Thursday, July 11, 2002
by Wayne Robins
A few thoughts from the world of publishing:
1. I'm NO Freak. That was the cover headline of Wednesday's NY Post, with a photo of an angry Michael Jackson. The Post, New York's only Australian-language tabloid, doesn't seem convinced, as writer Clemente Lisi began her story: "Wacko Jacko says he's no freako." One has to admit that Jackson's accusations that Sony chairman Tommy Mottola is "the devil" and a "racist" have accomplished a few things that one thought would not occur until the Next Millennium: That the Rev. Al Sharpton could register embarrassment; when Jackson made his impromptu allegations, Sharpton turned almost as white as The King of Pop. Jackson's been Off the Wall since he's been in New York ranting about Sony's refusal to sink another $10 million for another video from the unfortunately-titled "Invincible" album, so much so that another impossible accomplishment was to make Mottola, former manager of Hall & Oates and Dr. Buzzard's Savannah Band ("Tom-my Mot-tola lives on the road!" they sang) decades before he used both street and smarts in hustling his way to the pinnacle of Japanese-American capitalism, seem like not just an underdog, but a victim. The tabloid writer who compared Mottola to Mother Teresa, well, that may have been just a little stretch. But considering how long he stayed in his now-defunct marriage to Mariah Carey, well, let's pray for St. Tommy.
2. The Wall Street Journal's Nick Wingfield had a great scoop Thursday (I presume it was a scoop, since I didn't see it elsewhere) about how the major record labels are dumping inferior or bogus files onto song-swapping sites to make the downloading of their copyrighted material an unpleasant listening experience. These distorted files, known as "spoofs," are described by Wingfield as "digital decoys that contain annoying squawks, bursts of static or endless loops of a piece of the song." The industry's hyperactive lobbying group, the Recording Industry Association of America, defends the practice as both legal and "an appropriate part of their arsenal" in combatting file swapping.
This does raise the unfortunate question of what this does to the artist's reputation. For file swappers tend not to be too concerned with what label a particular artist is on, but who the artist is. You download a scratchy, squawking file of junk from an artist you like might create a negative impression of the artist. This marketing concept has great potential applications elsewhere in American commerce. I can see candy companies putting foul-tasting replicas of their best sellers to cut down on convenience store theft, or chefs randomly poisoning customers just in case the diners had skipping out on the check in mind.
(c) copyright 2002, Wayne Robins. All rights reserved. E-mail: waynerobins@hotmail.com
A few thoughts from the world of publishing:
1. I'm NO Freak. That was the cover headline of Wednesday's NY Post, with a photo of an angry Michael Jackson. The Post, New York's only Australian-language tabloid, doesn't seem convinced, as writer Clemente Lisi began her story: "Wacko Jacko says he's no freako." One has to admit that Jackson's accusations that Sony chairman Tommy Mottola is "the devil" and a "racist" have accomplished a few things that one thought would not occur until the Next Millennium: That the Rev. Al Sharpton could register embarrassment; when Jackson made his impromptu allegations, Sharpton turned almost as white as The King of Pop. Jackson's been Off the Wall since he's been in New York ranting about Sony's refusal to sink another $10 million for another video from the unfortunately-titled "Invincible" album, so much so that another impossible accomplishment was to make Mottola, former manager of Hall & Oates and Dr. Buzzard's Savannah Band ("Tom-my Mot-tola lives on the road!" they sang) decades before he used both street and smarts in hustling his way to the pinnacle of Japanese-American capitalism, seem like not just an underdog, but a victim. The tabloid writer who compared Mottola to Mother Teresa, well, that may have been just a little stretch. But considering how long he stayed in his now-defunct marriage to Mariah Carey, well, let's pray for St. Tommy.
2. The Wall Street Journal's Nick Wingfield had a great scoop Thursday (I presume it was a scoop, since I didn't see it elsewhere) about how the major record labels are dumping inferior or bogus files onto song-swapping sites to make the downloading of their copyrighted material an unpleasant listening experience. These distorted files, known as "spoofs," are described by Wingfield as "digital decoys that contain annoying squawks, bursts of static or endless loops of a piece of the song." The industry's hyperactive lobbying group, the Recording Industry Association of America, defends the practice as both legal and "an appropriate part of their arsenal" in combatting file swapping.
This does raise the unfortunate question of what this does to the artist's reputation. For file swappers tend not to be too concerned with what label a particular artist is on, but who the artist is. You download a scratchy, squawking file of junk from an artist you like might create a negative impression of the artist. This marketing concept has great potential applications elsewhere in American commerce. I can see candy companies putting foul-tasting replicas of their best sellers to cut down on convenience store theft, or chefs randomly poisoning customers just in case the diners had skipping out on the check in mind.
(c) copyright 2002, Wayne Robins. All rights reserved. E-mail: waynerobins@hotmail.com
Sunday, July 07, 2002
LAZY PUNDITRY IS HERE TO STAY
by Wayne Robins
Don't you love it when a serious pundit decides to draw on rock and roll history for a column and gets the reference he's making totally wrong? In his column July 5, Daniel Henninger, the deputy editor of the Wall Street Journal's clamorously conservative editorial pages, wrote a truly indecipherable column having to do with rock and roll, patriotism, and John Philip Sousa. It would be a dexterous triple axel indeed, but Henninger falls on his posterior before he's tied his skates. It’s free online in the WSJ's Opinion Journal.
Noting that "there is a museum of rock 'n' roll" in his native Cleveland, he asks, with rueful red, white and blue sincerity: "I wonder if some day there will be a museum of American patriotism."
This is just the set up to Mr. Henninger's big "rock 'n' roll" moment: He begins the next section of his essay quoting the lines "Rock 'n' roll is here to stay, it will never die." Then, Mr. Henninger writes:
"That lyric, taken from the rock-musical 'Grease' and made into an anthem by the oldies group Sha-Na-Na, once seemed true to me."
If only Mr. Henninger's bold assertion were true. For "Rock and Roll is Here To Stay" alights not from "Grease," the genteel yet phony 1950's musical from the 1970's, nor was Sha Na Na in any way responsible for the resonance of its message.
"Rock and Roll is Here to Stay" was the second of two top twenty hits for Danny & the Juniors, a clean-cut but sharp-looking vocal group out of 1950's Philadelphia. "At the Hop" was of course Danny & the Juniors' smash, number one for seven weeks in late 1957 and early 1958, and in the top 40 for four and a half months. The followup, "Rock and Roll is Here To Stay," peaked at number 19 on Billboard's Top 100 the week of March 10, 1958, according to the readily accessible "Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits." But it remained in heavy rotation on oldies AM radio and jukeboxes for many years. A sad footnote: the group's leader, Danny Rapp, died in 1983, an apparent suicide.
Mr. Henninger's column is named Wonder Land. I'd be tempted to ask "I Wonder Why," but I'm afraid that reference to the great Dion & the Belmonts hit (also from 1958), would go right over Mr. Henninger's head.
(c) copyright 2002 by Wayne Robins. All rights reserved. Comments? Write waynerobins@hotmail.com
by Wayne Robins
Don't you love it when a serious pundit decides to draw on rock and roll history for a column and gets the reference he's making totally wrong? In his column July 5, Daniel Henninger, the deputy editor of the Wall Street Journal's clamorously conservative editorial pages, wrote a truly indecipherable column having to do with rock and roll, patriotism, and John Philip Sousa. It would be a dexterous triple axel indeed, but Henninger falls on his posterior before he's tied his skates. It’s free online in the WSJ's Opinion Journal.
Noting that "there is a museum of rock 'n' roll" in his native Cleveland, he asks, with rueful red, white and blue sincerity: "I wonder if some day there will be a museum of American patriotism."
This is just the set up to Mr. Henninger's big "rock 'n' roll" moment: He begins the next section of his essay quoting the lines "Rock 'n' roll is here to stay, it will never die." Then, Mr. Henninger writes:
"That lyric, taken from the rock-musical 'Grease' and made into an anthem by the oldies group Sha-Na-Na, once seemed true to me."
If only Mr. Henninger's bold assertion were true. For "Rock and Roll is Here To Stay" alights not from "Grease," the genteel yet phony 1950's musical from the 1970's, nor was Sha Na Na in any way responsible for the resonance of its message.
"Rock and Roll is Here to Stay" was the second of two top twenty hits for Danny & the Juniors, a clean-cut but sharp-looking vocal group out of 1950's Philadelphia. "At the Hop" was of course Danny & the Juniors' smash, number one for seven weeks in late 1957 and early 1958, and in the top 40 for four and a half months. The followup, "Rock and Roll is Here To Stay," peaked at number 19 on Billboard's Top 100 the week of March 10, 1958, according to the readily accessible "Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits." But it remained in heavy rotation on oldies AM radio and jukeboxes for many years. A sad footnote: the group's leader, Danny Rapp, died in 1983, an apparent suicide.
Mr. Henninger's column is named Wonder Land. I'd be tempted to ask "I Wonder Why," but I'm afraid that reference to the great Dion & the Belmonts hit (also from 1958), would go right over Mr. Henninger's head.
(c) copyright 2002 by Wayne Robins. All rights reserved. Comments? Write waynerobins@hotmail.com
