perfidy

It's so sad.

The New York Times Magazine has a deeply depressing ten-page spread this week about the New Savior of the Music Bidness, the One Hero Who Can Save Us All From Certain Penury and Unemployment From Our Phoney Baloney Jobs... Mister Rick Rubin!!

Yep, Rick Rubin. Helluva record producer. Helluvan ear on that guy. LL, Run DMC, Slayer, Anthrax, the Chili Peppers, Johnny Cash's comeback, Neil Friggin' Diamond's very good comeback... that guy knows music for sure. But to save the music industry? Rick Rubin?

Please.

The thrust of the article is that Sony has made Rick Rubin the co-Head of Columbia Records, in the hopes of injecting a little of that wyld-ass energy he's got into the proceedings, and in the process transmogrifying the ailing Industry into something leaner, meaner, and more efficent at siphoning money into the pockets of shareholders.

Now, there's nothing whatsoever wrong with that, really. The job of a corporation is, indeed, to "maximize shareholder value." So good luck with that. But check out some of the "hot" "new" "ideas" that Rubin and his co-Head, a middle-aged run of the mill British record exec named Steve Barnett

(I once worked for a sharp and dapper gentleman, a young pretty thing and a rising force in the Industry, who had a taste for shiny suits, expensive haircuts, and the saddest upscale parties I've ever been near, lame affairs where the lower echelons sucked down furious premium cocktails on the company dime while a D-list hipster celebrity like Tricky or the guy who played drums on that Bjork record lurked sulkily in a padded banquette until enough minutes had crawled past that he could reasonably said to have performed the favor of appearing. This particular person had a penchant for arranging the firings of underlings who, in his estimation, were not partying hard enough at company outings. This man had executive power and the trust of a wealthy aging blowhard who once was a person of some consequence in music, at least until he was let go.

...but at least let go more gracefully than the one who was sacked after refusing to leave his hot tub to take an urgent call from the CFO, with an unfortunate sequence of words by way of instruction to his minion, such words being unfortunate due to their inference as to the character and moral standing of the CFO, and their audibility in the conference room at the other end of the line, the minion having failed to put his hand over the mouthpiece of the phone...

... the wealthy aging blowhard mentioned two paragraphs prior recently being heard to remark an interview, "I love iPod. I think iPod is great...")

...a run of the mill British record executive named Steve Barnett have cooked up to save Columbia, save Sony, and save the World.

This summer, Columbia Records began a program called Big Red. The company invited 20 college students from Harvard, Penn State and the University of Miami to work on various music projects. The interns concentrated mostly on the digital marketing and promotions departments in Columbia's offices in Midtown Manhattan, which are on Madison Avenue in a granite skyscraper designed by Philip Johnson.

At the end of their paid internships, the students took part in focus groups that were closely observed by Steve Barnett, Rubin's co-head at the label, and Mark DiDia, whom Rubin brought in as head of operations, as well as by other Columbia executives. The focus groups may have been the real point of Big Red — Barnett and the New York executives, especially those who had been at Sony for years, wanted to try to take the pulse of the elusive music audience. "The Big Red focus groups were both depressing and informative, and they confirmed what I — and Rick — already knew," DiDia told me afterward. "The kids all said that a) no one listens to the radio anymore, b) they mostly steal music, but they don't consider it stealing, and c) they get most of their music from iTunes on their iPod. They told us that MySpace is over, it's just not cool anymore; Facebook is still cool, but that might not last much longer; and the biggest thing in their life is word of mouth. That's how they hear about music, bands, everything."

Well, duh. But wait! There's an idea here!

At Rubin's suggestion, [Barnett] has also set up a "word of mouth" department, which will probably employ some members of the Big Red focus group along with dozens of other 20-somethings. The "word of mouth" department will function as a publicity-promotional arm of the company, spreading commissioned buzz through chat rooms across the planet and through old-fashioned human interaction. "They tell all their friends about a band," Barnett explained. "Their job is to create interest."

Wow. Damn. The secret to rescuing one of the greatest labels in the history of the world, and the flagship of one the big five... four... three sir! record companies is, pay some teenagers to go on the internet and pretend to give a shit about bands to their friends.

Shit! If only someone'd tried that eight years ago, set up a guy as, I dunno, the "internet marketing manager" and given him money and access to interns eager to tell their buddies all about the next big never-gonna-be, an', an', indie companies that you could pay to get content on dorm-room televisions, an', an' on campuses and into high schools and skate parks! If only every label in the world had tried that exact strategem back at the advent of the decade, the ship mighta been wrenched around by that critical arc minute to swing it juuuuust wide of the iceberg!

Oh, wait. They all screaming goddamn well did.

Brilliant, gentlemen.

But what else have they in mind?

Rubin has a bigger idea [I bet he does (-Johno)]. To combat the devastating impact of file sharing, he, like others in the music business (Doug Morris and Jimmy Iovine at Universal, for instance), says that the future of the industry is a subscription model, much like paid cable on a television set. "You would subscribe to music," Rubin explained, as he settled on the velvet couch in his library. "You'd pay, say, $19.95 a month, and the music will come anywhere you'd like. In this new world, there will be a virtual library that will be accessible from your car, from your cellphone, from your computer, from your television. Anywhere. The iPod will be obsolete, but there would be a Walkman-like device you could plug into speakers at home. You'll say, 'Today I want to listen to ... Simon and Garfunkel,' and there they are. The service can have demos, bootlegs, concerts, whatever context the artist wants to put out. And once that model is put into place, the industry will grow 10 times the size it is now."

So, say I'm somewhere like, I dunno, my buddys fire pit in Northeastern Ohio. We got a bale of primo bud and a cooler full ale. And we wanna rock the fark out to Motorhead. All we gotta do is... wait... dude, do you get broadband out here?

But at least Barnett sees reason here:

Steve Barnett is nervous about the subscription model. "Smart people have told me if the subscription model is not done correctly," he said, "it will be the final nail in our coffin. I've heard both sides of the argument, and I'm not convinced it's the solution to our problems. Rick wants to be a hero immediately. In his mind, you flick a switch and it's done. It doesn't work like that."

So, what you're sayin' is, your highly paid guru who has no office, no shoes, no phone number you can reach him on, and an oracular perspective on the Future of the Industry, is halfway fulla shit. Noted.

But this is where the antics spill over into full-on Larry/Curly/Moe madness. Check this shit out!

Barnett has other ideas, which he is discussing with Rubin. For instance, asking Columbia artists to give the record company up to 50 percent of their touring, merchandising and online revenue. This is unprecedented — even successful artists like the Dixie Chicks make a large percentage of their income from concerts and T-shirts.

So let's break this down good so even the dim kids in the back of the class get it. Artists signed to major labels get this much money from album sales:

• Zero.

If they go reaaaaaaly far, shift a few million units, that number can rocket all the way up to

• A little.

Artists, every artist, from the overly earnest hairy-legged songbird down at your local coffe joint, to Buckethead's wife's excellent band, to Cheap Trick, to the Rolling Stones, Prince, and Barbra herself, make money in these ways:

• Touring and appearances
• Merch (t-shirts, keychains, beer coozies, etc.)
• Whatever b.s. online revenue streams they can dig up.

If the artist also happens to be a songwriter, or to control their own publishing, they may also get decent to spectacular paydays off of that as well, and forego some of the above. (The rap and electronic worlds also have their alternate revenue streams, but at the end of the day they amount to a new flavor of touring, merch, online B.S., publishing, or songwriting.)

So, basically, leaving aside songwriting and publishing which are separate pillars of the business, with their own contracts, deal structures, and support agencies, the magic bullet that's gonna save Sony/Columbia from disappearing up their own anii while simultaneously collapsing in a fiery heap while offstage a muted trumpet plays "waaah-waaah" is, WE'LL FIND OUT WHAT MONEY OUR ARTISTS ARE EARNING, AND MAKE THEM GIVE IT TO US INSTEAD!!!

(While, one presumes, twisting their moustaches in glee and twisting their monocles deeper into their eye sockets, the better to see the young immigrant boys they hired straight off a plane at JFK for a nickel wrestle each other to their deaths. Sweet suffering Jesus; there's villainy, and then there's incompetent cartoon villainy.)

So, while the money man is looking at grade-skool level larceny as a viable corporate survival strategy, what's the GURU up to, Stu?

[Rubin is] always on a quest to find just the right thing, whether it be a book or a building. Recently, he hunted down the brand of water that claims to have the greatest level of purity (Ice Age); he pored over architectural manuals to determine what kind of hinge would have been used in 1923 (for his house); and when Johnny Cash was ailing, Rubin discovered a kinesiologist whom Cash credited with extending his life. And so on. Rubin has always been passionate, even compulsive, about his interests.

Gentlemen, I say with mingled regret and pleasure that you all deserve everything you get.

[wik] Oh, and another thing about that "Big Red" focus group? Isn't it a truism that kids these days (kids these days!!) have finely tuned bullshit detectors that can see right through most forms of marketing known to man and many which haven't even been invented yet? And a bunch of teenagers on the intarnets getting paid in free.... what.... free CDs??? Free "subscriptions" to whatever music download service Sony pukes up?... are going to somehow outwit their peers?

I've seen it a hundred times. Pimping music is wonderful and even fulfilling when you can really believe in the quality of the record you're working. Then it's no so much like whoring, and more like evangelizing. But nine times out of ten, you're actually getting paid to pretend that some giant steaming turd is really a tasty sandwich, when everyone from Prague to Paducah can see the difference. And that not only sucks the soul right out of you, it's how record companies and their hacks become hacks. The stink of hack clings to the hacky hacks like cigar smoke and drug store perfume clings to the upholstery in the $20 lapdance room out at the Moonlight on old Route 11. And you don't really come back from that.

Anything I might have cared to say about the distinguished- and empahatically hetero- Senator from Idaho was published years ago.

Back on May 21, 2007, I saw an article that I almost, almost thought worthy enough of derision that it justified a post. For reasons that now escape me, I decided otherwise at the time. However, as sometimes occurs, it's again become current, so I'll revisit.

This, from the Austin American Statesman:

A panic attack move into private equity?

By Robert Elder | Monday, May 21, 2007, 02:07 PM

Writing in the May 18 issue of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, Dallas investor and state of Texas pension official Frederick “Shad” Rowe tees off on the leaders of the Teacher Retirement System of Texas pension fund.

Rowe examines the Texas teacher fund’s recently announced plans to move massive amounts of its holdings into private equity and out of publicly traded stocks. The strategy strikes him as the investment equivalent of a panic attack.

(Rowe notes that the Texas Pension Review board, which he chairs, has no authority over TRS investment strategy and that he’s writing as a private citizen.)

Rowe writes that the teacher fund is trying to juice returns by moving into so-called alternative investments (hedge funds, buyout firms, hard assets such as timber, toll roads) a little late in the game. Maybe even just in time for the private equity bubble to pop and the very stocks the teacher fund is selling to rise in value.

Please ignore for a moment the fact that private equity and hedge funds are not the same thing - Rowe's core point, I think, was that high return comes with high risk. Big shock, that. But it appeared, in May, not to have occurred to the managers of TRS. I don't know whether TRS had gotten around to the absurd reallocation plans they announced at the time, increasing allotment to alternative investments from 3% to 35%. But Mr Rowe had the opportunity to weigh in again on the subject in a story from today's WSJ (subscription):

Pension Managers Rethink

Their Love of Hedge Funds
By CRAIG KARMIN
August 27, 2007; Page C1

Many public pension funds in recent years have become eager to invest in hedge funds. Now, some are getting cold feet.

Pension-fund managers from Louisiana to Ohio are saying they may slow their push into these funds after the recent losses suffered at big hedge funds -- including ones run by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and AQR Capital Management -- have reinforced some of the risks.

Indeed, one critic suggests that pensions would be foolish to keep pursuing hedge funds. "It's like planning a vacation to an exotic land, and finding out that there's an outbreak of bubonic plague," says Frederick Rowe, chairman of the Texas Pension Review Board, which provides oversight of Texas public pension funds.

I'm not certain which is more admirable - consistency, correctness, or the fact he avoided doing an overt Icky Shuffle and rubbing their nose in it. But in any event, Mr Rowe was stating the obvious back in May, all the while not claiming there was anything inherently wrong with hedge funds or their doppelgangers in the alternative investment universe, just that the TRS was clearly not thinking things through in their sudden mania for the flavor of the month.

Good for him, and, I guess, good for the teachers covered by the TRS. I have no dog in the race, but I hope the managers of the TRS paid attention back in May, for the sake of their beneficiaries.

Gad, I hate to seem to mimic the style of the "lovely and talented" John Edwards' campaign, but my reaction to this morning's news that Alberto Gonzales is resigning (WSJ - subscription) was, roughly, "What took so long?".

No shock, but he's being run out of town on a rail. Not alone among those with an opinion on the matter, I only think it's a shame that he's being run out for all the wrong reasons. The US Attorney firings? Pfft. Not a big deal - he, and the White House, have been well within bounds on the firings themselves, as previously discussed. Severe missteps, such as the McNulty Memorandum, should be considered embarrassments to him and the department, but are just horrifically bad administration, not criminal acts. As also previously discussed, his timid, goofy, and cackhanded defense of his boss, his office, and himself has been so inept that it's been embarrassing to watch.

Never one to favor viewing people humiliating themselves (and thus, my aversion to most forms of reality TV), it's been a cringeworthy handful of months, and the ordeal will soon be over.

Based on the WSJ story linked above and other sources, it seems there's a race to the bottom of the barrel in search of his replacement. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff? What an awful choice he'd be, and not just because he looks like a character who could have played alongside Michael Keaton in Beetlejuice. He's not obviously competent, and while that would make him a perfect stand-in for Gonzales, it would seem that now, in the last 17 months of the Bush administration, they ought to attempt to at least raise their game at the Justice Department.

Chertoff, far more so than the other choices mentioned in the WSJ article (Mueller, Johnson), strikes me a choice only slightly better than dragging Harriet Miers back out of mothballs and propping her up for yet another position beyond her scope.

Also odd, there were several names in the version of the WSJ story made available this morning (the link above is to a front-page version in tomorrow's print edition, but earlier today it was the breaking news version). Louis Freeh and Ted Olson were both mentioned, and either of them strikes me as a potentially apt choice, so it comes as no shock to find them no longer on the list, as reported by the WSJ. The IHT version of the story, available here, retains mention of Olson, but also omits Freeh.

Like Rove's resignation, the Democrats seem to have plans to continue their chase, harrying him as best they can in search of crimes not committed. Life would, I think, be far easier for the Dems if they just took what Bushies hand them on a silver platter (incompetence, ham-fistedness, PR stone-deafness) and ran with it, rather than inventing new crusades on which to wander. But that's just me.

As we await... and wait... and wait... the arrival of our characteristically stubborn firstborn, who is holding onto his cushy life in the womb like the last Japanese regular fiercely defending his little patch of Iwo Jima in late 1948, refusing to accept that history has moved on, I finally convinced my patient and loving wife to show me how to make the ethnic food of her Pennsylvania hill-country home.

Possum.

Naw, I'm just shining you on. Up in the hills of Western Pennsylvania, in the countless factory towns that line the Allegheny and the Kiskemin...Kiske... the Kiskesomethiwhatsit River, everyone eats pierogi. Originally brought to the area by the Slavic, Polish and Ukrainian immigrants of the early part of the last century, they have since transcended ethnicity to become the soul food of the region. Well, them and the cabbage-and-noodle dish known as haluski, but that's a recipe for another day.

Sadly, with the passing of all the grandmothers born before the war, good pierogi is increasingly hard to find. These days, their daughters and granddaughters have jobs, and the old parish kitchens where women would gather every Friday to gossip and make pierogi have all but vanished. It's a dying art in a dying region.

And so, a nice project for a rainy afternoon: Pierogi. (Makes about 6 dozen dumplings)

• 34 ounces (8 cups) all purpose flour
• .68 oz (2 1/2 teaspoons) salt
• 4 eggs, lightly beaten
• 10 oz (1 1/4 cups) water, at room temperature
• 1/2 cup butter, softened

BY HAND:

Place flour in a large bowl and whisk in the salt. Add eggs and water and butter and mix until rough. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead just until all ingredients are combined and homogeneous, and the dough is smooth and silky - about 3-5 minutes. Do not over-miz as this dough needs to be plastic (extensible), not elastic (will snap back).

BY MIXER: Alternatively, combine all ingredients in bowl of stand mixer. Mix with paddle attachment until roughly mixed, and then switch to the dough hook and mix on low speed for no more than 2-3 minutes or until dough is homogeneous, smooth, and silky. Do not over-mix as this dough needs to be plastic (extensible), not elastic (will snap back).

BOTH METHODS: Make and cool your fillings as the dough rests, or have them prepared and ready.

• Minced mushrooms sauteed in oil with a little onion, garlic and salt
• Plain sauerkraut (I use my parent's homemade)
• Sauerkraut combined with the above mushrooms (YUM!)
• Mashed potato with sauteed minced onion and garlic, seasoned with salt and pepper and a tiny dash of nutmeg
• The above potatoes plus gouda, smoked gouda, or cheddar
• Ricotta or cottage cheese, with a little salt and pepper, plus optionally some paprika
• Leeks sauteed in butter with a little garlic (to make the ravioli that the Afghanis know as "aushak")
• Winter squash baked with sugar and cinnamon
• Winter squash baked and combined with a little garlic and sauteed leeks
• Pureed peas with mint, salt and pepper
• Blueberry or blackberry preserves, with ricotta or cottage cheese

Roll out the dough in batches, taking about a baseball sized lump at a time. Roll each iteration on a lightly floured surface until it is approximately 1/8 inch thick. Using a large biscuit cutter or the end of a large (20 oz) tomato can (or a 14 oz can if you desire, though this smaller size is more difficult to work with), cut out rounds from the dough. You may re-roll any scraps once only, before they get too dry and too tough to use.

(Although it is surely heresy to say so, I strongly recommend you buy some frozen commercial pierogi (for example Mrs T's) if you need to be reminded of the proper shape, size, and thickness. Homemade tend to turn out a bit thicker, which is not a bad thing at all, but you want to avoid making your dumplings too doughy.)

Depending on the size of cutter you use, place between 2 teaspoons and 1 heaping tablespoon of filling at the center of a round of dough - enough for a nice bite of filling. Fold the round over and crimp edge to create a sealed half-moon. You may use a moistened finger on the inside edge of the pierogi if you've having trouble getting them to seal. Optionally, you may crimp each sealed edge with a fork to make them look pretty. There should be about 1/3 inch to 1/2 inch of crimped edge when you're done, to ensure a good seal.

Place individually on lightly floured wax paper on baking sheets, making sure the pierogis do not touch. As you fill each pan, lightly flour the tops of the pierogis and cover the sheet pan with plastic wrap.

Cook fresh in boiling water until the pierogis float.

Alternatively, place each pan of pierogis in the freezer for at least 45 minutes before removing in layers separated by wax paper to labelled freezer bags or containers. I like to freeze in batches of a dozen.

Cook frozen pierogis in boiling water for about 5 minutes or until they float.

Serve tossed with onions sautéed in butter until soft, salt and pepper. Sour cream and applesauce are essential accoutrements to most traditional variations. The squash and pea versions proposed above would be nice with a lamb or pork roast. The cheese and berry versions are unsurpassed drunk food, especially if you happen to have a deep fryer in your home.

Every so occasionally, an Onion post strikes my funny bone, and if I'm lacking the time to actually write something, I'll toss out a "FakeBlogging" entry, like this one, to memorialize the chuckle. In fact, I created the "FakeBlogging" category specifically to hold my Onion links.

The problem with the Onion, recognized and reported by others smarter and more widely read than I, is that most of the time, the entire punchline can be communicated simply via the article headline. For me, that's not so much a problem, because the text is generally also both juvenile & funny, and doesn't detract from whatever the headline was. I might be alone in that view, however.

To allow our readers to form their own impressions on that crucial question, should they care to, I present several items linked or relinked from today's Onion daily email:

Forgive me for thinking that, however insensitive, these are funny.

"Investment Strategies in a World Where Time Travel is Possible"

It's got aliens, it's got time travel, it's got the possibility of end of days. What's not to like?

The other day, I detailed my son's incisive reasoning in regard to human-robot relations. Today, he made his Dad proud once more. We were down in the basement, playing around a bit, when John had a new idea for a game:

Dad, you be the cops, and I'll be the Blues Brothers.

My heart just leapt. Then, not fifteen minutes later, he picked up a stick, handed it to me, and told me:

Let's fight. You bring a sword, and I'll bring a gun.

Such strong tactical awareness in a child not even four and a half years old.

My son turned to me, and said, "Let me tell you the rules about robots." Enumerating them with his fingers, he laid them out for me:

1. Don't burn yourself
2. Keep telling them what to do
3. Stay smarter than the robots

My son has come up with a new three rules for robots. And you know, I think they are a vast improvement on Asimov's original Robotic Laws.

[wik] Later in the trip, he added a fourth law:

• Don't let the robots into the woods, they might break themselves

Apparently Messrs Siegfried and Roy have decided to publicly own what has been blatantly obvious to everyone but Siegfried and Roy for years.

Note the word "schwul", which made this Minister laugh out loud when he read it.

[wik] Which is funny because the adjective "schwul" means "queer" or "humid"; and the adjective "hitze" means "hot" in both the ambient-temperature sense and the libidinous sense. And when I saw the article, I remembered one time rappin' to some fly madchens at this little dive I frequented... I was talking about the weather; they were hearing about what a flaming homo I was.