Have you been catching the Universal bashing by Trent Reznor and Josh Homme? Hell, Homme even mentions Jimmy Iovine by NAME!

Nine Inch Nails and Queens of the Stone Age may not sell millions of records, but one thing they’ve got is fans. Both acts can tour until their leaders die. The Grammy nominees?

There’s a fiction that the Grammy nominated albums are the best of the bunch, the people’s choice. The TV show celebrates the major labels and everybody’s happy.

But in a world where Top Forty is a ghetto, and MTV plays no music, what makes anyone believe the mainstream is hip?

The biggest hit of the summer, according to mainstream media, is Rihanna’s "Umbrella". But most people have never heard it. Because they pay no attention to the spheres within which it is exposed. They’ve got other choices, and they’re taking them.

Same deal with this Grammy mess.

The Grammys were a joke. Late to the party on rock, more specifically, the Beatles and the Stones, they got no respect.

But then something curious happened. The mainstream merged with the hip. In the eighties, when everybody was glued to MTV. And a mercurial southern boy took over NARAS, and turned the Grammy show into a celebration of the single-minded focus of the American public.

Now, there’s a steward in charge, and no one but the self-congratulatory pricks cares anymore.

You’ve got hitsdailydouble dissecting the nominees. You’ve got multiple articles in the L.A. "Times". Really, does the general public give a shit?

The general public’s been tuning out all of this century. The powers-that-be have lost their hold on America’s consciousness. It’s not about theft, it’s about listeners going their own way, into nooks and crannies, to something more satisfying than the mainstream crap foisted upon them by the major labels.

The star model is history. Burned out by not only vapidity, but choice. People do like music, just not what those who used to be in control want them to like.

How does Universal make it with an act that sells 10,000 copies? Never mind one that does 5,000.

But an individual can live quite handsomely on the same number of albums sold. For he gets all the profits, and unlike the big guys, he keeps the costs down. His fans keep his career going, not Volkswagen, "Grey’s Anatomy" or Top Forty radio. He’s got the tools of production and marketing in his possession, and he’s utilizing them.

The Grammys are a mainstream show for a country that no longer is mainstream. And that’s why they’re irrelevant. The Grammys are about consensus. Whereas arguing with your buds over who’s good is now passe, you just ignore what doesn’t appeal to you and play in your own backyard, which you created.

I guess what I’m saying here is that not only was Doug Morris unprepared for the future, but network television, newspapers and radio too. We’ve seen no adjustment by any of them. Just a holding on to what they had before, however little is left.

Real music fans don’t watch the Grammys. Why would they? The acts they like aren’t on the show. And the production is phonied-up with TV stars and ass-kissing talent. Real music fans believe in their acts. They don’t believe in these people on TV.

So please, enough with the Grammy hysteria. The only people who care are the labels looking for a sales bump and the overpaid NARAS team.

How about covering something important?

Oh, that’s right, the labels and NARAS don’t know what’s important. They’re out of touch, they’ve got no idea what teens and twentysomethings think.

There’s a generation gap as wide as the one in the sixties. Only this time, it’s the boomers who are out of the loop.

There’s something happening here and you don’t know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?

____________________________________

Trent Reznor:

While the music industry is doing everything they possibly can to go out of business, can we all make sure to rid ourselves of the Grammys, too? Out of touch old men jacking each other off. _ENOUGH! _Have a nice day.

(posted at nin.com on 12/06/07)

____________________________________

Josh Homme:

Fuck the labels man, they suck. The last thing they’re stripping down is their own expense accounts and shit. I mean, Jimmy Iovine of Interscope Records takes a private jet or rides first class to tell a band they don’t get tour support. You know what I mean? Fuck that shit, I’m tired of it. And I’m not gonna be quiet because the American label, not Canada, not Europe, but our American label’s fucking us like crazy, so fuck them. Why should I not say anything, what am I afraid of? I’m not afraid of them.

Interscope Sucks My Dick:
Antiquiet Interviews Josh Homme Of Queens Of The Stone Age

17. Jay-Z "American Gangster"

Sales this week: 51,979
Percentage change: -40%
Cume: 694,954
Weeks on: 4

This isn’t about album vs. single on iTunes.  This is about the status of rap in America.  It appears that it’s not the ubiquitous sound of the nation that the mainstream media believes it to be.

One might say that Jay-Z is long in the tooth, that we’re looking for someone younger, but I don’t think that’s operative.  Somehow, just like when disco eclipsed rock in the late seventies, the bottom has fallen out of hip-hop.  Oh, there’s demand.  It’s just not stratospheric.

Would sales be higher if there were airplay on Top Forty?

Certainly, but Jay-Z is not present in the Mediabase Top Forty chart (which actually includes fifty records).  "Roc Boy" is number 15, sans bullet, on the Urban chart.  Which, I guess, is helping to keep this album alive to the point it actually is.

Quality perception is high, the album garners a 4 1/2 star average on Amazon, but footprint is low.

Turns out if you’re not a Jay-Z fan, you don’t have to pay attention.  Probably you’re not paying attention.

And there we have twenty first century America.  Nothing is dominant.  We live in a land of niches.  One of which is inhabited by hip-hop, and Jay-Z.

19. Keith Urban "Greatest Hits"

Sales this week: 47,493
Percentage change: -59%
Cume: 164,687
Weeks on: 2

Sure, it’s found money.  But I’m not sure the strategy is a sound one.  Do you cannibalize your catalog?

Or is it that people don’t even need the album anymore, they’ll just download what they want…

So, we had the death of the movie soundtrack.  Now the death of the greatest hits album.  What’s next?  The death of the superstar.  But that’s already happening.

33. George Strait "22 More Hits"

Sales this week: 36,118
Percentage change: -24%
Cume: 164,249
Weeks on: 3

I guess the hits weren’t that big.  Certainly not needed.

And this guy won the 2007 CMA Album of the Year Award.

Either country fans finally learned how to download, or George Strait is not quite the star the business thinks he is.  This is a piss-poor number.  Then again, it’s got the smell of Christmas rip-off.  And today’s consumer is sophisticated.  And would rather buy a concert ticket than a lame album.

43. Paul Potts "One Chance"

Sales this week: 25,967
Percentage change: +8%
Cume: 204,569
Weeks on: 11

Guess it’s an English thing.

In the U.K. people are sentimental, they love all kinds of music, they’re in it together.  In America, you like one genre, and that’s it.  There’s no Radio 1.

Furthermore, this demonstrates Oprah can’t sell EVERYTHING!  Then again, without her imprimatur, is this album a complete stiff?

49. Kenny Chesney "Just Who I Am: Poets & Pirates"

Sales this week: 22,625
Percentage change: -42%
Cume: 823,703
Weeks on: 12

And this album contains a ubiquitous number one hit!  And he was CMA Entertainer of the Year!

Now the label will try to slug it out single by single, and the cume may rise.  But this guy is considered a superstar.  So, make no mistake, country sales are in trouble.

68. 50 Cent "Curtis"

Sales this week: 15,194
Percentage change: -30%
Cume: 1,140,482
Weeks on: 12

Suddenly, the whole country woke up and found out it didn’t like Fitty.

I was impressed with how smart Fitty came across in the VMA pre-game.  Maybe if he lost his bluster, and went on Oprah, we could learn to love him.  Everybody likes a comeback.  And it’s hard to love the boasting Kanye.

75. Goo Goo Dolls "Greatest Hits Vol. 1 – The Singles"

Sales this week: 14,699
Percentage change: -32%
Cume: 69,096
Weeks on: 3

Does anybody even know this album is out?

With so much clutter, it’s hard to get your message through.

Maybe you didn’t expect this to sell any more.  Maybe it’s not truly a disappointment.  But it does beg the question why they didn’t release this package sooner, when the band still had some buzz!

85. Santana "Ultimate Santana"

Sales this week: 12,929
Percentage change: -13%
Cume: 174,751
Weeks on: 7

Ultimately, people discovered they had all the Santana they wanted.

But this has the Columbia sides and the Arista sides in the same package!

Hint: Nobody interested in the Columbia sides WANTS the Arista sides!

102. Trisha Yearwood "Heaven, Heartache, and the Power Of Love"

Sales this week: 10,617
Percentage change: -32%
Cume: 59,407
Weeks on: 3

It’s not like the title track didn’t get a ton of airplay.

But airplay’s not definitive in country music.  You can have a hit record, but you’re not a star until the public anoints you.  You can’t headline your own shows, no one wants to see you.

These aren’t quite Patti Scialfa numbers, but this proves that who you’re married to doesn’t count.  Or maybe it counts against you…

110. Seal "System"

Sales this week: 10,003
Percentage change: -32%
Cume: 55,008
Weeks on: 3

At least he gets to go home to Heidi Klum.

117. James Blunt "All The Lost Souls"

Sales this week: 8,913
Percentage change: -22%
Cume: 269,309
Weeks on: 11

These sales aren’t too beautiful.

Even Christopher Cross had a couple more hits.  Maybe the label can get a track in a soap opera or as a movie theme…

Meanwhile, what about the guy who said he co-wrote all the original tracks.  Does his absence here make the difference?

120. John Fogerty "Revival"

Sales this week: 8,755
Percentage change: +10%
Cume: 190,555
Weeks on: 9

He’s back on Fantasy, his album has gotten good reviews, and nobody cares.

His old fans don’t want to buy new records.  Top Forty doesn’t play the music of oldsters.  He released this album and almost nobody knows.  Despite the publicity campaign.

Welcome to the dilemma of the classic rocker.  People just don’t want to hear your new music.

Of course, they want to hear the Eagles’.  But if you ever doubted that the SoCal rockers were a cut above, something different, now you know.   There’s a reason they own the greatest selling album of all time.  People care!  They might care about Led Zeppelin…if that band makes a deal with Wal-Mart or gives away its new music a la Prince.

Meanwhile, John kills live.  Why isn’t HE on the Super Bowl instead of Petty?  I love Petty, but Fogerty blows just about ANYBODY off the stage!

134. Little Big Town "A Place To Land"

Sales this week: 7,955
Percentage change: -19%
Cume: 67,063
Weeks on: 4

No hit single, no album sales.

I really like "I’m With The Band", but it wasn’t single material, and now the album is suffering.  Lead with your best!

148. Neil Young "Chrome Dreams II"

Sales this week: 6,946
Percentage change: -11%
Cume: 113,132
Weeks on: 6

Too many supposed comebacks, we stopped paying attention.

I’m not sure Neil cares…

Of course he cares, every artist wants not only respect, but notice.  In retrospect, Neil missed his moment when his protest album just wasn’t catchy enough.  It was coming from the right place, but it wasn’t listenable.  You certainly didn’t want to spin it again and again.  Does he have one more in him?

If he writes a riff as good as the one in "Ohio".

You can’t count Neil out, but he’s not doing his best work.

155. Jimmy Buffett" Live In Anguilla"

Sales this week: 6,691
Percentage change: +11%
Cume: 35,762
Weeks on: 3

Another live album?

Hey Jimmy!  People don’t want to hear OTHER people getting fucked up and having a good time, they want to do so THEMSELVES!

I’d say stay with the original double live album, "You Had To Be There".  It contains all the hits, since Jimmy hasn’t really written one since 1980 (oh, don’t tell me about that country shit, that was sheer stunting, selling on the names of his accomplices).

Funny that Jimmy can write hit books, with inspiration, but no good new music.  Maybe if we took away all his toys and he was forced to sleep on the beach his inspiration would return.

158. Duran Duran "Red Carpet Massacre"

Sales this week: 6,384
Percentage change: -40%
Cume: 46,114
Weeks on: 3

The Duranies want to still SLEEP with you, they just don’t want to listen to your new music.  And they don’t even know who Timbaland IS!

Rule one of music today, PLAY TO YOUR FAN BASE!  Don’t focus on expanding it, no one’s paying attention, they’re too busy overwhelmed with what already interests them.  Happy accidents will spread the word if you actually do something good.  Your fans will play the album for others, some deejay will bang it, it will become a theme song for some sporting event.

Fuck the big campaign, swinging for the fences, NO ONE’S AT THAT GAME EXCEPT FOR THE MEDIA SYCOPHANTS!

172. David Gray "Greatest Hits"

Sales this week: 5,757
Percentage change: -23%
Cume: 23,709
Weeks on: 3

Once he was destitute and desperate.  He made a record just for himself, "White Ladder".  Buy that album, it contains all his greatest hits.  The other stuff is for diehard fans only.

I’m wondering how big the check is. That’s Doug Morris’ new strategy. Pay enough, and he’ll entertain your music distribution idea. You might be bankrupted in the process, that’s usually why he makes you pay up front.

Microsoft won’t disappear. They lose money on every Xbox, they’re delusional, they believe everybody wants to join the social and share music on a Zune. The Redmond, Washington outfit’s philosophy is "we don’t want to be left out", they want to compete in every segment. Kind of like General Motors. And look what it did for them. (Toyota now too, their expansion has caused quality issues, causing "Consumer Reports" to lambaste them, hurting their image).

I would feel better if Doug Morris licensed a newbie, someone without an established entity to shore up, to maintain. That’s what Nokia is doing here, jockeying for position, not only with Motorola and Apple, but Vodafone and AT&T.

Turns out going for the deepest pocket is not good strategy in the tech world. Deep pockets play along, young ‘uns need to survive, so they don’t play by the rules. Unfortunately, many young ‘uns have left the music business, because they can’t get licenses. SpiralFrog got a license, but the payment was so heavy and the restrictions so draconian, that it’s fallen off the radar screen.

You’ve got to give Doug Morris credit. He’s trying new things. It’s just that he’s built his business on giving people what they want, and is failing to do this here.

Doug Morris would have the Atlantic promotion team work a record in a market. If it didn’t show up in retail reports after radio play, he pulled all efforts. Furthermore, he found new acts by researching retail reports, seeing what was selling out in the hinterlands. How could he get it so right in music, and so wrong in technology?

You’ve got to give the public what it wants.

The public wants unrestricted music, no DRM. On one hand Doug Morris knows this, selling MP3s at Amazon. But the Nokia initiative has DRM once again.

Doug Morris did get it right regarding the public’s desire to own a lot of music for a little price. That’s what the Nokia deal appears to offer, on the surface. But he’s forgotten the rule of Apple. That it’s about usability. That’s why the iPod succeeded. That’s why the iPhone is breaking through. That’s why Mac sales are soaring. Not because the products are cool, which they are. But because they’re good. Apple is the Beatles of technology. Nokia may be the Dave Clark Five. Microsoft is something akin to Cliff Richard, around forever, but not cutting edge.

You didn’t make headway in the sixties being a Beatle-hater. You had to join in. If Doug Morris wants to succeed, he’s either got to throw in with the Cupertino company or offer a product just as compelling.

It would be easy for Doug to do a test. Navigate a Nokia N Series and then an iPhone or iPod. It’s no comparison. People use Apple products because they can use them. And no offering is going to compete unless it’s just as usable.

Downloading and sync must always succeed, and be very quick. Navigation on the player must be simple.

Apple wasn’t the first in music, just the best. The dominant name in MP3 players when Apple entered the sphere, Rio, is now out of business. Creative vowed to compete, yet it has become an also-ran. Microsoft offered tethered subscriptions with bad software and the sphere is forever tainted, even though the software is now better, although it still is not seamless.

The war with Apple must cease. It’s not to Universal’s benefit. Universal must find a way to feed iPods, not to kill them. Everybody’s got one! Someday, a competitor might emerge, but an entrance is not imminent.

One thing Doug Morris does have right, sale by track is economic death. You need a plan akin to a subscription, a lot of music for a little money. But I’d tack a fee on the ISP. Allow file-trading. Try to enable behaviors the consumer has already endorsed. Fill those iPods, fill their successors. If the music is unprotected, it can go on any device. The best hardware player will win. And the best software player too. Until competing jukeboxes are as simple and savvy as iTunes, they’ve got no chance.

The goal of an adult is to remove himself from society. To become rich enough that he doesn’t have to deal with the hoi polloi. Just check the ads for resorts, they all include the word EXCLUSIVE! Baby boomers want gated communities, private dining rooms and private jets. Dealing with the unwashed masses is so bourgeois. You don’t even want to go to the movie theatre anymore, what with the cell phones, talking and gum on the floor.

As a result we’ve got a segmented society. One in which those in power are clueless as to the younger generation’s predilections. Those people who haven’t yet acquired assets, who are still foraging in the landscape for fulfillment. Like the people in attendance at Saturday night’s John Butler Trio concert at the Orpheum in Downtown L.A.

Note I used the word "concert". For this was definitely not a show. A show includes choreography, backdrops, lighting routines, you’re supposed to be dazzled by the effects. Whereas the attendees Saturday night were dazzled by the music!

We’re hanging in the basement with Eric and through the concrete walls I hear, I feel, a cheer. That adolescent excitement begins to build, I take Felice’s arm, and like members of Spinal Tap we make our way back under the stage, up the stairs and out the side stage door.

Turns out they’d just turned down the lights. The band hadn’t gone on yet.

We had to squeeze by numerous twentysomethings to get to our seats. And they build theatres like airplanes these days, squeezing everybody in. You can’t go by without touching.

Finally, we find our seats on the aisle. And the trio takes the stage.

John Butler sits on about an eight inch platform. With his amp within reach. The drummer’s up a couple of feet, surrounded by enough drums to compete with Carl Palmer. The bassist has got both an electric and a double. And a stuffed animal and books in his amp case.

Then, they look at each other, because the essence of playing music is communication, and they HIT IT! They start playing "Used To Get High".

Whirling dervishes come FLYING down the aisle! Short ones, tall ones, big ones, small ones. Giant hippies just in from a game of Hacky Sack. Their flower children girlfriends in long flowing dresses. Chubby chicks in jeans. Dorky guys with rolls falling over their waistbands. It was a cross-section of the generation.

And the floor is going up and down. As the assembled multitude got up and DANCED!

It was like watching a movie of religious zealots speaking in tongues. You couldn’t hold back. It was like a hypodermic needle was inserted into your soul and you were instantly INFECTED!

I’m standing, my arms flailing like Gumby’s. I’m singing along. And when the band sings "I used to get high for a living", I’m feeling that’s how it used to be, I used to play my records, live to go to the concert, to connect, to be with my brethren.

Sure, there were events in the past. But most concerts were experiences. You weren’t overwhelmed, but mesmerized, entranced. They were a drug, not a totem, not a notch in your belt. How can you addict the audience when people can only afford to go a couple of times a year and what they encounter is so slick, akin to a movie more than music?

And they’re playing "Funky Tonight", and heads are detonating like firecrackers. It’s like that SNL routine parodying Oprah giving away Pontiacs. But this isn’t about merchandise, but music!

And all these notes are being played on an acoustic guitar. Usually a twelve string. But this is no folk revival, rather the music is EXPLODING from John Butler’s fingers.

Maybe if he worked with the Matrix. Maybe if he called up Kara DioGuardi. Then John Butler could have a hit.

But his audience wouldn’t hear it. They don’t listen to Top Forty radio. They’re not paying attention to the mainstream. They’re living in their own world, and they’re happy about it. There’s a whole ECO-SYSTEM!

But unlike their parents, they’re not afraid of new experiences, they’re not afraid of letting go. Of feeling instead of thinking.

John is smiling. The audience has left its troubles behind, shaking their bodies, feeling fully alive. Like the song goes, what could be better than that?