Wednesday, October 24, 2007

The Money Shot: Arctic Monkeys, REM's Drummer, Chinese Lyrics and Managers Replace Labels?

Current headlines...

Leaving Record Labels Behind (Business Week)
MS: And often the closest relationship—business, and sometimes personal—that a working band has is with its manager. He or she generally serves as point person to a band's label, and to other arenas in which a band does business, such as tour booking and T-shirt sales. Transitioning to label-like functions is "something managers have been talking about for a long time," says Brian Long of Yes Know Management, which reps disco punks VHS OR BETA. Long, who founded electronic music label Astralwerks, calls such a move "the natural evolution of what a manager already does." In these dispirited times, label executives concede that the guy closest to the band could have the upper hand. "It's a logical place to go," says one.


Arctic Monkeys: 'People thought Oasis supported us!' (NME)
MS : "When we were in America recently there were loads of rumours that they had supported us in Manchester," he said. "Everyone asked us, 'it must have been ace having Oasis support you'".


China song-writers decry "unhealthy" pop tunes (Reuters)
MS: Delegates singled out online hits, including "Na Yi Ye" -- "That One Night" -- by Xie Jun, a song about a couple who get drunk and spend the night together. "That one night you didn't refuse me!/That one night I hurt you/That one night you were all tears," are the raciest lyrics.


A band's only as good as its drummer (Guardian UK)
MS: Indisputably, REM have shown fleeting moments of brilliance (E-Bow the Letter, At my Most Beautiful, She Just Wants to Be) since Berry skipped off to milk cows in Georgia. But, given the patchiness of their recent albums, you can't help thinking they'd have been better off following the example of Led Zeppelin, who sensibly realised there was no point carrying on after Bonzo snuffed it in 1980.

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