New Bands Breaking Into The Music Biz..
Posted August 26, 2008 — in Music News
It’s A Long Way To The Top If You Want To Rock N’ Roll: Mark Stoermer, The Killers bassist says new bands breaking into the music industry will have a tough time. “It’s a really hard time for new bands,” says Stoermer. “It’s not that there’s a lack of good music, it’s just that labels are struggling financially.” “Some people say that record labels are bad but people forget they are the ones who break the bands and get them on their way.” Although Mark says that people are more excited to see live bands today, “In the Eighties no-one was really going to see live music. Now it’s big business.”
Although we love The Killers we disagree with Mark’s statement that there isn’t a lack of good music. Mark may not realize that he is a member in a band with a killer rock star frontman that happened to write some mega songs. The threat isn’t bankrupt labels, the true threat is the lack of creativity and inspiration.
Yes my friend, there is a lack of good music which is why some labels are primarily bankrupt. It’s called the chicken and the egg scenario. What came first, the chicken or the egg? Now, does the band break themselves or does the label break the band? KOAR is betting on the chicken.
Lastly, nothing can stop or block an artist from writing great songs except for inspiration. When inspiration is non-existent then creativity and originality ceases to exist. This is what we are experiencing today known as the creative drought. An artist will ‘Make It’ If he or she writes great songs and presents an entire exciting package that excites an audience. At that point it will become undeniable and you will make many important friends who will assist in broadening your market.
Send new music along with your myspace to tips@kingsofar.com
I’ll be the first to admit that we need more good music… to be released by major labels. Fact of the matter is, there is an abundance of good music out there going virtually ignored. In fact, here’s a list!
Hotel Lights, +/- (the Plus Minus), Self, Spoon, Fleet Foxes, The Classic Brown, Portastatic, Ugly Duckling, The Long Winters… the list goes on and on, and most of these aren’t “new” acts either.
KOAR is always so quick to say that there’s a lack of good music being made, and then there is post after post about bands we should keep an eye on. But, those bands are the same regurgitated crap that’s driven people over the age of 22 away from FM radio. ENOUGH WITH THE ARENA ROCK CRAP! It’s not the state of modern music that’s the problem- it’s the state of most major label, commercial music. Give up on WEA, give up on Sony and stick with Matador, Barsuk and Merge. They are the ones pushing the envelope. A&R is supposed to stay ahead of the curb, not shake their collective fist and gripe about how things aren’t what they used to be.
Good grief.
Comment by david — August 27, 2008 @ 5:57 am
I always thought bad music is the reason label went bankrupt as well. People will purchase music that’s worth buying. Even if the artist do have a label deal, no one’s going to care if the music sucks.
Comment by WeRoqq — August 27, 2008 @ 6:44 am
um… how was the concert Business in the 80’s not big business? Other than ticket prices being half the costs and attendance being double?
Comment by RR — August 27, 2008 @ 7:34 am
I was a bit confused with that statement too, the concert business in the 80’s was tremendous. I will go as far to even say the nineties had an ‘ok’ concert business. In fact, it was only until the last 5-8 years that venues had to scale down because less people were attending concerts.
Comment by koar — August 27, 2008 @ 7:43 am
Oy. I disagree with everything in this write-up.
Firstly, fuck the major labels. It’s not hard these days to make a living and succeed as a new band - it’s easier than ever.
The live concert business was FANTASTIC in the ’80s.
There’s plenty of great music out there, KOAR just can’t find it ‘cuz you’re busy writing about bands that sound like Breaking Benjamin.
The Killers frontman is hardly a star - he wouldn’t be recognized on the street by an 18 - or 34 year old — and he can’t sing live worth a shit!
This bass player should be less worried about new bands breaking and more worried about how he plans on paying his own mortgage in three years.
Comment by SusanRockStar — August 27, 2008 @ 8:52 am
I Wanna Know Girls by Portatastic is such a fantastic song (when it breaks off after that last verse, it just kills me). Self is genius. So is Spoon.
Do you ever even check these bands out, Dean? I wonder where your heart is sometimes… whether the songs you post actually affect you, or whether your attitude is just “The kids will eat this stuff up…” The truth is that the emo/pop genre is so supersaturated at this point that the only thing that sets them apart is their producer. And we should ALL know that producers today don’t hold a candle to guys like Tony Visconti, Glyn Johns, Jimmy Iovine… maybe that’s the real problem with music today, bullshit producers who grew up with a pro tools rig.
But yeah, if it were that easy, Rilo Kiley’s Breakin’ Up would’ve been huge. It’s better than anything Blondie ever put out.
Comment by Jon Cole — August 27, 2008 @ 8:55 am
Susan - ok, so you believe the Egg came first rather than the chicken, and you contribute the labels for breaking artists rather than artists breaking themselves.
If it wasn’t for the Geffen A&R Tom Zutaut then the world would have never heard of Guns N Roses. We both know that sounds ridiculous.
It’s a dangerous mindset to blame the labels for the lack of good music. That’s like blaming the faucet on dirty water. I’m not claiming that so called music execs are musical geniuses, In fact, I am shocked sometimes to see some people in the business playing music critic. Blaming majors for the lack of good music is writing a blank check to artists to become lazy.
Comment by koar — August 27, 2008 @ 9:14 am
Any artist who would become “lazy” after hearing that statement wouldn’t have ever become great, anyways. Similarly, the ones who work the hardest will probably also never become great, either.
And you might also say that if not for Tom Zutaut, Appetite For Destruction wouldn’t have been recorded with Mike Clink. And Guns & Roses wouldn’t be Guns N Roses without Tom Zutaut.
Comment by Jon Cole — August 27, 2008 @ 9:30 am
Musically I like Portastatic, but I can’t say it would be repeat in my iPod. Personally, I find it bland. Hotel Lights puts me in the same mood as Portastatic. I know some people eat this up, I don’t.
Same thing goes for The Long Winters. For the most part, it sounds bland to me. It know you may feel this is GREAT, but I just can’t come to the same conclusion.
I can’t get into Fleet Foxxxxxes either. I can’t connect to a mid-evil choir mixed with a quasi sounding tribal chant (White Winter Hymnal). Sorry guys, It’s not me, but I’m glad it excites you. Be content that you found some music that relaxes your soul. That’s what music is suppose to do.
Comment by koar — August 27, 2008 @ 10:23 am
First of all, it’s awesome to know there are some other Self fans out here. What a criminally underrated band…
Second, it’s absolutely reasonable to “blame the faucet” for dirty water if the water starts out clean.
To build on your analogy, you take a talented, original band, give them a manager who thinks band members should be replaced if they’re not ‘photogenic’ enough (ahem), sign them to a label that wants a quick return on the band instead of investing in their long term career, put them in the studio with a producer who sucks the life out of their CD by quantazing drums, auto-tuning vocals, etc. And then put them on the radio that only plays 20 or so artists that sound exactly like each other and repeat the cycle ad nauseum. affects the ‘cleanliness of the water’.
Please Dean, stop this incessant whining about artists not being creative enough. It’s insulting to the musicians who actually read this blog (not to mention flat-out wrong). Or, at the very least, post one of you own brilliantly creative musical compositions and show us how easy it is. Apparently, all us ‘lazy’ musicians could use the inspiration.
Comment by Jalan — August 27, 2008 @ 11:34 am
Jalan, so I also may conclude that you believe the egg came before the chicken as well…..
Comment by koar — August 27, 2008 @ 12:24 pm
Actually, I believe in evolution — or in the case of the music industry, devolution.
Comment by Jalan — August 27, 2008 @ 12:26 pm
right, i don’t believe in evolution, because as you mentioned, we experience devolution, both can’t be right!
Comment by koar — August 27, 2008 @ 12:34 pm
Do we not experience evolution, Dean?
Comment by Jon Cole — August 27, 2008 @ 3:42 pm
we have 16 months before this decade is over. and all we have so far is the Jonas Bros.
Comment by larry anderson — August 27, 2008 @ 5:21 pm
Absolutely KOAR & Jon! Let’s not totally demonize the Major Labels… back when being an A&R person was a coveted job that took an amazing ear and talent and many years of hard work to get that title… Many hundreds of great albums over the years are in part thanks to a great A&R person who just “knew” and in many cases placed their entire career pushing a certain artist… catching flack from all sides.. but they believed in the music.. and that’s what it was all about! Tom Zutaut is a perfect example… Several others I could add to that as well…
IMO John D. Kalodner is the greatest true A&R person in the history of the Music business.. it was never about money or budgets.. it was about perfection… it was taking the art of A&R to an entirely new level.. it was ALWAYS only about the music.. and making it the best it could be… and if labels still had a new generation of people on board like that pulling the artistic strings… things may be a lot different than this mess we are in…
Comment by RR — August 28, 2008 @ 6:16 am
It feels like this just keeps going around in circles (and now my head hurts).
I’ve always been under the impression that it’s A&R’s responsibility to filter the “dirty water”- an obligation to weed out the crap and FIND the new, fresh, origial, talented groups. There’s plenty of proof that they’re out there and to say they’re not sounds like a cop-out.
Where the evolution of popular music takes us isn’t always going to be everyone’s cup of tea, but it seems like we can all agree that the state of modern music is pretty pathetic.
Comment by david — August 28, 2008 @ 8:08 am
there was a tv commercial that showed a guy “reaching” the end of the internet.may thats what has happen in music.maybe we have reached the end of creativity in music and like the internet we keep looking for something different but just end up with the same thing.
Comment by larry anderson — August 29, 2008 @ 9:23 am
IMO, this is the best line of the subject and comments on this topic.
“A&R is supposed to stay ahead of the curb, not shake their collective fist and gripe about how things aren’t what they used to be.”
I feel this rings true to the music industry as a whole, not just A&R.
I read KOAR a lot and I find it odd the same thing is written over and over about lack of new music and inspiration. KOAR is on preacher repeat about new music, but yet isn’t able to write a topic with out being repeat?
Here are some ideas…
KOAR, get out a map, close your eyes, and stab your finger on a location on that map. Randomly travel to the location your finger stab choose for you, and listen to some new music. Stop being a half-ass and asking for submissions. GET OUT THERE! (p.s. if you found a band this way, you better have the whole package as an A&R or fuck off!)
OR, hop your ass down to guitar center and buy some gear. Let’s start the process, KOAR. Put your money where your mouth is!
Comment by Muddykid — August 31, 2008 @ 6:35 am
Muddy
Staying ahead of the curve is crucial which is why we are urging artists to push the boundaries. We don’t want more of the same because the same is lame.
Sometimes we’ll referance a pre-2000 artist to use as an example of must have ingredients which are chemistry, great songs, attitude and energy.
If you been following KOAR we discovered a creative drought. Two years ago Chris Anderson invented the long tail theory suggested that since artists have all the tools that only a select artists had in the past, then we could expect better innovative original music. It made sense at the time, but we now know it’s not the case. No change, but more of the same.
After discovering the creative drought, we are now focusing on the reasons why the drought is occuring and after talking to a slew of artists, inspiration seems to be lacking.
Secondly, we scour the world for music. We watch over 2,000 artists sing and perform on stage during the course of the year.
Put your money where your mouth is, prove us wrong, and send us a link to a great band!!!!
Comment by dean — September 1, 2008 @ 8:33 am
I agree with MuddyKid - fact is KOAR hasn’t written about a band I hadn’t already heard of elsewhere in quite some time. Time to step it up over there!
Also, re: Tom Zutaut, what ELSE did he discover/develop? That guy just lucked out, let’s not kid ourselves. If he were such a musical mastermind, knowing what the general public wants, he’d be doing it over and over, again and again.
Comment by SusanRockStar — September 1, 2008 @ 10:57 am
Tom Zutaut lucked out? Any A n’ R who saw Guns n’ Roses in 1987 and didn’t immediately sign them should have been fired for malparactice. Including the Chrysalis rep who refused to run naked down Sunset Boulevard.
Comment by Brett — September 1, 2008 @ 6:53 pm
While I do agree that good music is the single most important part of being a successful band, there are plenty of good bands/musicians that don’t have the skills to get their music out there and market it. That’s the area that labels still are good for, and while many bands have been able to do it on their own, many just don’t have the chops for it.
Comment by Daniel Hollister — September 2, 2008 @ 1:36 pm
I argue that maybe part of the problem is that by having all the tools to record and promote themselves, new bands tend to focus too much on building their social networking sites etc, instead of really trying to write great music and raise the bar…. create something original. If they spent half the time rewriting their songs lyrics as they do rewriting their latest blog post, maybe music would be in a better state of affairs.
And A&R’s are to blame as well by perpetuating this myth that a band should know how to market themselves. NO! an artist should know how to craft and write a great song that strikes an emotional chord in the public. What does it matter how many plays you get a day on myspace, or how many “ilike” fans you got this week…. its about music and expression and writing something that relates to people…. an artist is supposed to be just that AN ARTIST… you’re not signing them for their NEW MEDIA skills. Most of these bands didn’t go to college to learn niche marketing strategies… so why are we as a collective biz demanding this from bands for them to have our support?
(note- I am talking about commercial art for the sake of this argument)
One thing Dean from KOAR always has right and does not deviate from is the opinion that THE SONG is king…. and he’s CORRECT!!!! and the entire biz (managers, attorneys, labels, pubcos, fans) are all centered around 1 thing and 1 thing only…. a HIT FUCKING SONG that we simply fall in love with and cant get out of our heads. Without that song, everything is much more difficult, and thats what we are experiencing today. Technology allowing anyone to record in their bedroom mostly led to over-saturation and a generation or songwriters who grew up watching MTV Cribs and writing unpassionate songs because they are in it for the wrong reasons.
ARTISTS, if you have a “PLAN B”, i’d argue you’re in it for the wrong reasons.
Comment by focus on the real issue — September 3, 2008 @ 10:11 am