It doesn’t matter whether I like it, it’s whether the public will accept it, whether it will connect with the general marketplace, or those it is targeted for.

Music is a professional business. Since it requires no CV, no education to get involved in, everybody thinks they’re an expert. Never mind the false information that flows freely.

Today I got e-mail from a reader up in arms because he heard a writer on a podcast complaining about royalties on a successful streaming song. What he didn’t take into account was THE WRITER HAD SOLD HIS PUBLISHING, ALL OF IT! The remuneration the writer was quoting was probably public performance fees, never mind they were split with multiple writers and there was no discussion as to whether this was streaming radio or on demand.

But never let the facts get in the way of a good story.

But, if you think you’re a better programmer, a better promotion person than the one at the label, HOW COME YOU DON’T HAVE THAT JOB! And these are jobs that are held by both men and women. Some women run promotion departments. If you’re so good, why don’t you have the gig?

Well, first and foremost you didn’t try. And it’s very hard to get your foot in the door, never mind move up the food chain. Maybe you can be a security guard or an usher at the amphitheatre…then again, you’d be surprised how many people with music business gigs started out at the absolute bottom, like this, BECAUSE IT’S ABOUT RELATIONSHIPS!

So, a label has to pick a track it believes it can get on the radio. Not the best track, not the track the station should play, BUT THE ONE IT WILL PLAY!

So, you’ve got to know the format, and you’ve got to know the personnel. Oftentimes the relationship is more important than the record, so just knowing a record a station should play is not good enough.

And stations are influenced by outside forces, what other stations are playing the track, what its streaming numbers are.

As for streaming…do you have the relationships to get the track on a playlist? What about TikTok, can you help it there? Does the act have a social media presence? Not only do these factors increase the odds of success, they are markers that help gatekeepers, from radio to print to even streaming services themselves, decide whether to push the button or not.

Oh, you love a track that requires five to ten listens to get. Fine, I’ve got no problem with that, but a track like that is hard to promote. Maybe there will be a groundswell for it after it is accepted by the public, sometimes after decades, but in a world of skippers, gatekeepers are looking for something more immediate. And yes, the more immediate the better these days, since there are so many options for a listener/viewer’s time.

But there are still the delusional. Who believe a country rock song performed by fiftysomethings with a bad singer deserves attention. In a world where good singers are a dime a dozen, why? As for the lyrics…you can have an imperfect voice if you write as well as Bob Dylan, but so far we haven’t found someone that good.

Doesn’t matter if your parents like it, your girlfriend or boyfriend, do those with no investment cotton to it and want to spread the word? If no one wants to spread the word, you’re dead in the water, it’s a definitive marker. So when someone sends me a link to a YouTube video with under a hundred plays, under a thousand plays, I wince, especially if it’s been in the marketplace for a while. They just think they need someone to recognize their greatness and push the button. But no amount of button-pushing will push a song like that over the top. I have never ever found a hit in these circumstances, NEVER! If something is great, people want to tell others about it, it’s human nature.

And maybe you’re pissed someone else is making it and you’re not. But maybe you’re a jerk and no one wants to work with you, did you ever think of that? Or maybe they work in a completely different genre with different precepts. Even if you make great klezmer music, traditional avenues of exposure like commercial radio are closed to you. Accept your fate. Be happy anybody is interested at all. But oh, I get it, YOU’RE AN ARTIST! WHO SAYS? Just like I get e-mail from people who say they’ve put in their 10,000 hours. That’s 10,000 hours of HARD PRACTICE! Read the book “The Talent Code” for instruction. Furthermore, and I hate to inform you of this, it’s harder for older people to learn new skills and become experts in them, it’s not opinion, it’s science. Look at it this way, if you want to be a great skier, 10,000 hours on the bunny slope, 10,000 hours on the groomers alone won’t do it. No, you’ve got to be willing to charge down the 35 degree slope in crud strewn with trees. And believe me, NO ONE is great at that the first time down. It’s about challenging yourself.

But people hate economics. They believe if they build it, people and money should come. Why? Because you say so? The landscape is filled with failed products, failed singles, but since you call yourself an artist it’s different for you. NO!

And sometimes you’ve got to put down a hit, just to demonstrate your superiority, your judgment. And I’m not saying that all hits are great, but usually there’s a reason why a track is successful, better to investigate why, to become a student of the game, as opposed to denigrating it.

This is what I mean when I say my e-mail bugs me. People telling me I’m wrong because they don’t like it, they know better, even though they oftentimes have the raw facts wrong. And now with everybody available 24/7 everybody is bombarded with those down the food chain punching up. I’ll tell you a little secret, if you want to move up the food chain BE NICE! And/or HELP those on the next rung of the ladder. Send them a track you know will be a hit, not one you think will be a hit, or believe should be a hit, but one the recipient will immediately be able to tell his circle about, burnishing THEIR image. As for promoting the work of your children…there’s not a single person in the business who doesn’t wince when they hear this. Because even if the act is good, and that’s almost never the case, the parents want to be involved and tell the experts what to do all under the rubric of “protecting their progeny.” Well, if you really wanted to protect them you’d tell them to stay in school, graduate from college, form opinions, be able to analyze and then try to make it. But no, you want them to make it because they deserve it and it will burnish your image.

Oh, and then there are those who will feed on your hopes and dreams. Producers who can no longer work in the big leagues but will take your cash to make professional work with your kid, which almost never goes anywhere. Or the website that will charge you for a hope of success, which never arrives. Yes, there are scoundrels in the music business, more than most other businesses, and the internet has only made it worse.

As for you hating a success, fine. But if you tell other people you look bad, it’s sour grapes. Also, in today’s world, where there’s a constant slew of product and a five year old track or video can be new to many, no one cares about your opinion, that’s so last century. Quick, name an influential music critic from today…NAME ONE! There isn’t one, that job has been eliminated by the internet. Used to be the writers had access, to the music and those who made and marketed it. But now everybody has access to everything, they don’t care what others have to say, and “music critic” was always a self-anointed moniker anyway, it’s not like you needed a degree.

But stuff does become successful. VERY VERY LITTLE OF IT!

Look at it this way… Imagine if I sent you all the links, all the music that is sent to me every day and forced you to listen to it from beginning to end, all of it, YOU’D SCREAM! And my point is this is how the consumer behaves…if they don’t like something, they click off it. Have sympathy for consumers. Furthermore, all that b.s. about short attention spans is just that. Did you ever watch these kids play Fortnite, FOR HOURS! Or stream “Friends” from beginning to end? Or listen to a podcast series of something they’re interested in?

The truth is great art breaks the mold. That’s what makes music different from regular commerce. People need milk. They’ll buy it. But they don’t need new songs. They may want new songs, but if there’s nothing that appeals to them, they won’t partake. So, either you can give them what they want, and there’s a business in that, or you can dig down deep and deliver something people truly need, but that’s a long, hard slog. First and foremost you’ve got to deliver it, which is uber-hard. And then you’ve got to find people who believe in it and then wait for the word to spread. Look at music history, those outside the mainstream artistically never broke immediately, never ever. They might have had four albums under their belt before it all clicked. And now it’s harder than ever, because everybody can play but it’s harder to reach members of the audience.

So, think of the above when you evaluate a track, when you give your opinion, assuming you consider yourself a professional, wanting to make it in this business. Despite no formal course of study, there’s a lot to learn to be successful in the music business and stay that way. And just like with artists, if business people don’t evolve they’re left behind.

My goal is not to make you feel bad, but to have you question yourself. You can hate something, no problem. But if you’re doing it to make yourself feel good, to shore up your identity, you need therapy.

Teddy Swims – Broke

Is this the new “Blurred Lines”?

I’d say it’s a one listen smash, but that’s not an accurate description, IT’S A FIFTEEN SECOND SMASH!

Oh, it’s not much of a song. A groove, that really doesn’t go much of anywhere. But it’s so infectious. It makes you move, it brightens your day.

Yes, there is a bridge two minutes in, but you’re closed long before that.

In an era where it’s all doom and gloom “Broke” rolls right down the alley and scores a strike.

And the track is enough, but when you watch the video, linked above, you’ll crack up.

This guy is not a rock star, at least not by the multi-decade MTV standard…the VMAs are this weekend, are you planning to watch? Funny how you can go from hero to zero so quickly, the VMAs used to be the highlight of the musical year, far eclipsing the Grammys, but then MTV stopped featuring music and the show turned into a self-promotion fest, all selling all the time. For a show that used to make memories the whole enterprise is now missable, forgettable.

And then there’s the video for “Broke.”

The paradigm has changed. To back what it was before MTV. The video is a chance to see the artist, to get to know the artist, where he or she is coming from, it’s not made for everybody but hard core fans who might spread the word. Then again, “Broke” was not made for ten cents on an iPhone, it’s got MTV production roots, but Jaten Dimsdale, aka “Teddy Swims,” is the opposite of camera-ready, anything but eye candy, which is what makes him so intriguing and lovable. Overweight and far from cover beautiful, he’s charismatic, magical. He and his music and the video evidence a sense of humor, irreverence, elements of music before it became so bombastic and serious and lost its hold on the American psyche.

I’m so used to being broke, but no more

On first listen, sans video, you get the impression that “Broke” is about just that, living on the wrong side of cash. WRONG! Turns out Teddy Swims now has cash. How? Via covers on YouTube and the merch sold on his website and then his ultimate Warner deal.

We gonna toast tonight to temporary wealth
Mama told me baby save it, knowing I probably won’t
All this money in my pocket gotta go, I’m so used to being broke

He’s poking fun at the paradigm. Ignorant entertainers who blow through their cash and wonder where it all went. He’s fully aware of what he’s doing…BUT HE’S GONNA DO IT ANYWAY!

Remember days, like just last week
There wasn’t nothin’ in the kitchen left to eat

Teddy Swims wasn’t born yesterday, he doesn’t have stage parents promoting him so he can top the chart as he reaches puberty, rather he’s thirty years old and has paid his dues, he’s got some miles on him.

And after his roommates left he moved in with his dad and started working at Chili’s. This is not an Ivy League graduate, they’d never slum like this, during high school they were saving the planet on excursions to third world countries, during school break they were interning at Goldman Sachs, and when they graduated they got a cushy job paying six figures, they’re winners. Which is why they could never create “Broke.” The artistic avenue is a dark and lonely street with no guarantees but you can only make it in entertainment if you journey down it, unless your goal is to be a flash in the pan.

So Teddy Swims starts releasing cover songs on YouTube, and the astounding thing, assuming all you know is “Broke,” is he can sing! Why don’t you check out his cover of Bonnie Raitt’s “I Can’t Make You Love Me”:

Teddy Swims – I Can’t Make You Love Me

It’s got 13 million views. Teddy has 1.38 million YouTube subscribers. Welcome to the modern world where the tools are at your fingertips and you employ them to get notice. In other words, if you’re looking for someone else to push the button, to make you a star, you’ve got it all wrong.

Girl what you want? Go pick it out
My wallet looking bigger than my belly now
Girl what a shame, they slept on me
They’re coming back and now they crawling on their knees
Ain’t nothing changed, same old me
Came up on some change, but that doesn’t change a thing

Money is quite an aphrodisiac. You may not be born beautiful, but that’s not the only way to make it in this sexually-charged world, you can create desire with your own creativity, if it connects you can suddenly have bread and be desirable.

Airbnb up in the hills
It costs as much as little brother’s college bills
Live seven rooms, called all my friends
They on the way across the country in a van
You know I can’t promise that this is going to last forever
But since I got it, we all gonna spend it together

A step up from the “Beverly Hillbillies,” but not by that much. Furthermore, these lyrics are true. It’s not like Teddy Swims is delusional, he’s not convinced it’s forever, if he’s ultimately back at Chili’s that’s okay. That’s the modern reality TV paradigm, it’s a lark, it’s only temporary, and after you open a few nightclubs and DJ a few parties you go back to Poughkeepsie.

And once you’ve seen the video just dial up Spotify or your music streaming service of choice and pull up “Broke,” you won’t be able to turn it off. I’m forty five minutes in already…I’m making Teddy Swims RICH!

P.S. THIS is the song of the summer, it’s still summer, right? What a failed concept, it’s not about looking for the song that dominates the airwaves, it’s about hoping someone drops a track that encapsulates the essence of the season, and “Broke” does.

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It sounds like Sunday. In the great tradition of Tom Rush’s “Rockport Sunday” and Jimmy Buffett’s “Duke’s on Sunday.”

Sunday… A funny day. A workday if you’re in Israel, I was reminded of that watching “Srugim,” but in America it’s a day of rest. Not for retail and service workers, we now expect everything to be open 24/7, but most people are not going to their jobs, but they’re anticipating working the following day. You wake up still relaxing, you read the newspaper, have an activity and as it reaches the six o’clock hour your spirits start to sink. It was especially bad when I was still in school. Actually, in college Sunday was a study day, you messed around Friday, licked your wounds and gave it your all on Saturday and then back to the books…if you weren’t studying on Sunday at Middlebury you were an outcast, someone noted by others, a renegade. But in grade school, high school, you had to finish your homework, go home relatively early, the following morning, Monday, it was back to the grind.

I’ve been to Salford. It’s right next to Manchester. I went there with Tony Wilson for a gig. He was getting paid a few quid to give insight to the government. No preparation, off the top of his head, his whole life was preparation.

I bought “Shoot Out the Lights.” I own more Richard Thompson albums than I can count, or find. I even own Fairport Convention’s “Full House,” I saw that tour at the Fillmore East. And I respect Richard’s playing, but I rarely play him.

So my college buddy sent me a playlist of the days of the week. It was long and it contained acts that I was stunned he knew, how did he find them, and a bunch of tracks I’d never heard, like “Salford Sunday.”

I got it immediately. I was entranced. I haven’t been able to get it out of my head for days. Not that it’s new, it came out in 2013, and by time I saw Richard in 2014 it was out of the set list. But it’s new to me.

Now “Salford Sunday” is never gonna be on the hit parade. At best it can be a staple on AAA stations on Sunday. How are people supposed to find it? How are people supposed to find anything these days?

Salford Sunday, skies are weeping
Dawn is creeping, through the blind

There are two kinds of people, night and day, literally. The day people boast about how early they get out of bed. Even 4 a.m., their goal is to get ahead of everything. Night people are already discouraged, they know they’re already behind, they’re more singular, not part of a crowd, they like their aloneness, they come alive when it’s dark outside, they don’t get tired, they get inspired, they don’t have to turn in early, they’re game for anything, they’re up to the challenge.

But the morning is painful. The light especially. It wakes you up. It reminds you of how you don’t fit in. You want the world to leave you alone, you’ll be ready when…you’re ready.

Salford Sunday and I’m walking
Though the rain is pelting down

That’s one of the features of England, the rain, the Beatles even sang about it, and it’s depressing if you cannot leave, but if you’re mobile it’s rewarding, it’s inspiring. Sure, your outdoor plans might have been canceled, but you can rationalize staying home, it’s a mental day off, you can read, play board games. And if you walk outside what you notice most is the quiet, other than the sound of the raindrops themselves.

There’s a train goes back to London
I hate to leave this ugly town

And it kinda is. And the truth is Los Angeles is a pretty ugly town too, but it’s saved by the sun, and the hills.

And the song isn’t solely about Salford and the rain, it’s primarily about a girl and how the protagonist, probably Richard, misplayed his hand, but you don’t need to know any of that, you just have to listen to the music, it conveys the mind-set, the mood.

I can listen to stuff like this all day. Because it puts me into night. Even if I’m smiling and driving with the sunroof open. Because it envelops me in a cocoon, where I can be who I want to be, without interference, without expectations. This is not hit music, made for masses to bump asses to, to show their moves on TikTok, “Salford Sunday” is personal.

Most of the time we’re alone. Wasn’t that Jerry Maguire’s greatest fear? You’d be surprised how many people are just like Jerry, to be left alone with their own thoughts is too scary. But you’ve got no choice, even if it’s just when you put your head on your pillow, before you fall asleep. And music used to evoke this mental space, ride shotgun along with you, like “Salford Sunday.”

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It sounds authentic. Up front and honest. Sans all the crap people put on their records to homogenize them and leak out their essence as they play to the gatekeepers as opposed to the ultimate listeners.

Chris Stapleton is the most revered man in Nashville/country music, how come what competes with him is such watered-down dreck? I’m a big fan of Luke Bryan, but even Pez has more substance, more soul-fulfillment than the tracks on his new album. As for “Build Me A Daddy,” it doesn’t sound like it came from the heart, but a computer, AI could write faux heartstring pullers like this no problem.

On the other hand there’s Americana. It’s just that that scene hasn’t delivered its superstar. Stapleton has one foot in each camp, but he’s not shying away from commerciality, and he knows first and foremost if the music is not appealing, your track is dead in the water.

Now back in the real country days, before KISS-influenced Garth Brooks dominated and subsequently was superseded by the church and babies crowd, country music sounded more like “Starting Over.” Made on a porch, in a bar to express the feelings of those playing it, less about the audience than the thrill of capturing the zeitgeist.

And once Gram Parsons opened the door to the melding of country and rock, and the Eagles blew a hole so big in the landscape that they ended up with the best-selling album of all time, stuff like “Starting Over” fit right in. But there’s no place for this track on Active Rock, and although introspective it’s not quite like what’s played on AAA, which is dominated more by shoegazers and those who can’t quite appeal to everybody, like Chris Stapleton.

Well the road rolls out like a welcome mat
To a better place than the one we’re at

Actually, it doesn’t. This is fantasy. People are packing up and moving less than they ever have in decades, they just can’t afford it.

And I’ve got friends out on the coast
We can jump in the water and see what floats

I’m glad you do, have friends, that is, otherwise you’d better be rich if you want to move to the coast, at least the one on the left side of the country, the one that borders the Pacific. And the truth is it ain’t cheap on the Atlantic either.

We’ve been saving for a rainy day
Let’s beat the storm and be on our way

Then he and she are unique. No one’s been saving. It’s not that they’ve been blowing all that cash on electronics and whiskey, it’s just that they’re barely making enough to make ends meet. Savings? What a concept!

And honey for once in our life
Let’s take our chances and roll the dice
I can be your lucky penny, you can be my four leaf clover
Starting over

Only you can’t. Certainly not if you don’t have a college degree, which you even need to get a gig as a secretary/assistant.

And if you’ve got said degree, you’ve been on a career path since before you graduated. You’ve done internships. This is not the seventies, where you graduate and go in search of yourself, certainly not the sixties. No middle class person, assuming there are any left, would get on that Greyhound in Pittsburgh Simon & Garfunkel sang about, it’d be too dangerous, you’d be scared to get on board.

This might not be an easy time

No b.s. Sherlock.

There’s rivers to cross and hills to climb

Life in these United States is harder than ever, “Reader’s Digest” had to sell its bucolic campus, it only comes out ten times a year these days.

And some nights might feel cold and dark

Especially if you’ve got no heat, if you live in California and there’s a blackout.

But nobody wins afraid of losing
And the hard roads are the ones worth choosing

That’s true. Wisdom. Inspiration. That’s what “Starting Over” is all about, putting you in the mood where you think of the possibilities, in a country where opportunities seem to be drying up.

Some days we’ll look back and smile
And know it was worth every mile

Hopefully. Lower class people split up at a higher rate than the wealthy, assuming they got married to begin with. And monetary woes, hard times, break up relationships, it takes special people to endure together, to not place blame on each other, I know from experience.

Still, what option do you have other than to put one foot in front of the other? Then again, suicide rates amongst white males are sky high, people are too depressed, by the lack of opportunity and the plethora of bills.

In other words, “Starting Over” is aspirational.

But isn’t this like some of the best music? You play it to squeeze out all the bad stuff, you play it to inspire you, to get ready, to tackle the world.

And if “Starting Over” is a hit, radio playlists have changed significantly since I listened to terrestrial radio. It’s a shrinking world. TikTok means more to the younger generation, but the music business was never forward-looking. And the truth is country is bigger on streaming services than rock, the country fans got the message, but just make sure you don’t touch the third rail, politics. No one wants to be Dixie Chicked.

So, “Starting Over” is a minor track, an album track, not a one listen smash you need to immediately tell all your friends about. But you don’t need an encyclopedic knowledge of the history of music to understand it, which today’s metal music tends to require. You can just drop the needle…er, click, and immediately go along for the ride. That’s where we do our traveling these days, in our minds, even before Covid-19.

And the funny thing about “Starting Over” is it sounds just as good on YouTube as it does on Amazon Music HD. It wasn’t compressed, it wasn’t EQ’ed to jump out of the dashboard, but to slowly infect your ears, not only remind you of where you’ve been, but where you’re going.

Now what we’ve learned today is no song is ubiquitous, no song reaches everybody. But if one could, I think it would sound something like “Starting Over,” which is as American as you get. Which begs the question why Stapleton doesn’t address the bigger issues, what’s going on in America today.

Stapleton’s no idiot, he went to Vanderbilt, albeit for only a year. If this music thing hadn’t worked out, he’d be screwed. But my point is this is a thinking man, someone who can cogitate, who can analyze the issues, who could lay some truth on us. Is he afraid of the audience, afraid of alienating someone, especially in the Nashville firmament, in the country music audience? Or has he been beaten into submission by the NashVegas ethos that you can sing about your personal life, but we want no opinions, we don’t want anybody stirring things up, unless it’s to party.

The best songs are written on sheer inspiration. Like Neil Young’s “Ohio.” You feel something and you say it. And that inspiration can strike when you’re doing the dishes, in the shower, usually when you’re not paying attention, when you’re not trying. Which means sometime in the next two months Chris Stapleton will probably be inspired. Nobody is apolitical, we’ve all got feelings. And if he were lay his down, people would listen, because he’s the king of Nashville, anointed even by all those soulless bros singing about drinking and partying. People anticipate Stapleton’s work. They don’t play six seconds and skip, they do their best to get into it. And so far, the music Chris has made has rewarded them. So, unlike the words of almost anybody else, Stapleton has the best chance of being heard, and despite all the naysayers, never underestimate the power of a song to infiltrate and change the culture, we shall overcome.

It is truly blowin’ in the wind. This feeling. We’re just waiting for someone to pull the thread down from the sky and weave a new tune. You can write, perform and distribute a song in 24 hours. We’re waiting.