I have read alot of your commentary and you really seem to have incredible insight in the industry. I don’t know anything about you, maybe you are a musician, maybe you owned a record company. Maybe that I why you speak with such authority, but one thing I disagree with is your summary of Glen Hansard. He is as powerful as Dylan. His songs cut through. Now he might not have the fame Dylan had but not many do. That history is still being written. Going to make it doesn’t mean you’ll be rich or famous. No one is promised that. But having a certain level of success on some level is a good thing especially if you are doing something you love. That’s all I m going to say about that. One more thing. I saw the Crib’s on late night TV. I thought this is the worst band I have ever seen who do they know, and who did they pay off.

Instead of breaking away, us musician just dig ourselves in deeper

I’m starting to feel sorry for the record companies ever having to put up with us in the first place

I couldn’t agree with you more about blogs selling out. Blogs are just interested in traffic - whatever that means. Blogs just talk about headline news and what is popular.

We post news to educate the music buying public and artists. Sometimes its headline news, sometimes it’s not. More importantly, we post emerging artists considering most other blogs don’t know the difference between good, great, and bad.

We are waiting for a revolution too..its about time!

Sometimes the establishment to die for something new to be born. And then the cycle starts all over. I thought the rise of blogs was a really big thing, but so many of them sold out, too. There are still great blogs. But I’m still waiting for another 1967.

But these are all sounds that were incredibly unique. Appetite For Destruction is the last great record recorded entirely to tape, Zeppelin blew everyone around out of the water, & RHCP have always existed in their own little world… John Frusciante can’t even drive a car. You think he was out their pounding away at myspace? He plays guitar & it’s all he can do. Success came to him.

When you’re great, success often comes to you. None of those bands started out as a run-of-the-mill radio rock band.

Being in a national band brings commercial success.

If you work hard, even for 20 years, no one owes you anything. Music is different than pumping gas in that you can’t really choose it, you have to be chosen. I don’t care how many social networks you join, how many flyers you post, whatever. It’s possible to work the system & milk mediocrity for all it’s worth, but the system is crashing. (Thank god.)

Start a revolution, be the next Bob Dylan or Jimi Hendrix or Nirvana. And THEN whine about how tough things are. If you’re just some derivative radio rock band, you’re not going to get any sympathy from me. If you NEED radio or if you NEED some label, then your motivations are commercial & that’s what’s taking the ship down to begin with.

She said “live”, not ‘believe’.. That changes the entire meaning of the sentence.

Sorry, that’s just not how it works.

I don’t even think that Hansard is that great. I much prefer Fionn Regan for that sort of thing. But he’ll be forgotten in a week or two. He won’t have a fraction of the impact that Elliott Smith had, which was marginal at best (and Elliott was infinitely more talented)… I don’t see how there’s any hope in that. “After 20 years you’ll win an award at some silly award show that hardly anyone even watched… you’ll join the ranks of Melissa Etheridge, Three 6 Mafia, & Eminem. And some guy named Jorge Drexler. (Who?) Exactly.”

Just write whatever you want & fuck what anyone else thinks. Rich Ward never made so you probably won’t, either. The Cribs-era is over. Just do something you’re going to be proud of at the end of the day. That’s all you can do until the powers that be ride their ship to the ocean floor. When the gimmicks are gone & the flashing lights finally subside, when everyone trying to “make it” finally moves on, then the talent will rise to the top. And by “talent” I don’t mean the well produced bands or the bands who worked the hardest or who “believed every word they wrote.” I mean the guy who can stand at a microphone with an acoustic guitar & have everyone in the room hang on his every word, like Dylan @ the ‘63 Newport Folk Festival. You either have it or you don’t. And those who have it probably won’t be living like kings. And they probably won’t care.