We won.

I’ve been reading this coffee table book about the Eagles.  Unfortunately, there’s not much in it I don’t know, but the pictures are fascinating.  David Geffen before dental work.  And Stephen Stills too.  When no one got up close and personal with a rock star unless they were having sex.

By time they formed the Eagles, the four band members were seasoned.  They’d been in multiple groups.  They’d made records.  This time they were gonna make it work.

So David Geffen signed ’em and sent ’em off to Aspen, to play night after night, honing their chops.  And then they opened for Yes and Jethro Tull, two bands who sounded nothing like them with audiences that didn’t care about them.  This is not a story of winning over the naysayers, rather it was about enduring the abuse, gaining experience that would be drawn upon for years.  You can only be unknown once.  What you learn then is used forevermore in your work.  But breaking through is the hard part.  And the Eagles broke through on their very first album.

But not to the degree it appears in retrospect.  Really, it was only when they jettisoned the controlling Glyn Johns for Bill Szymcyzk that they became America’s biggest band.  "Desperado", both the single and the album, were relative stiffs.  And "On The Border" languished in the marketplace upon release.  Then, it was "One Of These Nights".

What happened on those nights?

We read about it.  And we died to live it.  Died to be inside.

In the pre-Internet era, when only rich people had video cameras, when film was not yet digital, when there were no blogs, barely fanzines, the rock and roll world was a cutthroat business where rapacious scoundrels ripped each other off and the successful acts lived bacchanalian lives more akin to Fellini’s "Satyricon" than "Leave It To Beaver".

Yes, it started with the Beatles.  A zillion bands were formed in their wake.  And the idea was to use your creativity to make it in this alternative universe.  Where you could literally rape and pillage, live like kings.

Yes, the photograph that struck me most in the Eagles book was the shot of them in the private plane.  This was back when many Americans hadn’t even been on a plane!  And this wasn’t the tiny pencil-thin private jet of today, but a converted commercial airliner. Maybe there was waste involved, but the Eagles and Zeppelin and the other huge bands of the day could pay for it.

And everybody wanted in, everybody wanted to get closer.

That’s what the eighties were about.  Suddenly, greed was legitimized, the baby boomers could hoard their own.  And then came the giant separation between classes.  The rich emulated their heroes, they got private jets, hookers and groupies and cocaine.  They learned all this from the rock stars.  These same people who could move audiences with a glance, who campaigned for political candidates, who seemed to be in charge of their own nation.

The Tea Party?  Used to be the Music Party!  Only this one kept growing and was larger than any other.  Jimmy Carter needed the Allman Brothers to get elected.  You ignored the musicians and their culture at your peril.

But suddenly you could make more money playing baseball.  And then basketball.  And your expenses were lower.

And Apple went public and Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak got rich overnight.

And the rules on Wall Street were loosened and a whole coterie of nameless people got rich.

And how did all these newly minted millionaires act?

LIKE ROCK STARS!

And then the wannabe musicians weren’t in it for momentary good times, they desired world domination from the outset, dues-paying was for pussies.  Just get me on TV.  I’m worth it.

So we’re starting all over.  Knowing that you can’t get as rich playing music as you can in other endeavors.  But music is one of the few spheres that allows complete self-expression.  The new acts don’t even have labels, certainly not ones that tell them what to do. They’re on their own.  Playing.  And they’re enjoying the late nights of dope and sex in between the long rides cooped up in vans and buses.

We’re rebuilding the scene.  We’re focusing on the essence, the music, because really, the rest is just trappings.  And there are better places to get these trappings than music.  If you want cheesecake go to the strip club.  But if you want someone who says something, who stands for something, go to the show.

The Eagles: An American Band

"What they’ve latched onto, what people want, is recognition and to share their accomplishments."

Rob Katz, CEO Vail Resorts

Vail Resorts’ CEO On New EpicMix Application

He’s talking about FarmVille.  That’s the "they" in the quote above.  According to this article, FarmVille is making $1 million PER DAY selling virtual goods surrounding their free game.

Free game.

But if you want to play well, you’ve got to purchase virtual goods.  Virtual as in they don’t really exist, they’re dots on a screen, as evanescent as the stream of music you just listened to.

What about this does the music business not understand?  In constantly decrying free, trying to put the buggy back into the barn, wishing everybody would just embrace whips, um, CDs, once again, the music industry is missing out on a profitable revolution!  The public has money, maybe less in this recessionary era, then again, retail sales in the back to school window went up, albeit helped by discounts, and is willing to spend it on a product they desire.

And the best way to get people to spend is to make it about them.

That’s where the music industry has it all screwed up.  Make it about the CUSTOMER!  Don’t sue the customer, don’t draw a line between the fan and the act, EMBRACE HIM!

Speaking of a line between fan and act, I follow Rob Katz on Twitter.  His address?  @RickysRidge.  I’ve never met him, but I if I tweet him a question online, he answers it, or has the appropriate team member get back to me on it.  Meaning, that other CEOs should embrace their role as the face of the organization.  Believe me, there’s a lot to hate about Vail Resorts.  Like the almost hundred dollar daily lift tickets.  Then again, the company has offered a discount season pass, the Epic Pass, the last three years that allows you to break even in six days.  And the company even sells discount food cards.  Think about this, instead of railing against high prices at Two Elk, the famous lunch spot atop China Bowl, I’m thrilled every time the clerk rings me up, because I got TWENTY PERCENT OFF!  By buying $200 worth of food in advance, I got $240 credit.  Vail Resorts sat on my money, and I became generous, I bought food for my friends, whereas before I’d bitch every time I checked out.  Live Nation could make the same offer in its sheds.  Then the overpriced food looks like a deal.  And Live Nation gets the money in advance.  Staples Center could do this too.  But you’ve got to improve the quality of the food and offer a daily special, both of which Vail Resorts did.

And since I’ve now given you Rob Katz’s Twitter address, please tweet to him and make an offer to use your music in his campaign for free.  Joel Sill hipped me to the atrocious canned music Vail employs.  Hell, maybe they’ll even pay for usage, but even better, maybe they’ll book you at one of their festivals during the season, paying you and exposing you to new fans.  Yes, everything’s about the partnership these days, giving a little to make a lot.

But really, the point is about engaging the fans.  People no longer want to be anonymous. They build shrines to themselves online.  But they’re not walled gardens, they’re all linked together.  You need to be linked to your fans, you have to create a network, where information flows both ways, and you have to allow people to demonstrate their fandom, by showing how many gigs they’ve been to, how many times they’ve played your tracks, WHEN THEY FIRST DISCOVERED YOU!

Imagine if I could earn a badge by listening to a new act, stating I was there on that day.  If this had existed back in 1992, I could have shown it to all the Phishheads who thought I was a Johnny-come-lately.  Yes, the first time I saw Phish was on my birthday, April 22, 1992, at the Variety Arts Center in downtown L.A.  If I had a badge, I could PROVE IT!

This is how you get people to listen to new music.  They want to be on the ground floor, they want to be able to prove they were there first.  Give them this ability.

And needless to say, they’ll pay to play.  Maybe you only charge at the concert and merch level.  Then again, every act seems to have a fan club, which people pay to join to get good seats, why can’t there be social networking features tied in?

Everything is now topsy-turvy.  Companies and acts are in thrall to fans.  Fans have infinite choice, how are you going to hook them and keep them stuck?  By playing by fan rules, by making it about fans, giving back constantly.

Fans will give you all their money if you build an environment they can play in, if you establish a bond of trust.

FarmVille filled a vacuum.  That vacuum still exists in the music sphere.  The rights holders refuse to fill it.  Come on, it’s 2010.  Can you let the concept of overpriced albums and scarcity go and join the new world?  The public is ready, right now, even if you’re not.

We are experiencing a revolution.  Caused by the computer, aided by the Internet, old media monoliths are crumbling and seedlings are popping up all over.  The old guard is protesting, wannabes are struggling for a toehold in the decaying old game and newbies are reinventing the media business unchallenged and unknown.  And to outsiders, trying to make sense of it all, chaos reigns.  Desiring focus, those with loud voices demand a return to the earlier era.  But no one can turn back the hands of time.  Change has occurred which has caused a rupture in the entire fabric of our country.  And so far, no one has been able to make sense out of the result.

Take politics.  18% of Americans believe President Obama is a Muslim

Growing Number of Americans Say Obama is a Muslim

Such delusion wouldn’t fly forty years ago, when there were only three TV networks and a Fairness Doctrine that eliminated dissemination of demented ideas.  But today, every insane theory and plot has a website, with adherents who refuse to see the other side.  They don’t have to.  Democrats read the HuffPo and Republicans read Drudge.  Do you think everyone’s going to pay attention to Top Forty music?

Of course not, because they’ve got choice.  Listeners pursue their dream down a zillion different nooks and crannies.  The lame Pandora gets traction because no one knows about Slacker.  Children embrace Disney stars because their parents haven’t yet removed the controls from their browsers.  We’ve got many different camps, oftentimes operating in ignorance.  People say there’s no good new music because the mainstream outlets are promoting crap.  When the truth is music is in a glorious time, you’ve just got to know where to look.  And when you do look, you’ve got to separate the wheat from the chaff.  There are many more acts than before. And most of them are terrible.  It’s too daunting to delve in.

And then you’ve got the old guard saying that we’ve got to return to their way.  Which is an impossibility, because of choice.

Then there are the newspapers.  Which, like record labels, say they’re entitled to survive.  But why should I read the national news in the "Los Angeles Times" when the "New York Times" does it so much better and it’s just a click away online?  Used to be you couldn’t read the "New York Times" in L.A.  But those days are gone.

As are the days when the "New York Times" was the ultimate authority.  There’s a plethora of bloggers to not only critique what the "New York Times" has to say, but to trumpet stories the Gray Lady ignores.

And despite its vaunted place atop the print media pile, the "New York Times" doesn’t like its authority challenged.  But it’s got no choice.

Things used to be different.  MTV anointed stars and the public bought the records and went to the shows.  And radio was complicit, stations played the MTV hits.  And there was a limited number of releases, because distribution was a barrier to the entry of independents.

Now anybody can get their track on iTunes and MTV has stricken "Music Television" from its moniker and radio is lost, playing the hits of yesteryear or the vapid concoctions of today in between twenty odd minutes of commercials.  People have got choice.  And they’re exercising it.

It’s kind of like the transition from AM to FM in the sixties.  AM supporters decried FM.  The signal was weak.  The bands were unknown. But the free-format stations ultimately killed AM.  Music left the AM band completely.  And FM acts without single hits were slaying in stadiums while AM acts were lucky to appear on bland television shows and play the lounge in Vegas.

Only now, imagine an FM band with thousands of stations!  You’ve got freedom of choice, but you’re not sure how to exercise it.

This chaotic period is coming to a close.  Suddenly, there are acts plying the boards with no terrestrial radio airplay who are well known by their audience and can survive quite handsomely in their own niche.  But, since there’s no longer a pyramid, no longer the anointment of MTV airplay, there’s not a defined breakthrough into the stratosphere.  The build just continues, slowly, but surely.  Yet now the indie acts are not quite so indie, we’ve heard of twenty or thirty of them.  The landscape is firming up.  For everybody but the old guard.

The old guard is losing power.  It’s more expensive than ever to create a hit that fewer people listen to or care about.  Top  Forty radio is about beats created by producers, radio anthems concocted by committee.  It’s purely commerce.  Whereas the soul of music is elsewhere.

So if you wanna be a rock and roll star…

They want her to be successful, don’t you get it?

It’s easier this way.  You find someone attractive, hook her up with the producers/songwriters du jour, and hype her to high heaven.  If it doesn’t work?

Then you’re screwed.  Then you’ve got to do it the hard way.  You’ve got to find someone with talent, who’s put in thousands of hours and is willing to put in thousands more in order to establish a career fan by fan, by playing live ad infinitum, by being nice, realizing the customer is the fan, not the TV network or the radio station or any of the dying intermediaries.

I don’t think Katy Perry is without talent.  But the YouTube link below doesn’t close me.  In order to close you, a clip, whether it be audio or video, has to stop you in your tracks, it’s got to make you forget what you planned to do as you sit there stunned, overwhelmed with the sheer quality and intrinsic value of the artist’s material.

A good enough voice won’t stop you.  It’s the alchemy of song, singer and presentation.  Not everybody has it.  But when you’ve got it, you’re a star.

Maybe Katy Perry could have a career if she played by career rules.  If she refused to work with the usual suspects and just went on the road, starting in clubs, grinding it out, gig by gig, fan by fan, until suddenly there’s a buzz, when your friends ask HAVE YOU HEARD THIS GIRL?

But no.  She decided to take the easy way out.  Issuing novelty singles.  Trading on her sexuality.  Hyping to high heaven.

Sure, she did the Warped Tour, I commend her for that. But instead of dallying with Russell Brand in the gossip pages, she could have stayed on the road, honing her chops, building her audience.  Instead, she was holed up in a studio, trying to create pop perfection.  And pop perfection just doesn’t go as far as it used to.

So let this be a lesson to you.  Play the game at your peril.  Listen to the usual suspects with caution.  It’s your one and only career.  Everybody might know who you are overnight, but that doesn’t mean you’ve got any fans.  That’s the essence of a reality star.  Famous for nothing other than overexposure.  That’s Paris Hilton.  That’s Kim Kardashian.  That’s not a musical star.

Katy should do a mea culpa.  Can the overscripted, slick videos with guest rappers and go on the road with a band, sans hype.

But she doesn’t want to work that hard.

Oh, she’ll tell us how hard it is to be today’s Katy Perry.  All that time in the studio, all that hair and makeup.  Hogwash.  AC/DC had it right decades ago, and it hasn’t changed since, it’s more true now than ever:

Hotel, motel
Make you wanna cry
Lady do the hard sell
Know the reason why
Gettin’ old
Gettin’ grey
Gettin’ ripped off
Underpaid
Gettin’ sold
Second hand
That’s how it goes
Playin’ in a band
It’s a long way to the top
If you wanna rock ‘n’ roll

Those driving hundreds of miles a day in a van, sleeping four to a room, eating fast food to stay alive are the true stars of tomorrow.  It’s a learning experience.  You bond with your audience.  You get good.  And the public knows it.

Hell, how many albums did AC/DC release in America before they made it?  PLENTY!  Hell, their American label wouldn’t even put out "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap", but after the mega-success of "Back In Black", that earlier album came out and sold tonnage too.

And isn’t it great to be able to go back in time and find the undiscovered gems, as opposed to an act making one hit album, which succeeds immediately, and then nothing?

And now it’s not even an album, but a track.

And you can’t charge $1000 for a track.  You can’t sell a Topspin $100 package.  Sure, you can license it to a commercial, whore it out ad infinitum, but when the mania dies down, you’re left with almost nothing.  A momentary pile of cash that you’d better save, because there’s no more coming in.  Meanwhile, the fat cats who told you to sell out are on to the next thing.

Let Katy Perry be a warning.  If you’ve got a modicum of talent, take the road less traveled.  Go your own way.  Find your own voice.  Create something unique.  Build your audience fan by fan.  Then you’ll have a career, and money that rains down year after year.

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Sure would be nice if you knew what you were talking about.  

She’s done all this, do some youtube research and you’ll see.  She’s very talented.  It’s possible the persona she currently pushes might negate this, might push it back underground where no one will find it.  But she’s demonstrated her cred numerous times, those in the industry know, which is why they’ve invested massively in her, even at this teen- hits stage.

Michael Olson

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Well, had you been to her many hotel cafe shows (including other singer/songwriter events) prior to the emi signing, you would realize how far wide right you missed on this missive.

Todd A. Cooper
Of Counsel
Greenberg Traurig

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You should check out Katy Perry’s unplugged set. It’s got what you need to help her "real musician" cred.

Matt O’Donnell

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I couldn’t agree more with you on Katy . A little tough love now to learn from might still give her a career if she takes it all in and comes up with something SPECIAL not a sensational tease.

Kevin Sutter

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You mean like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLgy3P11aXI

Daniel Barassi

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Bob, Just a note regarding Katy Perry (formerly Katy Hudson).  I signed her in 2002 to a new label venture and had the bright idea to bring in Glen Ballard to write with her before we had her emancipated- She was 17.  Glen convinced her to jump ship to his label, which eventually folded. However, I will say she is truly talented and could easily pull off an unplugged guitar vocal performance.

Keith Thomas

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Do a youtube search for Katy Perry acoustic at Hotel Cafe and you will find hundreds of videos of her alone onstage and playing guitar.  She played there a lot before she got her break and she still plays there occasionally for her friends and fans.  I find it commendable that she saves that for the people that know her instead of trying to prove to the world that she is a real artist/musician/songwriter.  
When Lady Gaga does it on national television, it almost seems gimmicky.

Kevin Lyon

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Hi Bob….I’m a new subscriber and really enjoy your thoughts.
I think I want to disagree with you about Katy Perry, on some level.

Yeah, she – now – is basically "Katy Perry – the product".
Or fully submersed in the machinations of pop stardom, perhaps.
But she really is talented underneath all the makeup and baggage.

I had her on my (now defunct) Indie 103.1FM radio show back in December 2007 – many months before "I Kissed A Girl" was even released, and way way before her debut CD exploded. My radio show ("Neon Noise") was a DJ mix show — mainly an electro-indie rock club beats kind of thing.

While she sounds nothing like that, I’d really loved a 5-track sampler I’d gotten from her press people. And in my gut, I thought
"This girl’s gonna be something big" – so I booked her on my show.
She came in with her buddy DJ Skeet Skeet and we had a silly, fun time.

She did two songs live…just her and her acoustic guitar.

"You’re So Gay" is on video here – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLgy3P11aXI

Just the (better) audio is here – http://www.divshare.com/download/3270232-318

And here’s just the audio for "One Of The Boys"
– http://www.divshare.com/download/3270252-1c1

No Dr. Luke, no Swedish hit producers, no auto-tune & no Snoop Dogg – and if you watch the video — not even the glammed up makeup/look.

She wrote these songs, sang them live, and the talent IS there.
But sigh, yes — that was then, and this is now.

But I thought you’d like to compare and contrast?

Best – Paul V., Los Angeles

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Perry released an Unplugged album between the debut and this one. She can actually sing. But no one cared. They like her as a cartoon character, a Disney version of Gwen Stefani.

– Phil Freeman

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Did you see Katy Perry’s MTV Unplugged? She is talented. Get real. Stop hating on the pop machine.

Sexuality/Gimmicks get you attention- case and point: GaGa. She would not have been known or had as many fans is she was just sitting at a piano singing her songs. She was smart. She had talent, but knew her talent alone would not be enough to reach the stardom/fame that she longed for. So, she used the questionable sexuality, costumes and odd behavior to get what she wanted. Just like Katy Perry did with "I Kissed a Girl", on a smaller scale, but still, it is the same equation. And just because you use it doesn’t mean you aren’t talented, it means you understand pop.

L.A. Landgraf

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I can’t argue with any of your assessments because frankly, you know your shit and are normally 100% on target. I confess to being a little bit of a casual Katy Perry fan (her looks certainly have something to do with it). Her "music" is just ok on record.

I did catch her though on  that "Pladia" HD channel (the one you have to stick a coat hanger on to your roof with Dish Network dish to get) and she was quite impressive in a LIVE setting.

She played all of her songs acoustic and even did a great cover of an obscure Fountains Of Wayne song.

For what its worth, I came away impressed (especially with the choice of cover material) and I usually hate everything plastic and packaged up for music consumption.

Jeff D. Fulton
8bitrocket Studios

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Katy Perry:

Have you seen her performance on Letterman?  I think her handlers wanted to prove her vocal talent with an acapella start to her song.  BIG MISTAKE!  Truly awful vocals.  So bad that even when the instruments kicked in it was unlistenable!

-Please keep my name confidential-

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EW.com article on Perry’s disappointing sales:

http://music-mix.ew.com/2010/09/01/katy-perry-album-sales/?xid=email-ThisWeekend-20100902-5Things-Story4

Eric Schornhorst