Billboard, this week
1. Barry Manilow (career high)
2. Mary J. Blige
3. Andrea Bocelli (career high)
4. Jamie Foxx
5. Heather Headley
6. Il Divo
7. Eminem
8. Carrie Underwood
9. James Blunt
10. Train
Source: USA Today
As a child of MTV, I found myself socksless at these results (knocked my socks off...). Of the ten, only four get any circulation on MTV - the organization that masterminds the manipulation of children's tastes, and therefore the entire music industry...or so I thought. If this chart shows anything, it's how little teenagers actually contribute to the market, and that as consumers, they are pretty insignificant. Of the artists that are on MTV's rotation - Mary J. Blige, Jamie Foxx, Eminem, and James Blunt (and maybe Train; but I think they're more VH1, if anything) - only Eminem and James Blunt might be said to belong to the youth, though Eminem is so huge by now that no one group can claim his success. So that leaves us with James Blunt as the only artist out of the ten that MTV is endorsing in a purposeful way; the only one out of their current hundred or so who has come to any fruit.
And DEFINITELY NOT the most obvious choice.
What have I learned today? Perhaps VH1, as much as it sucks and seems entirely useless (except for the history stuff), perhaps it is on the right track. Pander to the adults, because they actually have money.
On the other hand, if you gather the lessons from the past, you find that the things that turn out to be historically significant were often not recognized as such at the time. I mean, there once was a time when the RAMONES were opening for Pearl Jam (in the mid-90s - this was even after we should have known better from 20/20 hindsight). It's inevitable that children dictate what will be historically significant because they're the ones who come out, twenty years later, and say, THAT was what influenced me, that was the good stuff. As for the music that doesn't find a torchbearer, its seed dies and we all laugh at what a joke it was.
But in the end, that doesn't solve my puzzlement: surely it is not MTV's aim to be historically respectable (because it will never be that anyways; cf their reality shows) over the making of a quick buck? Its raison d'etre jives so bizarrely with the way they conduct business.
I think this is all a long way of saying: hire me, MTV. Give me a job. That pays more than poverty-level wages.
2. Mary J. Blige
3. Andrea Bocelli (career high)
4. Jamie Foxx
5. Heather Headley
6. Il Divo
7. Eminem
8. Carrie Underwood
9. James Blunt
10. Train
Source: USA Today
As a child of MTV, I found myself socksless at these results (knocked my socks off...). Of the ten, only four get any circulation on MTV - the organization that masterminds the manipulation of children's tastes, and therefore the entire music industry...or so I thought. If this chart shows anything, it's how little teenagers actually contribute to the market, and that as consumers, they are pretty insignificant. Of the artists that are on MTV's rotation - Mary J. Blige, Jamie Foxx, Eminem, and James Blunt (and maybe Train; but I think they're more VH1, if anything) - only Eminem and James Blunt might be said to belong to the youth, though Eminem is so huge by now that no one group can claim his success. So that leaves us with James Blunt as the only artist out of the ten that MTV is endorsing in a purposeful way; the only one out of their current hundred or so who has come to any fruit.
And DEFINITELY NOT the most obvious choice.
What have I learned today? Perhaps VH1, as much as it sucks and seems entirely useless (except for the history stuff), perhaps it is on the right track. Pander to the adults, because they actually have money.
On the other hand, if you gather the lessons from the past, you find that the things that turn out to be historically significant were often not recognized as such at the time. I mean, there once was a time when the RAMONES were opening for Pearl Jam (in the mid-90s - this was even after we should have known better from 20/20 hindsight). It's inevitable that children dictate what will be historically significant because they're the ones who come out, twenty years later, and say, THAT was what influenced me, that was the good stuff. As for the music that doesn't find a torchbearer, its seed dies and we all laugh at what a joke it was.
But in the end, that doesn't solve my puzzlement: surely it is not MTV's aim to be historically respectable (because it will never be that anyways; cf their reality shows) over the making of a quick buck? Its raison d'etre jives so bizarrely with the way they conduct business.
I think this is all a long way of saying: hire me, MTV. Give me a job. That pays more than poverty-level wages.
posted by Rex at 11:14 AM
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