{"id":461,"date":"2006-06-27T15:13:49","date_gmt":"2006-06-27T23:13:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/archives\/2006\/06\/27\/ch-ch-ch-changes-2\/"},"modified":"2006-06-27T15:13:49","modified_gmt":"2006-06-27T23:13:49","slug":"ch-ch-ch-changes-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/2006\/06\/27\/ch-ch-ch-changes-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes"},"content":{"rendered":"

I saw a Deadhead sticker on a Cadillac
A voice inside my head said don’t look back
You can never look back<\/em><\/p>\n

"Boys Of Summer"
Don Henley<\/p>\n

1. Retail<\/strong><\/p>\n

Last Wednesday night, on my way to dinner at Il Sole, I drove past Tower Records.\u00c2\u00a0 Tower Records used to be SO busy, such a cultural hotspot, that they bought an additional parking lot on the other side of Spago.\u00c2\u00a0 But at eight o’clock this evening, there were EMPTY SPACES in the MAIN parking lot, right next to the store.<\/p>\n

Tower Records used to be a destination, it used to be the pulse, it used to be where music lived.\u00c2\u00a0 Now it’s a graveyard.\u00c2\u00a0 Inhabited only by those who didn’t get the memo, who are still buying CDs.<\/p>\n

Used to be that not only was every space in the main parking lot full, cars were lined up in the spaces BETWEEN the spaces.\u00c2\u00a0 Traffic was backed up on Sunset.\u00c2\u00a0 You had to wait to get in to LOOK for a space.\u00c2\u00a0 Inside the store you were confronted with piles of vinyl albums by artists only you thought you knew.\u00c2\u00a0 But then MTV made it only about the cream of the crop, Top Forty eclipsed album rock radio and everything but the hits became irrelevant.<\/p>\n

Then came Napster.<\/p>\n

I don’t want to hear another fucking word how bad MP3s\/files sound.\u00c2\u00a0 If you’re that fucking concerned, buy the biggest iPod you can and fill it with Apple lossless files.\u00c2\u00a0 Or download FLAC files from the Net.\u00c2\u00a0 The only people bitching about the sound quality of files are those NOT USING THEM!\u00c2\u00a0 Lamenting the death of the CD.\u00c2\u00a0 Isn’t it funny that these same people and their progenitors foisted upon the public the horrific 8-track and not much better duplicated at high speed cassette?\u00c2\u00a0 Eliminated the far superior vinyl record and delivered the too-low sampled to sound good CD?<\/p>\n

Furthermore, who killed the stereo business?\u00c2\u00a0 And, ever listen to today’s CHEAP stereos?\u00c2\u00a0 They sound light years better than what could be afforded for the same price back in the seventies.\u00c2\u00a0 And the iPod sounds BETTER than MOST people’s stereos.\u00c2\u00a0 So, to complain about sound quality is to show your ignorance.\u00c2\u00a0 And it’s about convenience anyway.<\/p>\n

There’s no convenience in getting in your car and driving at four bucks a gallon to an emporium that doesn’t have what you want and if it does, sells it to you along with ten shitty tracks.\u00c2\u00a0 People would rather stay home.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, there’s a market for indie stores.\u00c2\u00a0 Hell, there are stores selling all kinds of antiques to collectors.\u00c2\u00a0 But the CD is in a death spiral that nobody will talk about.\u00c2\u00a0 As they continue to try and reap the final financial rewards before the wall is hit.<\/p>\n

It’s like Napster never happened.\u00c2\u00a0 The concept of more people owning more music at a cheaper per song price never happened.\u00c2\u00a0 What we have is ostriches.\u00c2\u00a0 Ignoring the fact that most music is acquired FREE and just pointing to the Luddites who DO pay.\u00c2\u00a0 I don’t care how helpful the employees might be, it’s not about FIXING brick and mortar retail, it’s about ABANDONING IT!<\/p>\n

2. Top Forty Radio<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nobody listens to the radio.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, of course this is untrue, but be clear, RADIO IS NOT WHERE IT’S AT!<\/p>\n

How can you tell?<\/p>\n

Just ask somebody if he knows the big hits in the Billboard Hot 100.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, you might have READ about Paris Hilton’s track, or Kevin Federline’s, but unless you’ve got the intelligence of a gnat, you’ve done your best to AVOID CONTACT WITH THEM!<\/p>\n

There’s a whole subculture.\u00c2\u00a0 Growing by the minute.\u00c2\u00a0 Of the disillusioned and disenfranchised.\u00c2\u00a0 Who’ve abandoned traditional media for the Net.<\/p>\n

They don’t care about Mariah Carey.\u00c2\u00a0 They don’t care about Christina Aguilera.\u00c2\u00a0 These are SIDESHOWS!<\/p>\n

Musicians don’t want to debate the merits of Sony BMG vs. Universal.\u00c2\u00a0 Don’t even want to get into the advantages\/disadvantages of Frontline vs. the Firm.\u00c2\u00a0 The only people who care are those entrenched in the old.\u00c2\u00a0 People who’re living on fumes, in the realm that USED TO BE!\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, it’s not that these firms are going out of business, are irrelevant, it’s just that they and their charges no longer control the landscape, no longer are aspired to by musicians.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s the old way.\u00c2\u00a0 Now it’s make music, put it up on the Web and see what happens.\u00c2\u00a0 As opposed to getting a lawyer who’ll hook you up with a manager and a label.\u00c2\u00a0 After all, acts don’t TRUST the old infrastructure, it doesn’t look like THEM!\u00c2\u00a0 It looks like their parents.\u00c2\u00a0 People out of touch who are only interested in the bottom line.<\/p>\n

Most people have never heard Rihanna or Cassie and could give a fuck.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s no curiosity in the old system.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s like watching cricket instead of the World Cup.\u00c2\u00a0 Those days are THROUGH!\u00c2\u00a0 Not completely, but the old systems have been MARGINALIZED!<\/p>\n

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

I saw a Deadhead sticker on a CadillacA voice inside my head said don’t look backYou can never look back "Boys Of Summer"Don Henley 1. Retail Last Wednesday night, on my way to dinner at Il Sole, I drove past Tower Records.\u00c2\u00a0 Tower Records used to be SO busy, such a cultural hotspot, that they […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","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-461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-business"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-7r","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461","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\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}