The Eye of the Hurricane

So this is a little more personal than what I normally write. I steer clear of politics as much as possible, because I’m not really up for debating that kind of stuff online. I pick my battles and those usually revolve around music. I’m not writing this to debate politics and won’t engage in that.

That said, this morning I was faced with the loss of a friend in Afghanistan. Father of a young son and husband to a great wife. I can’t seem to shake the sadness. I’ve always been a avid supporter of our country, our president and our troops… I believe in (for the most part) what we are fighting for, but none of those things make the loss of someone any easier. Not by a long shot.

Times like this force me to turn to God and put my trust in Him and not in men that want to play God on a battlefield. Losing someone sends me through a range of emotions from sadness to anger and I know myself well enough to know that eventually it will lead to depression if I’m not careful. So I take that emotional turmoil and I’ve learned to write and to fall into the solace of music. It’s keeps my apathy at bay, so that’s what I’m doing this afternoon.

Springsteen fills that space in my heart alot and gives me hope. Within 5 minutes of the news of the loss of my friend I ran across his version of Edwin Starr’s “War”. It’s a shame that pop culture has ruined our perception of how this song is received. From the Simpsons to Seinfeld it’s been mentioned in comedy, which can’t be farther from what the heart of this song is about. Which is why I won’t post the audio of the original … you’ll be too side tracked with what those images reveal in their comedic nature.

You all know the chorus:

War… Huh… Yeah!
What is it good for?
Absolutely nothing!

At the heart of it, it’s a protest song proclaiming that no war is worth fighting. Unfortunately, those are probably the only lyrics most people even know to this song or ever will. If we get past those we see it’s a song of short, passion filled, lyrics that reveal the real tragedy of war. It may have been written and performed as a R&B song, but Springsteen could have easily penned this one in his early days.

War means tears in thousands of mothers’ eyes
When their sons go out to fight and lose their lives

Listen to me:
It ain’t nothing but a heartbreaker
Friend only to the undertaker

War has shattered many young men’s dreams
Made him disabled, bitter and mean

History tells us war is good for a lot of things. We fought for the freedom of our country over 230 years ago with help from other countries that sent their youth to die for our cause. The war of today is different in many ways but yet still the same. Our men still die for a cause we may or may not ever see the fruits of. Never makes it easier.

War. What is it good for? I wish I had the answer.

Going to high school in small town Texas generally means that you’re playing football at some point. It was a Friday night and we had been playing our hearts out and had run the score up on a neighboring town 45 – 7. We were moving in to score again and a Nosegaurd blew by our Center, Jeremy, and sacked our Quarterback. Even though we were winning (by a lot), you would have thought the guy won the Superbowl. Holler, holler, holler, smack talk, smack talk, smack talk…

At which point, Jeremy tapped him on the shoulder pads and simply pointed to the scoreboard. Awesome.

Jeremy knew what we had been doing the whole game… we were making first downs, scoring points, and holding their offense. We were doing the work to win the game. But boy could that guy run his mouth like he had done something great.

And here we are so many years later and the internets is no different. We’ve even honed our craft to be able to run our mouths in under 140 characters.

I recently made a short movie that got picked up by a ton of film blogs that were talking about a unique style I used. Most everyone thought it was cool, but there was that select few that would just rant and rave about what I did wrong. Which is fine, but these guys also just spend all their time on the internet correcting people and never make anything.

I can’t imagine the criticism that musicians get from the general population. Well, actually, I can since I run a website that has a public music forum. Everyone has an opinion to express and in principle, that’s a really great thing. I love to see the positive and negative side of everything, but at some point, if you want your opinion to have weight, you have to get out there and do something.

For an artist it means you need to get out there and create. For a non-artist you need to get out there and support the artists you love. Listen to them play, get on a street team, call radio stations, buy stuff, etc.. If we’re not ever “Doing Work” then all we’ll ever be is just a bunch of complainers.

All we have to do is sit down for a couple hours a week and write a song or two. That simple task is all the world asks of me, so I do it.

~Ryan Adams on how he can write so many songs

Just remember the root of why you love the things that you love. Remove the distractions and get to work. You don’t need a phone app to spread the news or a shiny new instrument to write a song. Merlin Mann (productivity guru) has a great/funny quote that goes “I don’t have to set an alarm to remember to masturbate.” If you’re not doing work then something else in your life has a higher priority… so fix that.

Write that song, play that song, paint on the canvas, write a blog post, create a new meal, build that piece of furniture, shoot more film, take more photos… you get the idea.

We have to be a society that is more than consumers and complainers.

——————–
P.S. After that sack, we ran a play that sent our Running Back right over that Nosegaurd and into the end zone. A play that we had practiced over and over all week. 52 – 7

About 4 months ago I started a small songwriting film project with some friends and towards the end of it my friend Alex got the idea to shoot the musicians in a one-time, quick take, “prove it” kind of set up. Something the guys could use for promo or just as an extra on their websites… whatever.

As we edited it down we realized that we had something special and something we wanted to continue to record. The Revive Sessions were born. I put out the first one at the end of last year and everyone seemed to really dig it so now I’m very happy to give you a full blown Revive Sessions outlet to follow our progress!

Revive Sessions Website

You can subscribe to the RSS or put in your email to let you know when we added something new. We have a few folks on the horizon so it won’t be long till you see something new! Enjoy!

In light of my post yesterday on Sales & Music by the numbers I’d like to add a little something. I just read this from Scott Rodger, who is Arcade Fire’s manager:

Arcade Fire are now one of the biggest live acts in the world. It’s not all about record sales. It’s about making great records and it’s about building a loyal fan base.

This, from a band that just won a Grammy for Album of the Year.

I don’t think I was very clear yesterday in my thoughts so I want to be really clear here. The future of indie/non-mainstream bands doesn’t appear to include a viable revenue stream for record sales. But don’t let that dissuade you from making a badass album. It’s not doom & gloom out there and my post yesterday was mainly to help everyone see a map of the music business with a big red X saying “You are here”.

Following a few posts and articles, I ran across the following chart that really opened my mind. Note: There was another chart some of you may have seen, but this one is the “correct” chart that has been corrected for inflation and population growth.

Along with it, was a TON of statistical info that I totally geeked out over, but I figure I’d save you the gory details. Feel free to read the whole article over at Business Insider if that is your thing.

A couple things are worth noting here.

Don’t bury your head
These are national numbers. Big label, big acts type of numbers. If you are a part of this local (Texas Music, Americana, Indie Country, Whatever), it’s easy to write this chart off as not being relevant to you. But trust me, you are a fool if you do.

Digital music isn’t our savior
I think it’s all our belief that digital music is the future. Many of my friends have only digital music these days and don’t buy CD’s, so I really did not expect to see CD’s to still have such a huge market share over MP3′s. Amazon MP3 and iTunes have done alot to streamline the buying of digital music, but as I wrote about earlier, in general it’s a big fat FAIL. And the numbers prove it… digital music is NOT replacing the failing CD numbers.

Singles
Interesting to note in another of the charts provided is that singles are outselling albums by almost 30% in gross sales. But yet, very few of our artists are taking advantage of this fact. I get that the album is the way it was meant to be listened to, but don’t over look this fact.

The Dip
Right about 2005 we see a major dip in sales with only a moderate shift that comes in about a year ago. But I don’t expect that we’ll see a peak/valley like the cassette to CD transition in the early 80′s. Digital will gain a little ground as the buying continues to streamline, but unless we see a format change (not likely) I think we’re going to stay on the low.

This is only RIAA reporting and with the injection of services like Pandora and Rhapsody, musicians won’t see the type of revenue that cold, hard music sales provided. Further more, our problem of indie type bands getting picked up on these services, isn’t solved either.

What now?
I wish there was an easy answer to this, but first we have to recognize that there is indeed a problem. That problem is that people aren’t buying music these days. But we all know that a new album won’t make you rich. Don’t we?

Many people have titled these charts and info as “The Death of the Music Industry”, but I think that’s all BS. The industry is changing and there’s not an easy answer. Albums aren’t going to pay the bills so you have to look hard at 1) how you’ll make money 2) how you’ll measure success. Not easy things to tackle, but it’s clear music sales won’t be it.

Update: I added a few more thoughts in a Part 2 post.