From: Larry Fast

Re: Biko and Lee Abrams

Hi Bob-

There’s a connection between Peter Gabriel and Lee Abrams.  I was there at the creation of works that both Peter and Lee originated.

Shaping the recording of Biko in 1979 with Peter on his third album and then taking it on the road for the next few years was a transcendent experience for me. I was there from near the start of recording in August, 1979 right through until I delivered the album masters in New York on April 24, 1980.  Biko was based around a beat that Peter had built on a little PAiA programmable electronic drum machine that I had gotten for him just as PG2 recording was wrapping up in 1978.  Going from that little beat on a demo cassette to an anthem in front of massive audiences was quite a journey for both Biko (the song) and my own PG3 experience.

So you were at the Greek forty years ago?  Me too, but I think I might have had the better seat watching from my synthesizers, especially on nights when Peter came back after surfing the audience.  Here’s the thing that links my Zelig-like experiences.  Lee Abrams was a big fan and came to many early 80s Peter Gabriel tour shows.  I had started in college radio and a little commercial radio, too.  Lee, by then the FM powerhouse he had become, and I got to know each other back then; we shared friends in the business and early radio experiences.

Much later, around 1998 I saw an article in Billboard about Lee joining a startup called American Mobile Radio Corporation to program this new thing called satellite radio.  I reached out to him to see if I could get some airplay for my esoteric electronic music and he invited me to Washington.  One Amtrak train ride later and the next thing I knew Lee offered me the job of creating the sonic branding for the renamed XM Satellite Radio across all 130 channels. I took the gig and stayed on for 10 years until the Sirius takeover.  And then Lee asked me to do the same thing for Tribune Broadcasting and WGN America.  Especially at the start of XM, I got to see the inside of the creation of satellite radio which was almost as much of an insight as working on the first 10 years of Peter Gabriel solo albums.  Lee’s sage understanding at XM staff gatherings were more about his philosophy of broadcasting and audience psychology than any other radio programmer, just like his latest video.

I also need to compliment you on the Bob Ezrin podcast.  I wasn’t sure how Bob might look back on the first Gabriel album after all this time.  Good, accurate memories.

I’ve got some fly-on-the-wall insights from my many days zig-zagging between academic electronic music and major rock/prog/pop artists. It’s not over yet.

best regards,

Larry

________________________________________

From: Bob Rock

Subject: Re: Biko/Playing For Change

Any fan of the sonics on records were very aware of Steve Lillywhite’s brilliance.. as well as the engineer on the Melt record .. Hugh Padgham equally brilliant…  Ron Obvious and myself were engineers at Little Mountain Sound in Vancouver at the time that Melt came out… we were floored by the record …the drums on the intruder…. No Cymbals!!.. an instant sonic and music masterpiece! 

In 1981 when I was touring with the Payola$  .. after our show in LA we got in the elevator at the Sunset Marquis to go to the bar for a drink.. we got in and there was Peter Gabriel… we told him we wanted to see his show but we had our show so we couldn’t make it…he asked us where we were playing next… we said San Francisco … he said he was playing there next as well… so he set us up with tickets … the show was as you can imagine .. incredible! A life changer… 

I watched the video you posted of Biko… totally choked up…that’s what that song meant to me… my life changed when his 3rd solo record…known as Melt came out…

________________________________________

From: Craig Fuller

Subject: Re: Mine Forever

Hi Bob,

Great track and video.  These guys CAN sing, and they’ve been around for a while; seems like my son brought them to my attention 2 or 3 years ago.  Back in 1969, after playing 3 sets a night  5 days a week pre Label deal, American Beauty and Working Man’s dead were two of the things in my small record collection that I’d wind down to at 3 in the morning, (The Witching Hour?).

Namaste,

Craig Fuller

________________________________________

From: Survival Management

Subject: Pure Prairie League

Bob

As the producer of the first 2 Pure Prairie League albums, including “Amie”,  I wanted to thank you for the kind words.

Craig Fuller was an exceptional talent, who never received the recognition he deserved.

His songwriting & vocals still stand the test of time.

It was an honor & privilege to work with him & the rest of PPL.

Stay Well

Robert A. Ringe

________________________________________

From: Scott Hallgren

Subject: Re: E-Mail Of The Day

Bob,

Ditto this. And it got so bad after 2014 that the national office began sending out minders to sit in the committee meetings; I was on jazz, instrumental, and orchestral committees which had always listened to every project (sometimes over 50, took all day long) and then voted. I always felt we were being very respectful & fair to the musicians who submitted.

We were later told the minder was there because many other chapters had just gone ahead and voted for friends/politics, then ate their free lunch and split. National had proof of this, and babysitting was their solution. Perhaps they should have come up with something else once there were more than 750+ entries PER CATEGORY in many cases?

NOBODY COULD HAVE LISTENED TO ALL OF THEM IN TIME TO HAVE A CONSIDERED OPINION.

I’m glad that I left the organization; it’s a high school popularity contest with an international TV show attached. It’s NOT helping music anymore.

– Scott Hallgren

________________________________________

From: Harv Glazer

Subject: Re: No One Is Interested

I lost my first Grammy nomination this weekend to a 9yr old. 

Director X and myself were up for best music video for Future&Drake Life Is Good.  We have 1.7billion hits on YouTube over the last year. Beyoncé’s daughter won the award, that video had 32million views in 6 months. It will never get close to 1.7billion ever with those metrics

I called that she would win the award the day they switched the award to include her daughters name. Awards noms were announced nov 24 with just Beyoncé on the bill. Blue Ivy was added December 11th or something like that.

The news hit every outlet, Blue Ivy wins her first Grammy.  I’m not mad about it, not complaining, nor upset, in fact I commend the Grammys on a well played piece of publicity. Had it been Future & Drake or anyone else in the category an award given in the pre-show would have received no recognition anywhere this way they hit every news cycle.

Harv Glazer 

________________________________________

From: Michael Stein

Subject: Re: H.E.R. Beats Abel This Weeknd At The Super Bowl

Bob, they should have just showed the 10 best TikTok videos using The Weeknd’s music for the Super Bowl halftime shows. There are some good ones on there. Way better than the halftime show.

Mike in Cleveland

________________________________________

From: Ritch Esra

Subject: Grammy Ratings

Hey Bob,

Since 2010, I have asked my students (Ages 18-24) every single year “Did anyone watch the Grammy’s, The American Music Awards or The Academy Awards” the day after the show airs and I have yet to have a single student raise their hand in 11 years.

When I ask them why they don’t watch the Grammy’s or have any interest they say “I don’t listen to any of those artists”. Or “The show seems like it’s completely out of touch with our generation”.  Same with the Film Award Shows. 

This is why I find it so strange that you are constantly reading and hearing that they are trying to “Attract a Younger Demo” when the reality is that time has passed.  Most of these award shows are so out of touch that they don’t even see that the audience they want to attract has NO INTEREST – no matter who they have on the shows.  It’s like a struggling marriage where neither party is open, willing or even capable of really seeing what the issues are that continue to keep them stuck. So they just keep making decisions over and over that allow them to avoid examining what is really essential to their own survival!

R

________________________________________

From: Brendan O’Connell

Subject: Re: More Neal Francis

Bob-

Just wanted to add a little postscript to my last note. Although the pandemic has devastated the touring business, there has been a silver lining for us: back in August Neal signed with ATO Records, home to The Black Pumas, Brittney Howard, My Morning Jacket, Emily King, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard and many other amazing artists. With the unexpected time off the road, Neal wrote and recorded his sophomore album here in Chicago, completely in the West Side church where he currently lives (that’s a whole story in and of itself). It’s been a light in the darkness of covid times and we’re incredibly excited to hit the ground running with Jon Salter (President of ATO Records) and his entire team later this year. Neal followed those same instincts that guided him on “Changes, Pts. 1 & 2” to capture live performances on analog tape, honing his song craft and marrying it with classic production. If you like “Changes,” I’m guessing you’ll like the new stuff too.

Cheers,

Brendan

________________________________________

From: John Hartmann

Subject: Re: Judas And The Black Messiah

Bob: Very interesting. Back in 1967 I had a nightclub on Sunset Blvd in Hollywood called The Kaleidoscope. It was the Hippie home for L.A. Our opening night was Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead and Canned heat. We were the managers of the Heat.

There was a strong alliance between the Hippies and The Black Panthers. We even let them put on a rally in our venue. The LAPD who issued the permits for Dancehall Cafes were not pleased. They even planted a guy in the house to record the whole thing. As ‘peace & love’ lefties we felt comfortable knowing that The Panthers were our militant allies.

And the beat goes on.

________________________________________

Subject: Re: Latest Record Project

Spotify and streaming music in general are the greatest invention since sliced bread. I speak as both a lover and consumer of music and an owner of master recordings.

The fact that almost the entire history of music is on my phone and laptop! (I would put GPS second on my list of innovations).

As a consumer, I curate playlists of music I’ve loved since i was 5 years old.( I’m 61).

This. morning I heard the Spinners “Games People Play “ and “Goodbye Jimmy Reed”  from Dylan’s latest! and that was just while just getting my morning bagel and coffee.

As an owner of master recordings, I go through CD baby, which provides greater transparency than any label ever did. The songs (15 in total) get 3 to 4 thousand Spotify plays a day consistently. I’m good for $1000 a month and thrilled that music that’s 21 years old provides ANY revenue. For the record, Spotify accounts for about $300/ month and Apple music and TikTok about $200 / month each. Then there are a dozen other platforms that add the nickels and dimes.

.

So here’s the reality.. a low fi simple pop song called Drivers License by Olivia Rodrigo gets 5 million Spotify streams a day (562 Million and counting) on its way to 1 billion streams. It has more Spotify streams than Stairway to Heaven and by next month more than any song by the Beatles or Stones. The point is ..Fir big $,  it’s about NEW MUSIC that breaks through. I know you know this. Some people obviously don’t .

Brian Lukow

________________________________________

From: Michael Fremer

Subject: Re: Young Shakespeare

Yes, it is a wonderful late night listen: just you and Neil and the audience in the distance (vinyl cut from 192/24 file sounds “you are there”)….the other early records (“Massey Hall” and “Canterbury”) are equally good IMO.

My take on the first album’s initial failure: first, it was released with no name or title on the cover. It’s not as if he was “The Beatles”.

By the time they put a big “NEIL YOUNG” across the top of a second go-round it was probably too late. Also, the first album’s original mix was kind of dreary and occluded. But maybe worse was what’s written near the bottom on the inside right hand gatefold: “This record uses the Haeco-CSG system”, which was a sonic DISASTER. I’m sure if you were to ask Neil today about it he’d admit it was a mistake because it absolutely RUINS the sound, or as Neil originally said about early digital “the sound is gone, we’ve lost the sound”.

Haeco-CSG was Howard Holzer’s (A&M Chief Engineer back then and formerly with Contemporary Records) system designed to allow stereo records to be play on monophonic radio stations without screwing up the sound by losing out-of-phase information that basically disappears when you flip the “mono” switch. Labels were finished with separate mono and stereo mixes and catalogs and the stores didn’t want to have separate mono and stereo sections so Howard’s innovation was supposed to get stereo records to be compatible with mono but instead it made them sound like shit in stereo and mono. It produced a 90 degree phase shift in the right channel that completely mucked up the sound. Atlantic and A&M used it for way too long (can you listen to the weird sounding studio sides of Cream’s “Wheels of Fire” without thinking “WTF happened to his recording?”. No mystery: Haeco-CSG.

So Neil’s debut mixed in the Haeco CSG system (another Haeco-CSG loser but a great record was the Beau Brummel’s “Bradley’s Barn” recorded in a GREAT sounding space but Haeco-CSG ruined) was buried by: bad cover, murky mix, and murky mix made even murkier by Haeco-CSG system.

P.S. From: Michael Fremer

Some Americans are fucking idiots including the ones who write to tell you that Biden is somehow anti-freedom but the Putin ass kisser orange haired SHITLER is? Covid on the rise again. A friend in my business (makes high quality phono cartridges) just texted: 

“ Michael maybe you can post it somewhere I sure could use some prayers I’m in the hospital but the second round of covid-19 with large blood clots in both lungs. Not good.”

So to those complaining about losing their “freedom” over a vaccine passport FUCK YOU ALL!

________________________________________

From: Joel Beeson

Subject: Re: Vaccine Passports

OMG Bob hahahahhahaha.

I’ve been enjoying the Easter weekend away from my emails, so when I finally logged in (Monday night in Australia), I read the response emails first. I only got about a quarter of the way through when I realised I needed to read this original email to work out what the hell had prompted such a response.

By the third paragraph I was laughing hysterically as I scrolled up to double check the date. The writing style was so similar to your previous April Fools messages, I’m shocked that so many people didn’t get it! I went back and re-read the response emails and you even dropped a hint in the first one with the last response an admission of it being an April Fools joke!!

But I’ve gotta be honest, the re-read of the responses was pretty disheartening. The absolute vitriol coming from people from so many different backgrounds and everywhere along the political spectrum was pretty disgusting and perhaps the best summation of where the USA is currently at: hyper-partisan hair-triggers that can’t see past their own righteous fury. Scary stuff indeed.

I can only assume you get this type of response to a lot of your emails, but no doubt you’re getting much more of a chuckle than you normally would.

Warm regards,

Joel

Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3uyrXBJ

YouTube: https://bit.ly/39WGYFz

I found this in the Apple Music New in Rock  playlist.

It started off with St. Vincent. Am I the only person scratching my head over the hosannas over her? She plays guitar, she tests the limits, but do I actually want to listen to this music? “The Melting of the Sun” is more palatable than most of her work, I felt if I listened more than once I could eventually come to like it, but I had no desire to do so.

As for the second track, Kaleo’s “Skinny”…I’ll admit I wasn’t thrilled the first time I heard it, but I listened again today via Jeff Pollack’s weekly list and the light went off (or is it on?)

You see “Skinny” starts off quietly, when you’re previewing tracks it doesn’t jump out at you, I skipped through it after a brief sample on the Apple playlist, but if you let it ride, as I did with the Pollack iteration today, it builds and it’s got a catchy chorus, it could almost make you believe rock could come back. Ultimately it’s the chorus, but the pre-chorus that leads into it sets it all up and it verges on magical, maybe if we’re looking for rock innovation we’ve got to go outside U.S. borders where we have too much heaviness without melody, to countries where rock never truly died, where more avenues of music get exposure, where people are still interested in forming bands. As for the lyrics… You do have to stay skinny, but having said that there’s a level of misogyny and darkness that you can’t get away with if you’re mainstream these days, the PC police will come out and get ya, but the truth is if you’re not Lil Nas X, if you’re not in the Spotify Top 50, few are paying attention.

But the winner is Offspring’s “We Never Have Sex Anymore,” the third cut on the aforementioned Apple Music playlist.

Desmond Child learned from Bob Crewe that you start with the title, and you build the song from there. And this is a great title, and you think it’s a viewpoint from the aged, since Dexter Holland is 55, but that’s completely untrue, “We Never Have Sex Anymore” applies at any age, assuming you’ve ever had a girlfriend, have had sex, which many listeners, many fans, will never have had.

And the truth is Dexter Holland is an anomaly in music today, like Queen guitarist Brian May, he’s highly educated, he’s got a PhD in molecular biology, and you know that could not have been easy. And you’ve got to be intelligent to create something like “We Never Have Sex Anymore,” aware of the modern market, aware that you have to grab people (by the balls?) immediately or your track will be skipped, and sans changes you’ve got little, you want some melody, you want to construct a minor masterpiece, it’s not about the album but the single, and the truth is the Offspring have a new album imminent, but they’re working the wrong track, the nowhere near as good as, “Let the Bad Times Roll,” I don’t know how they made that decision, probably some label wanker in radio promotion who is second-guessing radio station playlists, trying to find something that fits when the truth is that’s the completely wrong paradigm in today’s streaming first world. You lead with your best track. “Let the Bad Time Roll” can roll right over you, it sounds like classic Offspring, almost juvenile, appealing to teenagers, but the truth is “We Never Have Sex Anymore” makes you think, it breathes, it’s a roller coaster of sounds and dynamics, it’s infectious, not the best track you’ve ever heard, but if you hear it once you won’t forget it, if you hear it twice you’ll sing it to yourself for months.

It’s popping from the first note, that bass, and then it enters a ska-crazy phase, and then that drops out and Dexter comes in singing:

“We never have sex anymore

We never roll around on the floor like we did so long ago”

But really it’s the Cheap Trickish guitar changes at the end of the second line and the lead riff that engage you, remember when it was all about hooks? That’s what the guitar provides.

“You never yell at me anymore

You never want to even the score like you did so long ago”

This is the opposite of the hip-hop ethos, the woman is superior, it’s the man who’s being whipped around on the end of a chain. Even better is the phrase “even the score”… Oh, come on, have you been in a relationship, especially after it’s lasted, unlike the celebrities, who hop from person to person and don’t really know about intimacy, only wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am? The truth is power shifts, it becomes a battle, and if you get past that there are further rewards, although it seems like only the educated classes hang in there anymore and don’t get divorced (this is not an opinion, can we quote facts without being excoriated these days?) You need someone of Dexter’s intellect to turn a phrase like this.

And then comes the change!

“But you’re still with me so I guess I’m not complaining

And you always leave my dinner on the stove”

Dexter seems old enough to be channeling the Beatles, knowing that songs need to move, and fast, whereas too many rockers have endless, boring verses before they get to the chorus. As for “dinner on the stove,” yes, you could say that’s sexist, but you’ve got to smile at the previous line, “you’re still with me…” If you haven’t heard this from a woman, you just haven’t been in a relationship long enough, you haven’t let your insecurity flag fly.

The pre-chorus is intoxicating, it’s the ride down the hill of the roller coaster, but the chorus is the twists and turns, a full sensory experience, with all cylinders firing, that guitar wailing, as is Dexter.

“Baby please

If you won’t love me will you hate me

If you won’t violate me well will you just aggravate me

Baby please

It feels like war under the covers,

One way or the other is what I say”

You want to know where you stand. Tell him in black and white, don’t leave him in the no sex no know zone. And the term “violate” has such an edgy connotation, but in this case he wants the woman to do it to him, and the reference to “war” under the covers, you get the image of playfulness, and the truth is sex is mostly mental, and this imagery is stimulating.

“We never have sex anymore

We never make love to our song like we did so long ago

We never have emotional strife

You never even threaten my life like you did so long ago”

“Emotional strife”? STRIFE? Talk about pushing it, and the threatening of your partner’s life…the truth is relationships are volatile, inherently, it’s amazing two people can get along at all, if you’re not having arguments, you’re not engaging, but if it all gets pushed too far…you don’t have sex, your relationship ends.

But underlying this all is a sense of humor, you’re chuckling as you’re listening, while your head is bobbing, you can’t sit still listening to “We Never Have Sex Anymore.”

“We used to do it constantly

We used to have a ball

We used to do it everywhere

We never do it at all”

A killer, the final twist, sex used to be frequent and great, I don’t expect it as frequently, I don’t lie like those in the public eye, but baby this is too hard to handle, give it to me please!

And then there’s that magical instrumental break, which is akin to a carnival, sounds that hearken back decades, but are positively fresh.

“We Never Have Sex Anymore” reaches out and grabs you, either you’ve got to jump ship or go for the entire ride, and it’s so enjoyable you want to go again, to investigate the twists and turns.

The Offspring broke on KROQ, when FM radio used to rule. Now there’s no longer one central place where you can come from left field and enter the arena, maybe TikTok, but that’s more than the song, and “We Never Have Sex Anymore” is complete as is, it doesn’t need a video, the movie is playing in your head, your own!

Not that credit goes solely to Dexter. Bob Rock is the producer, and there’s the band… Yes, this is not a solo effort, this is the rock of yore, a group sound, without features, “We Never Have Sex Anymore” stands on its own. You should check it out, because Dexter understands, and too many do not, it’s good to go back to the garden, to our roots, to see where we came from, maybe like the Offspring we can start again.

Kaleo’s “Skinny”: 

Spotify: https://spoti.fi/39W2Mkz

YouTube: https://bit.ly/2OvLNOy

Dan Penn is a living legend who co-wrote “I’m Your Puppet,” “Dark End of the Street,” “Do Right Woman, Do Right Man,” “Cry Like a Baby” and he produced the Box Tops’ legendary hit THE LETTER! Dan recently released his first solo album in years, “Living on Mercy,” and it’s amazingly satisfying, check it out. And listen to this podcast to hear Dan’s story, from Muscle Shoals to Memphis, he was there, the history comes alive.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dan-penn/id1316200737?i=1000516268676

https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/9ff4fb19-54d4-41ae-ae7a-8a6f8d3dafa8/The-Bob-Lefsetz-Podcast

https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast

https://bit.ly/3s1WKp2

You should watch this video.

Although you probably won’t. It only has 138 views so far, and one of them is mine, and it was released back in August. But it’s not out of date, it’s just waiting for you to discover it.

Lee Abrams ruled rock radio in the seventies as a consultant. People believe either he killed it or he built it into a monolith. Yes, it was Lee who got rid of free-form, whittled down the playlist, made FM more akin to AM, albeit hipper and with better music.

Lee constructed the original channels at XM. And was focused on respecting the audience, taking them on a ride, not replicating traditional radio tropes. But then he got squeezed out.

And then he and his radio buddies gained control of Tribune, and it ended in a disaster, the mores of radio are quite different from those of news, radio is down and dirty, news is all about respect. End of story.

And since then…we haven’t heard much from Lee.

But Lee has been thinking, he’s never stopped thinking, you can lose your job but still not turn off your brain.

In this video Lee divides the public into four quadrants, quite accurately, although at the end even he says the divisions are not hard and fast. But these divisions will help you focus your viewpoint of the audience. And one thing Lee says is you must pick one quadrant, and your work must be appalling to the other three.

The radio clichés, who do they appeal to, who do they turn off?

This is marketing in general.

One of their greatest mistakes is the Grammys branding their awards show as “Music’s Greatest Night.” Half the audience is turned off immediately, it’s not music’s greatest night, it’s a lame claim, and it’s too broad and general, trying to appeal to all when it appeals to so few.

I waited days, till I had some time to watch this video after Lee sent an e-mail. And then I just checked out a minute. I found that snippet interesting, and then I had to wait for a time to play the entire thing and pay attention and digest it. It’s shy of twelve minutes long, but that’s a big chunk of time in my world, in today’s world, in everybody’s world.

And with so many messages in the marketplace, it’s hard to get traction, especially if you’re new to the game. Abrams is not new to the radio/psychographic game, but he is new to the internet, social media. And if you’re coming on board now, it’s harder than ever to gain an audience, so only start if you’re prepared for the long hard slog, irrelevant of content, irrelevant of greatness.

Unlike so much media, this clip is not background, you won’t, you can’t multitask while you watch it, you’re either in or you’re out. But the truth is we don’t really want to multitask, we want to be in. But very few things demand our complete attention. This does.