Selling Out
 

I meant to post this forever ago, but im lazy...

Recently, John Mellancamp told Rolling Stone that he had sold one of his new songs to a television advertisement because doing so got him more air play than any radio station would. In the article he also mentioned that Tom Petty's most recent release "Highway Companion" was an amazing release that radio stations wouldn't touch.

With more and more radio companies hiring "trend trackers", are televised ad's a freer market than the radio? And if this is the case, should we redefine what many would have once considered "selling out?"

Ok how about something you won't have to read...

Will television become a viable option for musicians to get exposure with advertising supporting them?

I think commercials have been doing that for some time now. I have heard songs in commercials and then researched to find out what they were. I do the same with indie films.

I can't be bothered to think about what you're actually asking, but I do recall a lawsuit within the Dead Kennedys over the right to use Holiday in Cambodia in a commercial; Jello refused and the rest of the band wanted to make money off of royalties.

So if you asked Jello, selling your songs for commercials would be considered selling out. Plus, there's the additional fact that you're selling the rights to use your song directly to a corporation, as opposed to a radiostation (who probably have corporate sponsors anyway), and if you're against that kind of thing I could see how that might be troublesome.

I don't remember the question. But there's an opinion about something.

Whatever, we're getting toward intelligent discussion.

Another remark: I've noticed that some commercials have started putting the name of the artist and the song up while the commercial is playing. I noticed some commercial with Mika in it do that.

How do you feel about Mika?

Pretty freakin catchy, though after listening to his album for two weeks or so I got tired of most of the songs.

I wondered if it was just me. It seems like he channels Freddy (sp?) too much and because oh that he doesn't know how to be Freddy, and to what to degree, so it often comes off forced.

"All You Need Is Love" by Lennon was on a Visa or Mastercard commercial.

I don't agree with bands selling themselves to corporations for profit.

Yeah but in regards to the OP, Mellancamp wasn't doing it for profit, he was doing it to get his album out to an audience, which apparently radio stations will not do.

Are you saying you'd back this because profit isn't the motive?

Obviously there is a profit motive if he isn't giving the songs away after he breaks even.

I don't care if you suck big money's dick as long as you're writing good albums.

I think that the buying public is more fickle nowadays because of the advent and popularity of downloading, there has never been more choice when it comes to music as right now. Maybe it's just me but I will not download an album on someones say so because I have gigs upon gigs of music that I like on my harddrive, this is clearly evident here. I will take the time and trouble to make a music thread about a band I really enjoy and upload a couple of albums and one or maybe two people will check it out. I assume that this is for the same reason.

Back when I was buying CD's I would take more of a listen to them because I had forked out that twenty bucks of hard earned to purchase it, now if I hear anything that I don't enjoy right away I just skip it and move on to the next. There are just too many options, I never use the sharing thread anymore because there is nobody left here that enjoys the music that I listen to.

I'm not really sure whether this is on topic or not however I don't really think that John Mellencamp has any trouble unloading his albums as his shows are sold out all over the U.S.

As for the Tom Petty album, a bad Tom Petty album is better than 98% of anything else that will be released that year

He obviously did do it for profit, John Mellancamp is huge, radio stations would have publicized the **** out of his album.

The radio stations are his scapegoat for wanting to make a larger profit on his capital by using a television to advertise.

Also, I agree with swim, if the album's good, meh.
Meh sometimes, if a band sells out big time, that'd be pretty annoying.

I don't understand why if someone wrote a great album and it was all over the place how that would be annoying. Isn't that the point? Don't you want a lot of people to be into good music.

It doesn't seem to be the case, if an album is popular all the "cool kids" can't wait to slag it off

I actually liked "Sowing Seeds" by Brand New for a week (14023948 plays), along with "Sugar, We're Going Down" by Fall Out Boy.

Anyway, how is it the point of bands that make good music to "sell-out big time"?
If a band is great and releases a great album that gets put all over the radio, then fine, but if that band capitalizes on their stroke of good fortune by posting themselves all over television, stores, video games, lunch boxes, then that would get annoying.

In my personal opinion: Music should be made as a gift for the ears of others, an entity of raw humanity developed solely for the speculation of listeners, free from any motive other than expression of emotion or pursuit of happiness, not made to sound any one way from pressure to become another "best selling" stat in a lame book summarizing the last decade.

Actually Brand New and Fall Out Boy can be seen as the opposite ends of the spectrum. Both released albums that have received tons of radio play and both have gotten to be extremely popular. The difference is that while Brand New keep a relatively low profile as far as media coverage goes (disappearing for 3 years after Deja Entendu), following and preceding any Fall Out Boy releases is major ad campaigns and marketing with American Eagle (or Hollister...same thing), Myspace, MTV, and FUSE.

I didn't tie either band into my second argument, it was a reply to swim saying, "I don't understand why if someone wrote a great album and it was all over the place how that would be annoying".

For Brand New I was only talking that particular song.

the song is called Sowing Season.

I also don't know why Brand New were brought up in this thread, its obvious they aren't in it for the money. They seem to have progressed farther and farther from their original easy to market sound with each album.

Finally, someone other than me speaks the truth.

I know. They just so happened to be the examples that I was going to talk about. A coincidence if you will.

I've heard some of their older stuff, and they actually sound pretty sweet.
A lot of their listeners say they like the direction they're going.
However, if you listened to 89X two months ago you'd know how popular they were.
I was stating the fact that hearing a song so many times it gets old is annoying.

as long as this practice earns them some money to create more songs, then this is not that bad at all.

I think selling out is underrated. Being all about the music is fine, but no-one's career lasts forever, and if you don't want to start stacking shelves when you're out of fashion, then you need the cash!