users and players, democratizing not only the distribution of music, but the consumption thereof.

CLICK NOW!

So last night we went to see the Monkees at the Greek. And when the show was over we were in Rena’s office listening to Andy Gould, the band’s manager, talk about the show. I asked him whose idea it was to project all the old footage, and after indicating it was his, Andy looked down at the floor and nearly started to cry. He said you have to understand, he grew up in England without indoor plumbing, and now he was managing the Monkees!

Oh, what a long strange trip it’s been.

We heard these records, and we needed to be in this business. And as hard as it is to get into the music business, it’s even tougher to stay in it. That AC/DC song about it being a long way to the top if you wanna rock and roll? Listen to that instead of going to music business college. It’s about perseverance, it’s about starvation, it’s about pursuing a dream when you’re so battered and beaten down that you can barely even see it.

So I’m listening to J.D. at McCabe’s.

No, let me go back a step. I had a reserved seat, but it wasn’t in the primo location, that row was saved for someone who skipped the opening act and didn’t show up until just before the lights went down… And that someone was Tom Hanks, who arrived with his wife Rita Wilson and a couple of friends. There was a hush in the hall. Because you’ve got to understand, Tom Hanks has been in our living room, each and every one of us. He’s not an unknown quantity, he’s the best friend you’ve never met.

And when the show is over, I amble upstairs uptight, I only know J.D. in e-mail, what exactly am I going to say to him, backstage can be the loneliest, most soul-decimating place in the universe.

And I’m hanging back. I’m not gonna interrupt Tom and J.D. But then J.D.’s manager introduces me and J.D. says of course he knows who I am and the three of us are talking about iPads and Kindles and my friend Kate’s bookstore and it’s like a reunion for a high school I didn’t go to and I’m not one of the outsiders, I’m a cool kid.

Not that Tom radiates cool. Or even charisma. Hell, up close and personal J.D. is whimsical, not the protagonist in most of his songs. They’re both positively normal.

And as Tom and I are getting into it J.D.’s a few paces away, calling my name, saying I have to meet someone.

I’m not used to this, I’m inured to being told to leave. I ignore him, not wanting to push my way through the assembled multitude, being aggressive backstage is a no-no.

And J.D. introduces me to Mary Kay Place.

And like the idiot I am, I tell he I loved her on "Mary Hartman". She was Loretta Haggers! And I figure I’ve alienated her, but she’s talking and it dawns upon me, she’s a reader.

You’ve got to understand. My act is done alone, in front of a computer screen. I’m in the eye of the hurricane, I send this stuff out and I’ve got no idea who’s reading it.

And she’s talking like she knows me and I ask her how she knows J.D. and she tells me she’s the godmother to Don Henley’s kid. It was the seventies, everybody knew everybody, it was like an issue of "Rolling Stone" come to life.

But that’s how I knew it, I read about it, I didn’t live it.

But I was living it now.

You have to understand how far it is from there to here. From Connecticut to Santa Monica. From the bar mitzvah dance to McCabe’s.

I remember asking Nancy Moss to dance after being inspired by the first few notes of the Animals song. She turned me down. I was a king at summer camp, but I was a loser back home.

And I kept journeying forward, looking not for where the weather fit my clothes, but where I could speak to people on the same page, who wouldn’t make fun of me. In college I was the weird guy with thousands of records. I moved to L.A. and found a plethora of people just like me.

But with no connected father, with nothing but my wits, I had to climb the ladder. And if you think it goes straight up, you’ve never gone past the first rung.

And I’d like to tell you tonight felt like a victory lap, like I’d arrived, but it felt like nothing so much as home. An abode I’d been searching for forever but had entered only now.

________________________________

Sure, J.D. played the hits, but the best part of the show was the stories.

Today’s stars have no personality. And if they do have something to say it’s been filtered to offend no one and further their career.

But J.D.’s the wisecracking dude who looks at life from an angle and is always included because he’s the special sauce who makes it a good time. Not the star, but the voice of reality, the one who speaks the truth.

He’s talking about a light coming on in his Volvo and it’s like you’re driving in the car along with him. And when the payoff is about the tuner for his guitar, you realize this is a raconteur, a smart person with a skewed view of life who is always interesting.

And it was an interesting evening tonight!

Character is doing what’s right as opposed to what’s expedient. Caring about the well-being of mankind as opposed to oneself.

In the sixties, the Youngbloods sang about getting together and loving your brother. Now your brother is someone to be stepped upon on your way to a private jet lifestyle inside a gated community. The hoi polloi must pay your bills, but you must never come in contact with the great unwashed.

And it’s not only corporate titans. Entertainers earn the perks of their success, but too many sing about their wealth and their power, it’s hard to relate if you’re a working man.

I’m fascinated by the story of Christian Lopez. The 23 year old who caught Derek Jeter’s 3,000th hit, a home run. Surrounded by security guards, he was whisked into the bowels of Yankee Stadium and asked what he wanted for it.

This is the moment we’re all supposedly waiting for. A chance to pull ourselves up the economic ladder, profit upon our own good fortune, that which excludes the community at large.

Christian asked for "a couple signed balls, some jerseys and bats."

Returning Jeter’s Big Hit: No Good Deed Goes Untaxed (Perhaps)

"’It wasn’t about the money – it’s about a milestone,’ Lopez said to reporters. ‘I mean, Mr. Jeter deserved it. I’m not going to take it away from him. Money’s cool and all, but I’m only 23 years old and I have a lot of time to make that. It’s his accomplishment.’"

A Fan Holds History in His Hands, Briefly

Huh? What kind of schnook is this guy? Didn’t he take any business classes in college, couldn’t he immediately calculate the riches in front of him?

Mr. Lopez was "ridiculed for his refusal to consider selling the ball."

But then a strange thing happened. When the Yankees rewarded him with merchandise and tickets incurring a tax burden, and it was revealed that Mr. Lopez was working at a Verizon store while under the burden of $100,000 of student debt, the business community rallied around him. Modell Sporting Goods and Steiner Sports coughed up $25,000 each, and Modell also pledged 5% of revenue from Yankees merch sold in his emporia over the next week to Christian.

Yankees Fan’s Generosity Is Returned, With $50,000 to Ease His Debt

It’s like everything your parents told you was true. Like the Golden Rule really existed. Like people truly were good underneath and a hero could be an everyday person who does the right thing.

We’ve evolved into a culture of winners and losers. And everybody’s trying to climb the ladder and leave the losers behind. This might lead to financial riches, but the enmity of the public is palpable, those left out are angry, and it’s not a good strategy if you’re building a career.

That’s what bugs me about the Live Nation salaries. You’re losing money and your venues are shitholes and you’re paying yourself all this money because other corporate titans make as much? I thought entertainment was about individuality, going your own way.

Guess not.

And acts that scalp their own tickets and bitch about brokers capturing all their revenue. How about keeping prices low so the fans can get in, instituting policies like paperless so those who care aren’t squeezed out.

Can’t be done. The broker’s got to make money. StubHub, owned by eBay, has to make a fortune. No one can sacrifice in America.

Hey, I never had any children, public school should not be free, I want my money back!

And I don’t own a home, so you’ve got to get rid of the mortgage deduction!

We live in a society, and if we don’t watch out for each other quality of life goes down for all of us.

If you truly want to be successful in business, give back, care about your customers first, stop boasting and get down in the pit. This is one of the reasons why country artists last, they put the fan first and keep ticket prices low.

How did money become number one? Our culture used to be led by entertainers, now they’re following behind, trying to emulate the bankers.

We’ve all got to eat, have a roof over our heads.

But how much do you need?

And sure, you might not need those government services today, but you never know what’ll happen tomorrow.

Today’s musicians have games and clothing lines, they’re mini-corporations just trying to get rich. No wonder the public can’t relate.

This is the end, my only friend, the end…

It’s just like the opening of "Apocalypse Now". The helicopters are hovering, the news vans are out in force, and on the freeway…

Claustrophobia. Many say they’ve got no problem with heights, but tight spaces, the inability to move renders everybody a bit queasy. In this case, I was sitting in my house in Santa Monica, knowing that at some point I wanted to be in Felice’s house in Sherman Oaks, how exactly was I going to get there?

In case you’ve been under a rock, they’re closing the freeway. They’re tearing down the Mulholland Bridge. They got Gaga to tweet about it, it was on electronic signs as far away as Oregon. Would L.A. creep to a standstill or would it be like the ’84 Olympics, clear sailing?

But the Olympics were twenty five years ago, more, and the traffic density is ever worse. And the more people referenced that free-flowing time the more it seemed there would be a backlash, a loosening up, and it only takes a few gawkers, a few joyriders to muck up the works. What do they say, 250,000 cars go through the Sepulveda Pass every day?

And you can go around, through downtown, if you get the memo. If not, Mayor Villaraigosa held out the possibility of a twenty mile traffic jam. How do you cope with that?

And you can take the canyons, Topanga, Beverly and Coldwater, but they’re narrow and twisty and how much extra traffic can they handle?

I figured I’d wait until two a.m. Take Beverly then. Turn around if it was crowded.

But maybe I should go early. But would everybody be doing this?

And I’m sitting in my house getting more and more anxious, wondering if I should just get it together and jettison myself NOW!

It’s kind of like being a Jew in Europe in the thirties, do you heed the warnings or relax? True, the consequences are not as dire, but you lose your reference points, you don’t know who to believe, how to act.

And then my mother called and some unexpected e-mail came in and the clock was ticking and I felt tense and nervous and I just could not relax.

Midnight. That was closing time. But ramps started closing at 7, I’d already missed that cut-off. And lanes were restricted beginning at 10.

And I’m planning alternative route after alternative route.

Should I drive down Wilshire, check out the traffic on the freeway there, would the entrance be closed? Could I just scoot through the underpass to Beverly Glen?

And there was always Topanga. The long way home, but had everybody else decided on the same route?

So I’m driving down Sunset, and there’s almost no traffic.

There’s less traffic than there is at 2 AM.

And I decide to creep up to the freeway.

Which is almost empty.

And I get on Sepulveda, and it’s clear sailing.

I go right past Ground Zero, literally, right by the Mulholland Bridge. No destruction has begun, but there are trucks and the aforementioned helicopters but really, it’s like the eye of a hurricane, calmest at the center.

Utterly amazing that at this late date we cannot predict the future.

And that we can get the word out and change everybody’s behavior.

What else can we change?