What If...Motley Crue Edition
Wednesday, January 16, 2008 at 12:01AM I play "what if" games all the time in my head.
"What if I eat sixteen cookies for lunch?"
"What if I spend $700 on a new handbag?"
"What if I run every red light on the way to work?"
On a Glam note..."What if Motley Crue were a new band?"
Seriously.
Let's say the Sunset Strip kings released Too Fast For Love tomorrow. Would it succeed or would it flop?
The music scene is so different today. Yes, we have the Internet and the power of Myspace, but fans don't seem loyal and they certainly are not rabid like they were in the early 1980s.
When I go to club shows, I'm impressed to find 50 people in attendance...let alone a hundred. Every picture I've seen from the Sunset Strip heyday shows packed clubs, with people hanging out the door.
Can we get back to that? I'm not sure. I mean, I certainly wasn't partying on Sunset in 1983, but I'm guessing bars didn't charge a $25 cover and beer didn't cost four bucks a bottle. The high cost of life is clearly hurting the music industry...but that's another article altogether.
Motley Crue was - and is - a band that feeds on crowd energy. Founder Nikki Sixx is a marketing genius. He knew what he wanted to create when he dreamed up the band. Even though the band had some catchy tunes, their beginning musicianship was lackluster. It was their over-the-top image that helped send them, well, over-the-top.
Fans wanted to be around Motley Crue because they were cool. Certainly dangerous, new and larger-than-life.
I'm not sure if Motley were a modern band...people would even notice.
The Internet has given us an incredible tool to find all sorts of new artforms...and yet, it has pulled us further apart. It's easier to stay home and watch videos on YouTube instead of going to a show. We can listen to our old favorites instead of going to bars and finding new talent. Plus...the world is certainly more jaded now.
Many of you know I'm a big fan of Avenged Sevenfold. Even though Glam is my number one music choice, I still think it's important to like new music. Avenged Sevenfold's most recent release is absolutely phenomenal, yet most people don't even know about the band. In fact, the band hasn't sold that many total albums considering their major label status. In some ways this is ironic because there are more ways to sell music these days than 20 years ago.
Back to Motley Crue. Too Fast For Love comes out tomorrow. It's released on CD, special press vinyl and naturally, iTunes. Do you buy the release? How do you even learn about the band when Rolling Stone doesn't cover Metal acts and other magazines offer spotty coverage at best. MTV doesn't play videos anymore...
Have we reached a time when new artist cultivation is dead? I shudder to think we have.
Discuss.
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