Let me deviate from the normal “Music Blog” and let me dig up a piece I wrote for a different blog in the past. At the end of the day, a lot of this stuff transfers right over to the music business anyway. I was born into a family of Hoteliers so I’ve been around the business a long time. This is kind of my take on where I see hotels going, and how I think management could improve upon that.
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People either ignore your brand, or they judge it. When judging it, people usually judge with very little information or background surrounding your brand. When they do judge it, they will be judging it on the loudest, most brash, meanest, and selfish member of your brand.
When a waitress gives a customer poor service, suddenly the food is a little less appealing. The restaurant is a little louder, a little dirtier, and a little less likely to get a good review.
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When a homeowner decides to put his house on sale and calls the office of the top real estate agent in town…
When he calls the moving company the real estate agent referred…
When a family arrives in a new town and calls someone recommended as the family doctor…
When a wealthy couple calls their favorite fancy restaurant looking for a reservation…
Go down the list. Airlines, hairdressers, hotels, etc.
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Having the presence, and maintaining the amount of communication that I do through various social media outlets, it’s pretty common that I receive my share of spam and general garbage. Sometimes it gets hard to sift out what’s real and what’s not.
Today, while looking over my usual Facebook/Twitter/E-mail messages, one jumped out at me and I couldn’t help but take some time out of my day and send this aspiring engineer a proper response.
I do a lot of reading from the great Derek Sivers (Founder of CD Baby among other ventures). He’s led to a great deal if inspiration for me, and I’ve read, and reread everything he writes many many times.
Here is what I couldn’t help but share with this student from India. I sure hope he can gain something from it.
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On February 15th, 2010, On The Rechord founder Emily Buss posted a mini interview with me on their web site. She made me sound way cooler than I really am! This is part 1 of a two part interview. Look for part two further down in this post.
As an up and coming face in Rochester, Minn., Dallas McLaughlin and his in-home audio production studio Digital Avenue is helping amateur musicians make the leap from wannabes to must haves. With nearly a decade of business under his belt, McLaughlin still dreams of the day when music will be his sole meal ticket. Until then, he must balance Corporate America with the glamour of the music industry.
Dallas McLaughlin hard at work in the recording studio doing what he does best.
McLaughlin. Dallas McLaughlin. But, that’s Boss DeeJay to you, punk. He’s suave. He’s debonair. He’s a… hotel manager? A staunch business leader by day and a flashy music producer by night, McLaughlin has perfected his double life down to a science. Only on his 15-minute ride back to his home studio does he get quality downtime between identities. But, it’s at home where the magic, or what he calls “black magic,” really happens.
It’s a typical day at Comfort Suites on the south side of Rochester. Phones are ringing, guests are settling into their home away from home, and a man stands at the front desk flaunting a black sport coat, dress shirt and matching shoes with professionally gelled hair. His nametag reads DJ and he is the Assistant General Manager. “I’m a manager at the hotel so my shifts are kind of all over the place. I have a set schedule, but unfortunately, as some of my clients can vouch for, I’m basically on call 24/7.” Shifts at the hotel, he says, can be anywhere from mid-morning to early afternoon gigs or late night hours, which prove stressful for his music. “Sometimes it gets chaotic, but I’d like to say my dad passed on the ‘running on no sleep’ gene. So, I guess I got that going for me.” As his day job winds down, DJ quickly gets into his bright yellow 2004 RX-8 Grand Touring Edition sports car and assumes the persona, Boss DeeJay. One might wonder just how these two seemingly incomparable lifestyles took shape. But, it takes an intensive look back at his youth that determined the road he would take.
At the impressionable age of 10, McLaughlin’s older brother picked up a guitar. Feeling that his brother always had the upper hand, McLaughlin saw the guitar as a tool that leveled the playing field. “I played it all the time. I got pretty good at if for a while.” It was then that he decided to work toward a career in music. Before high school he dabbled in web design but it wasn’t until the start of his secondary education that his love of music became more than just a hobby. “When I decided I wanted to do this, I re-branded all of my material as Digital Avenue, built a new web site, made a real brand for myself.”
While finishing up his last semester of high school in 2004, McLaughlin began his search for the perfect music college. “I was originally planning on going to Berklee College of Music in Boston for some sort of performing arts. But, when I took a step back and looked at it realistically, I wanted to make a living with music. I had played around with home studio stuff in the past, so when I looked into it further and took some studio tours, I knew right away that was it.”
A change in mindset pushed McLaughlin to look into what he calls the “big media development school” in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl., Full Sail. Equipped with one of the most renowned audio engineering program in the country, he applied to start in the fall semester. Once accepted, he began to realize Florida was a bit too far from home. “The whole time I was preparing to go there, everyone was trying to get me to check out the Institute of Production and Recording in Minneapolis. I kept blowing them off, then finally I caved in.”
Where did Boss DeeJay decide to go? Did he get accepted? What happened once he graduated high school? Keep your panties on and tune in to the next article when we figure out just what happened to our modern, musical Mr. Bond.
If you are an artist looking to perfect your sound or just looking for more information about Digital Avenue and the man of the hour, visit www.digiave.net.
To read the original, go to http://theemilyb.wordpress.com/2010/02/15/the-modern-bond-part-i/
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Tattoo the pristine flesh?
What is permanent anyway?
The ink only lasts ’til the grave.
Skin and ideas decompose,
that which we composed.
The blog here at Digital Avenue has long been devoted solely to music, music business, and other music related ideas. With our newly rebranded company, I’ll also be refocusing the scope of this blog. I’ll still be writing about music, but I’m also going to focus a lot more energy into examining local and unique business ideas and models; unique products, and services.
The world’s economy as we know it has changed. In a time where business after business is scrambling to be just like everyone else, it’s refreshing to see someone execute their unique ideas. I don’t think that the upside down economy needs to be feared. The bell curve has been turned upside down and there is no more “middle”. You can either choose to go to the left and be cheap, fast, and below average; fall into “The Dip” in the middle and die; or you can go to the right and be extraordinary, surpass all expectations, and demand business.
“The Dip” is there to create scarcity. Companies shouldn’t just be trying to survive The Dip, they should be using The Dip as an opportunity to create something extraordinary that people can’t help but talk about it, recommend it, and yes, choose it. Businesses need to understand that in order to survive today, they need to be different. They have two choices: Quit, or be Exceptional.
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Apparently my citing of the source on the bottom was not prominent enough for some people. But this IS a snippet of an article originally by Steve Albini.
There’s this band. They’re pretty ordinary, but they’re also pretty good, so they’ve attracted some attention. They’re signed to a moderate-sized “independent” label owned by a distribution company, and they have another two albums owed to the label. They’re a little ambitious. They’d like to get signed by a major label so they can have some security: you know, get some good equipment, tour in a proper tour bus — nothing fancy, just a little reward for all the hard work. To that end, they got a manager. He knows some of the label guys, and he can shop their next project to all the right people. He takes his cut, sure, but it’s only 15%, and if he can get them signed then it’s money well spent. Anyways, it doesn’t cost them anything if it doesn’t work. 15% of nothing isn’t much! One day an A&R scout calls them, says he’s “been following them for a while now,” and when their manager mentioned them to him, it just “clicked.” Would they like to meet with him about the possibility of working out a deal with his label? Wow. Big Break time. They meet the guy, and y’know what — he’s not what they expected from a label guy. He’s young and dresses pretty much like the band does. He knows all their favorite bands. He’s like one of them. He tells them he wants to go to bat for them, to try to get them everything they want. He says anything is possible with the right attitude.
They conclude the evening by taking home a copy of a deal memo they wrote out and signed on the spot. The A&R guy was full of great ideas, even talked about using a name producer. Butch Vig is out of the question — he wants 100 Gs and three points. Or they can have just anybody record it (like Warton Tiers, maybe– cost you 5 or 7 grand) and have Andy Wallace remix it for 4 grand a track plus 2 points. It was a lot to think about.
Well, they get the final contract, and it’s not quite what they expected. They figure it’s better to be safe than sorry and they turn it over to a lawyer–one who says he’s experienced in entertainment law and he hammers out a few bugs. They’re still not sure about it, but the lawyer says he’s seen a lot of contracts, and theirs is pretty good. They’ll be great royalty: 13% [less a 10% packaging deduction]. They’re signed for four years, with options on each year, for a total of over a million dollars! That’s a lot of money in any man’s English. The first year’s advance alone is $250,000. Just think about it, a quarter million, just for being in a rock band!
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For YEARS I let people talk me into things that just weren’t right for me. I’ll bet you have, too. I went down wrong paths, doing things I wasn’t excited about, because someone or something convinced me it was what I “should” be doing.
I’ve recently figured out something that’s made all the difference, and I’ve been happier and more successful since:
There’s a compass in your gut that points two directions : EXCITING and DRAINING.
No matter what advice anyone gives you – no matter how smart the person telling you what to do – you need to let this compass override your other decisions.
Whatever excites you, go do it.
Whatever drains you, stop doing it.
I’ve heard about too many musicians getting into music because they LOVE playing drums, for example. They love it so much they want to do it for a living. But then the world says, “If you’re going to be in the music business, you have to understand cross-collaterization! You have to read this book on music business law. And you need a great website. So you have to learn HTML. And Flash. And how to stream audio files on the web. And you need to understand marketing, and accounting, and blah blah blah….”
Soon this drummer is spending all his time doing everything BUT play the drums, and decides it’s not worth it! He gets a job at a bank and loses interest in his drums, because a career in music now seems like the most awful thing ever.
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I’m aware life is not always as simplistic as the title of this post suggests, but how can people expect to succeed if they have a negative attitude towards everything? We all encounter people on a daily basis who live life with a “can’t do” ethic, and while a “can do” attitude doesn’t guarantee success, constantly thinking you can’t succeed will almost certainly guarantee failure.
Many people put off starting their own business because they think that they can’t because of numerous reasons; I would argue, however, that if you really want to start your own business then nothing should hold you back. No money? Bootstrap your business. Need to hold down your regular job? Work a 9-5, spend the nights building your business until you are in a position to rely solely on your business venture.
There are obstacles that are incredibly difficult to overcome; but being pessimistic and taking a negative view on challenges that you or your business face will almost certainly lead to hardship. View every challenge as an opportunity, and every problem as a way to gain experience and improve your business.
Looking for all possible ways to turn a problem in to an advantage is fundamental in being successful in business. Entrepreneurial spirits tend to have this attitude; you didn’t see Richard Branson giving up when he lost it all, did you? As a businessperson you will face challenges, and you should not only expect them but also embrace them.
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Ten thousand years ago the world changed. The invention of Farming changed how humans approached life.
Civilization forked. The worlds population could now be boiled down to two categories. Hunters, and Farmers.
Hunters were the old school of thought. Bring your big pointy stick out in the woods, come back with dinner for your family. Repeat the next day.
Farming became the new school. Farmers spent time sweating the details, worrying about the weather, making smart choices about seeds and breeding and working hard to avoid a bad crop.
It’s not crazy to imagine that some people are better at one activity than another. There might even be a gulf between people who are good at each of the two skills. Thom Hartmann has written extensively on this. He points out that medicating kids who might be better at Hunting so that they can sit quietly in a school designed to teach Farming doesn’t make a lot of sense. Why don’t we tailor the learning environment to a individuals strengths, rather than force a square peg into a round hole?
A kid who has innate hunting skills is easily distracted, because noticing small movements in the brush is exactly what you’d need to do if you were hunting. Scan and scan and pounce. That same kid is able to drop everything and focus like a laser–for a while–if it’s urgent. The farming kid, on the other hand, is particularly good at tilling the fields of endless homework problems, each a bit like the other. Just don’t ask him to change gears instantly.
Thom Hartmann breaks down each group similar to how I have below:
Here is a quick update about what has been going on around Digital Avenue lately!
Tonight, Wednesday April 21st, Digital Avenue will have a song featured on KROC’s ‘Smash or Trash’. The song, Killing Me Softly, was recorded, edited, mixed, and mastered right here at Digital Avenue. The song is performed by Digital Avenue recording artists Nick Mac, and Jenny Holubar. Be sure to tune in at 6pm to listen!
Here is the free download of Digital Avenue’s “Smash”!
[wpaudio url="http://www.digiave.net/music/Killing%20Me%20Softly%20Uncensored.mp3" text="Killing Me Softly"]
Saturday, April 24th, Digital Avenue will be down at Mickey’s Irish Saloon hosting “Spend a Night With Digital Avenue…”
Here is the excerpt from our invitations:
Digital Avenue, a Rochester Minnesota based recording studio, is proud to announce the much anticipated “Spend A Night With Digital Avenue”… The chosen venue for this celebration, and our ever so gracious host is Mickeys Irish Saloon in the heart of Rochester. Our special host and MC will be none other than Dave Chiarini and the rest of the Mickeys Staff.
Mickey’s has been gracious enough to offer anyone wearing a Digital Avenue T-Shirt, Hoodie, or any other assortment of Digital Avenue clothing, $2.00 Domestic bottles from 10:00pm -- 2:00am.
If you have yet to purchase a piece of Digital Avenue gear, head on over to http://clothes.digiave.net and pick something out! If you are not interested in placing an order online, please talk to DJ McLaughlin or Nick Mac.
Digital Avenue will be hosting a series of contests throughout the evening, each with special prizes. Mickey’s Irish Saloon will operate at normal business hours, with “A Night With Digital Avenue” events running from 10:00pm to 2:00am.
On The Rechord will be in attendance to document the whole evening for a follow up article! You can check out On The Rechord on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/OnTheRechord
We have also teamed up with North Coast Photography for the night! North Coast Photography will be taking pictures all night, and uploading them to their web site. All pictures will be offered online for free, unwatermarked prints will also be available for a little bit more. You can check out North Coast Photography, and watch for the event pictures at: http://northernmostcoast.com/photography.
Budweiser Rochester is also sending us some beautiful Bud Girls for the night!This is the first of a wave of promotions to announce Digital Avenue as the premier music recording, and promotion resource in Rochester and many more cities to come.
You can also view a short interview I did with Keeley Kenworthy of the Rochester Convention Bureau. The Digital Avenue segment starts around the 1:45 mark.
The bad news is, the better your business, the more people are going to hate it.
The good news is, the better your business, the more people are going to love it.
Walk into any supermarket and you’ll see a phenomenon. Aisle after aisle full of products that most people don’t really give crap about. Sure, they might be a perfectly good brand of paper towel or breakfast cereal, but at the end of the day, they offend no more than they please, they ride the fence. And so how much do people care? Answer: Nodda.
And go visit these products’ corporate headquarters and you’ll meet their human equivalent. Aisle after aisle of people in cubes. Sure, they’ll be perfectly nice, polite and all, they’ll be efficient and good at their jobs and all, but how many of you would care if one of them lost their jobs tomorrow? Answer: None.
But once your business starts getting traction, you’ll start noticing a much more polarized world start to emerge. People who LOVE what you do, and people who HATE it.
Why such strong feelings? Why the emotions? You’re just doing your thing, they’re just doing their thing, so what’s the big deal?
Answer: Because A LOT of people AREN’T ACTUALLY doing their own own thing. They’re just trying to pay their bills, living paycheck-to-paycheck, payroll-to-payroll, promotion-to-promotion.
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I love what I’m doing. I love what I’m developing. I love the whole thing about it. Once again, I have to really look at it for five years at a time and ask, “Am I doing it for the right reasons?” Because all I want to do is make history at this point. I have to get paid to make history of course. But that’s my goal. I want to sit there with people who are really into making history. I mean everybody. I don’t mean just artists. The interns, fans, friends, family – if everybody’s not committed to making history every time I go into a meeting, and if I look into their eyes and I don’t see the fire, then I gotta move on. Because, you know, I don’t have time. I don’t have the luxury of time to just blow off five years. I do, but I don’t.
The world of the 2010′s and beyond will not belong to ‘managers’ or those who can make the numbers dance. The world will belong to passionate, driven leaders. People who not only have enormous amounts of energy but who can energize those that they lead. People who can spot trends and capitalize on them. People who can start a movement. Not build the movement for the money, but only receive the money as a reciprocal of the hard-work.
I’ve always run my business, Digital Avenue under the mantra “Be extremely subtle, even to the point of formlessness. Be extremely mysterious, even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby you can be the director of the opponent’s fate.“ I’ve always maintained that “mysterious” quality about what it is I do, and what it is we’re doing here. I never talk about my ideas and plans until they are actually happening. I’m breaking that trend a little bit here.
I’ve compiled a few “stats” which I keep a very close eye on. I’ll try to explain what each number means, what it means to me, and how I (you) can leverage it in your favor. I’ve put a lot of effort into this side of business for quite a few years now, and I’d like to think I’m pretty good at it. I’d like to offer this here, cause I would have loved to have it years ago. Likewise, if you have any further input, I’d like to hear it in the comments.
So if this is something you’re just jumping into, or something you just want a better understanding of, here you go! Or if you just want a peek at the reality (madness) of Digital Avenue, here’s to you!
NOTE: All stats below are only from January 1st, 2010 through March 21st 2010. An 80 day window.
Every time I open a music magazine, whether it’s an engineering magazine, guitar magazine, Rolling Stone, anything involving music, I can’t avoid someone claiming their product is the “Future of music!“
The guy whose company sells MP3s says, “MP3s are the future. No DRM. Convenient. The public has spoken and they want MP3s.”
The guy whose company sells subscriptions (iTunes, Rhapsody, Napster, etc.) says, “Subscription services are the future. Anything, anytime, anywhere. No need to keep a huge music collection.”
The guy whose company sells CDs says, “People still want something tangible they can hold in their hand. CDs are going to be around a long time.”
Anyone who claims to know the future of the music business is full of crap and should not be trusted. Nobody knows the future. That’s a hard but crucial lesson to learn.
As human beings, we WANT someone to tell us the future. We want someone to turn our future unknown to known.
The music business is the Wild West right now. There’s no certainty. Even the ultimate insiders, the heads of every major record label, have no idea what’s going to happen.
But why is everyone scared of this? I think that’s what makes the future so intriguing. It’s completely uncharted territory, and we’re the modern Lewis and Clark’s.
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If I had a record label, would you be signed to it?
I never liked the idea of having a record label, because you’re too deeply invested into something you don’t control.
So if I were to have a label, my decision on who to sign wouldn’t be decided just by the quality of the music. There are plenty of people with great music but destructive work-habits or an unsustainable approach to their career.
It doesn’t matter how many times you fail. It doesn’t matter how many times you almost get it right. No one is going to know or care about your failures, and neither should you. All you have to do is learn from them and those around you because… All that matters in business is that you get it right once. Then everyone can tell you how lucky you are.
Business is business. What’s relevant in one business field, will often hold true in any other. No matter what, a good business plan always wins.
So, who else would I look to, than The Notorious B.I.G. himself? Biggie is the poster child for living in excess. Coming from a private school upbringing, a teacher as a mother, a politician father, and excelling in school. Eventually Biggie took his entrepreneurial spirit to dealing drugs and rapping. He was the richest of the rich. He could have anything he wanted with a snap of his fingers. He flipped his whole image from a little private school kid, to a gang banging, drug dealing rapper. Eventually, this all lead to him being shot and murdered outside of an award ceremony in Los Angeles.
No matter how much you think you know someone, don’t tell them how much you make. This has many downfalls. You don’t want people thinking you can “spare a dime”, you don’t want people thinking they don’t need to pay you back cause you’re “good without it”, and you don’t want people to hold a grudge, or have any sense of jealousy towards you. Nothing positive can come out of someone knowing what you make. It will only breed jealousy and put you in a tight spot.
Keep your business income to yourself, and even more importantly, keep your personal net income to yourself.
Tests done since 1933 show that people who talk about their intentions are less likely to make them happen. Announcing your plans to others satisfies your self-identity just enough that you’re less motivated to do the hard work needed. In 1933, W. Mahler found that if a person announced the solution to a problem, and was acknowledged by others, it was now in the brain as a “social reality”, even if the solution hadn’t actually been achieved. Once you’ve told people of your intentions, it gives you a “premature sense of completeness.”
In my line of work, you would not believe how often I hear people tell me they are being signed to a major record label, going on a nationwide tour, filming music videos, getting on the radio, etc.
“This guy from EMI is interested and going to be presenting it to the VP.”
“I’m getting ready to work on some new material with a writer from Los Angels.”
“I’m getting signed to a major label and this is gonna be my big break.”
Of course these are the things some people have to tell themselves to be hopeful when facing another day of challenges. But of course nothing materializes. You never hear it mentioned again, and you politely don’t ask. (Surprising circumstances always seem to foil the certain event.)
I feel like getting a shirt that says “TELL ME WHEN IT’S ACTUALLY HAPPENING.”
Keep your moves to yourself, and right along with that, comes Commandment Three….
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I run across kids all the time who say they want to be a great musician. I tell them I can help, and tell them to show up at my studio at 1:00 am if they’re serious. Almost nobody ever does. It’s how I weed out the really serious ones from the kids who are just talk. Are you really serious about what you do?
For the last 7 years, I have been reading and studying the paths to success that many different people have taken. Evel Knievel, Tom Williams, Derek Sivers, Mark Cuban, and so on. It doesn’t really matter what your calling in life is. It might be the Circus, it might be Wall Street, but the determining factor is doing more than the next guy. Persistence.
Michael Irvin, the former Dallas Cowboys Wide Receiver, once said something along the lines of, “Being the very best at what you do is not easy. I was the best at what I did, I know. I got there by working harder than anyone before me. When I was eight years old, there was a kid down the street running a mile a day after practice. I wasn’t gonna let him beat me, so I started running a mile a day before practice, and another mile after practice. Then I started running before school, before practice, after practice, and before I went to bed. No one was gonna be better than me.”
You have to imagine that there is someone else out there, who wants whatever it is that you want. Except he might want it more. Pretend that there can only be one of you. You don’t know who the other guy is, where he is, what he’s doing, or how hard he’s pushing. But, you have to have it in the back of your mind, that they want to take that precious little goal of yours away from you and keep it for themselves.
You can’t wait around. The other guys not gonna take a time-out while you do. He’s gonna keep pushing, and he might reach that finish line before you do.
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Last year, internationally celebrated violinist Joshua Bell tried an experiment. He took his violin (a Stradivarius built in 1713, worth about $3.5 million) into the Washington, D.C. Metro and played for about 45 minutes.
If you want to get cheap seats to hear Joshua Bell perform, expect to pay at least $100.
So who stopped to listen to him play Bach and Schubert? Nearly no one. Thousands of people marched past, avoiding Bell’s eye so they wouldn’t feel guilty about failing to throw a quarter or two into his case. (He made a little over $32 for the day.)
Music did not soothe the savage breast. Music failed to even register in the savage breast.
(I was fascinated to read about exceptions, like a three-year-old named Evan. Evan knew there was something special going on, and tried to dawdle so he could check it out. But Evan’s mom was in a hurry to get him to daycare and herself on to work and hustled his curious little butt right on past. I don’t blame her, we’ve all been there. As the Washington Post story reported, “The behavior of one demographic remained absolutely consistent. Every single time a child walked past, he or she tried to stop and watch. And every single time, a parent scooted the kid away.”)
Evidence, if we needed it, that kids are smarter than grown-ups about some things.
So what can we learn from this slightly depressing little story?
For one thing, it’s a stark illustration that talent and ability are not enough. The moral of the story is probably not that Joshua Bell is a mediocre violinist.
Remember the famous coffee commercial, where they substituted crummy supermarket instant coffee for the coffee in great restaurants? Of course people loved the crummy coffee. When they ordered it, they expected to pay $5 a cup for it. It was delivered in a delicate china cup. It came after a great meal. It was brought by a snooty waiter.
It’s not that talent and ability don’t matter. They do. But no one can begin to see talent or ability until they’re put into the right frame.
Some people never see past any frame. Not much we can do for them. But for you, we can make sure you’re choosing the frame that sets you off.
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Ladies and gentlemen,
a few months ago we ran a little contest on our Facebook Fan Page and gave away a free shirt to one lucky fan man by the name of Jeffrey Curtis. This time around, to kick off our new web site dedicated solely to our Recording and Audio Production branch, we’re doing it a little bigger. We’re giving away three shirts, to three lucky Digital Avenue fans! This time you even get to pick your own color of shirt!
As an added bonus. Ryan ‘R-Dubs’ Wacholz, has also decided to kick in 3 ‘R-Dubs’ demo CD’s of his upcoming album!
So I know what you’re asking yourself. “How can I get a sweet Digital Avenue shirt?“ Have no fear my friend, I’ll set your worried mind aside below the break.
The song is the purest and most natural form of entertainment known to man. It truly is the universal language. The youngest of infants (it’s speculated even unborn children) can hear, react, and reproduce musical forms, before they can even speak the language. A vocalist of another language can sing a passage, and bring people of other nationalities to tears, using only the language of music. Throughout time, music has been used to convey emotion, and explain the explainable.
I fear that our children, or our childrens children, will lose this connection to music. I will do my best to tell you why.
When I was young, four years old, I had an unhealthy fascination with David Lee Roth. At that time, David Lee Roth was already known as the former lead singer of Van Halen. I remember riding with my dad in his car in Arizona and listening to David Lee Roth’s “Eat Em’ and Smile” on cassette tape (remember those?). The one track I specifically remember, was “Yankee Rose” (watch the linked video. Its a classic).
Yankee Rose wasn’t just any song, Yankee Rose was the song that sent me on the life journey I am on today. That single 4 minute song changed my life. Granted I was four years old, it was still about the music. I didn’t go about my childhood singing Sesame Street, or Looney Tunes, I was singing David Lee Roth, The Beatles, AC/DC, Guns N’ Roses, Van Halen, and Metallica. It was music, not a gimmick.
This was music in its purest form. There was no “special formula” to making a hit song. You either had it, or you didn’t. No amount of studio work was gonna save your album if your vocalist was only a face and smile.
I eventually graduated from that punk kid blasting Metallica from his dads trunk, to the punk kid in his dads house splicing together cassette tapes and making crude sounding 1/8th” tape loops. By the age of 10 I had my first guitar. By 18 I was a student at The Institute of Production and Recording, built by Prince’s engineers and colleagues. Now, I not only had the latest and greatest technology at my fingertips, I was face to face, being trained by the very same people that brought you Purple Rain, 1999, Little Red Corvette, When Doves Cry, Musicology, and much more. And that’s only the Prince stuff. These guys had forgotten more over breakfast than I might ever know.
What I learned scared me.
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Piracy didn’t kill the music business, the music business killed itself. Filesharing, also known as Peer-to-Peer Networking, has gotten a bad rap by the music business. When I say “music business”, I’m referring to a few people and groups. For one, the “Big Four” record labels, Sony/BGM, Universal Music Group, EMI, and Warner Music Group. Others lumped into the “music business” title include artists (mainly major headlining acts), publishers, advertisers/promoters, A&R departments, and pretty much anyone else involved in the process of releasing a major record.
The reason I say the music business killed itself is because the music business was in a major recession long before anyone had ever heard of “P2P” or Napster.
In the early 90′s the music business was booming. Record sales were through the roof and everyone wanted in on the action. Major corporations took notice, and record labels sold off to the highest bidders. The very same thing that caused the 2000′s dot com crash, the music business over saturated the market. No longer were businesses being operated by the people who loved the business, but now it was being run by men in suits who’s livings were based off profit/loss margins.
In the early 90′s, if you were an artist with a back catalog, you were an overnight millionaire. As the Compact Disc took off, people around the world were forced to go back and re-buy their entire catalog of music. Everyone, in a matter of two years was buying up the music they had been collecting over the previous ten. Buyers soon went back to their normal purchasing routine and caused the start of the downfall.
With national corporations running music, also came budget restraints, annual reports, and shareholders. Unable to meet the growing demands, major labels needed to cut costs. One of the first places to go was Artist Development, and Promotions.
Now instead of having a promotions department which was truly passionate about their product, now we had a bunch of businessmen trying to promote a product they had no relation too. This caused a major disconnect between the product and consumer.
This is when major record labels started depending on one-hit wonders and bubblegum pop to push profits ignoring their own rich history and tradition.
It’s expensive to develop an artist. It is common knowledge that for every 12 artists signed to a label, 10 lose money, 1 breaks even and 1 makes enough to pay for the development of all the others put together. It’s a really risky business. But, the small independent labels didn’t care because they wanted to discover the next Bob Dylan or Bruce Springsteen. They knew that one major success could make up for a string of costly failures.
Unfortunately, that equation doesn’t work in the corporate environment. You have to justify your budget every year, every quarter. The only way to do that was to release lowest common denominator music that would sell fast but fade just as quickly.
This caused major record labels to forget what got them involved in the first place, “heritage artists.” Tom Petty, Springsteen, Bon Jovi, U2, Metallica, and others were what sustained them over the long haul, not The Backstreet Boys and Britney Spears. Heritage artists were bands and musicians developed over years and they didn’t come cheap, but they made up for it in the long run.
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No matter the size, function, location of your studio, or who you’re recording, you’ll always have to deal with the dreaded “guests” of the bands, artists, and performers. In my experience, I have witnessed many a sessions derailed by a studio guest. Below, I will include a quick guide on what to do, and what not to do if you ever plan on being invited back.
