Amy Winehouse, American Artists and Record Labels

Atlantic Records was the label that did not take chances with jazz or blues artists based upon potential talent, they took chances on artists with actual talent and there is a pretty big difference between the two.  

Of course when Ray Charles decided to attempt to sign a deal that allowed him to keep future recording rights he did not go to Motown because no one at Motown would have had any idea if they could make money on such a deal.  To understand the marketplace, the expected returns both short term and long term, and have the money to promote a recording artist under such a contract was more than a rag-tag bunch of hustlers could handle.  Sure, there are exceptions to the rule, but generally if you had the talent and could prove it then Atlantic Records was where you wanted to be.  Otherwise you ended up with Motown and the promise that if you worked hard enough then, golly gee, you just may have a chance to make it big.  Few did.  

Motown's formula was basic, relied on many of the same musicians for different artists, and stuck to a tried and true sound they thought would guarantee hits.  A truly innovative artist may find such an atmosphere stifling.  Which is why real talent would go to Atlantic.  Not that Atlantic put artistic creativity ahead of money, but if you had the talent the choice was simple.  Ray Charles was at Atlantic, but so was Led Zeppelin.  Not only did Atlantic make money in the blues, but also the rock and roll and heavy metal cultures that Motown could not compete.  This diversity gave Atlantic the talent pool and the money to develop new talent and therefore ensure their company could make even more money.  Well, it usually is about the money, isn't it?

Motown's glory days came during the 60's, and their reputation is still built on the major artists of that era; The Jackson 5, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, among many others.  Compared to Atlantic and their longer and storied history this was small potatoes.  

Today, the music industry no longer can support so many major labels due to competition and the new distribution medium introduced by the internet.  To maximize profits record labels have become good at narrowcasting their product to the consumers most likely to purchase their product.  In short, this has allowed artists to make more diverse music than ever before, and also be much better at producing the type of music they are "into".  Why should a rap artist such as Jaz-Z write music that would be broadcast on a local FM station that catered to classic rock?  Due to similar market forces in radio there really are no more FM stations that cross the cultural divide between these two mediums.  But there once were FM stations that would.  Jay-Z, for example, now has the opportunity to narrow his music to a specific market as never before therefore capturing a larger market share of that niche.  Even the vaulted New Yorker which started by boasting to potential advertisers that they did not edit their magazine for the old lady in Dubuque made the assumption that any such old lady would gladly purchase a well edited magazine.  Today's R&B artists make no such assumption about any subculture and are only producing music with narrow casting in mind.  

And rappers are hardly alone.  Try using the new iTunes Genius with any fairly large collection of music and you will find that the list of songs provided does not cross genres.  You won't find Jay-Z with Guns and Roses, the assumption being that no G&R fan would listen to "that" style music.

Comparing this reality to the UK market and you quickly notice that the airwaves are filled with music that crosses genres and age groups.  And, of course, they need to cross cultures with such a condensed and smaller population than in much of the States.  And this is the culture that produced Amy Winehouse.  For her to be successful she needed to be talented, and she needed to appeal to the widest possible audience and what better way to do this than to take the R&B sounds of the youth subculture and combine melody and singing of the Motown sound?  And it worked!  And it easily exported over to the States, thus contributing to an already expanding array of British artists on the American charts.   

Today Atlantic Records has been combined with Electra Records.  Although Motown is still around no one argues that its better days are ahead.  Atlantic was bought by Warner and eventually all talent was decimated by the dotcom implosion and aftermath in the AOL/Time-Warner fiasco.  As a parting gift Atlantic gave us the sounds of Norah Jones.  Well, indirectly anyway.  The music business talent that had been running Atlantic for years was laid off by AOL and they needed somewhere to go.  Many chose Blue Note Records, a reputable small competitor and new home to Norah Jones and these are the people that helped her early career.   

Ayn Rand and Faust

To say that Ayn Rand would be against the current bailout is obvious, but her philosophy for the marketplace was very helpful in causing the current situation. How her books, especially The Fountainhead, came to be viewed as must read material for the corporate culture in the past 10 years is testament to the poor decisions of corporate America.

On one level Rand would have the opinion that the companies now facing extinction should be allowed to fail; after all these are the natural marketplace rewards for foolish choices. Furthermore, someone that views charity as something that is not a moral obligation, and should only be given when not an inconvenience and when the recipient is most likely to use the help as the donator sees fit, is not a person of much use in our current situation. But it is important to note that the culture of corporate America was influenced by her philosophy thanks to Alan Greenspan because he was an early follower of Rand and a subscriber of her philosophy of Objectivism early in his career.

Greenspan's disillusionment with the financial establishment's incredible shortsightedness was a pretty shocking admission before congress, especially after his previous warnings of irrational exuberance and the possibility of squandering the surplus were readily ignored.

For myself there were two moments of clarity that convinced me that America was heading in the wrong direction and had no idea how to change course. These incidents included a piece of work I had recently read by Ayn Rand, and an appearance on Meet the Press of Henry Paulson.

The The Art of Fiction is a posthumous book of lectures or discussions by Rand as advice to authors for developing a work of fiction. When discussing character development I was struck by the single mindedness she espoused for the characters; if the character was to have a belief in a goal then every action should lead to that goal (my paraphrasing since I returned the book to the library). I think her views are an insult to the complexity of the human condition. In short, the advice was a little simplistic and immature, which, by the way, is the same criticism of the philosophy of Objectivism. And anyone subscribing to this advice may produce writing that is downright boring.

My second moment was being awestruck by Henry Paulson on Meet the Press when he glibly stated that we must bailout big business but homeowners had options open to them that they should take advantage of to stay in their homes. This seemed pretty out of touch with the steady news reports of the numbers of people in financial trouble and the rising statistics of foreclosures. Perhaps there is an argument for not helping homeowners, apparently Obama has a different opinion, but to so blatantly dismiss such difficulties being experienced by so many Americans was cold, at best. At worst it displayed to the nation a political tone deafness that we have come to see many times by Paulson, and it showed that he really did not, and does not know if the steps he is recommending will actually work.

In Goethe's Faust Part Two we witness a climb to power with still the want for more. When Faust laments that he does not have a perfect view because it is obstructed by a small cottage he becomes obsessed with obtaining the “perfect” view. Mephistopheles, i.e.: Satan, comes to the aide of Faust and murders the elderly couple living there and burns the cottage to the ground thus providing the perfect view that Faust desired. Faust is distraught, but Mephistopheles assures him that when you are making an omelet that you have to break a few eggs. Faust does go on to salvation, but this was an important lesson for him.

And herein lies the rub. We should not idolize the type of corporations that Rand worships because the days of the cold war are over. The philosophy of Objectivism did work well when it directed its critical eye toward the communist philosophy, but then fell out of favor when we actually won the cold war. The work of Rand found a second life in sections of corporate America and this is where the shortcomings of Objectivism have become startlingly apparent. Like communism it removes the human spirit and ignores the cultural tendencies that can change any supposed outcome. In this way, Objectivism and communism are really just two sides of the same coin, and both as naive and immature as a philosophy to live or govern by.

We should be making Goethe required reading for the top echelons of corporate America. Of course at one time it was required reading because most people running large corporations used to receive the classic liberal arts education and this is the type of education that requires deeper thought about morals, values, and consequences. In short, the type of education that rewards long term success, not short term gain. The type of education commonly received by CEO's today is in business and this is an important distinction. When businesses fail it hurts a great many people, and in the end you want to think that it was the true marketplace that caused the hardship, and not for an instant payoff to a corporate gamble or because someone was striving for an office with a better view.