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Rock

Businessmen Abba Savaged

It's about time someone exposed the record companies for the big rip off artists they are. A record, wholesale, is $4 08 — the sales tax of 40% lifts this price to your local dealer to $5.71. He adds a mark up of $2 28 which means a final total of $7.99.

Are these claims outrageous? I think not. I've outlined their first sin as a sort of introduction to this limited type of expose, but the contentious stuff is still to come.

What about the next two sins? They are basically mutually dependent so I will deal with them as one, and then extract the two sins like loaves from fishes. I'll start with a personal touch.

I'll admit that I hate, detest, abhor the music of Abba, Olivia Newton-John, Neil Diamond, et al. However I do not deny its right of existence. But: there are valid reasons for denying its right to such a large share of existence.

(I'll call this type of music crap for want of a better name.)

The practice of advertising records on TV has only taken off in the past three years. This practice is designed to stimulate an artificial demand and it succeeds tremendously well in this aim. Too well. Abba had only sold 4,000 LPs before RCA started TV advertising.

A year or so later 100,000 of the bloody things have gone through the racks.

People have started comparing Abba to the Beatles solely on the strength of an artificially engendered taste. Orwellian isn't it?

The output of crap has become the record companies' sole objective. Specialist tastes have been allowed to slip by the way-side. For instance, RCA has cut out over 75% of its back catalogue simply to make room for Abba. Such musical gems as the entire Guess Who catalogue, early Jefferson Airplane and Hot Tuna are no longer available (except as old stock in dealers' shops.) There's even talk of deleting Ziggy Stardust — and that's a blow that hurts, I tell you. It seems that only WEA is not guilty though this company cannot be left off completely for reasons I'll come to later.

The proof of the avalanche of crap can be seen in supermarkets and chain stores all over the country. Alarmingly, good music is being mixed with the crap. These chain stores offer a very suspect service their employees are usually uninterested in good music but rather they like to entertain the lady on the lolly counter with John Denver or Abba. The stores don't guarantee the quality of the records, have no listening facilities, and won't accept returns. Steer clear of chain stores. The few cents less is not worth the cost of a good relationship with your local dealer (records, that is.)

The advent of chain stores and the reduction of diversified output has serious implications for the small dealer. A reputable dealer relies on this diversified output to make his money. The service he provides is exceedingly good. He knows his stuff and the records. None of this droll "I haven't heard it," or "If it isn't out there we haven't got it" kind of shit you get from crap stores like woolies. Woolies know they'll sell Abba with even a pimple-faced 15 year old behind the counter. The dealer cannot be so sure of his George Benson and Chick Corea type of records. A small dealer has to get behind his records and offer an honest service, (if it wasn't you wouldn't come back.) The result is sheer pleasure to buy records. The advent of crap has seriously limited the range of records available.

The prospect of increased import restrictions also means that the small dealer will not be able to look to imports for relief.

Your friendly dealer faces extermination at the hands of large chain stores who don't give two shits for the buyers and also as a result of unscrupulous record companies. The gain small dealers make from crap records does not compare with the loss of the range of product they can stock. Your specialist store will soon be a thing of the past.

All the record companies are guilty. WEA claim that they do not supply chain stores and will not raise the price of their records this year. However the presence of A Night on The Town in chain stores still remains unexplained. WEA have some sort of story about a business called Osborn Enterprises appropriating their stock somehow, some way. They claimed to have had this business sorted out in mid-February yet Rod Stewart still appears besides the cans of fly spray and woolies still advertise his records as coming "From WEAI' not "from Osborn Enterprises!" This is only one instance however and on the whole WEA is the best of a bad lot. Their supply to the chain stores shows that they are not totally free from subversion into the alleyway of crap.

I would state that it is better for one Hot Tuna LP to be played by one enthusiast ten times a day than for an Abba record to be brought on Christmas Eve, played twice on Christmas Day, once on Boxing Day and three times in one night when a pissed Mum and Dad have their annual 'swinging' party with the Golf Club Crew. One thing's for sure. That record wouldn't be there it it weren't for TV.

This is why record companies are hypocritical. The secretary of the NZ Federation of the Phonographic Industry said the Federation was endeavouring to get the sales tax on records eliminated. But, what's a bet, that the price of records would still be the same if the sales tax went. The NZFPI contends that records should'. . . be treated the same as other cultural material for taxation purposes." (Evening Post 4-4-77.)

However the record companies' contribution to New Zealand culture, (excepting EMI and its work with classical music performed by New Zealanders — however even this role has decreased significantly over the past three years. Why? Because there's more money in the Rollers) have been conspicuously low and governed not by any sense of national pride, but by a warped sense of scoring bucks out of the public's misplaced sense of national pride. There's a subtle difference there but it is a helluva big one.

In fact, it can be substantially shown that record companies' contribution to culture is declining from low to non-existent.

Contribution to culture surely exists in the satisfaction of specialist and minority tastes. It is a truism to say that the specialist taste is being more and more ignored. To claim that the record industry is making a positive contribution to culture is absurd because those who should reap cultural benefits are being denied by corporate noses sensing a 'quick buck' in crap. If their noses are that sensitive they should also detect a putrid smell.

There is no way Abba or Neil Diamond make a contribution to culture. These types of musicians will only be remembered as reflections of the mid 1970s record buying public. A secure middle class society smugly sure of themselves who do not went to be shocked or offended. The people of today know what they want out of life (two cars, colour TV, stereo, big house, Golf Club etc) and their music reflects this conformity and insipdiness. That is the only way Abba or Neil Diamond will be remembered. Abba bases its songs on irritating repetitions or painful play on words. For example "Nina, Nina, Pretty Ballerina;" "Rock Me, Rock Me;" "Money. Money Money;" "I Do I Do I Do I Do I Do I Do," Neil Diamond's music is weak and based on the same chordal progressions. What is the difference in these three songs?

I can't quite see myself: "Skybird" "Longfellow Serenade" and "Beautiful I Noise.'Those three songs are basically the same — no one can deny that Occasionally Diamond changes the tempo or producer but the result is the same — crap. Olivia Newton-John is too painful to say any more about. Even Rod Stewart is quickly becoming crap. His music of late has been singularly unadventurous, unoriginal (I'm still sure that The Killing of Georgie Part 2 sounds like the Beatles' Don't Let Me Down. Of course, most people who brought "A Night on The Town" think that record his second LP after "Atlantic Crossing.' Rod Stewart, that one time piss sinking rebel, has sold out to the middle class. They're lapping up his life story in the Sunday Times. Gawd! If Granny likes him so much what's wrong 'with Bob Marley, Mon?

I am not advocating music for a coterie elite, but I am indignant that the public is being fed with shit which creates an artificial demand at the cost of a real demand. Artificial tastes are winning over natural ones. Back catalogues are being trimmed almost daily. It is simply not fair.

The record companies' marketing policies and its purported cultural intent are clearly incompatible. As long as we are stuck in a conservative middle-class controlled market, then the crap will keep on coming. Gone are the halycon days when a genuine demand (not one created by The Media) lifted CBS records to its post-Woodstock height.

The record industry has been infiltrated by middle-class stoolies. Woe is me! I lament! I cannot get Audience's "House on the Hill" anymore; "Howling Wind" by Graham Parker and the Rumour is only available on import; my Guess Who "Live at the Paramount" is scratched and I can't get 'em!

So if you can't see how record companies have sold you all down the road then you never will. Do the go-go Dancing Queen but remember the high cultural opportunity cost of that crap.

How is the economy affected? Record companies pay out inordinately high royalty fees to some overseas companies. For in-stance, EMI pays $1.5 million per year for the Tamla Motown contract. This is absurd! The record companies outbid each other, wasting precious overseas funds. If the Government would control the system somehow then Tamla would only get a quarter of that money. All that is needed is a little impartial regulation. Records use petrochemicals — a ban on TV advertising of cultural material would reduce demand and save oil on records. That last recommendation would be undemocratic. However, the point has to be made that the Government must investigate the companies' claims to cultural contributions wherever the record industry approaches Government. Any Government will find that the major companies have done bugger all for culture. (I'm disregarding Reed Pacific, Kiwi etc which are very minor companies.) To satisfy an artificial middle-class demand the record companies are needlessly and wantonly wasting the petro-chemicals. Most of the companies (especially Phonogram) are controlled by overseas parent companies. All or most profits leave the country.

— P.G. McHugh.