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Music and economics (Part II)
Pete's right that any Who album released now will be a drop in the bucket
against what's out there. So what's a band to do?
What musicians in a monopolistic competition have going for them is the
monopoly part, i.e. their own original music. Combining this with a good
marketing strategy is all they can do. The good news is, Roger/Pete/The Who
are doing things right. They've established a strong market position and
are selling their music well. I'm glad to see them trying out different
forms of music recording, distribution and promotion, as I suspect the
support they're getting from MCA is pretty much non-existent may eventually
fail.
Maybe this kind of analysis doesn't really accomplish much, as it doesn't
provide any terrific methods to beat the system, but does the realization
you're unlikely to beat the market lead to more freedom to write and record
what you want? Does this remove the pressure Pete is under to produce a
genius album that will bring back the profits of the Seventies? I hope so.
Unfortunately, there's no way back to the simpler days when there were only
a few hundred recordings in the album bins, so everybody has to go with what
they've got. There are more reasons to write and record music than just to
sell an album. As long as it's good music, nobody is going to complain.
After all, you're still competing with Elvis.
keets
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