When I moved from Detroit to LA in December ’74 to launch a bold new album rock station, KWST (K-WEST) to compete with KLOS and KMET, we chose Supertramp “Crime of the Century” as one of the albums and bands we would hang our new hat on and pounded in Heavy + rotation throughout the year. If not the first, certainly the most powerful major market station to blow it out. We played it all, including my two favorites, the title track and “Rudy”. A&M flipped and ran around the country spreading the story.

By March ’75 Supertramp headlined Santa Monica Civic and delivered a state of the art, magical show that lives in my memory. The show was recorded for us to air. Somewhere there is this recording of the show, beautifully mixed by  legend, Ken Scott. We were permitted to then play it a week later start to finish and then again a short time later. It’s a truly extraordinary recording which deserves to be released if anyone can find it wherever A&M Records or band archives might be hidden away.

PS/ When the CD format debuted, Supertramp’s “Crime of the Century” was my first purchase.

Joni Mitchell “Blue” the second.

Jim McKeon

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Bob, I caught the Crime of the Century tour at the Santa Monica Civic in 1975. Everybody played the Civic in those days. Everybody. The album came out of nowhere and I ran to the Wherehouse in Westwood to pick up the vinyl. Then I saw it was produced by Ken Scott and it gave this band I never heard of before immediate cred to this stoner kid immersed in fusion and prog. You are spot on that this music could never register in another era, but 50 years ago was wide open. It was crisp, it was fresh, it was smart. The Civic show was a meticulous note for note recreation of the record. They didn’t stray and it wasn’t adventurous, but it was sparkling.

Jim Brock

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.. top 10 shows of all time .. Miami Jai Alai Fronton .. 04/11/79 .. they blew everyone away .. !

Jordan Zucker

Infirst Promotion

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Back in 1981, my college friends and I would go to Stereo Sound in Chapel Hill on slow Fridays. If it was a slow sales day, our buddy who worked there would usher us into the high end room with the $800 amps, $1000 turntables, and the giant speakers. He would play side one of “Crime of the Century” at full blast.

Ever since then, “School” is my go-to song for audio testing any piece of sound equipment.

Steven Leventhal

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I saw them at Madison Square Garden for the Breakfast in America in 1979. They were magnificent live. One of my top five concerts of all time. A very underrated group.

Harlan Coben

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Yes, Roger still has it. And the songs still resonate.

Had the pleasure of working with them in their heyday and nearly broke “Bloody Well Right” Top 40 (flipped the stillborn A-side, “Dreamer”) abetted by WB’s David Cahn and the rest of the local Buffalo promo guys plus the inestimable Barry Lyons.

And “Crisis? What Crisis” is basically “Crime Pt. 2,” with “Sister Moonshine” and “Another Man’s Woman.” Ken Scott, whoah!

Great stuff. Priceless memories.

Richard Pachter

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Saw Supertramp twice in Buffalo. Which was only fitting since the band was HUGE in Western NewYork. The 1978 show was better than the 1983. The visuals were excellent as well. When we went to the 1983 it was my last show in Buffalo as I was transferred to KC. While it to was also  outstanding it was also also the show I believe Rodger announced that this was the last tour for him as he would be leaving band. There was a strange moment where no one knew how to react. Cheer him to show appreciation? Silence? Yell no?

I remember for a long time after many of us

were in the “He will be back probably just taking a break”

Jeff Appleton

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When i was in college in Washington, DC in the early 1970s, i worked for a concert promoter and one of our venues was a great little theater at Georgetown University called Gaston Hall. We did some great shows there including Bruce Springsteen (pre Born In The USA), National Lampoon’s Lemmings with all of the early Saturday Night Live cast members, a great double bill of Jackson Browne and Linda Ronstadt, and many others.  In 1975 we received a call from A&M Records telling us they had a new band they had just signed called Supertramp who had made a great album called Crime of the Century and they were going to put them on a tour where the label would 4 wall all the venues with no risk to the promoter. Over the next few weeks we received boxes of posters and other promotional materials to try and ensure a full house. Absolutely old school artist development record business which both A&M and Warner Brothers were most famous for in that era. The venue was full and the band performed Crime of the Century in its entirety and it was breathtaking. Even though he wasn’t one of the two lead vocalists, sax player John Helliwell was definitely the focus of the show as he played with an electric lit jacket and did the majority of the talking. That night i became a lifelong Supertramp fan and years later got to know bassist Dougie Thomson when he was a consultant for Warner Chappel Music in Chicago. While they obviously had many hits that followed, i still feel that Crime of the Century is one of the best produced albums of the era and still holds up today.

Larry Mazer

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As a kid we Listened to super tramp on the way up to the ski hill. Whistler in April. Bloody well right. Goodbye stranger. On the way to a ski race. Sunshine. Spring skiing. Those memories seared in my head forever. My parents knew what to play!

James Rose

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Thank you for saying all this out loud, as it were. For some reason, as a senior in high school, I lived off this music. It had the rebellion and questioning you need at that age, along with the ability to feel sophisticated as you tried to figure out who you were. Roger and Rick are who I wanted to be. All the albums were easy to get lost in, but “Live” in Paris brought it all together nightly for me, hiding from my parents and sister in my room doing my homework.

Joe Fusco

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Thank you for sharing this. I was seventeen, in high school, when Crime of the Century came out. I still remember that opening with the harmonica wailing. It gives me chills even today. Growing up in Toronto school, was rote learning designed to get a job. I hated it. Music was my lifeline. I was alienated too as I didn’t fit into the right box. I saw Supertramp live in 1977 when they were at the peak of their career. Can’t say I remember much of it, but this video brought every note and lyric back to me.

Elbows Out, Canada Strong

Ellen Worling

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I was a bíg Supertramp fan back in the day, but never catch them in a live concert.
But some 20 years ago I saw Roger playing a small theater in Buenos Aires, him alone with a local sax player.
He blew my mind, one of the best concerts I’ve ever been to.
Today my 22 y.o. son listens Supertramp in awe. It seems we’re a family of alienated music fans indeed.
Thanks for the memories.

Aldo Blardone

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Supertramp’s virtuosity still thrills me all these decades later.

Tom Guarriello

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Crime of the Century is criminally underrated because it was too prog for wide commercial acceptance, yet too commercial for prog. Fifty-plus years later, the concert I saw in support of Crime remains one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. And I’ll die on the hill that while not as vaunted as Fleetwood and McVie, Supertramp’s rhythm section of Bob Siebenberg on drums and Dougie Thomson on bass was as rock-solid as any in the business. By Breakfast in America, Supertramp had ditched most of the prog trappings that made Crime of the Century so special and were merely a great commercial rock band.

Chris White

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Nice reminder of how wonderful Supertramp was.  They created unique songs with interesting lyrics.  Roger Hodgson toured quite a bit prior to Covid, and my wife and I were lucky to see him multiple times in small venues.  His voice was still in excellent form, and he is one of the best at connecting with his audience.  To me, he was the driving force behind the music of Supertramp.

I will never understand why this band is not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  Absurd!

Don Weis

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Supertramp not ever being nominated tor the Hall of Fame is a Mystery????

Mike McGinley

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My family just love Supertramp. My late father was the best man at their band managers, Charlie Prevost, 2nd wedding back in Southern Ontario back in the early 70’s. Charlie was an AR guy for A & M records and I remember as a snot nosed kid we heard an early sampling of their music on an old reel to reel tape player. He told my father that he wanted to or was offered to manage the band and he ended up doing exactly that. I had the privilege of seeing the Crisis What Crisis tour when the played at the fabulous Queen Elizabeth Theater in Vancouver BC when I was about 12 years old with both my parents. Amazing show where they played both albums seamlessly intertwined. It still brings a tear to my eye remembering the magic, joy and how their music really impacted my life. To this day I am forever thankful that my father, along with people like Mr. Prevost, taught me about what real and meaningful music is all about. Years later both my parents went to a Summer Sunday show at the old Empire stadium by the PNE fair grounds in Burnaby BC for the Breakfast in America tour as guest of Charlies and it was shortly after that he left as their manager and Roger Hodgson quit the band. The rest, as we know, is now history.

Thanks for sharing your story and sending us a reminders of the greats in a time where music was had a soul and not cold, technical and digital as we know today.

Mission Mike

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I grew up in Fresno. To pay for my drone-flying and skiing habits, I got a paper route in 1969.

 

A guy on my route lived with his mother in a triplex apartment. Unlike my friends and I, this older kid had really long hair. When I went to collect, he would often answer the door. These were bohemian types, which I never saw as a kid.

 

A couple of years later, music migrated to KFIG, and this kid was now a DJ on it. The top DJ in Fresno – Ray Appleton. He also had a band that opened for Montrose, Slade, etc. in town.

 

A few years after that, Crime of the Century came out. I’m pretty sure it was Ray that barricaded himself in the studio and played it repeatedly for a day, letting his bosses’ calls to shut it down ring off the hook. This generated a ton of good PR in California.

 

The band hired him as a road manager and promoter, so effective was he at getting this band widely known and played, he left town for a while to work for them.

 

I left Fresno in 1976, but I heard that when Supertramp band members would come to town, he would be invited to play with them. It’s often said – no Fresno, no Supertramp success. Who knows?

 

BTW, Ray has been a right-wing talk show host for decades. MAGA these days, etc. But one of those that seems to still have hippie ethics.

Gary Lang

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I saw Supertramp at the Technical High School in Ottawa (about a 300 cap pocket theatre) on the Crime of the Century tour in the spring of 1975. I’d owned the album since the previous fall when it came out and listened to it incessantly. I even hand-painted the cover on t-shirts and sold dozen of them to friends. Sic months or so later, the album had hit in Canada and I saw them again, this time at the city’s largest venue, the Civic Centre with about 13,000 other people. They were fantastic live.

Also managed to see Split Enz in a smallish venue in Toronto on the tour for the Dyzrythmia album in 1979 and a couple more times when they opened for Tom Petty’s Damn The Torpedoes tour when True Colours was a hit.They gave Petty a run for his money. Neil. And Tim Finn were a great team until young Neil emerged as obviously the best singer and songwriter in the group.

I was working for MuchMusic in the mid 80s when Neil’s new band, Crowded House, found themselves stuck in Toronto when Bruce Hornsby, who they were opening for at the time, got sick and had to postpone some shows. The band came to the station every day just to hang around because they had nothing to do. Much was a live service and one day we just just gave drummer Paul Hester a microphone and had a cameraman follow him as he roamed the building, talking to anyone and everyone. One of the funniest days of television in our history I’d say. A more personable, talented bunch of guys as you’d ever care to meet.

Canada loved and embraced all those bands.

Mike Campbell

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Growing up in Montreal in the 70’s, Supertramp, Genesis and Styx were my salvation.

Every week my best pal Micheal Korman would escape to his basement and play that Supertramp record over and over at the highest possible volume in his really superior Technics stereo system and Boston speakers.

We didn’t know anything about music but somehow we appreciated the complex orchestration and brilliant layering of vocals and music. The record spoke to us and took us somewhere else than a faux wood paneled office.

I was fortunate that my parents had a very solid and eclectic record collection so I appreciated everything from Latin  to jazz but somehow Supertramp was something completely different, elevated rock music as brilliant as  opera and defined as classical music.

Barry Avrich

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Great read, Bob. So many of Supertramp’s songs are part of the soundtrack to my life. I remember when MTV got behind them in 1985 after Hodgson left, a full special for Brother Where You Bound in a longform video with sax player John Helliwell. ‘Cannonball” was an MTV exclusive, heavy rotation, followed by the superior “Better Days”, their political statement at the time (still holds up), but this effort should have been poured into Hodgson’s solo album the year prior. “Had A Dream (Sleeping With The Enemy)” quietly entered medium rotation, but the follow up “In Jeopardy” was relegated to “request” status on Nickelodeon’s Nick Rocks, a program we were led to believe was youngsters writing in requesting such good music.  On occasion, Sirius plays tracks from both of these albums, but I credit KCDX 103 out of Phoenix for having “In Jeopardy” as a cut in rotation as recent as 2015.

Kevin Andrusia

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Thank you for sharing, that is a remarkable performance…almost too good!

Supertramp songs were always packed with ironic, insightful lyrics that ring as true today as they did then — “The Logical Song”, “Bloody Well Right”, “Breakfast in America”, “Take the Long Way Home” and more. While all very agreeable FM radio sounds, they contained veiled critiques of class, culture and government rule that were (and remain) spot on.
Like Meat Loaf, Gerry Rafferty and many more, I discovered Supertramp through my sister’s 8-tracks when I was a kid. So I’ll admit there is a sentimental resonance in my Supertramp journey, but the lyrics and varied song compositions are unique and meaningful. “Take the Long Way Home” speaks to every broken marriage from “Mad Men” to “American Beauty” and beyond.

David Toner

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Long time fan of Supertramp from when “Crime of the Century” was released in 1974 during my senior year at the University of Vermont.  The entire album was put into heavy rotation by the Live Earl Jive on CHOM-FM, Montreal’s legendary rock music station that we picked up a hundred miles to the south in Burlington.

In June 1977, Supertramp played a concert at Burlington’s Memorial Auditorium, a 2,500-seat venue that was more suited for basketball and wrestling than music.  An unruly concert a few months prior by Styx already had the mayor and city council contemplating a ban on rock concerts.  The same promoters, not taking the hint, once again elected to go with general admission tickets.  As expected, there was a large surge forward when the doors were about to open.  No one was hurt, but many without tickets attempted to gain access thru the windows. The mayor, Gordon Paquette, along with the police chief and fire marshal were called away from the city’s annual retirement dinner and upon inspecting the scene they concluded that the venue had been oversold by 1,000 tickets, which the local promoter, Alan Abair, vehemently denied.  Wasting no time, the city’s Finance Board banned rock concerts from the auditorium a few days later.

A couple footnotes. Four years later, in March 1981, Bernie Sanders defeated Paquette, the still incumbent mayor, by ten votes in an upset no one saw coming.  Rock music was subsequently restored to the Auditorium and the City of Burlington’s Youth Office, which Bernie started, opened a club called 242 Main in the building’s basement. With programming driven by teens, it became America’s longest-running all-ages punk rock venue, and a sanctuary anchored in the hearts of thousands. Unfortunately, in 2016, after decades of deferred maintenance and neglect, the city closed the doors to the auditorium and 242 Main, declaring the structure too unsafe to occupy. Redevelopment plans have since come and gone without anything yet moving forward.

Second footnote: The day after the Supertramp show, Susan Green, the Burlington Free Press’  music critic, interviewed Hodgson and asked him about the very lines from “School” that you excerpted.  He thought for a moment and then replied, “There are two different types of revolutionary Iyrics.  One that just incites listeners to stand up and start shouting ‘This is wrong.  This is wrong.’ And one that suggests they become aware of what’s really happening and change themselves and bring about a change.  The world needs that now,” he said.

That was 48 years ago.  Hodgson’s words still resonate today.

Chico Lager

I remember years ago reading an interview with Paul McCartney where he was asked who he was listening to, and he said Supertramp. I thought, what? That band? Aren’t they a little fluffy? Then he said his favorite song of that year was “The Logical Song”. So this spurred me to quickly give them a deeper and broader listen, and yes, they are great. I didn’t catch it at first. What’s the theme of “Logical”, what’s the main question? “Please tell me who I am”. So, to your point, they asked, they thought, they considered how to fit, what to do about it. You described it all perfectly.

Preston Bealle

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Two of my favourite bands and ‘Message’ and ‘Hide’ are my all time favourites from each.

 

Supertramp used to have their ‘choir’, aka their roadies, come onstage and sing the final part refrain “So watcha gonna”…etc, onstage after the epic HIYS live performances, and it was always a hoot!

 

I remember the 2000 world NYE concerts and watching to see if any would be disrupted by the Y2K bug, the first was from the first nation to ring in the new millenium, New Zealand and the band was Split Enz doing ‘Message’ with the line ‘no more new year’s resolutions, it’s more than that’, the soon to shut down band were in fine form and Neil Finn was on song, after that Y2K trepidations dissolved and good cheer was here, if for a millisecond!

 

Tony Barnes

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As I wrote in a review I just did of the expanded, 3LP edition of Supertramp’s 1980 live album Paris, I probably listened to the Supertramp records in my collection growing up in the late ’70s as much as, if not more than, those I had by Led Zeppelin and Yes. And I had ’em all — even Supertramp’s 1970 self-titled “Flowerhead” debut LP, with great lost songs like “Surely,” “It’s a Long Road,” “Aubade (and I am not like other birds of prey),” and “Try Again.” Supertramp spoke directly to me for all the reasons you cited — in essence, they let you know that you — the internalized individual with the searching/questioning the status quo mind — was not alone, even if it felt that way sometimes. Crime of the Century remains one of my Top 10 albums, well, ever, and Breakfast in America continues to resonate (though its production values were a tad slicker by then). And “Fool’s Overture,” the big 11-minute epic that closed out 1977’s Even in the Quietest Moments…, was an amazing history lesson of postwar Britain — listening to it now evokes that gnawing sense of “the more things change” that we’re all going through today.

1982’s …famous last words… (don’t forget those double ellipses!) was a bit of a letdown, to say the least, but Hodgson’s 1984 solo album In the Eye of the Storm remains a favorite (the title track especially!), and I also love the Davies-led Supertramp’s 1985 LP Brother Where You Bound, with that epic 16-and-a-half-minute title track and the sniping hit “Cannonball.”

As an inveterate lover of B-sides, I knew every word of “Just Another Nervous Wreck,” the Rick Davies-penned album cut that backed Roger Hodgson’s “The Logical Song.” Speaking of “The Logical Song,” kids of that era, like me, absolutely loved that they included the double-pumped Mattel Electronics’ Electronic Football “punting” sound effect — which appears right after Hodgson stutter-sings the word “digital” — something any handheld gameplayer of that age/era knew instantly. (Still got mine, of course, even if I haven’t played it in decades.)

I’ve seen Hodgson live twice (interviewed him twice too — a lovely and thoughtful chap!) and his voice remains as sound and inspiring as ever. Saw the Davies-led Supertramp once, at the Beacon in NYC for their Slow Motion tour in September 2002, and was glad I did so that I could hear him sing many of his songs from their repertoire. Bloody well right, indeed.

I’ll leave you with these key lines from a track on Side 2 of Crime of the Century: “If everyone was listening, you know / There’d be a chance that we could save the show…”

Mike Mettler

Editor, Analog Planet

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First concert ever! Back in mid-70’s or so. Hide in You Shell always brought me to tears. Even in the Quietest Moments was another great “deep cut” (even as the title song). Another great one about alienation by Roger was Sister Moonshine from Crisis What Crisis (“I’m a stranger to everyone”). It got a fair amount of FM airplay.

I do think the band’s finest moment was Bloody Well Right from Crime. So many styles, and the buildup is great. I can listen to that song on loop.

Rick and Roger came to the band from such different tastes (Rick blues, Roger more pop), but they made it work. And sadly, they had the typical nasty band breakup involving animus and multiple lawsuits. They weren’t allowed to touch each other’s songs in performances. I’m not sure if they ever mended fences but I hope so.

Best,
Mitchell Brook

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“How Supertramp’s $100 Million Album DESTROYED The Band”

Mitchell Sussman

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Howdy Bob,

Coincidentally, Breakfast In America was released on this day (March 16) in 1979.

Your friend and mine,
West Anthony.

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You recent missive about the band brought back a memory. In 1977/78 we were touring Europe including stops in Portugal and Spain. During a press session in Madrid, the local press were on Roger’s case about what the Crime of the century was. They were convinced it was about the late Franco and nothing we said could convince them otherwise. We were the first major UK band to play Spain after Franco died. It was wild, really wild at those gigs.

Charly Prevost

Mismanagement

I was served this up on TikTok.

I’ve got a special place in my heart for “Take the Long Way Home” because that’s the song I sang in my head after the 1994 Northridge earthquake. This was when California was still hip and natural disasters were not everyday events. Still…unless you’ve experienced an earthquake you don’t really get it. It’s so unnatural. I guess because it is natural. You count on terra firma being…firm. And when it’s not, your body is not prepared for it.

Anyway, the freeway collapsed, ergo “Take the Long Way Home.”

Now I never saw Supertramp in their heyday, even though I was a huge fan. Actually, “Breakfast in America” was the last hurrah. The audience finally caught up with the band, then again the band compromised too…gave up most of the alienation.

That’s what made “Crime of the Century” so fantastic. You could resonate with it.

Of course, of course, we can all resonate with love songs, either dreamy or breakup. But the human condition… Today people will testify they’re depressed, but not that they’re alienated, that’s taboo. You’ve got your tribe. But in reality, you may not. Certainly not in the sixties and seventies, before money was everything and income inequality was rampant.

I’m an alienated f*ck. Have been my entire life. I feel…just outside of life. I’m here, but my mind is elsewhere. Not all the time, but a lot of the time. It seems that everybody else is on a different wavelength, getting with the program, hopping through the steps, investing in a car, a spouse, a house, a retirement account… Where are my people, who are questioning everything?

In a song.

So I’m watching this performance of “Take the Long Way Home” and it’s so perfect, I cannot believe it. First and foremost, Roger Hodgson still has his pipes, unlike many of the singers of his vintage. But all the flourishes in the original, they’re reproduced, with an orchestra.

These are some of my favorite finds. One of my Napster gems was Neil Finn singing “Message to My Girl” with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. You can see it on YouTube:

“No more empty self-possession

Visions swept under the mat

It’s no New Year’s resolution

It’s more than that”

“Message to My Girl” comes from the last real Split Enz album, before Tim Finn left. And I’d like to say “Conflicting Emotions” is as good as “True Colours,” the band’s best work, or even “Waiata,” but it’s not.

However, it’s got “Message to My Girl.”

He’s infatuated, but he’s having a hard time crossing the gap, telling his object of affection, but finally…

“I can’t spend the rest of my life

Buried in the sand”

These are the moments of every alienated, pessimistic life. You realize that you’ve got to stop listening to your records and take a risk.

That Neil Finn with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra track/video was recorded in 1996, when was this iteration of “Take the Long Way Home” recorded?

Well, when the camera pulls back, you can see the words “Jazz Open Stuttgart,” so I Googled and it came right up.

2013.

Okay, okay… I remember the early days of YouTube, when we’d find amazing things and send them to each other. But that era faded, just like the early days of e-mail when you forwarded jokes.

So Google told me the full show was on YouTube. 

So I clicked and…

I went through the track listing and the second song was “School.”

“Don’t do this and don’t do that

What are they trying to do? (Make a good boy of you)

And do they know where it’s at?

But don’t criticize, they’re old and wise

Do as they tell you to, don’t want the devil to

Come and put out your eyes”

That’s what they teach you in school, to obey the rules. And if you continue to go to school, matriculate at a college, you ultimately realize it’s all…

B.S.

The puffed up professors. The grinding students. All for what? A grade that will mean nothing in your future life? Maybe you can trade in your grades for a good graduate school, or a job, but at some point you’re going to wake up and realize none of this make sense. Or you’re going to get fired and confront reality.

Which is why baby boomers can’t understand the techies. You dropped out of college, WHAT DIDYOUR PARENTS SAY?

The concert also includes “Hide in Your Shell,” the second longest song from “Crime of the Century,” it’s got multiple movements, it’s a tour-de-force.

“But what you see is just illusion

(What you see is just illusion)

You’re surrounded by confusion

(You’re surrounded by confusion)

Saying life’s begun to cheat you

Friends are out to beat you

Grab on to what you can scramble for”

Now ultimately “Hide in Your Shell” is akin to “Message to My Girl,” a hand extended to bring you into the world of love.

However…

“Crime of the Century” closes with the title track.

“Now they’re planning the crime of the century

Well what would it be?

Read all about their schemes and adventuring

Yes it’s well worth the fee

So roll up and see

As they rape the universe

How they’ve gone from bad to worse”

Us versus them. That’s the way we saw it back then. To sell out was anathema. Now selling out is the goal, that’s the backbone of social media influencers. Screw credibility, it’s money I want!

But the acts of yore left money on the table. Not everything felt right.

Not anymore.

Now “Crime of the Century” is not a part of the Stuttgart show, it was sung by Rick Davies.

“Crisis? What Crisis?” followed “Crime of the Century,” it was for fans only.

But after that came “In the Quietest Moments” with “Give a Little Bit.”

That’s a Hodgson song, and it’s part of this show. But also included is the title cut, my favorite from the album.

“Don’t you let the sun fade away

Don’t you let the sun fade away

Don’t you let the sun be leaving

Won’t you come to me soon?”

There’s a reaching out, an optimism.

But the pure sound of the record… It’s hermetically sealed. It’s not made for dancing, but listening. You want to sidle up to it, try to get inside it.

That’s music.

Assuming you’re a big fan from the seventies. When the charts meant nothing, even though those who were not there keep referencing said charts whilst depicting a reality that is far from the one those who were there experienced.

So I’m thinking how this music wouldn’t float today. Sure, we’ve got some introspection, but everybody’s looking for a way in, nobody is on the outside feeling that they don’t fit in and this might be their condition for the rest of their life, people with more questions than answers.

Then again, the outsiders question the status quo, whereas the insiders are invested in it.

Now punk was a reaction to corporate rock, which Supertramp was not, however Supertramp was a bunch of skilled musicians taking their time to create a seamless statement. So the punks didn’t embrace it. However, Supertramp and the punks did share a basic trait, the aforesaid ALIENATION!

So you may pooh-pooh Supertramp, not only not watch this video, but feel a need to insult it.

However, for a chosen few…

This is manna from heaven.

This was his Napster moment.

And he failed.

Everything comes back to the music business. Which was the canary in the coal mine for digital disruption. When they finally started stealing movies…there was a trailer in the theatre scolding moviegoers not to, PAYING CUSTOMERS WHO WERE ALREADY THERE!

Never forget, those with money and status protect money and status first and foremost, they cannot question their beliefs.

Like Chuck Schumer.

Schumer seems to believe it’s business as usual. That the system works. As it is crumbling all around him. He reminds me of the executives who kept saying that the CD was perfect, who would want anything more…after ripping off the public with one good track on a disc they sold for fifteen bucks. The public was angry, the industry was ignorant, and then an explosion happened.

This time the explosion is on the other side, the Republican side, a slide towards authoritarianism. If you think Trump believes in the system…you just haven’t been following the news. He acts willy-nilly and dares the legal system to stop him, and so far it hasn’t done a great job of this.

Now it’s not only Trump. But his acolytes. We’ve got to stop demonizing each and every person who voted for Trump. Forget the Biden-haters, those who constantly want to own the libs. The bottom line is people wanted change, and the Democrats weren’t giving it to them. Biden was a placeholder. Where was the march to the future?

Oh, don’t bother to defend him. And don’t bother to point out the small margin with which Trump won. Or denigrate Gavin Newsom’s new podcast. Makes me crazy when people are so up their own rear ends, inside their bubble, that they can’t see the outside.

Sure, if you’re part of the educated elite you think you know better. But one thing you do not know is how the other half lives. You’re so busy chasing the billionaires that you’re myopic.

Ah, I’m an equal-opportunity offender! People hate when you question your own team. Which is what Newsom is doing. He realizes he’s vulnerable, with the issues in California, with the fetid debate with DeSantis on Fox. So Gavin is switching it up, trying to save his presidential prospects, and what do we keep hearing? HE’S LEGITIMIZING THE RIGHT!

As if we don’t all live in a society together. Isn’t that the cliché, keep your friends close, your enemies closer?

And then there’s James Carville telling the Democrats to roll over and play dead and wait for the Republicans to self-destruct.

I’m sick and tired of the usual suspect Democrats who believe in the game so much that they can’t question the game.

Like the coming elections… Do you really believe they’re going to happen? On a fair basis? I mean they have elections in Russia and Hungary and it makes no difference, the incumbent strongman wins.

Everything is suddenly up for grabs. People are afraid to speak. Talk about a chilling effect… How do you lose the ability to speak truth to power? Very slowly and then all at once.

If you want to be really horrified, read this piece from “The New York Times’: 

“Young Democrats’ Anger Boils Over as Schumer Retreats on Shutdown – A generational divide, seen in newer lawmakers’ impatience with bipartisanship and for colleagues who don’t understand new media, has emerged as one of the deepest rifts within the party.”

Free link: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/14/us/politics/government-shutdown-spending-bill-schumer-democrats.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4U4.rYGH.R5a6fF1fgYte&smid=url-share

Here’s the money quote:

“And in private, 30- and 40-something lawmakers commiserate about having to decipher the mysteries of the internet for their older colleagues; one said she recently had to explain to another House member what a podcast was.”

This reminds me of the turn of the century when record execs did not use computers and had their e-mail printed out. How in the hell could they understand technological change? THEY COULDN’T! They couldn’t fathom the discontent of the public. And they had the law on their side… So they sued their customers, and instituted the rootkit. How did that work out? HORRIBLY! Revenues continued to sink until an outsider, Daniel Ek, came along and rescued them.

And the funny thing is the labels LOVE Ek and Spotify, he’s their largest account. And the users who bought the internet dream that everybody would be rich and famous in the future because of the unlimited opportunity blame Ek when this fallacy evidenced itself. More artists are making more money than ever before on Spotify and this still isn’t enough for wannabe and broke artists, especially those who made money in the past. What more do you want?

Oh, a penny a stream. Then you’re instantly ignored. You don’t know economics. And if you don’t know the landscape, you’re screwed.

The public knows the landscape and is horrified and scared. And the only people seemingly tapping into this are D.C. pariahs Bernie Sanders and AOC. Bernie is speaking English, constantly railing against the oligarchs, and AOC represents the younger generation. But Schumer, et al, are in bed with the oligarchs, they’ve got their own team just like Trump and the Republicans, and they want no change, while believing that they know everything and rule forever, they’re baby boomers, aren’t they?

The record labels refused to make a deal with Napster, they legally shut it down, it was copyright infringement. And then what happened? KaZaA surfaced, and since there was no central database, a new legal question arose. And after KaZaA came lockers… It was an endless race until Ek and Spotify. (Don’t talk to me about the iTunes Store, it was a wank, a temporary solution of ownership when ownership is passé, just ask anybody under thirty, they want ACCESS, not OWNERSHIP, meanwhile the aforementioned boomers can’t understand this, aren’t you supposed to build a shrine to yourself?)

So as you can see, it was one cut after another for the music industry until an outsider came along and rescued them.

So Schumer capitulates on the budget and he thinks this is the end. No, it’s just the BEGINNING! Trump has Schumer and the Democrats just where he wants them, afraid and complacent, believing in business as usual when nothing could be further from the truth.

Well, they’ll get him next time. Huh? When are you going to draw a line in the sand, when are you going to activate the public, get them on your side.

Napster gained traction with college students, because at the time they were the few with high speed connections. And even eventual users pooh-poohed Napster. It was illegal, the sound was supposedly poor, there were viruses… And then they started to use it and they were amazed, this was the greatest thing of all time! Not only could you get the hits you wanted that you’d never buy, you’d get all this unreleased stuff! Metallica said they didn’t want their work tapes out there. Now acts are begging for attention, they’re flooding YouTube with live shows, covers… Credit Napster. And if you think we’re ever going back to the controlled market of yesteryear… You believe that foreign music is not infiltrating the scene and diluting the power of U.S. and U.K. repertoire.

Now the labels had an edict that no one employed could use Napster. Which only made them ignorant. Because if you used the service, you saw its magic, its advantages.

Schumer wants the Democrats to fall in line.

Whereas if he’d voted down the budget we’d be in uncharted territory, which a politician hates the most, they want a controlled environment. Yes, in the past a government shutdown was anathema, but I wouldn’t think that would be the case today. It would focus and define the issues. As for the deleterious effects…how about all the people who’ve already lost their jobs as a result of Musk’s chainsaw?

And the press keeps reporting the news. Just like with Napster. But the press didn’t make the difference, THE USERS DID!

The general public.

And the general public is pissed, certainly the Democrats. And Republicans who voted for Trump are about to experience pain and what did Schumer do? Roll over and play dead.

It’s a new world. You employ new strategies.

Read that article above:

“Representative Sara Jacobs of California, 36 — who said she recently had to explain what a podcast was to a Democratic colleague she would not name…”

Said:

“‘Democrats won the people who watch cable news and read newspapers,’ Ms. Jacobs said. ‘We lost the people who don’t feel like they’re part of politics at all. And so, how do we go to them, instead of keep trying to force them to come to us?'”

Bingo. It’s not only those on the right who do not believe in mainstream news. You’ve just got to read my inbox.

Oh, that’s right, YOU DON’T!

If you did, you wouldn’t have been surprised that Trump won in 2016 or 2024. And you’d be aware of the discontent and anger on the left today. People who are not only sick of the politicians, but big media. They rely on Substack and YouTube and podcasts and…alta kachers in Congress are clueless. Even baseball changed its rules, realizing the game had to be sped up and reined in.

But not the Democrats.

What do you want them to do? Their hands are tied!

No, they’re not, we want you to wake up and LEAD!

Tune in today March 15th to Faction Talk, channel 103, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.

If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz