Thursday, June 4, 2009
Cream Almost Famous: Nashville Bands and Major-Label Purgatory
Posted by Steve Haruch on Thu, Jun 4, 2009 at 11:08 AM
In her cover story this week, Tracy Moore follows four artists who got their gears caught in the major-label machinery (or the shit trough, if you take Steve Albini's word for it) and made it out alive--barely. For every Kings of Leon there are hundreds of De Novo Dahls, AutoVaughns, Butterfly Bouchers and Eureka Golds waiting for a slice of a pie, or maybe some money for ingredients for a pie with the promise of pie later, if there's enough pie to go around after the label gets their helping of pie. Is it easy to get seduced? Of course it is. Even if everyone doesn't want to be a rock star, doesn't everyone want to feel like they're special?
De Novo Dahl bassist Keith Lowen: "I thought, with us, it's going to be different." Butterfly Boucher: "You always think it's different this time.... I'm solo this time. I can make the decisions. I just thought it would be different."
At least athletes have a better idea, when they're drafted, what they're up against. There are objective measures. No one who bats .175 is going to make it to the Majors. But a band that doesn't even know how to play their instruments can be squeezed into the right jeans and made into million-sellers if the stars align right. At least 0.5 percent of the time. The other 99.5 percent of the time, bands think it's going to be different, but it isn't.
Comments (30)
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"De Novo Dahl bassist Keith Lowen: "I thought, with us, it's going to be different."
HAHAHAHAHA!!Did the record company realize there isn't much of a music market for gay muppets?!What the hell were they thinking?Let me guess,the guy responsible for signing De Novo Dahl was fired immediately and without remorse!
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Three things I would have liked to see in that article: comments from the record labels mentioned in the article; comments from Kings of Leon, Paramore and other Nashville bands that have found success at major labels; and comments from bands that have gone nowhere through indie labels.
good luck getting interviews with paramore and kings of leon since all the SCENE does is talk shit about both of those bands.
i agree, though, glenn. it would have been nice to have another perspective from bands that are on majors and making money/selling records.
How boring. Didn't she write the same article last year? Ooooh. The music biz eats it's young. Read the details inside!
I've said it before, although not recently: can't you guys try a little harder to come up with something interesting to write about? You manage to make free seem like too much to pay.
KOL & Paramore aren't Nashville bands, Glenn. Neither of them came up thru the 'scene,' neither of them had to play to 5 people at Springwater prior to the biz-pigs taking interest. EG, AV, and DnD are. I remember Joel playing at JJ's Market.
(I know it's a tired argument but I'm fucking right.)
I did appreciate the comment about squeezing non-musicians into the right jeans and making it work. That's my main gripe with the industry tho its not gonna change.
Not a bad article actually, even if we knew the story alreay.
this goes back to the classic question... how do you classify a "nashville" band. almost every band member of bands in nashville weren't born in nashville city limits. it makes no difference whether or not they "came up thru the scene". if bands can bypass the suffering of playing to 5 people at springwater, i commend them. of course, they won't be embraced by all of the bands that do have to suffer through it but i don't think that eliminates them from nashville-band status. why would it?
if you are making the argument that paramore is from franklin, then i think that is a weak argument since it is only 15 miles outside of nashville. murfreesboro is another beast entirely.
i THINK KOL was "born" in memphis, although I'm not positive. either way, they live here, tour from here and have been doing so for years now. it seems like the real problem here is that you don't want them to be nashville bands.
@Glenn: Include all that information and you've got another kind of article altogether--and about 9,000 words. The piece, as I took it, was about the kinds of weird shit that can happen to a band in the world of corporate music, and I think it succeeded at portraying that.
As for the whole "KOL and Paramore aren't Nashville bands" argument, in addition to not caring, I will say again: Paying dues doesn't matter.
I don't agree. Franklin & Nashville are two different worlds. It DOES make a difference whether thay came up thru the city, which they did not. There's nothing sinful about that but it explains why they don't get much love here. I cringe when I hear that overproduced boring shit and our name in the same sentance. I wish we were represented on a large scale by something that wasn't so weak.
I hear that argument all the time. I don't really care or have a dog in the fight but I do occasionally point out that KoL played new faces night at the Slow Bar in front of about 35 people before their debut album came out. And they played a couple "word of mouth" gigs at 12th & porter when they were working up material for their 2nd album that were well-attended but not sold out. those are the kinds of things local bands do.
you are right. they ARE two different worlds. to go along with your point, so is east and west nashville. if you have lived on both sides of the river, as i have, you know that. i cringe when i hear a lot of weird indie nonsense at springwater. i still consider those bands part of nashville's scene even though they are not contributing much of anything to it except some diversity. they still serve a purpose although i'm not sure what. let's face it... you are ashamed that paramore and KOL are from or near or living in nashville and successful by commercial standards, therefore you don't want to consider them from your city. i can respect that. but don't try to make an argument that they don't count b/c their music is overproduced and you consider it boring. millions of others consider it awesome and entertaining. i know i know, everyone except you is stupid. i'm just saying, you are the minority even if you aren't on this one small blog.
I love how we have two KoL posts this week, yet this "do they count?" debate happens--yet again--on this of all threads. You're so Nashville if: you post about Kings of Leon on the Nirvana Nevermind thread.
I can relate to that argument. I've lived in the Cannery downtown, East Nashville, South Nashville, West End, Bordeaux, and even Franklin. You make an excellent point and I can't see a counter to it. I was even going to say that the majority of music consumers are stupid, but you even beat me to that. At least I can admit blog-comment-ownage.
How did this thread relate to Nevermind except for the picture? And you're so Nashville Scene if you smugly deride people having an honest debate when you've nothing to add to it.
agreed! the only correlation between nirvana and this thread is that they are both dead from alleged suicide.
Who cares if KOL played JJ's market or not! At least they didn't put on clown suits like some Record Exec told them to like De Novo Dahl. At least they aren't doing stupid clowny jingles in hopes of getting endorsements or something. Can you say the same about De Novo Dahl? If you question the credibility of KOL then think about that! Whether you like their music or not at least they aren't some put together marketed crap like De Novo Dahl. Anybody can put on a clown suit for a record deal and try to do kidz bop pop.
Right. Because it's not like Kings of Leon are "put together marketed crap." It's not like their first—and best—records were co-written by their producer. And it's not like they're marketed hard by their label(s) toward a certain demographic. And it's not like they wear clown suits or any sort of attire to that's intended to give them a trademark "style." And it's definitely not like they make kidz bop pop.
Right?
yeah that's bad but not as bad as this!!
http://ipodaddict.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/l_c5164f68c04a7cbdcbc19f586694d5b3.jpg
wake up and gimmie a break dude!!!!
If you thought those were called clown suits you're obviously not from Nashville so you should probably stop talking.
O.K. cato,they're very awesome suits.They don't resemble anything a clown or a flaming troubador would wear!How could anyone not laugh at those suits and that music?!?
i don't care about what is or isn't a clown suit, but seriously, you mean to tell me that you guys haven't figured out the SCENE doesn't cover anything that succeeds ? this blog and paper would rather show up late to a blog approved show at The End than see KOL when they were playing EXIT IN to about 300.
That's one way to put it. Another way would be that they only cover bands that their friends are in and portray those bands as unsuccessful victims.
You got to admit De Novo Dahl are a lot more "clowny" than KOL. Even De Novo Dahl's music seems like something a circus clown would sing to 2nd graders.
SHOUT SHOUT,LET ALL YOUR FEELINGS OUT!
Well then again even a circus clown wouldn't sing something that lame!!!!
Absolutely Kenobi.
Didn't De Novo's old manager work AT the SCENE ? ha ! I think what bands in Nashville should do is just make sure they know someone at the SCENE. They'll always catch your show with your other 8 friends. Don't worry, you'll be a critic pick that week. And no, i'm not in a band and jealous of anything. I just listen to music and have a horrible habit of reading bad press.
I'm happy to see that at least some other people in this city have opened their eyes.
Hey Glenn - I agree, it would be cool to do a story from the label perspective, but that's a different story altogether, as Steve pointed out. It becomes a story entirely about the pressures and pitfalls of that revolving door of executives and CD sales. An interesting story, to be sure, but not the one I wanted to do. And there was no room for it in this piece.
And yes, everyone knows labels suck. Everyone knows the industry fails more often than it succeeds. We know that, but we often don't know what's really at stake for these bands, and the tedium involved, and how drawn out it can be, and how much of their lives are given over to this. Sure, it's their choice, but how many artists really understand what they're signing away? I just wanted to tell that story from the band's perspective. Not just the "it went to crap" story, but how it went to crap, and how rarely it has anything to do with the artist's own inaction.
Also, KoL is not going to tell us the details of their record deal, and neither is Paramore. And most bands are rightly incredibly hesitant to discuss problems with labels while they are still on that label. Similarly, labels almost never call you back on these stories, especially when you're asking them specifics on specific bands, and specific deals, with specific terms. Similarly, bands who've been screwed over by deals (indie or major) are also often hesitant to discuss the terms, for fear of looking uncooperative to industry types they may still want to work with.
I didn't pick my friends bands to write about for this story--I'd never even met Butterfly Boucher or AutoVaughn until I did this story.
And finally, there is an online-only story connected to this piece about Be Your Own Pet. Their deal went right, and they broke up anyway.
The Scene loves their cokehead eastnashville hipster bands and any band that isn't part of that lifestyle they don't care about.
So lets play American Apparel and wear girl jeans so the scene will love us.
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