Butrscotch: I’m not a big Springsteen fan myself, but that’s really irrelevant. As I said, I could pick any singer you DO like, and make the same point.
If Norah Jones were an “American Idol” contestant, how would she do? Very well on some weeks, but probably very poorly on weeks where she was asked to do a country song (yes, she sang Hank Williams’ "Cold Cold Heart, but in an utterly non-country style) or a rock song.
I happen to love Enya’s voice, but as moving and chilling as her voice can be on her own songs, she’d probably sound ridiculous doing a Billy Joel or Bee Gees song.
And as a Led Zeppelin fan, I shudder to imagine Robert Plant being assigned to sing “Smile, though your heart is breaking…” He’d look and sound awful!
And since one bad week is all it takes to get voted off, both Norah, Enya and Robert would be toast, in short order.
On the other hand, a guy with a pleasant voice who can do a PRETTY good (but not great) job singing a lot of different genres would stand an excellent chance of winning. In short, “American Idol” champions are likely to be perfectly fine but undistinguished vocalists.
Contracts with this clause are not recognized by the Orion Senate beyond boundaries of the Solar System as recognized by OS Resolution 9569827, Paragraph 475:
“The Solar System’s legal boundaries are set as the extension of the Ort Cloud and no further. Any contract expressing rights beyond said limits is void.”
The In Perpetuity Clause is voided also by a galactic standard of OS Resolution 4862, Paragraph 27:
“No contract entered into in the Galaxy, the Magellenic Clouds or sub-galaxies of can contain a clause or an indeterminite time up to and including eternity or a time reference that alludes to eternity.”
And people wonder how seriously I take these shows.
Kelly Clarkson just released a new album and her first single from it, “Miss Independent” is #30 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and is a fast riser (last week, it was #46). It is played endlessly on the radio (or at least the stations I seem to be listening to ).
If your goal is to make assloads of money, mass appeal is a good thing.
RealityChuck is right. Indie bands simply don’t have the mass appeal of the latest Britney clone. They have their niche and many do well at playing to that niche – all the Jack-Black-in-High-Fidelity wannabes eat their stuff up – but the average Joe just ain’t buying.
I’ve never understood the argument tracer is making – that big, evil record companies are pushing Britney clones at the expense of indie bands, and if only the people could hear the latest indie band (perhaps via an MP3) they’d flee en masse from the terror of bubblegum pop. Look, record companies are about one thing: selling records. If they thought the latest indie band album would sell as well as Britney, they’d market it with the same energy they give Ms. Spears. What possible rationale could they have for doing otherwise? Why would they deliberately pass up such a lucrative opportunity?
The music industry isn’t about selling musical talent, and it certainly isn’t the case that the best musical talent sells most. Occasionally you get an artist like Norah Jones who has a remarkable voice and sells a lot of records, but when it comes to making business decisions, record companies are looking for people who are good-looking, who appeal to the largely youthful record-buying market, who do what they’re told, who will be easy to promote (possibly some kind of gimmick), who either fit into a successful mold (like the innumerable boy bands) or constitute an exploitable gap in the market (like Avril Lavigne).
And they are looking for songs with immediate appeal, not depth and substance. Because it doesn’t matter how often you listen to a song, only whether you hear it and buy it.
Most people don’t give a great deal of thought to music. They listen to it in the car, while they’re working or studying, on cheap CD players or personal stereos with tinny headphones, and they hear it in malls and noisy restaurants. They might read about who their favourite artist is sleeping with, but they don’t study the lyrics or notice clever musical features, just like they eat easy-to-prepare junk food and buy whatever groceries are on special offer.
IAONAL, but it looks to me like the producers have the right, in perpetuity, to forbid anyone else to use the name or likeness of the performer. In other words, the exclusivity clause doesn’t expire. If that’s the case, then these young people aren’t getting a jump start on their careers at all; they’re getting only what the producers of the show agree to, forever.
I hope they have some good burger-flipping skills, too, because they’re going to need them a few years down the road.
By the way, astorian, the concept of Enya singing a Bee Gees song is probably the funniest thing I’ve seen, heard, or read in the past week.
