The title of this post really has no bearing on this content except that it’s a lyric from Raspberry Beret, written by a Minneapolis musician, and this post is about a book written by a Minneapolis musician. I heard Rasberry Beret on the way to work this morning and that lyric just made me laugh for some reason.
Another business trip, another book read. I just finished reading So You Wanna Be a Rock & Roll Star: How I Machine-Gunned a Roomful of Record Executives and Other True Tales from a Drummer’s Life by Jacob Slichter. Slichter was the drummer for the Minneapolis band Semisonic best known for the 90’s hit, Closing Time. The book was a little dry at times, but very enlightening. He reveals what it is like shopping a record around to various record labels and the fuzzy math used to determine an artist’s cut of the profits. It sounds like you’re making a deal with the devil. It also has a lot of great behind the scenes stuff about recording an album, shooting videos, and touring. There was no dramatic ending and the bandmates are still friends. Also, they didn’t have a meteoric rise or a bidding war for their album so the story is probably more like what the majority of artists signing a recording contract experience.
It is obvious from the book, as we all already guessed, that the record companies are sometimes so far out of touch with what the fans want. There is this hilarious bit in the book about Dan Wilson’s ramblings on stage in between songs when Semisonic would perform. The record company exec would be pissed because the ramblings would sometimes go on and on, yet the fans loved this.
If you’re interested in the music business, this book is good. You may find yourself skimming through the boring parts. I got the feeling that the author might have held back a bit not to hurt anyone’s feelings.
--J
No comments:
Post a Comment