What happened to the record business? It used to be wildly successful selling outstanding music that showcased performers’ creativity and individuality. Now it’s in rapid decline, and the best music lies buried under the swill.

 

This unprecedented book answers this question with a detailed examination of how the record business fouled its own livelihood--through shortsightedness, stubbornness, power plays, sloth, and outright greed. The Dirty Little Secrets of the Record Business takes you on a hard-headed tour through the corridors of the major labels and rides the waves of corporate radio to explain just why so much of the music you hear sucks.

 

Here is a close look at just how the machinery behind the popular song broke down, including:

 

  

¨      The corporatization of the record business

¨      Why stockholders play an important role in what you hear

¨      How radio went from an art to a science, and what was lost in the change

¨      How the record companies alienated their core audience

¨      Why file sharing may not be the bogeyman the record industry would have you think it is

¨      Technology’s effect on what you hear and how you hear it

¨      And dozens of other reasons that all add up to the record industry’s current financial and artistic woes.

 

Check out a podcast of the introduction here.

 

 

Publishers Weekly proclaimed: Music journalist Bordowitz (Turning Points in Rock and Roll) delivers a concise summary of the current state of the record business, with fascinating details delivered in a no-frills style… Unless you are a Britney Spears fan, Bordowitz presents a fairly convincing argument that current music "sucks" by looking at "how the system that turned music into a commodity ultimately failed, trivializing its product and the user of that product." He presents an inside look at how the music business works, from artist management to production and distribution, as well as current music technology. And a section on "The Messy Suicide of Commercial Radio" is an excellent overview of the change over the last three decades from the free-form radio formats of the 1960s to the homogenized niche corporate radio stations of the '90s and today. In the end, this is an eye-opening look at why, as Bordowitz quotes music mogul David Geffen, "If Joni Mitchell were just starting out today,... she'd have trouble getting radio air play."

 

 

 Billboard found the book "Engaging and enlightening . . . a solid primer to today' s Byzantine music industry."

 

 

 Producer Tony Bongiovi called Dirty Little Secrets …"An accurate and well-researched exposé of the surreptitious, undisclosed, and covert activities of the music industry."

 

 

 “DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS is the book that any one of us who once did time in the music business for more than fifteen minutes and are now out of the life wish we had written. We who lie awake at nights mentally washing our hands as assiduously as yet with as much success as Lady Macbeth, have a voice in Hank Bordowitz.

We got in because we loved and because we wanted to share, to create, to inspire, and to enjoy it. And to drink heavily for free, of course. Then, as we learned more, we wanted to grow and change it. Then we kept on going anyway because the money and the perks were too difficult to give up, because we thought we still meant something in the bigger picture or because we might inspire those coming up behind us to effect some change. Fool me once.

I got out, I got a life…but then they dragged me back in – and so little has changed; the avarice, the truthlessness, the misery and disappointment salved only by being and playing with my (old) best friends. Why do I keep doing this to myself? Because I still love it and because now I have a big book that I can throw at the liars, the cheats and the bastards who have fooled me twice. “

Thanks, Hank.

–Hugo Burnham, drummer for The Gang of Four, former manager and A&R Exec, and Professor of the Music Business at the Boston College of Art

 

 

 “Brilliantly written, insightful, a good history, and a great read.”

--Jack Ponti, songwriter (Alice Cooper’s “Hey Stoopid,” Bon Jovi’s “Shot Through the Heart”), producer, manager, and record company president.

 

 

 



 


PRODUCT REVIEWS
OCTOBER 2007

Hank Bordowitz. Dirty Little Secrets of the Record Business: Why So Much Music You Hear Sucks. Chicago: Chicago Review Press, 2007.

One could go on and on about the ills of the music industry. Who’s to blame, why it’s happened, and what the future holds is prime fodder for the popular press, critics, and bloggers these days. But readers many times get the surface treatment. Hank Bordowitz offers a more detailed and a well-outlined history of how we got here in Dirty Little Secrets of the Record Business.

Record labels, distribution companies, commercial radio, and retailers have together and separately been blamed for the declines in the recording industry. Consolidations, panicky control measures, the lure of quick and easy windfalls, and practices that don’t necessarily pass the sniff test have affected all of these players at varying degrees through the years. Bordowitz expertly outlines those developments in plain English and what the results have meant for both artists and fans.

The further reality is that advances in technology have exacerbated the situation and in most cases put traditional practices in a corner. The ying-yang of art vs. commerce has always provided the fascinating interplay of music as a business. The challenges brought about, however, have always left the industry in a better place. Dirty Little Secrets.. includes both a historical and more current perspective on how the industry has fought, but eventually accepted and monetized, such advances as the ability to broadcast music through radio, record it on tape, and nowadays share or sell it through the Internet. Though we’re still trying to figure out the latter, history tells us we’ll eventually get there. And the business models will change accordingly. But perhaps some of the bad habits will remain. Will the practice of paying in some way for airplay or promotion, for instance, ever really go away?

Bordowitz has an extensive and varied background that enables him to speak to the details of the processes involved in several parts of the industry. The radio business, for example, is well explained, warts and all. For insiders who have worked in any part of the music business, though, there may be little that’s newly revealed. Students of the business, consumers, and fans, however, have a good primer here. Background information (the history of record retail, for example), legal issues, and simple explanations of the sometimes quirky economics of the business are outlined in everyday terms. Simple and sometimes humorous analogies (what if General Motors addressed declining sales the same way the music industry has?) further clarify.

A challenge to anyone writing about the industry is that it’s virtually impossible to be current with the material. These days the ink could hardly be dry at the publishing house before a Steve Jobs product presentation or a bill in Congress sends at least a tremor of change through the biz. Bordowitz does extrapolate and project forward, which is probably the best one can do given the rapidity of change. Amidst the conclusion, he doesn’t lose sight of the good and hopeful things that are happening in the new environment: artists succeeding more on their own terms, for instance.

There are probably dirty little secrets in every industry. When profits and pleasing shareholders become the endgame, there is certainly going to be a new set of rules. That’s natural, though. Gained efficiencies, reduced costs, and capitalized opportunities keep stakeholders happy, but challenge and frustrate the players. The music business did indeed grow in an environment akin to the Wild West. And it prospered in the same atmosphere. So there are perhaps some habits that are hard to break as the industry begins to reflect the rest of Wall Street, fortunately or unfortunately. But the goal remains the same: deliver the music to the people who will enjoy it, especially when they will pay to do so, thereby supporting the creator’s ability to make a living and deliver more.

The subtitle of the book, “…Why So Much of the Music You Hear Sucks” is a murky subject that could perhaps be subject to never-ending debate. Sure, there’s a lot of dysfunction in the system, but the quality of the music is a relative, subjective matter, and there are plenty of periods in the history of pop music when it’s been questioned. Many argue that while the major gatekeepers have stood staring at the headlights, smaller operations and independent artists who grasped technology and/or new trends, rather than fight or ignore them, have delivered great music to listeners who may not have heard it otherwise. Bordowitz explains very well the bad habits and lost focus that developed within the music business models through the years. One can only wonder what “great” artists or songs never became so due to those shenanigans or how many still won’t during these days of mergers and consolidations. But is it possible that truly great music, no matter what stands in the way, will find its audience somehow, some way, despite the dirty little secrets of the record business?

-REVIEWED BY STORM GLOOR

 

 
“Nobody should ever even think about signing any kind of music industry contract without reading this book. Reading it may not save lives but it will certainly save some careers.”
-Dave Marsh, author of Bruce Springsteen: Two Hearts, Heart of Rock and Soul, editor of Rock Rap Confidential.

 

 

From Publisher’s Weekly

 

 “Music journalist Bordowitz (Turning Points in Rock and Roll) delivers a concise summary of the current state of the record business, with fascinating details delivered in a no-frills style ("The RIAA has compared the practice of downloading songs 'without permission' to shoplifting, but whose permission do the downloaders need?"). Unless you are a Britney Spears fan, Bordowitz presents a fairly convincing argument that current music "sucks" by looking at "how the system that turned music into a commodity ultimately failed, trivializing its product and the user of that product." He presents an inside look at how the music business works, from artist management to production and distribution, as well as current music technology. And a section on ‘The Messy Suicide of Commercial Radio’ is an excellent overview of the change over the last three decades from the free-form radio formats of the 1960s to the homogenized niche corporate radio stations of the '90s and today. In the end, this is an eye-opening look at why, as Bordowitz quotes music mogul David Geffen, "If Joni Mitchell were just starting out today,... she'd have trouble getting radio air play."

 

 

“Through my decades as an artist and producer working with both major and indie labels, I have never read as comprehensive a history of how the recorded music and broadcast worlds arrived at their sorry artistic state. I’ve lived the quicksand economics and conflicting intra-industry motivations that Hank Bordowitz so succinctly explains. If you want to understand how and why we got here, this is the book to read.”

--Larry Fast, Synergy, keyboardist for Peter Gabriel, Foreigner, Nektar, and others

 

 

From U Weekly

Dirty Little Secrets of the Record Business

[Comment Below]

By Corey Spring

There’s an old quote oft-attributed to Hunter S. Thompson that goes, “The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There’s also a negative side.” While Thompson never actually said that, the words are no less true. In his new book, Hank Bordowitz outlines the unpleasant dealings of the music, and pulls no punches in the process. If you’ve ever turned on the radio and heard the same formulaic Britney Spears bulls**t on every channel, Bordowitz says that’s no coincidence. While a lot of the music you hear really is crap, ironically, he asserts that there is more good music available today than ever before... if you know where to look. He would know. He’s a former recording artist, music business consultant, and veteran music journalist.

Bordowitz traces the history of popular music back to the days when the business was run by a ‘renegade industry of outsiders’ to the present, where record labels stay true first to their shareholders, and then to their audience. He outlines how the music industry quickly became a victim of its own success and grew to see music as a commodity first and an art second. As a result of this, Bordowitz demonstrates how the entire industry becomes its own victim, forced to churn out acts like the Spice Girls in hopes of short-term gains.

In a section titled ‘The Messy Suicide of Commercial Radio,’ Bordowitz outlines how the music you hear so often on the radio came to be manipulated from the recording studio to the airwaves. Bordowitz also blasts the record labels for their treatment of artists and restrictive contracts placed on them in the section ‘Contacts and Contracts: Why an Artist Can Go Gold One Day and Be Flipping Burgers the Next.’

What’s most interesting about “Dirty Little Secrets” is the level of detail it goes into about the industry; Bordowitz doesn’t hesitate to name names. While anyone who has worked more than a week in the entertainment industry would be hard-pressed to disagree with Mr. Bordowitz’s cynic look and analysis of the music industry, he does hold out a small amount of hope that good music can yet be saved. This book is simply a great read for anyone interested in music, plain and simple.

Originally Published: Issue 484 - January 31, 2007

 

 “Brilliantly written, insightful, a good history, and a great read.”

--Jack Ponti, songwriter (Alice Cooper’s “Hey Stoopid,” Bon Jovi’s “Shot Through the Heart”), producer, manager, and president of the Platform Group Records.