Cannot Believe what I'm seeing!

There's nothing wrong with making money off something you love or are good at, but money isn't the be all and end all.
When we die, we won't be remembered for our financial situation. As musicians we should be aiming to be remembered for making incredible, powerful, moving works of art; money SHOULD be secondary to all of that, but it obviously isn't, and it's not about to change.

And Tim, your Uncle sounds like a very inspiring man, good on him.
 
There's nothing wrong with making money off something you love or are good at, but money isn't the be all and end all.
When we die, we won't be remembered for our financial situation. As musicians we should be aiming to be remembered for making incredible, powerful, moving works of art; money SHOULD be secondary to all of that, but it obviously isn't, and it's not about to change.

And Tim, your Uncle sounds like a very inspiring man, good on him.


It is a very interesting concept, seriously... to be immortalized or to have some sort for legacy.

these "incredible, powerful, moving works of art" that you speak of are subjectively so. one individual may feel the band, poison is a powerful art movement ...and another may feel they have obtained a form of catharsis from having listen to hanna montana (or in this case justin bieber) it wouldn't be fair to dismiss either preference as misguided and foolish.

We know the facts: the pop artists we speak of today are held under ridiculous constraints by the record label/distributor's support. this said record label is operated by enormous amounts of equity and resources which become inherently a resource to the artist. unfortunately these record companies are now suffering from bankruptcies and tremendous overheads that most of them don't even have enough money to support musician's anymore… as a result the labels and distribution license the musical content to syndication networks and commercial publishing.

this is what pays the bills for these companies. so much so that it has allowed them to peruse new works of musical "talent".

the problem that you all seem to have with this is that the "artists" are not artists at all... and they have no talent. (which is a reasonable assertion considering the circumstances the labels are faced with) young, teenage vocalists and garage bands engineered to have an "unpolished sound". this leaves a young unseasoned "talent" that is discriminated against of not having "soul"... which by it's resounding popularity; the very word "soul" is completely based on interpretation.

my point has been simple: don't continue to form an opinion about the musician and you will be able to treat yourself to the music industry.

gareth brought up miles davis earlier... well, miles is a classically trained musician so there is no doubt that he is skilled to the service. but miles was also a huge failure in the music business. people never "understood" his work which made him loose a lot of label support... and rightfully so. he was trying to cross the two worlds. now his music is marketed as much as justin bieber by sony entertainment because miles sold all of the rights to his work. which can be purchased on itunes and at starbucks.

if you want to make money and have fans ...connect with them.

if you don't care about the appreciation ...be someone like my uncle.
 
There is nothing wrong with making money by playing music. I would love to make a living off of playing music for the soul reason of being able to support myself, while at the same time I just generally have a passion to play music regardless if I am payed or not.

There comes a point however where the industry has become too much of a business. Yes at its core its an institution to obtain a monetary gain on the music arts, but this gain is one shared by fellow musicians and artists. At this point today and escalating onward, it has become more a corporation that is desperately finding anything they can to obtain more money. With all the artist they have and as large as some of them are, only horrible financial decisions are to blame for these companies to be on the verge of bankruptcy. The industries answer to more money to keep them afloat is to find any artist who will sell because the are physically attractive and as a result the music become more generic, for numerous reasons, the behind the seems songwriters are writing more songs at faster rates, stretching their creative ideas thin and the artist that do write music are not as talented as the previous batch. The equation lines up with more generic sounding music that is just trying to sell to as many people as possible. It isn't about the elegance or class of fine art and we are slowly loosing culture, and among the main corporations being american companies, the claim that America lacks a strongly defined culture I find very true.

Music today is not nearly as personal as it used to be. For example, I grew up con country music, and I still listen to many of the classics that I grew up on, and being much older analyzing the music found that the conviction of the art is extremely strong in many of those classics. I was surfing for a country station on my way to class a few hours ago and unfortunately the first station I found was a new country, and with critical listening I discovered that the songs have no substance, they don't tug you around emotionally, they don't make you think and they don't connect with you on a personal level. The same goes for all genres, the pop music I grew up to connects more personally to you than the pop music today, I can listen to RnB from the 50's to the 80's all day long, but hit me with the new stuff, and I am bored out of my mind. Lyrics in more mordern music don;t say much, are just blah and generic, go back to old music I grew up to, just treading the lyrics takes you somewhere.

Thats the state of things, the industry used to be a money making business for music, now its a money making business using music.
 
I have heard of his name but never heard him or know why he is famous. I also don't listen to the radio unless its Sirius and then its mostly the metal stations
 
only horrible financial decisions are to blame for these companies to be on the verge of bankruptcy. The industries answer to more money to keep them afloat is to find any artist who will sell

this is just not true... the reason the labels are having trouble is due to evolving technology. the music industry is using every outline in syndication it can to become a modern relevance, hence itunes/rhapsody/napster/amazon. these provisionary syndication channels allow for the property to be promoted and monetized on a cost per click basis. it's not a fact at all that the losses by a label have fundamentally ensued as a result of marketing failures. modern marketing has proven to work for record labels (hence justin bieber).

like i said, this is making them money again and the labels are continuing to network the publishing rights with syndication channels. this proves that we can still "have our cake and eat it too" ...if the labels continue to fight off piracy by using syndication networks. the piracy patrons will become less of a commonality. sure! there will always be people who download content illegally... but when content providers like EMI/UMG/SONY etc. work out the modifications to syndication pricing and deals (like netfilx) the content will become a lot more abundant.

example: not many people owned a lathe during vinyl production... (not many people still own one today) so people had to buy records by the studio that produced them... then the tape made it more difficult for the labels and the cd ... then the mp3 and so on (obviously).

we are seeing more label music in television commercials now more than ever. we are also seeing an up rise of more and more indie musicians through the internet... these people are producing/distributing/marketing their own stuff without the help of a label.

hey… umf right?


It isn't about the elegance or class of fine art and we are slowly loosing culture, and among the main corporations being american companies, the claim that America lacks a strongly defined culture I find very true.

it's not wise to base this primarily on music. i have seen more art come out of music now more than ever and this is because of the advent technology.

anecdotal: when i was younger no one in my hood recorded music... mtv still played music videos and there were the same talent agency’s and record labels there are today.

also, america doesn't lack culture at all... america is an amalgamation of hundreds of cultures. the reason it appears as though america lacks anything is due to the country's infancy. america is extremely young. (labels work the same way everywhere) business operates the same in all countries with a few minor discrepancies in regards to model.



Music today is not nearly as personal as it used to be. For example, I grew up con country music, and I still listen too many of the classics that I grew up on, and being much older analyzing the music found that the conviction of the art is extremely strong in many of those classics. I was surfing for a country station on my way to class a few hours ago and unfortunately the first station I found was a new country, and with critical listening I discovered that the songs have no substance, they don't tug you around emotionally, they don't make you think and they don't connect with you on a personal level. The same goes for all genres, the pop music I grew up to connects more personally to you than the pop music today, I can listen to RnB from the 50's to the 80's all day long, but hit me with the new stuff, and I am bored out of my mind. Lyrics in more mordern music don;t say much, are just blah and generic, go back to old music I grew up to, just treading the lyrics takes you somewhere.

once again this is subjective and anecdotal... and means nothing to society.

music is apathetic; music is an adaptation of being. if you can interpret “art”…then it’s art. if you can connect with only some ...but not all music in some way the fault is your own.


Thats the state of things, the industry used to be a money making business for music, now its a money making business using music.

it depends on who you ask... some people remember differently.
 
How do you go through life not hearing about people as huge as this.

You can hear about them without having to listen to them more than a couple times.

Avoid the radio: Check
Ignore/treat backround music in stores, bars, etc...: Check
Avoid myspace and youtube advertisements for their shitty artists: Check

I've hear of him, thankfully I have only had to listen to him 2 times (fucking wedding and fucking in laws little brats).
 
Anne Frank managed it.... and that was all set in the same location... Imagine what someone who goes outside could produce!
 
His management would fail pretty badly if they didn't push for a book at this point. Justin Bieber, the product, doesn't appeal to a an audience that covers broad demographics like - let's say - Lady Gaga. Justin Bieber is a niche product if you will. His fanbase will grow up and eventually leave him behind. The past has shown that only few child-stars manage to transfer their career successfully into adult hood. And the kid is certainly no Michael Jackson... ;)

So the management hires a skilled ghost writer and there'll be little to no risk for a commercial failure at this point of the products ("Justin Bieber") live-cycle.
 
My question is, how can people be so concerned about this and not be able to name a single Supreme Court Justice? (For the U.S. folk).

Absolutely agreed. Yeah it's sad how so many Americans have no clue as to how our government is supposed to work, but they all know who the latest flavor of the split second pop sensation is.