{"id":4148,"date":"2011-05-09T12:05:08","date_gmt":"2011-05-09T20:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/?p=4148"},"modified":"2011-05-09T12:05:08","modified_gmt":"2011-05-09T20:05:08","slug":"top-ten-most-powerful","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/2011\/05\/09\/top-ten-most-powerful\/","title":{"rendered":"Top Ten Most Powerful"},"content":{"rendered":"

1. Richard Russell<\/span><\/p>\n

It all comes down to the music.<\/p>\n

Adele is on XL.<\/p>\n

What’s on XL sounds like nothing else.<\/p>\n

If it’s on XL, you pay attention.<\/p>\n

A&R is king.\u00c2\u00a0 When it’s truly about music and not about lunch.<\/p>\n

Want to learn the future?\u00c2\u00a0 You’re better off hanging with Richard Russell than Irving Azoff.\u00c2\u00a0 Richard’s all about the music, Irving’s all about the money.<\/p>\n


2. Irving Azoff<\/span><\/p>\n

He controls Ticketmaster and Live Nation and all those acts over at Front Line.\u00c2\u00a0 The only question is whether the company is Microsoft (or Nokia or RIM!) as opposed to Apple.<\/p>\n

When you’re in the catbird seat, it’s harder to innovate.<\/p>\n

Then again, with the concert side in turmoil, that’s the best time to make changes.\u00c2\u00a0 GrouponLive is a step in the right direction.\u00c2\u00a0 We could say it’s cheapening music, but music was cheapened eons ago, it’s only the acts that didn’t get the message.<\/p>\n

3. Coran Capshaw<\/span><\/p>\n

He’s built an empire while the mainstream was not watching.\u00c2\u00a0 Building on the back of the Dave Matthews Band, Coran owns everything from facilities to a piece of C3.\u00c2\u00a0 AEG may own Coachella, but Coran seems to have a piece of everything else.<\/p>\n

And now he’s building these DMB festivals which look to be a winner…<\/p>\n

The question is where Coran goes from here.<\/p>\n

His inferiority complex (matched to a superiority complex) leaves him outside the inner circle, where he desperately wants to be.\u00c2\u00a0 A strategic partner could help him so much.\u00c2\u00a0 Someone who can do the Hollywood\/New York dance.\u00c2\u00a0 Coran’s smart enough, but is he worldly enough?<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, check out Five Guys Burgers and Fries.\u00c2\u00a0 Coran’s got the rights in so many states.<\/p>\n


4. Ian Rogers<\/span><\/p>\n

He’s giving artists the tools to make money in this new era for themselves.\u00c2\u00a0 The future is in selling multiple items to those who want them, especially hard core fans. \u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Maybe it’s not Topspin.\u00c2\u00a0 Maybe it’s Bandcamp.\u00c2\u00a0 But he who figures out how to maximize revenue in this new world triumphs.<\/p>\n

5. Pasquale Rotella<\/span><\/p>\n

Insomniac Events.\u00c2\u00a0 The Electric Daisy Carnival.<\/p>\n

This is almost as significant as Napster.\u00c2\u00a0 While the rest of the industry was sleeping, under their noses Pasquale built a powerhouse.\u00c2\u00a0 The key here is demand.\u00c2\u00a0 People want to go to his shows.\u00c2\u00a0 They have a good time.\u00c2\u00a0 They want to go back.\u00c2\u00a0 No Groupon offers are required.\u00c2\u00a0 Electronic music is all about the experience, the performer and the audience are in it together.\u00c2\u00a0 And the mainstream is clueless.\u00c2\u00a0 Sound like rock and roll forty years ago?\u00c2\u00a0 Sound like hip-hop after that?\u00c2\u00a0 Don’t miss this juggernaut.<\/p>\n

As for it being all about drugs…wasn’t Woodstock?<\/p>\n

6. Jimmy Iovine<\/span><\/p>\n

Not because he heads Interscope, not because he’s on "American Idol", but because he built Beats.\u00c2\u00a0 Now worth hundreds of millions of dollars. He leveraged artists to sell something they could believe in, and the public bought.\u00c2\u00a0 The red cord is almost as meaningful as the white one. Can Jimmy save sound on laptops?\u00c2\u00a0 Can he improve the listening experience all around?<\/p>\n

Just maybe.<\/p>\n

7. Jeff Price<\/span><\/p>\n

Although some users are ragging on Jeff for the Tunecore price increase, the basic proposition remains sound.\u00c2\u00a0 For a tiny sum you can get your music placed on all the relevant distribution services, with no royalty involved.\u00c2\u00a0 Marry Tunecore with Topspin and you need a major label…why?<\/p>\n


8. Ralph Simon<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s all about the hand-set, the mobile device.<\/p>\n

And there’s tons of untapped money in India and Asia and the rest of the third world markets.\u00c2\u00a0 Ralph’s on the cutting edge here.\u00c2\u00a0 He’s the gateway.\u00c2\u00a0 You need to know him.<\/p>\n

9. Pro Tools<\/span><\/p>\n

You don’t need the major’s money to make your music.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s game-changing.<\/p>\n

10. __________________<\/span><\/p>\n

The filter. The Website that tells you what to listen to.<\/p>\n

It still doesn’t exist.<\/p>\n

But it will.<\/p>\n

And we’ll all pay attention and say we could have done the same thing and the site will make ALL the money, just like MTV did in the last century.


NOT AS POWERFUL AS YOU THINK<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Major Labels<\/span><\/p>\n

Whether it’s Lucian Grainge or Doug Morris or Lyor Cohen, they’re all playing the old game, which is shrinking.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s almost no innovation, just consolidation, a leaner style of doing it the old way.\u00c2\u00a0 More and more the best acts will come from somewhere else.\u00c2\u00a0 The majors just want what gets on Top Forty radio, and they want a piece in all rights to deliver this.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s like an automobile company saying it only makes cars that drive on dirt roads and you can only lease them, you can never buy them.\u00c2\u00a0 Might have sounded good a hundred years ago, but TODAY?<\/p>\n

2. Radio<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s all about content.\u00c2\u00a0 And radio thinks it’s about commercials.
Read Lee Abrams’s BRILLIANT comments on this here:<\/p>\n

\n
Lee Abrams says \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Time to Fight the Content War\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/a><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

He’s right, but no one’s listening.<\/p>\n

3. Terry McBride\/Nettwerk<\/span><\/p>\n

Terry made the mistake of being bigger than his acts.\u00c2\u00a0 The manager always needs to stand BEHIND the act, not in front.<\/p>\n

4. Satellite Radio<\/span><\/p>\n

More and more subscribers yet they still haven’t organized the listeners and turned them into a club.\u00c2\u00a0 When Sirius XM finds a way to connect those who listen into a tribe, then acts can truly be broken.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s what FM did in the days of yore.\u00c2\u00a0 In other words, it’s more than what comes out of the speakers.\u00c2\u00a0 But Sirius XM has more power than ever before.<\/p>\n

5. Apple<\/span><\/p>\n

Music is not primary for Apple.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s just a way to sell more of their gear.\u00c2\u00a0 Cloud-based storage is terrible for record companies, it disincentivizes people to buy subscriptions.\u00c2\u00a0 And if you don’t think the future is in subscription, you know nothing about economics.<\/p>\n

6. Spotify<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s been too long and the message has been muddled.\u00c2\u00a0 Now there are listening limits and purchase options and…didn’t Apple succeed by keeping it simple?\u00c2\u00a0 Spotify is playing to the labels as opposed to the audience and it’s hurting them, like everyone else who’s tried to play by rights holder rules in the past.\u00c2\u00a0 You can only win by being a renegade.\u00c2\u00a0 Right now, Grooveshark looks more like the future than Spotify.<\/p>\n

Rights holders need to authorize Spotify yesterday. The old Spotify.\u00c2\u00a0 Free streaming with ads.\u00c2\u00a0 Because this is the only hope for getting the public to buy subscriptions.\u00c2\u00a0 Once Apple’s cloud-based locker system kicks in, everybody without traction dies, or has a harder row to hoe.\u00c2\u00a0 Just look at the history of the iPod for example.<\/p>\n

7. Brick and Mortar Retail<\/span><\/p>\n

They sell souvenirs.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s about the packaging more than the music.\u00c2\u00a0 If vinyl were the future of music, Jimmy Iovine, the ultimate opportunist, would be behind it.\u00c2\u00a0 But he’s not.\u00c2\u00a0 Vinyl does sound better, but the future is better digital files, not an antiquated system.<\/p>\n

8. Simon Cowell<\/span><\/p>\n

None of the "American Idol" acts has lasted, other than Carrie Underwood, who lives in the fake, two-dimensional world of country music, and none of the "X Factor" acts will last either.<\/p>\n

If you think the future is throwing things against the wall with tons of hype you believe we’ll still be watching "The Jersey Shore" in 2021.<\/p>\n

The mainstream will write about Cowell’s acts and antics.\u00c2\u00a0 But the future is not the mainstream, not the mainstream media which is having trouble surviving itself.\u00c2\u00a0 Just because you can’t codify the Web world doesn’t mean it’s not the most powerful, that it doesn’t exist.<\/p>\n

9. Len Blavatnik<\/span><\/p>\n

The power is not in fat cat consolidators, but in the artists themselves.\u00c2\u00a0 This is a Wall Street play.<\/p>\n

Major labels are about ripping off acts.\u00c2\u00a0 Always have been, always will be.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s their business model.\u00c2\u00a0 But the future is about honesty and transparency and that’s just not in the labels’ DNA.<\/p>\n

Blavatnik is a sideshow.\u00c2\u00a0 Professional wrestling.\u00c2\u00a0 It was a fun movie to watch, but about as meaningful as "Pirates Of The Caribbean".<\/p>\n

10. Music Conventions<\/span><\/p>\n

Think tanks, you name it.\u00c2\u00a0 The future is in the hands of the public.\u00c2\u00a0 Who will follow the leads of individuals utilizing tech tools to build infrastructure.\u00c2\u00a0 I’d love to tell you exactly where we’re going, but I don’t know.\u00c2\u00a0 But one thing I’m sure of is the future will not look like the past. Those in the past have blown it by insisting the public stay in the past.\u00c2\u00a0 The public loves digital files, wants tons of them, for nowhere near a buck a track, yet the labels still cling to an old model.\u00c2\u00a0 The future is a new model.\u00c2\u00a0 Based on access.\u00c2\u00a0 Monetizing in ways heretofore unseen.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s about marrying Richard Russell’s acts with Topspin exploitation.\u00c2\u00a0 All the while charging the public to hear everything at their fingertips.\u00c2\u00a0 We’ll get there.\u00c2\u00a0 And most of the people who were powerful before Napster will be ancient history.\u00c2\u00a0 Some of those who are powerful today will be history. But those who make the music will survive.\u00c2\u00a0 If they’ve put in their 10,000 hours, if what they create resonates with the public.\u00c2\u00a0 You don’t have to make what everyone else does.\u00c2\u00a0 But when you get it right, you need a Coran Capshaw or an insightful twentysomething to navigate a career where you make every decision thinking about your audience, not your wallet.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s plenty of money..if your music is great and you’re credible and you know that the old institutions, radio and television and labels, mean less than ever before.<\/p>\n

<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1. Richard Russell It all comes down to the music. Adele is on XL. What’s on XL sounds like nothing else. If it’s on XL, you pay attention. A&R is king.\u00c2\u00a0 When it’s truly about music and not about lunch. Want to learn the future?\u00c2\u00a0 You’re better off hanging with Richard Russell than Irving Azoff.\u00c2\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-business"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-14U","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4148"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4148\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4150,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4148\/revisions\/4150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}