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That's a good analogy. I always planned to try and make it in the music business till age 40 and then write books. Well, never made it in the music biz so I wrote a fictional novel. I gotta tell you, it's probably easier to get a record exec to listen to your tape than to get a literary agent to request your novel and take you on as a client. It's all mega business now and very few get to participate.
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Good article and a great analogy, but a bit limited in its music perspective. To me, the author suffers from the same issues that the record industry has in not recognizing change and the big picture. In particular, the music business is MORE than Rock n Roll, and while most segments have had trouble, the growth in hip-hop music is worth noting in this conversation. Music is a reflection of the times. If in fact the music industry died twenty years ago, perhaps more needs to be said about the collective lack of undersanding that times had changed, both socially and technologically. We know how they missed the boat on the whole technology issue. On the other hand, is it a coincidence that during this same time there were the beginnings of a major shift in musical influence towards something most considered a fad? Rock n roll did create a go-go industry for a generation or two ago, but hip-hop has had a far wider impact economically and socially. The industry is not a fluke. The real deal that it is mismanaged now by bean counters out of touch with creative, social and technological change. Deal with these issues and I guarantee the economic condition in the industry will change.

Yamaha (Motif XS7, Motif 6, TX81Z), Korg (R3, Triton-R), Roland (XP-30, D-50, Juno 6, P-330). Novation A Station, Arturia Analog Experience Factory 32

 

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OK, I think I took a different tack on the original quoted article. I can't disagree with the intial proposal of the article that R&R supplanted literary efforts in it's ability to capture the attention of the masses. I do wish the article weren't so restrictive. To say that popular music distracted the world from the printed page ignores the effect of radio, television and a whole lot of other distractions that came along right after WWII. The article's premise here is simplistic, but the analogy still holds I think. In the article, the author's statement... [quote] For a long time, anybody with any creative ambition wanted to write the Great American Novel. [/quote]...could easily have been made about a lot of us in the sixties and seventies about our music and the reasons were much the same, notoriety, money, acclaim, popularity, all goals to be sought and for good reasons. But the point the author seems to be making is missing the significance of the [b]result[/b] of the desire of so many to exercise their creative potentials. You see, it's the same today. For every novel published by a Hemmingway or a Steinbeck, there were thousands of novels (some good and some bad) written by people whose names we've never heard and probably never will hear. We see the same thing in music, for every big name there are thousands of guys and ladies working in garages, small clubs, and home studios, So what's different? I'll tell you what's different. (You knew that was coming, didn't you? ;) ) Where back about 100 years ago (Hemmingway and Steinbeck's times) anybody could write. What did it take to be a writer? A pen and a piece of paper. The tools were there, they were affordable to everyone, and while education might well have been the distinguishing factor, it was still there and available to everyone, black, white, red what ever color your skin, you could learn to read and write. Quality of education might be arguable across the races but availability, in that time in this country, isn't. However, with music it is different. It is only recently that affordable recording tools have become available. Now, yes, I owned a 4 track and mixer 25 years ago but certainly not everyone did. Now days, most anyone can pick up a four track recorder for pennies on what I spent back in the sixties. So, just like education (and the availability of pens and paper!) gave anyone with the creative urge the opportunity to write, the same is happening today with those that have the urge to make music. (Those with the urge to merge have been doing it all along!) Again, what point is this article making? I can only believe that the availablity of recording tools is going to produce a rennaisance for music. In many ways this has already happened. Of course, as long as the recording industry believes that it can "generate" not only product but by clever marketing, a demand as well, we're bound to hear/see the same crap on the radio, TV and big screen. An excellent example of what I am trying to say is the recent success of Chris Thomas King. I don't know too much about this guy but I recently bought his "The Legend of Tommy Johnson" CD and he played all of the instruments himself. Now, I don't know if he did this work in a "bedroom studio" (I doubt it!) but there's lot's of us with home studios now that are experimenting, trying to find our own sound and give birth to new music that could never see the light of day without our PCs and Macs and mixers and effects and our "creative ambitions", as the author said. While I found the article interesting but unsatisfying in it's purpose, I am glad it brought to my mind's focus the opportunity that we all have today. Everyone! Make your music! Make it as good as you can and make it YOURS!!! One day the industry is going to wake up and find out that the pap they've been force-feeding the public for the last twenty years isn't cutting it any more. Most of us no longer believe the industry hype as far as the BIG NEW HIT SONG they've just released. What's begining to happen is that people like you and me and Chris Thomas King are making our music and thru the internet and a few bold local radio stations, are getting out where the public can hear it. It's coming, the best, most creative and original music you have yet heard. Keep listening, it's almost here. When are you going to let us hear it?????

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