stevelawson.net

This guy is Young Guru. No, I’d never heard if him either. Mainly cos precious little of my time is spent reading hip-hop/R ‘n’ B sleevenotes, but he’s worked on a lot of big records for Jay-Z, Kanye, Mariah etc…

Anyway, here he’s talking about the recording industry, the relationship between artists and labels and the irrelevance of the majors in the current musical climate.

He’s brilliant – eloquent, insightful, experienced – it’s the best speech I’ve heard on the subject in a very long time.

2010 is – rather tragically – shaping up to be the year when Rock Stars (and old-industry millionaires) complain about the state of music on behalf of ‘the little people’.

Here are three examples:

Peter Waterman, in an interview with The Times, said that Spotify was a terrible thing. It, he says

“devalue[s] our artists, they damage this country economically, culturally and morally”

Why’s that then, Pete?

“The big stars are a tiny percentage; the rest are broke, including a lot of well-known faces. Who is developing new talent? Without money, new acts are strangled before they mature. We all suffer.” [Read more →]