Is it possible to grow old gracefully in the music business, and if not, who's fault is that? Plus, we wonder out loud if the music industry is inherently misogynisitc.
Now on to today’s episode, that I will start by spouting my thesis statement that the music industry – in particular the arm of the industry that feeds us op music – is inherently misogynistic. Sometimes I watch musical artists of the female persuasion and I wonder if I’ve woken up in a bad dream in some backwater strip club in Tampa. It sometimes seems like the only clothes the latest pop superstar are allowed to wear are leotards, Alabama Crimson Tide baton twirler suits or things that are meant to take our minds off of the music in one or another.
Now I’m being somewhat hyperbolic, but not by much. I have two problems with this whole way of marketing music – the first is I respect people in this case women, way too much to force them to be recued to some weird nymphomatic Barbie doll, and second, why don’t the people behind the scenes have enough respect for their artists to not reduce them to their distributed body parts.
I don’t see Chris Stapleton Ed Sheeran prancing around on stage in stuff their mom’s would be embarrassed to see them prancing around in. I Mean, I get stage craft and the fact that today’s audiences demand visual shows instead of musical ones, but aren’t we getting bored yet?
I mean, Lady Gaga does not need to wear a dress made out of lunch meat to help us understand her talent. Back in the day, no one made Billy Joel wear a suit made from English Muffins to be taken seriously as an artist.
The genesis for this show goes way back to early December and the TV special for the lighting of the Rockefeller Christmas Tree.
I always thought of Gwen Stefani as this uber-cool Orange County rock chick who had something to say and a great instrument to say it with. In the late 90s, Stefani and No Doubt were at the vanguard of the alt-pop scene that would eventually rule the early 2000s.
But here she was on the stage in Rockefeller Center, lip-synching to a snappy Christmas song arrangement ad looking classy, sexy and intriguing as mid-fifties something artist. I’m not a huge fan of the whole NBC Rockefeller Tree thing – except to go there and see it in person, but there was no doubt that Stefani has reconciled to growing older in a most graceful way.
There is no argument that Madonna changed the face of pop music, turned the direction of 80s music in general on its head and had more hits and genre-defining releases than any other female pop star. I’d dare say she’s in the discussion among the most successful artists ever – regardless of gender.
Madonna also taught the world to sell music with sex. Not that it hadn’t been done before, it had but never as blatantly or unapologetically as Madonna did it. Madonna perfected the amalgamation of sex and pop music.
The thing about Madonna was in her prime – from say 1985 to 1997 – she was legit, and she had the goods to pull it off. She had the material, the visuals, the dance and believe it or not the pipes to make the statement she made. Without naming names, pretty much every female pop artist who followed didn’t break new ground they just followed the path Madonna blazed for them. Was that their choice or the QUOTE FINGERS music industry’s choice?
But here’s the problem when you build your career around the idea that your sexuality runs deeper than your musical talent: You get old. And as you get old you get a little less attractive than you were when you were young. And that’s cool because all of you young people out there who laugh at old people are much sooner than you know it going to be old and decrepit like the rest of us. Even Tom Brady had to give in to getting old.
So each artist is then faced with a decision as they age: Try to hold on to their youth at the expense of their legacy or accept time and the blessing of getting older and book gigs at Rockefeller Center during the Christmas season.
I’m not attempting to throw shade at Madonna, I don’t know if she’s happy or not, and I’m sure that if she hears this podcast she’ll laugh with pity at me, but it all gets a little Sunset Boulevard and “Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up” to me, and that’s kind of sad.
But what drives that? Is it ultimately us the audience who refuses to let our own youth go by accepting our artists as they age? Is it the industry in general who has become deathly afraid of separating sex from music?