and people keep telling me that i dont understand it
usually i find the people telling me that are the people who are withholding my dough
i have the bizness acumen of a wet sponge
i admit it
but lemme toss around a few ideas here
first of all
the music biz is one of the only if not the only bizzes in the world
where the guys at the very centre of it are the guys making the least
most nights at a gig
you can be sure everyone there is earning more than the players
i aint talking about pink floyd or brooce springsteen either
im talking about the other 98 per cent (incl myself)
the first bit o money i ever made was in 1980 when i signed a fifty/fifty publishing deal
for 500 bucks
the company i signed with are still hanging on to me
but in 2015 i will be able to slip out
after 35 years of them dipping into me
all because of that one stupid day in 1980 when i needed the 500 bucks
izzat fair?
eventually a manager got it changed to a 75 25 deal
ie i get 75 cents of each dollar i make n they get 25
wow thats a lotta money they collected for me over the years
and they did alright from their measly advance so long ago
at the same-ish time the church signed a deal
and we were off making albums that never recouped their cost
ie the album cost say 150 grand to make plus a few 100 grand vids
so you can never sell enough to get any money
thats been pretty standard for almost all albums
i have had 4 or 5 record companies go bust and take all my/our royalties with em too
including carrere in england
stunn in NZ
thirsty ear in america (boy i’d like to catch up with that c**t in a dark alley)
and another mob who bought 20 thousand MATS from me n marty
then distributed em n got the dough n then went bust!
in 1984 i signed a pub deal with my then manager
when we quit with him
he sold the catalog on
and i was acquired and disposed of a few times
in the middle of the nineties a big pub firm did this to me
they sent my money round n round the world
each branch in each country would apply a handling fee
until they whittled a cheque that had been about 10 grand a six month period
down to $250 a six month period
this was perfectly legal
in fact it was a STANDARD PRACTICE until a few years back….
the said manager commissioned us at 20 per cent of the gross
which meant that in 1988 when we were earning around 100, 000 gross a week
he was getting 20, 000 grand a week while the band was on 800 bucks a week
which is still what the church pays itself
800 bucks a week (when we are on the road)
off the road=nothing
(in fairness we do occasionally divvy up small mounts if a tour does well)
so theres some real non -indexation of wages for ya
1988 800 bucks a week, 2012 800 bucks a week
when we left the guy in 1990
he jumped up n down and got even more money out of us
he claimed were unpaid commissions
but he never ever presided over a tour that made money
they all lost money a small fortune (he made while we lost!)
but arista records picked up the loss
and tacked it onto a minus position we could never escape from
i remember ringing up the slimy philistine hopeless manager and saying
“how come you get 20 grand a week n i get 800?’
he said
YOU DONT UNDERSTAND SHOWBIZNESS!
ha ha ha
so i still aint never been paid for any of those albums…only my songwriting royalties
(and then only if i was lucky!)
yeah guys
all those records you bought
very little if any at all came down the line to me
it still isnt
if this happened in any other business there would be an outcry
but we musicians are not very good at anything other than music
now
imagine this scenario if you will
(this is all imaginary from here on in)
some old veteran band eventually bumps into a very generous patron
now the patron doesnt wanna just hand out money to the band
that would be hopeless
but what he wants is for them to finally get some financial relief
some of the members were living below the official poverty line at the time
ie 35,000 grand a year in aust
so a couple of members of imaginary band go looking for a way to do it
they find some much younger guy who is a fan of this imaginary band
hes got a little label going and theyre impressed he aint some evil suit like in the old days
the kind and generous sponsor dips his hand in pocket a provides a “shitload” of money
for younger guy with his little penis..er sorry..i mean label to buy back said imaginary bands catalog
and put it on his honest john label called mom n pop records
wow at last n finally our heroes will get some $!! YAY!!
but guess what?
oh damn i bet you guessed
mr mom n pop still aint paying the old boys
hes a fan yep
he dont wear a suit, nope
but the boys still aint getting nothing
even tho quite a bit is coming in
i bet in this imaginary world and imaginary band too
that you would not expect mr younger mom n pop guy would also take 50 per cent
whoah! no way…i mean that would mean hes earning 3 times more dough
than stevie mainman who is the geeza WHO DREAMED THIS WHOLE FUCKIN TRIP UP!
(in this imaginary example natch)
hes pocketing dough from records
hes pocketing dough from kind imaginary patron
but he aint paying the guys properly (read ;AT ALL!)for records they made 25 years ago
when he was just a little snotty nose kid
jesus…the irony!
stevie mainman does a quick knee jerk calculation n figgers out
AT THIS RATE HE WONT SEE ANY DOUGH UNTIL HES IN HIS EIGHTIES!!!!
boy no wonder the imaginary anger
so he decides to take the law into his own hands
he decides fuck copyright fuck libel and fuck everybody else
its time he finally made some frickin money outta his own music himself
(luckily he had taught himself to sculpt in the meantime or he woulda been broke!!)
this mainman guy realises he has some powerful allies
allies that grew up listening to his sweet music and are not impressed
and allies that maybe are anxious to see things put right at all costs
well mainman got nothing to lose (literally by now)
also hes released a few solo records and sold a few hundred copies
and hes AMAZED to see how much money a few records can make!
and when he thinks of mr mom n pop he gets real real angry n bitter
and confused
he blurts out this
he blurts out that
he leaves his band who are wonderful musicians n friends
but who seem to labouring under some delusion that they know what they are doing
after all
in our imaginary world they got mainmans band hitched to mr mom n pop
who now
as per usual
aint giving our tired old veterans their just desserts after all this time
mr mom n pop seems to be taking from both sides
(or thats how it seems to our hotheaded imaj. hero)
anyway
i hope you enjoyed my theoretical example of how your whole lifes work can go wrong
besides do musicians even need to be paid when they obviously are having such a good time anyway?
who cares if agents, managers, publishers and record company guys are getting all the cream?
(despite the fact they cant sing, write or play a note!!)
alright
well there you go
judge for yerselves!
ps
and watch this
the turtles (who sang on most of marc bolans hits explain the biz….)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NdBGV86Vz6E
Via
'no i do not recant'
Bonus:
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