Ripe and Rotten Fruit...On Tour Now!

“With so much drama in the L-B-C
Its kinda hard bein Snoop D-O-double-G
But I, somehow, some way
Keep comin up with funky ass shit like every single day”
-Snoop

But he doesn’t, does he? I mean, has Snoop come up with “…funky ass shit, like, every single day?”
No. And it isn’t his fault. Well, it is partially his fault but that is as far as I will go. Do you remember Pearl Jam’s first album? Remember the first time you heard the now worn Welcome To the Jungle? Remember Blood, Sugar, Sex, Magic before it became Scabby, Saccharin, Masturbatory, Mundane? What happened? Are you really so much more sophisticated now than then?
No offense to you but I doubt it.
That first public work, at least for musicians, is a monumental task of epic worth. It involves blood sweat and tears, sometimes literally, and changes the band as much as it changes all of us, if done correctly. This awesome act of birth, yes, birth, is painful, beautiful to watch and inspiring even when it brings us something that will later turn into the current Metallica or dump someone like Axl Rose on society at large for the next two to three decades. So why is that the second, third and fourth album so frequently fail to impress? I would argue that there are several reasons.
Me, me, me, now, now, now!!! is the first problem. Not the whiny artists, the whiny consumer. Yes, I loved the subtle grooves and funky lyrics of that first album, too. But can we all stop and realize that, with the exception of pure evil such as Miley Cyrus and Tiffany, talent that inspires many takes a long time to develop. Twenty years is no tome at all to produce a decent singer or guitarist. Twenty five is a decent number and no one ever got hurt by waiting to serve the wine until it was time by letting an artist reach their thirties before wringing some genius and cash out of them. So how is it, that after letting a childhood, lessons, early performances, failed attempts, club dates and broken hearts produce a work of genius, or at least dancability, that we want a follow up within 18 months? Sure, the Beatles kicked our ass over and over again but they are the exception to the rule. Don’t believe me? Go break out all your Led Zeppelin vinyl and listen to them on order of their release. Led Zeppelin rocked, Led Zeppelin IV set a standard, and Physical Graffiti can be listened to but Coda? Seriously? Coda? Get outta here!
The second is need. Not want, need. This secret doesn’t work for sex, well, it doesn’t work for guys and sex, but it does work with music. Hunger makes even Captain D’s seem like good food if you wait long enough. Once the adulation, eager groupies, travel and big money start to sink in you are no longer dealing with the same artist. You are dealing with a spoiled dweeb. Spoiled dweeb is if you are lucky. Frequently you are dealing with a megalomaniacal ass of epic proportions that would make Darth Vader look like a pony-tailed church girl with candy to share. I consider myself a decent human being but if you offer me my fill of nubile college girls, wads of cash and my own jet with a list of riders on my contract letting me describe under what conditions I am willing to pursue my passion with all the free, kinky sex I can take and a small army of sycophantic suck ups I am under no delusion that I will be throwing temper tantrums over my tea being 3 degree off my preferred temperature in just under a heartbeat. You would too, trust me.
This situation cannot be helped by record companies that pursue a steady supply of cash like fat, single girls treat wedding cake. There is maximizing what you have and then there are record companies. These over-industrious leeches think that if an artist doesn’t produce 3 top 10 hits a year they have wasted their investment. As if their investment somehow entailed driving a precocious Kurt Cobain to his guitar lesson at the age of 9 and being forced to sit through his early adolescent poetry. These epic level morons wait until the tree ahs fruit and then stand around looking sharp but useless whining through three seasons that it isn’t time to make jam again yet. But that is another rant.
So, what now? Do we eliminate long-term contracts? Visual artists spent a few centuries showing that they were only as good as their next painting or sculpture and it seemed to work for them. Executing record company executives seems appealing but there are legal difficulties in the effort and there will always be another crop of cocksure asshats lining up to take their places. Educating the public seems like it would work but if that was possible it would have been done by now, Van
Gogh would still have both ears and someone would have kicked the shit out of Mozart’s father when it would have done some good.
What if everyone was a little more patient? You, me, record company executives, that whore who got Van Goghs ear, and even the artists themselves. Is there not enough music? Wouldn’t you rather have your favorite artist produce a whole, heaping mess of genius twice a decade than sit through another mediocre attempt?