The absolute shape of the music business...
Does it seem like legit musicians are getting screwed on listening platforms?
I think it was Hunter S. Thompson who said “The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side.”
https://futurism.com/man-arrested-fake-bands-streams-ai
I could make a SHORT post about what I know about the music business. It can be summed up by saying: Musicians get screwed by record companies. They get screwed by the machination itself. The best way to gain attention and notoriety these days is to give music away on free platforms like YouTube. The Thompson quote above sums it up.
Al Kooper titled his autobiography “Backstage passes and backstabbing bastards” because the ‘bastards’ part is a good cover-all for past bandmates and partners who fucked him over through the years. He’s not broke, but songwriters and young, newly signed acts who don’t know the inner workings of dealing with record companies, are bound to get fucked out of royalties or publishing rights. When they find out about the potential monies they could have made from this album or that band they were associated with, it’s usually too late. Sly Stone finally received five-million dollars 5 decades after he earned the money. Old and living in a trailer, he was ‘saved’ from dying poor.
If PRINCE were around, you could ask him how much of a slave he felt like. He held his music for ransom. He kept thousands of songs unreleased and not (yet) made public to stick it back to ‘the business.’
Then there’s this guy who created artificial bands and used artificial means to show artificial popularity on streaming apps to gain REAL profits. He was busted. The record companies sneak away gaming the rights of music profits from as many pop-whores as they can.
I didn’t really think this post all the way through other than to state an opinion and that is that the music world isn’t fair. Some musicians with world-class skill and technique never get their names known beyond their hometown. Other World-class musicians have a moment in the sun and some find a path to create a life-time of income and residual royalties. Still others have a taste of notoriety and obscurity and earn a commensurate income based on the acceptance of their art.
Honor living artists. Buy their merch. See them perform. Support their skills. That is all.
Now join this Substack! Watch the documentary and the concerts and other content. MORE COMING
In the INDIE FILM, POSITIVELY PORCO, Mike's grandson, undertakes an ardent personal odyssey, seeking out and sitting down with those living treasures that launched a global music paradigm shift from a street corner in Greenwich Village.
It's an inspiring tale of a DEPRESSION-ERA immigrant- and the musicians that he met later in life- who answered their COLLECTIVE CALLING to be a part of the 1960’s Folk and Blues Revival together.
The FOLK MUSIC stars themselves tell the astounding history of Gerde's and Positively Mike Porco.
https://bobporco86.substack.com/p/documentary-on-mike-porcos-folk-music