Blogola

Can I take a moment away from the pressing issues of our day (war, Supreme Court appointments, superfluous shuttle missions, the nadir of democracy in this country, the soon-to-be ranking of America as a fourth world nation, etc.) and speak about Pay for Play? I’m talking about “payola”, the quaint old practice of giving the disc jockey twenty bucks to play your awful garage band cut on the radio enough times to make it number one on the Billboard charts.
Elvis who?

A 1960s federal law banned the practice. Now, I’m all for level playing fields, but I’m just not getting what the fuss is about.

Supposedly some one at Sony BMG’s Epic label was trying to promote the rock group Audioslave (which, you may recall from my previous posts, is a personal fave) and offered ‘Whatever you can dream up, I can make it happen’. Hmmm. Makes me want to dig out those Audioslave CD inserts and see if I think any of those guys are cute. Think of all the women who waste their time being groupies hoping to get a back stage pass. What idiots. The real power is in owning a chain of radio stations and concert halls.

Sony agreed Monday to pay $10 million in fines and stop bribing radio stations to feature its songs. Now wait a minute. What’s wrong with that? This isn’t the 1950’s any more. I know contestants get the questions in advance. Hate to spoil your fun, but ‘reality TV’ is scripted, ok?

As a semi-intelligent consumer, I do not expect any media outlet to not accept advertisement or not try and force its views upon me. We’re all a little more jaded now. What would be the difference between a station saying it will hire a sales force to sell ads with stupid jingles for carpeting and auto repair shops versus creating a price list for music placement? Want your song played first thing in the morning? $100. Dinnertime? $200. And so on.

What stops Sony from buying their own damn radio station? Playing anything they want? Front list, back list, have the performers act as emcees, what ever. As a consumer I will vote with my ratings. I don’t like what you play, I will turn the knob.

I can certainly see where paying a disc jockey was unethical. The station owner frequently did not know or profit, so it was an under the table form of exposure. ‘Request Calls’ could be generated to create artificial buzz, and girls hired to scream and swoon when the performer walked on stage. The Beatles and Frank Sinatra are examples of performers who employed these methods yet won lasting critical acclaim.

Now anyone has the capability of producing a medium-quality recording with limited funds and can pod cast it if they so desired. Bring it out into the open, I say. Let stations accept payola but have to declare it, just like any other source of income.

Educate the consumer. And let them decide.