Imagine this conversation – I am in a sandwich shop and the person making my sandwich has a song playing that I produced. He is singing along to it and knowing I work in studios asks me if I like it. Naturally I say “yes I do – I produced it – glad you like it too – do you like the album?” He replied ‘don’t know, I just downloaded a couple of the tracks from the net”. I asked him if he used legal download sites. “No” he said “I don’t believe in paying for music, the record companies are making too much money as it is – they can afford it”.
I was getting annoyed by now and offered the suggestion that perhaps it wasn’t just the record companies he was stealing from but me and the artist too – but the argument seemed to be lost on him.
I tried again, well let’s look at it like this” I said “ this sandwich you are making for me, the bread costs about 5p, the butter - 1p, the cheese – 5p and the salad maybe 8p tops – let’s be generous it cost you 25p to make along with your time and the unnecessary packaging you will put it the total can’t be more than 75p and yet you feel quite justified charging me over £2.50 for it. How about I decide that this food should be free and you are making enough profit already so I will just take it?”
It is taking him a little time to get his head around this – I am still waiting for his answer.
Of course this conversation is fictitious but nevertheless perfectly plausible.
For my part, I can’t quite get my head around the concept that music has no value and should be free. How is that supposed to work? Even the concept for instance that you don’t pay for the music but you do pay by tolerating some advertising is also something of a mystery to me. The opposite however does make sense, for instance I subscribe to an internet radio service which enables me to listen to the stations without the commercials – it’s my choice.
I can’t think of any other industry where the workers are expected to provide their services for free – where are the free builders, plumbers, plasterers and electricians? There are certainly no free lawyers, accountants or doctors and as we all no there is no such thing as a free lunch1
It is high time we dispensed with this nonsense about free music and started putting the economic structure of the music business in order.
Saturday, December 6, 2008
“Why Jumping Up and Down Is Important”
“Why Jumping Up and Down Is Important”
A few months ago, I found myself standing, beer in hand, in the middle of an ecstatic audience, cheering wildly at the performance of Japanese rock band, Electric Eel Shock. Not an unusual occurrence in the big scheme of things but the guy next to me was shouting even more loudly and jumping up and down – again not an unusual occurrence - except that he is the boss of a big music company.
The unusual part is because I can’t honestly remember the last time I stood next to the boss of any music company at a gig let alone one showing such unbridled enthusiasm for the show.
Why is this so important then?
It’s important because I believe that people involved in music should be, first and foremost, interested in and knowledgeable about music. They can be hard-nosed businessmen or spin obsessed PR people but above all they must love music and respect the creativity of the artists.
It is important because there have been times when it is, quite frankly, very difficult to persuade myself that the music business is worth bothering with, times when ‘the business’ overrides ‘the music’, times when the artist is shown so little consideration I find it embarrassing to be involved at all.
It is also important because I firmly believe that this could be the most exciting period for music since records began, if we stop hanging on to the past and let the future begin.
Now that may seem contradictory when I started this piece with a longing glance over my shoulder at the past, but surely the most effective way to move on is to make some careful value judgements about what to retain and what to leave behind – just like moving house?
Whenever I am asked what is the most useful attribute for success in music my answer is always the same – enthusiasm. Enthusiasm for the process of making music and enthusiasm for the people making music – it was in short supply for a while but I think it may be making a big comeback!
As a producer I want always to find ways to enthuse the artists I work with – I want the best environment for them, I want to surround them with excellent musicians and great facilities, but nothing can replace the obvious validation that artists receive from their fans. I have seen this from a very privileged position on many occasions, when they come out of the studio, when they come out of a concert and more recently when they meet those people who have shown advanced faith in them by buying parts.
I am a major fan of all but a couple of the artists I have worked with (they know who they are and it was as much my fault as theirs!) - I really want them to succeed and every knock they take I feel almost as much as they do. I grew up in this industry amongst others who felt the same, A&R people, Marketing Managers, PR, Artist Managers, all understanding that the focus of attention was the music and the artist.
Let us not forget that it is what has brought us all here.
© Tony Platt 2008
A few months ago, I found myself standing, beer in hand, in the middle of an ecstatic audience, cheering wildly at the performance of Japanese rock band, Electric Eel Shock. Not an unusual occurrence in the big scheme of things but the guy next to me was shouting even more loudly and jumping up and down – again not an unusual occurrence - except that he is the boss of a big music company.
The unusual part is because I can’t honestly remember the last time I stood next to the boss of any music company at a gig let alone one showing such unbridled enthusiasm for the show.
Why is this so important then?
It’s important because I believe that people involved in music should be, first and foremost, interested in and knowledgeable about music. They can be hard-nosed businessmen or spin obsessed PR people but above all they must love music and respect the creativity of the artists.
It is important because there have been times when it is, quite frankly, very difficult to persuade myself that the music business is worth bothering with, times when ‘the business’ overrides ‘the music’, times when the artist is shown so little consideration I find it embarrassing to be involved at all.
It is also important because I firmly believe that this could be the most exciting period for music since records began, if we stop hanging on to the past and let the future begin.
Now that may seem contradictory when I started this piece with a longing glance over my shoulder at the past, but surely the most effective way to move on is to make some careful value judgements about what to retain and what to leave behind – just like moving house?
Whenever I am asked what is the most useful attribute for success in music my answer is always the same – enthusiasm. Enthusiasm for the process of making music and enthusiasm for the people making music – it was in short supply for a while but I think it may be making a big comeback!
As a producer I want always to find ways to enthuse the artists I work with – I want the best environment for them, I want to surround them with excellent musicians and great facilities, but nothing can replace the obvious validation that artists receive from their fans. I have seen this from a very privileged position on many occasions, when they come out of the studio, when they come out of a concert and more recently when they meet those people who have shown advanced faith in them by buying parts.
I am a major fan of all but a couple of the artists I have worked with (they know who they are and it was as much my fault as theirs!) - I really want them to succeed and every knock they take I feel almost as much as they do. I grew up in this industry amongst others who felt the same, A&R people, Marketing Managers, PR, Artist Managers, all understanding that the focus of attention was the music and the artist.
Let us not forget that it is what has brought us all here.
© Tony Platt 2008
Sunday, February 3, 2008
It’s All About Babies and Bathwater Really!
It’s All About Babies and Bathwater Really! - Music2MyEars
There are days when I wonder who took the music out of the music industry! It’s a real roller coaster ride at the best of times but when even the music channels on the radio are full of opinionated chat and everyone’s iPod seems to be playing nothing but hi-hat I do wonder – why?
Of course then I turn up the monitors in the studio, work through the instruments channel by channel and as the music starts to take shape the sun comes out from behind the clouds and I realise what I came here for.
I like the moments when I hear a new artist that makes the hairs stand up on the back of my neck or go to a gig that makes the earth move.
It’s a fight though these days – too many people trying to find the next big thing and hundreds of displaced marketing people running around like headless chickens bleating about ‘product placement opportunities’.
The doors that this chaos might open though – that’s what gives me a warm feeling of possibility, things to be tried, - creativity rewards the brave.
The best part of being ‘in the business’ has to be the community. I share a studio with a couple of other guys, in a complex with other similar rooms and several other studios of all types. I’m always bumping into people on the stairs and sometimes simply going to make a cup of tea becomes a major social outing!
This is where the heart of the music industry lies, this is where it gets stripped back to its core, amongst those of us who are doing it not just talking about it.
I have great optimism for the future of our industry – the opportunities are immense and the technology to make them happen is easily available – but what we are very short on is good imaginative ideas and entrepreneurial spirit.
There is a tendency in these fast moving times to ‘throw the baby out with the bathwater’ in the blind pursuit of the newest model. It happens with cars, iPods, movie stars, TV stars, Pop stars (and even spouses).
New developments should make us more able to use the good practices more effectively whilst replacing the things that didn’t work. We should increase our understanding of what is available and then make informed judgements about how to use the best tools creatively.
Most of all what we need right now are new dynamic managers and visionary A&R people who can create and support imaginative business models – what we don’t need is global, multi national conglomerate media mammoths. I’m optimistic that because they no longer have the strength to crush everything in their path that the young hopefuls I see coming out of the colleges wanting to make their career in music have the world at their feet.
Music2MyEars © 2008
There are days when I wonder who took the music out of the music industry! It’s a real roller coaster ride at the best of times but when even the music channels on the radio are full of opinionated chat and everyone’s iPod seems to be playing nothing but hi-hat I do wonder – why?
Of course then I turn up the monitors in the studio, work through the instruments channel by channel and as the music starts to take shape the sun comes out from behind the clouds and I realise what I came here for.
I like the moments when I hear a new artist that makes the hairs stand up on the back of my neck or go to a gig that makes the earth move.
It’s a fight though these days – too many people trying to find the next big thing and hundreds of displaced marketing people running around like headless chickens bleating about ‘product placement opportunities’.
The doors that this chaos might open though – that’s what gives me a warm feeling of possibility, things to be tried, - creativity rewards the brave.
The best part of being ‘in the business’ has to be the community. I share a studio with a couple of other guys, in a complex with other similar rooms and several other studios of all types. I’m always bumping into people on the stairs and sometimes simply going to make a cup of tea becomes a major social outing!
This is where the heart of the music industry lies, this is where it gets stripped back to its core, amongst those of us who are doing it not just talking about it.
I have great optimism for the future of our industry – the opportunities are immense and the technology to make them happen is easily available – but what we are very short on is good imaginative ideas and entrepreneurial spirit.
There is a tendency in these fast moving times to ‘throw the baby out with the bathwater’ in the blind pursuit of the newest model. It happens with cars, iPods, movie stars, TV stars, Pop stars (and even spouses).
New developments should make us more able to use the good practices more effectively whilst replacing the things that didn’t work. We should increase our understanding of what is available and then make informed judgements about how to use the best tools creatively.
Most of all what we need right now are new dynamic managers and visionary A&R people who can create and support imaginative business models – what we don’t need is global, multi national conglomerate media mammoths. I’m optimistic that because they no longer have the strength to crush everything in their path that the young hopefuls I see coming out of the colleges wanting to make their career in music have the world at their feet.
Music2MyEars © 2008
Sunday, January 27, 2008
How Virtuous is the Virtual World?
How Virtuous is the Virtual World? – Music2MyEars
We were wondering how much of our lives we spend looking at progress bars. Why are they so compelling?
Everyone uses the internet as an example of how artists can democratically control their destiny. How realistic is this though? Indeed how many artists want to spend a large part of their time updating web pages and networking on MySpace and Facebook? And if the internet is so democratic then why do we need these social networking sites created by 25 something geeks who are now rich beyond their (and our) wildest dreams?
At the end of last year we saw the start of the bun fight over whose idea ‘Facebook’ was – quite frankly do I care? Once something becomes this big it no longer has the attraction for me because it becomes part of the same monolith that we were running away from! These successful social networking sites are easily snapped up by major media players and then become nothing more than online billboards for incessant advertising. This is probably exactly what they wanted, though of course they never told us that, but is this really what we want?
There are also plenty of pundits who will advocate giving music away is a good way to promote yourself as an artist. Why is that such a great idea?
Surely music has value and should not be given away free, but how do we make it possible for people to consume music and satisfactorily reimburse the creators?
The popular notion that everyone loves downloads is continually being undermined. I talked to people about it and was surprised to find how many of those who actively prefer physical CDs are the younger music buyers. Apparently the buzz of actually holding a CD (or vinyl album) in your hand is still real! I also wondered whether the concept of ‘the album’ was still relevant – if everyone is downloading off iTunes one song at a time then isn’t ‘the album’ dead? Not so my young friends tell me – we love idea that the artist has created a body of work especially for us and packaged it in the way they would like us to hear it.
Cool!
I guess these findings are supported by the growing success of festivals like All Tomorrow’s Parties where someone actually ‘curates’ the artists on the bill and creates a whole experience for a weekend. Will this take over from the mega-festivals that have become a fixture every summer?
This has led me to wonder whether the same issues will arise in the live music sector as have done in the recorded music sector. It is arguable that one thing that has contributed to the demise in CD sales is the bad value offered in recent years. We have all bought an album on the strength of hearing a couple of the songs and then been disappointed to find they were the only worthwhile tracks on the album. Perhaps this is starting to happen at gigs and festivals? I heard some very varied reports from last summer’s offerings and they haven’t just been about the weather!
What about concert gigs? I went to a gig some months back – even bought a ticket! This was an artist I really quite liked and whose album I had also bought. It was terrible, the venue was too big for his reticent style and the moody intimacy of his music was swamped in the cavernous sound from the P.A. At first I was annoyed with the artist – then I considered whose fault it actually was – I now blame the promoter who had gone for the two nights in a big hall rather than more nights in a more appropriate, smaller venue. Greed? Very possibly but this attitude of short term gain will lead to long-term problems for us all. Promoters don’t actually seem to live up to their name these days anyway when they insist the acts they put on to bring their own audience – we all know who I mean!
Perhaps this is what is happening to the internet too? Already the advertising is driving the content and ISPs will take very little responsibility for the content they allow through their portals so it has all become something of a mess.
Let’s have some ideas for using the internet to really let artists become the creators of their own destiny – then I will start believing again in the democracy and the power of the web.
Music2MyEars © 2008
We were wondering how much of our lives we spend looking at progress bars. Why are they so compelling?
Everyone uses the internet as an example of how artists can democratically control their destiny. How realistic is this though? Indeed how many artists want to spend a large part of their time updating web pages and networking on MySpace and Facebook? And if the internet is so democratic then why do we need these social networking sites created by 25 something geeks who are now rich beyond their (and our) wildest dreams?
At the end of last year we saw the start of the bun fight over whose idea ‘Facebook’ was – quite frankly do I care? Once something becomes this big it no longer has the attraction for me because it becomes part of the same monolith that we were running away from! These successful social networking sites are easily snapped up by major media players and then become nothing more than online billboards for incessant advertising. This is probably exactly what they wanted, though of course they never told us that, but is this really what we want?
There are also plenty of pundits who will advocate giving music away is a good way to promote yourself as an artist. Why is that such a great idea?
Surely music has value and should not be given away free, but how do we make it possible for people to consume music and satisfactorily reimburse the creators?
The popular notion that everyone loves downloads is continually being undermined. I talked to people about it and was surprised to find how many of those who actively prefer physical CDs are the younger music buyers. Apparently the buzz of actually holding a CD (or vinyl album) in your hand is still real! I also wondered whether the concept of ‘the album’ was still relevant – if everyone is downloading off iTunes one song at a time then isn’t ‘the album’ dead? Not so my young friends tell me – we love idea that the artist has created a body of work especially for us and packaged it in the way they would like us to hear it.
Cool!
I guess these findings are supported by the growing success of festivals like All Tomorrow’s Parties where someone actually ‘curates’ the artists on the bill and creates a whole experience for a weekend. Will this take over from the mega-festivals that have become a fixture every summer?
This has led me to wonder whether the same issues will arise in the live music sector as have done in the recorded music sector. It is arguable that one thing that has contributed to the demise in CD sales is the bad value offered in recent years. We have all bought an album on the strength of hearing a couple of the songs and then been disappointed to find they were the only worthwhile tracks on the album. Perhaps this is starting to happen at gigs and festivals? I heard some very varied reports from last summer’s offerings and they haven’t just been about the weather!
What about concert gigs? I went to a gig some months back – even bought a ticket! This was an artist I really quite liked and whose album I had also bought. It was terrible, the venue was too big for his reticent style and the moody intimacy of his music was swamped in the cavernous sound from the P.A. At first I was annoyed with the artist – then I considered whose fault it actually was – I now blame the promoter who had gone for the two nights in a big hall rather than more nights in a more appropriate, smaller venue. Greed? Very possibly but this attitude of short term gain will lead to long-term problems for us all. Promoters don’t actually seem to live up to their name these days anyway when they insist the acts they put on to bring their own audience – we all know who I mean!
Perhaps this is what is happening to the internet too? Already the advertising is driving the content and ISPs will take very little responsibility for the content they allow through their portals so it has all become something of a mess.
Let’s have some ideas for using the internet to really let artists become the creators of their own destiny – then I will start believing again in the democracy and the power of the web.
Music2MyEars © 2008
Sunday, January 20, 2008
“What A Performance!” – Music2MyEars
It seems that the current view of a ‘record producer’ is some strange mixture of a magician and guru. “Check it out dread – it’s Maguru (or maybe The Gurician?)”. Then apparently we also have to act as an administrator. This has changed beyond recognition since I first joined the music industry in the 70s. At that time a producer was either a shirt, tie and sports-jacket type or a mate of the band that knew ‘something’ about records – generally not much more than the fact that they were round and had a hole in the middle! My entrance as a tea boy was much more auspiscious!
What I really love doing is the actual recording and view this imposition of managing all the stuff behind the scenes as being only a necessary evil to clear the space and get to making music. I have found that the best way to deal with it is to turn the whole organising process into an art itself and so have become almost obsessive about the detail – I’m not sure if that is such a good thing!
Of course what I really want is for an artist to tell me exactly what they hear, give me an idea of what is going on in their head – then I can help them make that a reality, but often those who are most eloquent in their art cannot easily communicate in other ways. I have had to develop all sorts of extra facets of my own ‘self’ in order to manage this. Perhaps this is why so many of us producers are good at amateur philosophy and psychology! Sometimes I think that quite honestly if they want me to come up with all the ideas then I might just as well do it myself! Then I have to give myself a good talking to.
So I spend a great deal of time talking with them and trying to get them to put their music into their words and what I really want to know is how they see themselves as artists and performers.
You see I don’t think that making music is like writing books or even painting pictures – the music performer has to actually deliver in person and that requires a very special personality.
This is why I have such respect for singers, the front people, the ones who have to get used to being loved and hated in equal parts.
Singers are difficult though.
One particularly neurotic singer I worked with was very difficult and over a period of a couple of months had called me almost every night to analyze everything that had been said during the course of the day’s session. I had put a band around her and rehearsed them, helped to develop the songs, listened to hours of relationship woes but still kept as cool as possible because it was her debut album and I wanted to try to make it as good as possible for her. Eventually though she wound me up so much that I shouted at her “Why are you so f**k**ng paranoid?” and when she answered, “Who said I’m paranoid?” it took about 10 minutes before I could stop laughing. I left the project because quite frankly she wasn’t talented enough to warrant that much ‘Diva’ and sadly even after a couple of others tried to finish the album the project fell apart and ended up being shelved.
There are of course just as many other situations where I have put up with all sorts of artistic tantrum because the artist was so good that they almost deserved a break in the personality department!
I’ve spent hours and hours getting just one syllable to sound right or one note to be in tune and then other times when the singer does two takes that are so perfect I’m left trying to find something more useful to say than “Fantastic”. Mind you in the days before computers when we often only had one track to record the vocal on, necessity became the mother of invention and we had to find a way to make it really happen, regardless of circumstances.
Singers can make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck and they have the power to make you laugh and cry – it’s an immense power to deal with and not many of them can cope with it, but they deserve our utmost respect when they try. We all like to sit comfortably and judge from afar but not many of us could do better – that’s why we let them do it for us and why we should always give them that big round of applause.
I still don’t understand how people can love the droners though – can you really stay awake for a whole Coldplay concert? What is so great about Morrissey? And I get frustrated with the spin from artists supported by a PR machine – “The Extraordinary Ordinariness of Kate Nash” one recent news item opined – ordinary yes, extraordinary I don’t think so! I know so many singers and songwriters who are so much better - in fact I had meetings with some of them this week!
I find myself fascinated when watching someone like Amy Winehouse or Rufus Wainright or Tori Amos perform – not only are their voices interesting but so is the way they deliver the words. They include their audience. I think that’s important for performers, a real desire to entertain. I remember seeing Oasis at Glastonbury and wanting to get up there and shake them for turning their backs on the audience and just standing there in those stupid parka coats without making any effort at all. People paid good money for that!
I should make it perfectly clear; I like (most) singers, songwriters and musicians. I’m not like the very influential record company executive who once said to me “You know this business would be great if it weren’t for the bloody musicians” – and he actually meant it! He is part of the breed of (unfortunately) influential bigots in the music industry who fail to realise that the raw material that pays their wages comprises real people with real feelings and dreams that deserve at least chance of becoming a reality.
Music2MyEars © 2008
What I really love doing is the actual recording and view this imposition of managing all the stuff behind the scenes as being only a necessary evil to clear the space and get to making music. I have found that the best way to deal with it is to turn the whole organising process into an art itself and so have become almost obsessive about the detail – I’m not sure if that is such a good thing!
Of course what I really want is for an artist to tell me exactly what they hear, give me an idea of what is going on in their head – then I can help them make that a reality, but often those who are most eloquent in their art cannot easily communicate in other ways. I have had to develop all sorts of extra facets of my own ‘self’ in order to manage this. Perhaps this is why so many of us producers are good at amateur philosophy and psychology! Sometimes I think that quite honestly if they want me to come up with all the ideas then I might just as well do it myself! Then I have to give myself a good talking to.
So I spend a great deal of time talking with them and trying to get them to put their music into their words and what I really want to know is how they see themselves as artists and performers.
You see I don’t think that making music is like writing books or even painting pictures – the music performer has to actually deliver in person and that requires a very special personality.
This is why I have such respect for singers, the front people, the ones who have to get used to being loved and hated in equal parts.
Singers are difficult though.
One particularly neurotic singer I worked with was very difficult and over a period of a couple of months had called me almost every night to analyze everything that had been said during the course of the day’s session. I had put a band around her and rehearsed them, helped to develop the songs, listened to hours of relationship woes but still kept as cool as possible because it was her debut album and I wanted to try to make it as good as possible for her. Eventually though she wound me up so much that I shouted at her “Why are you so f**k**ng paranoid?” and when she answered, “Who said I’m paranoid?” it took about 10 minutes before I could stop laughing. I left the project because quite frankly she wasn’t talented enough to warrant that much ‘Diva’ and sadly even after a couple of others tried to finish the album the project fell apart and ended up being shelved.
There are of course just as many other situations where I have put up with all sorts of artistic tantrum because the artist was so good that they almost deserved a break in the personality department!
I’ve spent hours and hours getting just one syllable to sound right or one note to be in tune and then other times when the singer does two takes that are so perfect I’m left trying to find something more useful to say than “Fantastic”. Mind you in the days before computers when we often only had one track to record the vocal on, necessity became the mother of invention and we had to find a way to make it really happen, regardless of circumstances.
Singers can make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck and they have the power to make you laugh and cry – it’s an immense power to deal with and not many of them can cope with it, but they deserve our utmost respect when they try. We all like to sit comfortably and judge from afar but not many of us could do better – that’s why we let them do it for us and why we should always give them that big round of applause.
I still don’t understand how people can love the droners though – can you really stay awake for a whole Coldplay concert? What is so great about Morrissey? And I get frustrated with the spin from artists supported by a PR machine – “The Extraordinary Ordinariness of Kate Nash” one recent news item opined – ordinary yes, extraordinary I don’t think so! I know so many singers and songwriters who are so much better - in fact I had meetings with some of them this week!
I find myself fascinated when watching someone like Amy Winehouse or Rufus Wainright or Tori Amos perform – not only are their voices interesting but so is the way they deliver the words. They include their audience. I think that’s important for performers, a real desire to entertain. I remember seeing Oasis at Glastonbury and wanting to get up there and shake them for turning their backs on the audience and just standing there in those stupid parka coats without making any effort at all. People paid good money for that!
I should make it perfectly clear; I like (most) singers, songwriters and musicians. I’m not like the very influential record company executive who once said to me “You know this business would be great if it weren’t for the bloody musicians” – and he actually meant it! He is part of the breed of (unfortunately) influential bigots in the music industry who fail to realise that the raw material that pays their wages comprises real people with real feelings and dreams that deserve at least chance of becoming a reality.
Music2MyEars © 2008
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