|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
Also this issue: Vindicated Drunk and Ignorant Confessions of a Media CEO |
|
|
|
|
 |
|||||||||
August 22-28, 2002
slant
Whatever happened to the idea that any press is good press?
Anyway, this is a true story, one where the names of the guilty (or innocent, whatever) are withheld.
Why? Because:
a) Damn it, it's about me. Not them.
b) The story is hardly indicative of only one band in one city.
c) I don't wish to be accused -- yet again -- of picking on someone.
Story goes like this:
Local band, signed to big label, has problems with local press.
Not just me. Though I have criticized their music on occasion, and mentioned them in my column.
It's what I do.
Anyway. Said band is in trouble. Not just with low, slow sales. But with other local critics dissing their newest record. So troubled are they that they started a fight with one said critic by bothering his band while working. (No. You can't guess. Wouldn't help anyway. Practically every newspaper critic in town has a band.)
OK. Forget about that critic and think about me. I'm out last week reviewing a show. I see guys from said band in the crowd. They see me. Nothing. But at show's end I get into a brief cute run-in with the band's leader. (Not his sidekick, mind you, who happens to also play -- in a far more worthwhile enterprise.)
I get pushed by Dude One. I push him back. He says, "Yo, you pushed me." At that moment, I realize I've stepped back into high school. I say, "Yeah." He proceeds to ask my name (which he knows), what I'm doing (which he can see) and why I don't review his band (clearly I have). He calls the band onstage "old cunts," all the other press in tow that evening "big older cunts," then asks me to have a drink. Nope, I'm working. How about a bump, he says. Nope, I'm working. When I finish working tonight, I'm going home.
I must REALLLLY not like this guy if I'm not drinking, bumping or hanging out.
As I walk out when the band ends, he walks with me. Says he wants to talk. I say we're not talking.
Now -- in this order -- he tells me, "Yes you are." (I say no.) Then he says, "If you don't talk I'm going to kill you." ("No you're not," I say.) Says he's going to "hit me in the head with a glass." (I say nope.) He calls me "a cunt." I tell him, "How very British of you." Dejected, he says, "Well, go home then." I say, "That's where I was heading." End of story.
I never felt sorrier for someone who wanted to do bumps with me and hit me in the head. I actually felt like Mr. Wilson rejecting Dennis the Menace. "No, I can't chase cats around the lawn right now, Dennis." "Oh, OK. Well go home then, Mr. Wilson."
Look, I don't hate any band. I give them all credit for wanting to snag the brass ring while going through the muck they have to go through to survive in an ever-worsening sales climate. Oddly enough, I especially give this band credit for continuing on when everyone around them gives them such a raft of shit. And for the record, I have written good things about some of their music. I happen to think that their new CD -- the one getting dogged -- is their personal best. I'm not a tough guy. And this story isn't meant to illustrate any machismo on my part.
BUT. Whether I'm working in public or just chilling in public, don't bother me. Seriously. Or any other critic. Why. Because we're all just doing our jobs: like you, the thing you work hard to get paid for. I don't come to the studio and give you tips while you're recording (despite the fact that some bands do have press/radio peeps very much on the inside). Imagine if I went out and punched every band who made a lousy record. I'd be the welterweight champion of the world.
Bands hate criticism unless it's good criticism. That makes sense, I suppose. And it's funny. I like records when they're good records. So I can see the correlation.
But whattayagonnado? If it weren't for worse records, there would be nothing to grade better records on. Heck, if we thought every album was great, we'd be Jann Wenner talking about Jagger and Springsteen. And we don't want that.
So, here's the deal.
If you don't want criticism:
a) Don't do stupid things.
b) Don't make stupid records.
c) JUST DON'T. Stay at home. Or move to Brooklyn. Or Jersey. Or Japan.
If you do choose to make records and we critics dis them, have some dignity about it. Don't bug us, touch us, bump, jostle, spit, punch -- nothing. We, in turn, won't butt you with guitars.
We do our jobs. It should be a peaceable enterprise. You're not driving to any other cities whose critics are slamming your new CD, are you? You wouldn't push around a Rolling Stone critic if he gave you a bad review, would you?
Do like Axl Rose did to Tom Moon, or Elton John did to me: say funny things about us from the stage. Send letters to our respective papers (like the guy who wants me to apologize for dissing Oasis; hey, I never apologize unless I hit an unintended target). Write an angry song about us. (But don't rhyme "Amorosi" with "nosy" or "posy." It's been done before. Here're some names to practice with: Valania. Rapa. Sherr.) We won't bother you.
Despite me liking your new record, I choose now -- after this -- to tell no one how "OK" I think it is. You don't pay me to defend your recording practices. And you know what I never want to hear about your drunken brouhaha-ing behavior: that you were young. That you didn't know.
I'm telling you. Now you know. It's not cool. No one thinks so. Ever.
So make like Dionne Warwick -- as I will -- and "when you see me walking down the street... walk on by."
And P.S., to quote one of the very location managers where you play regularly, who hangs up your posters and lets you run up bar tab after bar tab:
"Pay your bar tab, moochie."
 |
-- Respond to this article in our Forums -- click to jump there |
