“Rock Me on the Water: 1974 – The Year Los Angeles Transformed Movies, Music, Television, and Politics”: https://amzn.to/3fpmpDt

At first I loved this book.

Then it depressed me.

Ronald Brownstein posits that 1974 was the apotheosis in entertainment and it all emanated from Los Angeles. This is patently untrue. I hate when writers come up with a theory and shoehorn the facts to make their case. Didn’t David Hepworth write a whole book about how 1971 was the year music exploded, they even made an Apple TV+ series about it, as a matter of fact it’s going to launch this week! But Hepworth is a music journalist and Brownstein is a political writer and it makes all the difference. Brownstein is a better writer, but he’s got no innate feel for the landscape. But it all happened so long ago, a long long time ago as Don McLean sang, but that was in 1972.

1974… I graduated from college.

I remember going to the Beatles’ 50th Anniversary taping. Supposedly Paul had been reluctant and Ringo gung-ho but really it lacked gravitas, almost intentionally, at least what I could see from the floor, it might have played a bit different at home. It was a celebration, it was light as opposed to heavy. But when it gets heavy…

So Brownstein starts with Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson. That was a golden era of film, the late sixties and seventies. But I’d never say that ’74 was the peak. And Brownstein never mentions “The Deer Hunter,” which came out in ’78, and was the most dynamic and thought-provoking anti-Vietnam film of the era.

Not that Brownstein doesn’t discuss the penumbra, what happened before and after ’74, but he says it was basically all downhill thereafter, that the social consciousness flicks were from the earlier part of the decade.

Anyway, Warren Beatty is now 84 years old. And Jack Nicholson is the same age. Warren is still around, but Jack has completely disappeared. There are rumors he is ill, but if this is so, no one is talking. And I learned a bit of info reading about these two, my mind drifted back to that era, talking to Jack at the sporting goods store I worked in when I first moved to L.A. And I thought how the Oscars were a cultural rite back then and are nearly irrelevant today, but that’s because TV has usurped the throne that film abdicated. Studios decided they were going solely for the bucks, and they ruined the business, at least artistically.

And then Brownstein went into music. Jackson Browne, Linda Ronstadt and the Eagles. There was very little I didn’t know, but the scene came alive in my mind, I know those records by heart, and it’s about more than the records, what we felt back then. And it’s fun to read about what you already know, as long as the writer gets it right, and Brownstein does here. He interviewed all the subjects, he had access to everybody, the book is littered with footnotes, as a matter of fact, 25% of the book is footnotes, then again, I could write the music stuff off the top of my head, at least 95% of what Brownstein did, and his perspective is different from mine, he’s doing research, he’s coming from the outside, he’s not rock and roll. And therefore, especially as the book unfolds, it’s all about analysis and descriptors…I won’t say style trumps substance, but I also won’t say his viewpoint is the same as everyone else’s. He cherry-picks Jackson Browne’s apocalyptic lyrics while leaving the personal ones completely aside, and any fan knows Jackson Browne is a star because of his insight into people and relationships.

But then the book shifts to television. It’s basically the story of Norman Lear. And CBS, which aired most of his shows. And the truth is…when I went to college we had no TV, I was aware of these shows, but I never saw them. Hell, I didn’t own a TV until 1987, and I don’t think I missed much. Sure, I gathered in houses to watch SNL, when I had mono I watched “Mary Hartman,” but back then it wasn’t happening on television, not at all, you could exist quite easily without ever turning on the idiot box, as a matter of fact TV was considered a time suck, and if you avoided it wisdom was you lived a much fuller life. TV didn’t really become a thing until HBO started its original programming, and then the whole paradigm was blown up and jetted into the future in 1999 by “The Sopranos,” Sunday night was for HBO, the networks didn’t even bother to program against it.

But then there was a chapter on Tom Hayden and Jane Fonda and…it was all about politics, not Jane’s movie career.

Many are now aware of Hayden as a result of the recent Chicago 7 movie, but he was never ever rock and roll. Nor was Jane Fonda. And as far as what they did in 1974…it wasn’t much different from what they did before and after.

So why do we even need these two?

Because politics is Brownstein’s beat, his everyday gig. And the truth is by the very early seventies, music disengaged from politics, and other than the news, TV wasn’t involved at all. This is when Brownstein, trying to weave the story, loses the thread.

And this was when the book started to become tedious. Which completely surprised me, because I was so into it previously.

This is when I reminded myself that fiction is so much more rewarding.

This is when I started to realize everything that happened in this book happened a long damn time ago, almost half a century.

Let’s see, I won’t say it feels like I graduated from college yesterday, I feel like I’ve got runway left, but having said that, everybody I know outside the music business has retired. And that’s it. Done. You can have experiences, but your life has basically been written, at least the way these people live it. They play golf and travel, but they don’t change the world, despite having so much time on their hands.

And when you read this book you can’t stop thinking how different things are today. TV and politics are obvious. But music is too… Acts don’t migrate to Los Angeles to make it, you can make it from anywhere today, that’s the power of the internet. Sure, you might ultimately move to the west coast, but back then you had to! And you paid a lot of dues. And hung out and got drunk and theorized… Today everybody is going where they’re going real fast, there’s no time to woodshed, the fear is that you’ll be superseded, and never be able to catch up.

So music has completely changed. It’s driven by the internet and it’s about branding and money and the building blocks…that’s a step you hope to skip. You read about these old tunes and you realize there are no modern equivalents, none… Come on, Linda Ronstadt’s “You’re No Good” was her breakthrough, we haven’t had a track that engaging and powerful in eons. As for “Hotel California,” which was ’76, that’s a high water mark. The Eagles are hated because they were so damn good, talented, polished and great singers and songwriters, the reaction was punk, breaking it down, even though punk was really a reaction to prog and corporate rock. Simple had power. And in truth, punk didn’t really have its heyday until ’91 and Nirvana. And the reason that act was so damn great, and ultimately legendary, was because of the songwriting, Kurt Cobain had both punk and pop sensibilities, he knew how to write a song, and he had what all of the classic acts of the seventies possessed, he was alienated, he was the anti-Dave Grohl.

But forget debating quality, the point is those great records were fifty years ago. And as I’m thinking of the age and career status of those who made them it occurs to me they’re all in their seventies, some, like Ronstadt, have already retired from the road. Soon, they’ll be gone. And then I will be too.

One thing is for sure, time marches forward.

That’s another thing that’s upsetting about this book. I have sixties and seventies values, but those days are a couple of changes back.

The police are now gods, except when they kill people. Back then they were “pigs,” yes, even Joni Mitchell sang about kissing a “Sunset pig.” But that was back when Sunset Boulevard was the epicenter of the music business, not only is Pandora’s Box gone, but so much of the music and arts infrastructure, the real estate values are just too high, now you’ve got residence towers and offices and…the culture has been excised.

Our worst enemy was Nixon. Sure, there were rednecks, but we didn’t argue over the facts, just the opinions.

And the military! Vietnam vets were angry their efforts were not respected. Today people in uniform are exalted, irrelevant of the results of their service.

In other words, I grew up in a different era.

Most people my age have given up trying to keep up. They’ve got a smartphone, but oftentimes it’s a few generations old. As for TV? They’re the generation that still watches in real time, check the data. It’s easy to use the clicker to change channels, quite another to record to the DVR and use the smart TV or the Roku to watch streaming outlets, never mind dig deep into the offerings. Of course there are exceptions, people who are computer savvy…then again, the truth is you no longer need to be computer savvy, the devices and operating systems are superior.

And the digital excitement and exploration of twenty years ago is almost extinct. Remember the Naked News? Probably not unless you’re over 30. Now you can just Google nude bodies, sex acts, and your next door neighbor is flaunting it on OnlyFans.

In other words, culture moved. Forget judging whether it’s for better or worse, one thing is for sure, it’s different.

And so am I.

If I went back to my college campus, which I won’t, the students there would see me as an oldster who attended in an ancient era. And they’d be right. We had no cable, no DVDs, no internet…it was literally a different century.

And then I start thinking about how much runway I truly have left. Do I really have twenty or thirty years? And even if I do, what will be my quality of life? Junior Bounous may have skied Pipeline at 80, and gone heli-skiing a month ago at 95, but you probably have no idea who Junior Bounous is. Bounous was the original ski school director at Snowbird, a legendary powder skier, was his life equal to that of the entertainment stars? I spent a lot of my life in the mountains, is that where I should be? Wherever I should be, whatever I want to do, I should go there and do it now. Most people don’t live to 95.

But boomers thought they’d never die.

Therefore they’re not prepared for retirement not only intellectually, but financially. Most can’t afford to do what they want. And now my generation is the conservative one, living in the Villages in Florida, on a fixed income, not wanting to be taxed for social programs that don’t benefit them. We used to blame our parents for thinking like this, now it’s us.

Now if you didn’t live through the aforementioned era, if you weren’t in your late teens in 1974, you’ll take everything in “Rock Me on the Water” as gospel. But it’s not. It’s not that the facts are so wrong, as a matter of fact they’re almost universally right, but the feel and context are a bit off. Because Brownstein was not part of the equation back then, that wasn’t his life. As a matter of fact, he was born in 1958. Chris “Mad Dog” Russo was born in ’59, just a year later, and he was testifying to Howard Stern how the book was a revelation, that he was too young to truly experience what was happening back then, so he loved it.

I didn’t love it.

He or she who writes history owns it.

As far as the history of the late sixties and seventies…

It was an era where we had time, today we don’t. You could be bored, today you can’t. Big ideas were important, cash was secondary, what you stood for was everything, credibility was key. That’s hard to understand for today’s generation, which is struggling just to keep its head above water. No one with a brain moves to Hollywood to spend a decade trying to make it in music, they exit much earlier if they try at all. Today you graduate from college and get a high-paying job, you get a business degree, never mind an MBA. No one I graduated from college with met with a recruiter, never mind got a corporate job. I don’t think I even knew what an MBA was until the eighties. My life was about experiences. Which were rich. But not valued much today.

So you can listen to the records of yore, you’re not going to bother to watch the TV, as for the movies, now classics are from the early twentieth century, but the context…one in which music was everything, when you listened to albums to from your opinions and direct your future, I don’t think that comes through via the wax alone.

It was a long time ago, it’s history.

And soon I will be too.

P.S. Brownstein posits “On the Border” as an artistic breakthrough for the Eagles. He’s the only one who sees it that way. Yes, it was a commercial success, but the real breakthrough was its follow-up, “One of These Nights,” in 1975, never mind “Hotel California” a year later, and all believe that its predecessor, the commercial disappointment “Desperado,” is superior to “On the Border” artistically. And as my old friend Tony Wilson said, if you get the little things wrong, who is to trust you’ll get the big things right?

Trailer: https://bit.ly/3uPZOXi

This movie starts off lame and then becomes FANTASTIC! When it ends you’ll be smiling, telling yourself how great it was, and lamenting that there is not more.

“Undercover.” I wrote about it. I got a lot of feedback from people who said they watched it and loved it. Certainly the first season, with Anna Drijver as Kim.

But the star of the show is Frank Lammers as Ferry, a big time ecstasy dealer who is not greedy, but is not wary of using force to keep order. Most criminals in filmed entertainment are one dimensional. Or bad with a heart of gold. They’re never people you know, who you could see growing up with, being friends with. Ferry breaks that mold. Ferry is VERY serious about business, but he loves to hang with his friends, watch football, drink, have a good time. I mean what sense does it make to be a criminal if you can’t relax and enjoy the fruits of your labor?

And it all takes place in a trailer park. Not exclusively, but that’s where the main action is. But Ferry has the best domicile, and they judge you based on how improved your trailer is. Cops Bob & Kim rent a trailer as part of their plan to entrap Ferry…but Ferry is streetwise, and hard to get on the record. So, they keep proffering more and more riches, unsuccessfully.

But Ferry has a much younger wife, played by Elise Schaap, Danielle. Who talks too much, alienating the rest of the residents, and is constantly complaining of aches and pains and relying on wackadoodle health treatments that Ferry doesn’t believe in, but…

Danielle is completely different in “Ferry.”

“Ferry” is the prequel to “Undercover.” We find out where Ferry came from. Amsterdam. But he was originally from “Down South,” which is said with a sneer, in the trailer park area. You see income inequality, upward mobility is not just an issue in the States. Danielle dreams of going to Amsterdam, meanwhile she’s cleaning trailers and manning a carnival stand to make ends meet. Life is hard. In America you dream of becoming a rapper or an influencer, but the truth is few make it, and then you find out without an education your options are limited, you end up working with your hands for very low wages, trying to eke out a living. The only difference is on this side of the pond we have the American Dream, we believe we can move up the economic ladder, whereas in Europe and the U.K., the class system is much more rigid, you’re born to your station and you end up there. Sure, people move up, but it’s not embedded in the national mind-set.

So Ferry has a job to do, and in the process of tracking down offenders…

He goes to the trailer of his sister. They don’t get along. They haven’t spoken in years. Ferry won’t apologize. And it’s not until deep into the movie that you find out what the problem is…it’s always family squabbles, they mean something to those related by blood, the rest of us just shrug.

But then Ferry moves on with the hunt and he encounters Danielle. She’s cleaning a trailer.

Now Danielle is wearing a very visible thong. And when she bends over…

And Danielle has an hourglass body, she has hips unlike the mannequin models. And when she starts to dance, slinking to the music on the radio…FERRY CAN’T RESIST IT!

This is an easy concept to grasp, but a hard concept to depict accurately. What gets someone’s loins burning…

So, Ferry and Danielle start doing the dance, but she’s not the depressed person of “Undercover,” she hasn’t lost her optimism, she smiles and she and Ferry connect and…

IT’S LOVE!

Oh, we see this every day in movies and on TV, but it rarely resonates. Here you can literally see the magic grow between the two. And then… When they wake up together and it’s new and Danielle starts talking about her breath and… There are so many hurdles to intimacy. You see someone from afar and have a crush. Rarely does anything happen. Most of the time you’re off the gridiron, just waiting to hit the playing field. And hip-hop records tell you the guys are irresistible and the women are sassy, and the pop records are fairy tales, but in truth, love begins in fits and starts. And it doesn’t always bloom. But the key element is when you realize…you’re both interested. Are you? When it stops becoming a pursuit and is more about being together.

And when you wake up in bed the next day… You’ve swapped spit, and more, but you don’t really know this person, but if it’s a real relationship, you let down your guard, you lower the boundaries and you reveal your truth. Your anxieties, your desires, you reference what happened between the two of you…

And then there’s one moment when Ferry leaves Danielle’s trailer and she asks…ARE WE OKAY?

God, you know it, they’re leaving and it’s not completely lovey-dovey and you’re wondering, did what happen mean anything, will you ever see them again? Danielle is asking for reassurance, so she doesn’t torture herself in the ensuing hours/days.

And later in the show, when Ferry is inscrutable, inaccessible, Danielle says “I thought we clicked.” Whew! The honesty. She’s saying how she feels, she’s putting it all out there, willing to be hurt, just to get to the truth.

You see human connection is powerful. We’re all just animals, even if we’re potty-trained and can think and speak.

I’m not giving much away, because the truth is you know Ferry ends up with Danielle. Only in “Undercover,” he says he was married when he met her and there’s no hint of a previous wife here. But everything else lines up, the characters and the action, but we always wondered…how did Ferry get from there to here? We didn’t even know where “there” was!

To tell you the truth, “Ferry” made me mad. Because it ended. As I was watching I realized if this was a series instead of a movie, there’d be so much more detail, the story would be so much richer. Here, a glance suffices to move the action forward. But in a series, you’re privy to the inner thoughts, the motivation.

I’m always wary of these tack-on productions. They’re rarely up to the quality of the original. Kinda like the “Breaking Bad” movie… Okay, they wrapped it up, but it wasn’t visceral like the series. But “Ferry”? It takes a while to get going, but then you can see the arc, you can see Ferry developing his strategy and executing it.

And ultimately you find out his life story, well, at least more than you knew, but what makes it so great is the love story between Ferry and Danielle. Danielle is cute, but in “Undercover” she’s often not attractive. She’s not drop-dead gorgeous, and her attitude at times is not endearing. But here, she’s shined up, she smiles, she’s up for it, she’s wary of engagement but then she’s all-in. And when Ferry is all-in too… This is what we live for, this is the development of a relationship, the essence, and I can’t remember the last time it was depicted so well.

So, if you’re interested, watch “Undercover” first, both seasons, so the prequel makes sense.

If you’ve already watched “Undercover,” watch “Ferry” IMMEDIATELY!

Of course I’ve now overhyped you, then again I was disappointed at first. It was a bit too paint-by-numbers. But then the movie evolves and by time you hit the end, you’re thrilled, that someone has gotten it so right, satiated you, like I said, you only want more.

“Ferry” made me swear off movies. Literally, I told Felice that. They’re too disappointing. They’re too short, not fleshed-out enough. I could have watched ten episodes bringing me up to speed on Ferry. My only hope is there will be more, a third season.

We live in a b.s. world where we ultimately feel powerless. But when you watch “Undercover” and “Ferry” you focus on little lives, you go down the rabbit hole and you realize we all live little lives, “Ferry” gives us a sense of perspective. I LOVED IT!

I wasn’t expecting much, I didn’t absolutely love the first two seasons, but unlike conventional wisdom I loved the third iteration, maybe because it was only six episodes instead of eight, the story wasn’t drawn out.

The story?

“Big Little Lies” in Wales. At least that’s what critics said, but I can’t vouch for that because I never saw “Big Little Lies.” I go for more highbrow fare. Or much more lowbrow. But having said all that I’m recommending “Keeping Faith” because of EVE MYLES!

I haven’t seen a picture where I don’t see Nicole Kidman in every role she plays. She’s pretty good, but her acting is visible, kind of like Meryl Streep, she’s showing off, in an understated way, trying to win an Oscar.

That’s not Eve Myles.

Eve Myles runs the gamut of emotions, goes from zero to a hundred and back again with no governor, just like a real person. Kinda like Joni Mitchell said, “laughing and crying, you know it’s the same release.”

So when the series starts, Eve’s husband Evan has disappeared, and she’s forced not only to carry the law firm, but the show. Sure, there are peripheral characters, but it all revolves around Eve/Faith. Without Faith, there is no show!

Unlike Nicole Kidman, Eve Myles has not gone under the knife to try and excise her unique qualities to look just like every other Hollywood star. She has what my mother used to call “air-conditioned teeth,” which could be fixed, certainly by an L.A. dentist/orthodontist, but she’s owning what God gave her. As for her hair… Felice remarked how many colors there were in it. You see Faith is a mother and an attorney, and there’s just not enough time in the day to get everything perfect. This is not June Cleaver, put-together with her pearls… Faith is always running around, dropping documents, wearing her heels but kicking them off at the first opportunity… You see Faith is real.

As are the emotions.

Do you trust your spouse? Do you believe what they say? How much evidence does it take for you to question their statements?

And Faith is a bleeding heart to boot. She goes to the wall for her clients. Not only in the courtroom, but personally, when it’s not win or lose.

So in the original two seasons the story revolves around this criminal family. And the police investigation. But the third season…

It revolves around Faith and…

Someone we haven’t seen before. Who has caused Faith to be who she is. The backstory, it’s uber-important. Find out where someone came from and it will explain their behavior in the present day.

Also, Faith gets involved in the legal case of a dying boy and…

Yes, there are some hokey elements, especially at the end. And I’m not really giving anything away, it’s just…just when the show is approaching highbrow, it goes lowbrow.

But everybody looks to Faith, she’s the strong one, she has to be there for everybody, her no-good, wandering eye husband, her family, her best friend alcoholic Lisa… That’s a lot of pressure. And sometimes Faith reaches her limit, but she always puts on her coat and exits the front door and addresses the issue.

Sometimes an actor is so talented that not only do they supersede the material, they make the whole show worth watching. You can’t take your eyes off Faith, her behavior isn’t always predictable, she’s principled but not a goody-goody either. She is the opposite of the ice queens in Hollywood blockbusters, the eye candy who look good, but are wooden and two-dimensional. In the U.S. we think it’s solely about looks (and money!), whereas in the rest of the world, looks are not everything. I’m not saying Eve/Faith is unattractive, but she’s not the drop dead gorgeous star of an American production, she wouldn’t instantly turn your head.

You see Eve/Faith has a personality, an identity, and that’s what we’re drawn to. Sure, you might be attracted by looks, but they don’t go that far. You know the cliché, show me a beautiful woman…

I’m not sure you can say that anymore. You can’t say so much anymore. And some shouldn’t be said, but if thoughts just go underground is that a good result?

So, everybody ends up in love with Faith.

And the truth is it’s hard to be an attractive, dynamic woman in society. Men can’t stop propositioning you, you’re what they want!

I just cannot say enough about Eve Myles, how great she is. The six episodes of the new season breezed along.

And I loved how things fell through the cracks, when you’re trying to service everybody yet complete your obligations, some people are going to be slighted, and there could be significant effects as a result. We’re all imperfect, but some of us enter the fray nonetheless, willing to make mistakes in the furtherance of good.

“Keeping Faith” is on Acorn. Which costs $5.99 a month. The easiest way to get it is via the Amazon Prime app. Search for “Keeping Faith” and just before it plays you’ll be asked if you want to pay. But you do get seven days free, so if you watch fast and cancel in time… And if you sign up and then come back on again…you don’t get another free seven days, just so you know. And the good thing about buying through Amazon is it’s on your Amazon bill and Amazon has the best customer service of any online entity.

I wouldn’t put “Keeping Faith” at the top of my list, insist you watch it right now, but I’d put Eve Myles there. It’s your decision.

P.S. “Ferry,” a prequel to “Undercover,” started on Netflix yesterday, unfortunately it’s only a movie, I’d prefer a series, but Frank Lammers is in the league of Eve Myles, he’s a modern day Tony Soprano. I can’t wait!

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss!

This reminds me of Dick Cheney being charged with finding a VP for Bush II and then recommending himself. Huh?

The Grammy Organization is now no different from the Golden Globes. A cabal of self-serving individuals living off the largesse of CBS. Strike the TV show and you’ve got little left. But times change, and if CBS were smart it would look for a loophole to cancel the show of this travesty of an organization.

It’s a boys club, plain and simple.

A woman comes in with experience in the nonprofit world, with her own vision and…they can’t take it, they’ve got to return to the norm, of opacity, of manipulation, of no credibility. Hell, they hire Tina Tchen, Michelle Obama’s chief of staff, to find the perfect candidate, but they know better. As for Mr. Mason, he’s a person of color, so he checks that box, but where is his background in running a nonprofit? He seems to have been hired to herd cats and quelch dissension, and that does not move an organization forward.

And if you want to truly be horrified, check out Mr. Mason’s new salary…

They hire Heidrick & Struggles to look for a new CEO…it was just a diversion, why don’t the members of the Recording Academy claw back that payment from Mr. Mason’s salary, what a waste of money!

So let’s see, you’ve got an out of touch organization running a failing TV show with so many awards voted by old nincompoops that they’re irrelevant. The voters are so out of touch that they vote in the leading categories based on publicity, not quality. Really, did Billie Eilish deserve another Grammy this year? It seems like she didn’t even think so. As for a Grammy’s impact on a career… There’s no longer a meaningful sales/stream bump, the industry has changed, but the Academy has not. Turns out everybody who is truly interested already checked it out. And n with the streaming model you don’t have the threshold you did in the physical world, where you’ve got to convince people to pull themselves over the transom by having multiple hit singles and awards…no, you can check anything out for free, when it’s happening, and it turns out those who weren’t interested before are not interested again when an award is given.

And who wants to listen to all these wankers thank God when everybody knows God had nothing to do with it.

And if you’re not white, good luck. Tell me again how the Weeknd is excluded? Oh, the secret committees! So now they’re gone and the truth is…all those Recording Academy insiders who passed Grammy nominations around, gave each other undeserved statuettes, are SOL. No, they didn’t want change, they liked it the way it was, where they controlled the Grammys and now…

Well, the Grammy organization was started back in the fifties. And what has changed…NOTHING! When the whole world has changed! Records start on TikTok, but you don’t hear about it on the show. How about a segment on a TikTok star instead of one of those retread duets that no one likes?

I mean you’ve got to change with the times, or you’re history!

Come on, want to buy a Compaq computer? Or how about investing in Sun? Even better, Digital Equipment, the ruler of the minicomputer world that never believed it would be usurped by microcomputers, never mind the smartphone. Change or die, but in the Recording Academy world…

So, Apple excommunicates Steve Jobs and is then run by…

A guy who sold flavored water. And a salesman. And…eventually the company is on the verge of going under. So Jobs comes back and what does he do? PLAN FOR THE FUTURE! A stable OS based on Unix, a slimming of the product line, a focus on consumers and creators… And speaking of tech, everybody in the music world relies on it, how about an explanation of Ableton or Logic or Pro Tools on the show!

And even the Rock Hall has a fan vote, but Grammys are sacrosanct! Hogwash!

Which is why anybody with a real career doesn’t bother to display their Grammys, at best they’re in the bathroom, whereas those on the undercard have got them right up front and center, they keep telling you they won, it’s like a student council member bragging of their achievement at the retirement home. The joke is on THEM!

The Recording Academy doesn’t need a placeholder, someone to make the trains run on time, they already did that, with Neil Portnow. And the end result is the organization took ten years, when our country was changing nearly daily via technology, to make sure it stayed back in 1999.

What the Recording Academy needs is someone to shake it up, move it into the future, question all of its principles and activities, but this might mean…someone will lose their job or influence, and that just can’t happen. That’s what’s wrong with America at large, business and society change but no one can lose out, everybody’s got to keep their job, meanwhile youngsters come along with no investment in the past and disrupt the entire enterprise and everybody loses their job.

Where are the skills Harvey Mason, Jr. brings? Does he have an MBA? Musicians can’t run Fortune 500 companies and the CEOs of the big public companies can’t make a hit record…but they know how to run an organization, they know not only how to manage people, but to keep the stock price up. And there’s no stock traded in the Recording Academy, but there are issues of credibility and relevance and Mr. Mason and his male cronies are doing a good job of running this vehicle straight off the cliff, they’re nearly equivalent to Van Morrison and his right wing ravings, wait long enough and the truth comes out, which is that there’s a cancer at the heart of the Recording Academy and the only way to treat it is to rip it out!

I don’t really care on a musical level. I never respected a Grammy win, never ever. But as a business lesson… When an organization keeps doing the same damn thing expecting a different result… When women are out of the equation, with no real power, never mind the interests of rappers… What you end up with is an out of touch edifice that can crumble with just one push.

It’s bad enough to see a world where almost half of the public believes the election was bogus, where elected officials are cowering, afraid of alienating them. But now we’ve got the Recording Academy doing the same damn thing.

Ridiculous!