Sadly, these days, it's really a matter of "every man for himself." In terms of possibilities, we are but an echo of what we once were. Of course, the artist does not want to "sell out to The Man." Left with no real choice except that business model of greed and the bean counting mentality that Reagan propagated and the country embraced, there is only "The Man" to deal with. There is no street for the music to rise up from. There is no time for the music to develop in a natural way that we can all embrace when it ripens and matures.

Hello? bittorrent anyone? streaming audio and fan created/run radio stations via the 'net?

Aside from that comment, this is a good article. not sure why he's blaming Ronald Regan for the destruction of the music industry....but for the most part, the guy is on target. corporate greed and arrogance destroyed the music biz and they've got nobody to blame but themselves.

Timothy, as many of you know, died suddenly, at the age of 50, waiting for an elevator at Billboard's office in New York. Artists including Don Henley, Brian Wilson, Sheryl Crow, James Taylor, Jimmy Buffett, Roger Waters, Sting and me thought so much of him that two sold-out concerts -- one in Boston and one at Madison Square Garden -- were produced to raise money to support his widow, Judy, and family that includes their autistic son. Each of you, who care enough to read this, should ask yourself if people would be there to celebrate your life so lovingly as this.

Uh, no - - sorry, Johnny, but I don't know a lot of famous people to do benefit concerts for my family -- I wasn't aware that cultivating a crop of rich friends with connections should be a key component of my daily life.

The music business went downhill when artists/producers decided to be lazy and make albums filled with half-assed filler songs just so they can try and make a buck.

And yes even though in this day and age thanks to technology I can "borrow" certain songs for a long term basis, but if an artist comes out with an album that I can honestly listen to from beginning to end without hitting skip I will go out and buy that CD in a store and know that I spent money on a quality product.

Weaver95: Sadly, these days, it's really a matter of "every man for himself." In terms of possibilities, we are but an echo of what we once were. Of course, the artist does not want to "sell out to The Man." Left with no real choice except that business model of greed and the bean counting mentality that Reagan propagated and the country embraced, there is only "The Man" to deal with. There is no street for the music to rise up from. There is no time for the music to develop in a natural way that we can all embrace when it ripens and matures.

Hello? bittorrent anyone? streaming audio and fan created/run radio stations via the 'net?

Aside from that comment, this is a good article. not sure why he's blaming Ronald Regan for the destruction of the music industry....but for the most part, the guy is on target. corporate greed and arrogance destroyed the music biz and they've got nobody to blame but themselves.

He's always been extremely anti-Reagan. Pink Houses... not yours. I believe he views him as a huckster dressed up like a working-man.

DarthBrooks:

Uh, no - - sorry, Johnny, but I don't know a lot of famous people to do benefit concerts for my family -- I wasn't aware that cultivating a crop of rich friends with connections should be a key component of my daily life.

He wasn't referring to just famous people. I've known many people who have been the recipients of benefit concerts. There was one for a friend of mine last summer to help pay his bills after he was shot in the leg. There have been multiple efforts as of late to find the killer of bartender in Atlanta. They've raised a $45,000 reward.

You're not supposed to cultivate rich friends, but create the type of meaning to others in your community that makes them want to support you. No one ever throws a benefit for a crotchety old bastard that only thinks of himself.

Rapmaster2000: He's always been extremely anti-Reagan. Pink Houses... not yours. I believe he views him as a huckster dressed up like a working-man.

Aside from the obsessive and weird comments about Regan, the guy was spot on about how the music industry got into it's current situation. But if he's worried about the artists then all he has to do is start up a distribution center via the web and completely cut out the big guys from the loop. I see a lot of smaller bands that do just that. I've found several smaller bands that way and I buy music from them directly. And i know it's music that i'd NEVER find in a store.

LegacyDL: The music business went downhill when artists/producers decided to be lazy and make albums filled with half-assed filler songs just so they can try and make a buck.

So your takeaway is not that the record companies, that hold the keys to broad recognition of music made a decision to promote fluff artists that make formulaic music... but that all artists failed and the record companies just took the best of the worst?

I don't buy it. There are too many good bands that have flown below the radar or just earned their fame without significant radio spins to say "the artists left."

Mellencamp, like his music or not, understands the music business and the "profit first, product last" mentality in its corporate culture. His anti-Reagan stance fits in because it was Reagan's economic climate that saw the entrance of this business model writ large in the music industry.

Weaver95: Rapmaster2000: He's always been extremely anti-Reagan. Pink Houses... not yours. I believe he views him as a huckster dressed up like a working-man.

Aside from the obsessive and weird comments about Regan, the guy was spot on about how the music industry got into it's current situation. But if he's worried about the artists then all he has to do is start up a distribution center via the web and completely cut out the big guys from the loop. I see a lot of smaller bands that do just that. I've found several smaller bands that way and I buy music from them directly. And i know it's music that i'd NEVER find in a store.

I'm surprised he didn't work in a slam at Bush. That's usually SOP for someone with his political leanings. Having said that, yeah, that was a good article.

Hey Mellencamp,
Reagan is dead. I think you need to find a new boogieman. If you want to blame anyone for the self perceived "downfall of the music industry", blame the industry execs that gave us such sensational acts as 50 cent, Kanye West and The Jonas Brothers.

Go suck on a chili dog down at the tasty freeze you pinko hack.

Mellencamp was the product of his record company working the payola circuits to ensure that he was all over the markets that he would do well in. Little Town, Middle America USA.

Not to downplay he method that his music is made, he's right there. He formulates songs that mean something to him and that are hopefully catchy to others.

Regardless, the article didn't exactly state the case of how even he was a part of the non-stop corporate machine in its early days. A little transparancy would be nice, Cougar.

John Buck 41: I'm surprised he didn't work in a slam at Bush. That's usually SOP for someone with his political leanings. Having said that, yeah, that was a good article.

This wasn't a political article; his references to Reagan were economic and specific to the 80s. Bush's policies just aped Reagan's, minus the charisma and ability to deliver the pitch.

degreeless: Reagan is dead. I think you need to find a new boogieman. If you want to blame anyone for the self perceived "downfall of the music industry", blame the industry execs that gave us such sensational acts as 50 cent, Kanye West and The Jonas Brothers.

What article did you read? That was EXACTLY his point.

factoryconnection: John Buck 41: I'm surprised he didn't work in a slam at Bush. That's usually SOP for someone with his political leanings. Having said that, yeah, that was a good article.

This wasn't a political article;

Then there was no need to mention Ronald Reagan, was there? Other than to get a subtle dig in at a Republican, of course.

Summary: Greed killed the record industry.

Thanks Captain Obvious.

Although I wish he would have talked about the internet and how the ease of recording and distributing your own music will take music back from the corporate assholes. The only real losers in the downfall of the record industry are the fat cats with no talent.

Ronald Rayguns is their nobody so evil???? My eyes started getting heavy after you brought RR into the article. I blame MTV. I didnt see you blame them (although I could of missed it). It might be because they are lefties like you ? When music all of sudden became about looks and attitude - it died.

LegacyDL: The music business went downhill when artists/producers decided to be lazy and make albums filled with half-assed filler songs just so they can try and make a buck.

And yes even though in this day and age thanks to technology I can "borrow" certain songs for a long term basis, but if an artist comes out with an album that I can honestly listen to from beginning to end without hitting skip I will go out and buy that CD in a store and know that I spent money on a quality product.

You're a thief...and a liar.

Slu: The only real losers in the downfall of the record industry are the fat cats with no talent.

this.

A lot of people seem to act as if music downloads will completely kill music. At best, it will kill off those only in it for a buck, those who are making music because they love doing so will still do so.

I can't say i like Mellencamp's music, but he was pretty spot-on.

FeedTheCollapse: At best, it will kill off those only in it for a buck, those who are making music because they love doing so will still do so.

Yes and he can eat those tasty bytes for supper and feed the comments from the people who downloaded his music for free to his kids. Hell, he can probably use his high site counter to buy his wife a diamond ring.

Jeesh, farking kids...

Madbassist1: Yes and he can eat those tasty bytes for supper and feed the comments from the people who downloaded his music for free to his kids. Hell, he can probably use his high site counter to buy his wife a diamond ring.

Jeesh, farking kids...



then maybe he shouldn't go into making music with the expectation to make money?

Again: Anyone making music because they love to make music will continue to do so, regardless of whether or not they'll make money off of it. Is this really that hard of an idea to understand? I'm sure every artist aspires for Beatles-esque proportions of fame... but most are smart enough to know it won't happen.

the record business is farked dot com (new window)

toddism: the record business is farked dot com (new window)

i guess because the name of the site has a bad word the filter killed it.

He's totally wrong about Reagan, but that's to be expected given his political leanings.

He is right about the effect that SoundScan has had on the music industry, and the way that artists are now marketed for the masses.

Madbassist1: FeedTheCollapse: At best, it will kill off those only in it for a buck, those who are making music because they love doing so will still do so.

Yes and he can eat those tasty bytes for supper and feed the comments from the people who downloaded his music for free to his kids. Hell, he can probably use his high site counter to buy his wife a diamond ring.

Jeesh, farking kids...

What in the hell are you talking about? Musicians will still be able to make money. It is proven that people will pay for music online if it is easy and priced right. And people will pay for live performances. There have always been pirates and there always will be. But most people will pay a fair price for music if it is easy to do so.

The only good things the established record companies were good for was promotion and fronting the large amount of capital it took record an album. Technology has made it so both of these things can now be done without the big companies.

Sure major artists will still need help in many of these areas and there will be many people willing to help them. But you don't need a mega-corporation anymore. And in the new world, the artist will even get to keep a larger percentage of the revenues since they will not have to sign over the rights to everything to get bank rolled for the recording of a record.

All that is changing is the business model. Artists will be fine. One could even argue that artists will be better off. The only ones who won't be better off are the employees and shareholders of the legacy record companies.

Weaver95: Aside from the obsessive and weird comments about Regan, the guy was spot on about how the music industry got into it's current situation. But if he's worried about the artists then all he has to do is start up a distribution center via the web and completely cut out the big guys from the loop. I see a lot of smaller bands that do just that. I've found several smaller bands that way and I buy music from them directly. And i know it's music that i'd NEVER find in a store.


I think it is a poke at the fundamental shift to profits above all that kicked in during the Reagan tears. In the 50's if you company pulled an AIG you would be expected to do the honorable thing and hurl yourself out of a window

Rapmaster2000: Weaver95: Sadly, these days, it's really a matter of "every man for himself." In terms of possibilities, we are but an echo of what we once were. Of course, the artist does not want to "sell out to The Man." Left with no real choice except that business model of greed and the bean counting mentality that Reagan propagated and the country embraced, there is only "The Man" to deal with. There is no street for the music to rise up from. There is no time for the music to develop in a natural way that we can all embrace when it ripens and matures.

Hello? bittorrent anyone? streaming audio and fan created/run radio stations via the 'net?

Aside from that comment, this is a good article. not sure why he's blaming Ronald Regan for the destruction of the music industry....but for the most part, the guy is on target. corporate greed and arrogance destroyed the music biz and they've got nobody to blame but themselves.

He's always been extremely anti-Reagan. Pink Houses... not yours. I believe he views him as a huckster dressed up like a working-man.

Does his dumbass realize that Nabster was killed under Clinton's watch, as was the Telecommunications Act which enabled 3 companies to buy up all of the media outlets? His generic, poor-man Springstein shiat is always on the classic rock stations anyway. Are you sure you don't want to change your name back to Cougar again, you hack?

/Hate the big labels for fark him. This would be like Lars all of a sudden trying to biatch about the RIAA>

degreeless: Hey Mellencamp,
Reagan is dead. I think you need to find a new boogieman. If you want to blame anyone for the self perceived "downfall of the music industry", blame the industry execs that gave us such sensational acts as 50 cent, Kanye West and The Jonas Brothers.

Go suck on a chili dog down at the tasty freeze you pinko hack.

exactly. kanye west and the jonas brothers make me want to puke just looking at them. fiddy is just a clone of precursors.

don't like me borrowing music off the net? shouldn't have charged me 20 bucks for a cd all those years...fark you.

degreeless: Go suck on a chili dog down at the tasty freeze you pinko hack.

I came here to see these exact words set to music.
/And get between Dianes knees.
//I'm dancing over here boss, I'm dancing....

FTA: "If we have any hope for survival of the music that we all love, compassion must replace name-calling, fairness must replace greed and we need to come together as a musical community and try to understand each other's problems."

What's the marketing angle on that? How does that affect the bottom line? Those were great sentiments when it was easy to sell free-love music to peaceniks, but that stuff doesn't fly any other way.

If it's not a sales angle, it's not valuable to record companies. That's not an opinion, it's a fact of life - these are corporations that exist to generate profits, and anything that doesn't adhere to that principle in one way or another naturally works against it.

Sing about peace, love, and understanding all you want - if nobody's buying that sentiment, though, don't expect the bean counters to be swayed by it.

i don't have to RTFA to know:

it's a shambles! the record companies are screwing us! the little guy should self-publish! they don't care about music, just making a buck!

/old and busted

Haven't bought a cd in 15 years, don't intend to.

FTA:
The CD, it should be noted, was born out of greed. It was devised to prop up record sales on the expectation of people replenishing their record collections with CDs of albums they had already purchased. They used to call this "planned obsolesce" in the car business. Sound quality was supposed to be one of the big selling points for CDs but, as we know, it wasn't very good at all. It was just another con, a get-rich-quick scheme, a monumental hoax perpetrated on the music consuming public.

I'll grant him that CD prices were born out of greed, but CDs themselves work a lot better than cassette tapes with regards to durability, portability, and sound quality.

I didn't read through the whole article, mainly just scanned through it.

Thats when a smoke was smoke
Groovin was groovy.

I felt that was a very disappointing article. It didn't really bring any new light on the problem of music today, just a rehash of things we already know. Nor does it give us any solution or path to follow to correct it.

TFA's rambling gives me the sense of an old codger who sees the world is starting to pass him by, and laments for the "good old days."

There's plenty of awesome, inventive music around, and it's easier to get than ever. You just won't hear it on your local Top 40 station.

Nobody under the age of 30 listens to music primarily on the radio anyway, and this trend is NOT in danger of reversing.

Forget John Mellencamp. Read what Janis Ian has to say about this. (new window) Here too. (new window)

The CD, it should be noted, was born out of greed. It was devised to prop up record sales on the expectation of people replenishing their record collections with CDs of albums they had already purchased. They used to call this "planned obsolesce" in the car business. Sound quality was supposed to be one of the big selling points for CDs but, as we know, it wasn't very good at all. It was just another con, a get-rich-quick scheme, a monumental hoax perpetrated on the music consuming public.

Someone needs to get a hold of Mellencamp and explain to him how CDs actually do have better sound quality than records in most situations unless you like to buy $1000 sound cables and connect them to your tube-amplifier you built in your mother's basement. The guy sounds like an old paranoid dude who obsesses about conspiracies that keep his art from the masses.

Imagine the gall of music executives that were trying to make money by selling people cds. How dare they! Damn that hoax of cds that have been conning people for the last 30 years.

He neglected to mention that for some reason there seems to simply be a profound lack of tallent out there.

GodTurtleOm: I'll grant him that CD prices were born out of greed, but CDs themselves work a lot better than cassette tapes with regards to durability, portability, and sound quality.

True... I have a car that only plays cassettes, so I dug my old tapes from the '80s out. The commercially made tapes don't play because the pads that are supposed to ride against the back of the tape against the head all fall off. This does not happen with the taped I made of my records (and yes, CDs) where I used quality cassettes from TDK and Maxell.

/my lawn is still brown, despite spring having arrived
//get the hell off it anyway

Personally, I blame Gwen Stefani. Her music is just terrible.

One of John Mellencamp's three houses (new window) Guess this is his idea of fairness replacing greed

Dude,

The 80's 90's and 00's are all about the same thing : The race to the bottom.

Simply put, shiat sells. Whether it is music, cars, american beer or cheap chinese shoes it doesn't really matter.

The companies figured it out, who can really blame them for wanting to make a buck?

I don't wear chinese shoes, drink american beer, drive american cars or listen to top 40 shiat-pop. There will always be an alternative (I hope) I'll make my own damn shoes if I have to, brew my own beer, fix my car, or start a business doing anyone of the above.

No one, except for the top 5% of any interest group is willing to pay for quality and the premium it commands.

So JCM, suck it up and deal with it. Most people are happy living in their own shiat.

There is nothing wrong with the music industry. I listen to at least 100 new CD's a year for free, no cost at all. And still, there were 1900 bands at SXSW. If there were no incentives for them to make music anymore, why would they be trying so hard?

Music is information, digital information is ubiquitous, value is in rarity. Every high school kid with a laptop and Protools can make a decent record; nobody sings off key anymore.

The past is past, there will never be another Dark Side Of The Moon. There will be 100 good albums that no one will pay for and everyone will forget in in month when the next 100 come out.

emnar: Nobody under the age of 30 listens to music primarily on the radio anyway, and this trend is NOT in danger of reversing.

I well into my 30s and I haven't tuned into a radio in years. Heck I don't even know what the local stations are anymore. Radio has become completely irrelevant.

/still have XM in the car but not going to renew it when it comes due in a couple of months.

I woke up this morning to the wife's alarm clock radio blasting some nonsensical "pop" music. Simply dreadful.

In contrast, I listened to three Joe Ely albums this weekend. Simply bliss.

Unfortunately, I'll never hear Joe Ely on the radio.

John Mellencamp

Director_Mr: Someone needs to get a hold of Mellencamp and explain to him how CDs actually do have better sound quality than records in most situations unless you like to buy $1000 sound cables and connect them to your tube-amplifier you built in your mother's basement. The guy sounds like an old paranoid dude who obsesses about conspiracies that keep his art from the masses.

I've never been anything but thrilled with the portability, sound quality, access, and durability of the CD. Technologically speaking it is a huge, huge, huge leap forward for music from analog tape and vinyl. That being said, that technological leap made the production of CDs far cheaper than cassettes and vinyl, and yet the price was always higher.

You can't tell me that the moving parts, magnetic encoding, assembly and winding are half as cheap as imprinting a CD image and screen printing the front. CDs work great, made car audio way better, but were always overpriced.

Stranded On The Planet Dumbass: There is nothing wrong with the music industry. I listen to at least 100 new CD's a year for free, no cost at all. And still, there were 1900 bands at SXSW. If there were no incentives for them to make music anymore, why would they be trying so hard?

The industry has little to do with what you're talking about. He's talking about a corporate culture that markets itself as art, not artists that market themselves as art. SXSW is a massive collection of musicians that create music and perform it. The pop music industry is a limited collection of performers that, for the most part, perform scientifically-engineered hooks to sell goods.

Mellencamp is talking about the death of billion-dollar companies that bring you Milli Vanilli, Britney Spears, and the like.

I'd say he'd have a good point on the damage done - that soundscan and the major labels burned the house down - except as someone whose been releasing music via the internet for about a decade, I have seen countless people go from "dude putting music out a website" to "being in a documentary or two." Music still comes from the ground up. However, it's now not at all tied to mass-media (or rather, just because the old house burned down doesn't mean musicians didn't build another house.)

A solid example of this to me is Nerdcore, as outside of mc chris, everybody who has done well in that scene has done well because they worked completely outside of any mass-media (even mc chris is relatively non-traditional as his start was on the then-fledgling Adult Swim block on Cartoon Network.) You have atleast 3 acts in that scene touring nationally and making a livings as musicians, even though even college radio won't really touch their work, let alone ClearChannel and their ilk. Instead, they've built their names on internet word-of-mouth, and the rare article or public radio report highlighting the scene. This has worked so well in regards to building their careers as musicians that outlets like G4, a relatively mainstream outlet, payed them to do advertisements for the channel. Why? Because those musicians have credibility with G4's target audience.

As I see it, the internet, independent artists/labels and alternative media outlets (such non-music networks highlighting indie artists,) have made the traditional music industry into the horse and buggy. This new paradigm may not sell a million records, but musicians live off their work and they do so without at all compromising their ideals as artists. Strikes me as a better deal than anything involving a publically-held, multi-national company, especially in regards to them telling the artist exactly what percentages and cuts they are allowed to get, and how they will be marketed worldwide.

Once we destroy any hope of making profits off music, it will be able to become art again, and then after a generation or so we might actually start to hear good music again.

/viva la piracy

He says the CD was born out of greed. Moron. It's simply a better idea than vinyl. I was happy to re-purchase my record collection, because re-purchasing albums was what I did a lot of. Either I would wear out a vinyl LP or my friends would by playing it with crappy needles.

Vinyl always sucked. I always hated it. And when something better replaced it I rejoiced.

The sound quality isn't as good? Jesus, man! What do you listen to? For me, here's one example out of thousands: Al Stewart's "Roads to Moscow." I had heard it on vinyl hundreds of times. When I put on the CD I was blown away. The quiet little guitar at the start comes out of nowhere - nothingness, outer space, silence. It's like a creepy horror story. Do I miss the crackle and hiss of the needle hitting the vinyl? Don't be stupid.

The guy's a f*cking idiot. You can complain about an industry all you want. (Publishing, record labels, whatever.) You don't have to be a part of it. An artist can always go independent.

There is now an entire generation for whom the term "tape hiss" is meaningless, and that is good.