Winston + Chuck 2014-06-30 11.25

A Change Is Gonna Come If You Make It So

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A company I worked for – I won’t say which one – has an amazing catalogue of rhythm & blues music, arguably the best r&b catalogue of any record label. Despite possessing this goldmine, most of our catalogue releases were from white rock bands. I asked a member of senior management why we didn’t do more with our black artists, and the answer I got was “We don’t know how to sell that music.”

Is that not a stupid response? If you don’t know how to do that, hire someone who has that expertise, or learn how to do it. Why ignore a large swath of your potential market, especially when you already own the assets?

Years ago I was put in charge of licensing at a record label. I knew the music and I knew the components of licensing deals; however, I wasn’t a very good negotiator. I found the process intimidating. I could have left it at that – “I don’t know how to negotiate.” My company would have made money nonetheless, though not at its full potential. For that matter, I wouldn’t be working at full potential.

I took a course in negotiations. Six weeks, $300. Money well spent. I put what I learned in the class into action. Practice makes perfect, and I became an excellent negotiator. In my four years at that company our licensing revenue increased 400%. My skills also led to my next job as the Vice President of Licensing at another company.

Is a lack of some skill or knowledge holding you back? Fix that. Read a book, attend a seminar, take an on-line course or find a mentor. Saying “I don’t know how” won’t lead to success; learning how will.

Winston + Chuck 2014-06-30 11.25
Today is the last day of Black Music Month. It would be ludicrous to think a 40-song playlist would cover black music in any comprehensive way. Enjoy it for what it is – nearly three hours of fantastic music. Listen to it while you research how to learn a new skill.

Ringo + Macca 2014-06-18

Paul McCartney And Me: Lives In Parallel

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On October 24, 1963, The Beatles were in Stockholm, Sweden on the first day of their first foreign tour.

On October 24, 1963, I was born.

Both of these events turned out to be remarkably influential on the culture.

The Beatles, who synthesized American rock & roll with various British music traditions, moved popular music to a whole new place, expanding the types of song structures and lyrical content heard in the hit songs of the day and opening the floodgates for many British bands to prosper around the world.

Using the medium of stand-up comedy, I went to blue collar towns and meetings of Catholic senior citizens and told them of my travails same-sex dating. Just like the USA and Sweden and other parts of the world were exposed to what was happening in Liverpool, so were the people of Allentown, Pennsylvania exposed to what was happening in my love life, which believe me, wasn’t much. The Beatles and I opened peoples’ minds to a world beyond their own. They delivered their message to 55,000 people at Shea Stadium, while I delivered mine to a couple dozen folks at Bananas of Poughkeepsie. I also played to sold-out crowds at Caroline’s on Broadway and StandUp NY, but it’s not my nature to brag about such things. I’m the quiet Beatle.

On October 24, 1979, I turned 16 years old. That same day, Paul McCartney received a medallion commemorating his achievements in music. Having written or co-written 43 songs that sold over a million copies each between 1962 and 1978, he was named the most successful composer of all time. While working on the Licensing departments at Sony, Zomba and Warner, I licensed recordings to 43 Now That’s What I Call Music compilations that sold over a million copies each. It’s like Paul McCartney and I are twins.

Ringo + Macca 2014-06-18
Today, Sir Paul McCartney (he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1997, something we don’t have in common. I am not a British citizen, and therefore not eligible.) turns 72 years old. The Beatles’ recordings are not on Spotify, so I’ve worked around that minor inconvenience to create this playlist of some of the finest songs McCartney composed or co-composed.

Ringo + Kool 002

It’s Friday And I Need To Dance!

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Ringo + Kool 002

This week’s dance playlist kicks off with Kool & the Gang’s “Celebration,” which hit #1 on this date in 1981. The song had prominent television exposure for the couple of weeks prior, as it was played during the 1981 Super Bowl and when the American hostages returned home from Iran on January 26 after 444 days in captivity.

Kool & the Gang were a funk band whose fortunes were on the decline as the seventies progressed. They scored two top ten singles in 1974, “Jungle Boogie” and “Hollywood Swinging,” but no more until they recruited a new lead vocalist, James “JT” Taylor, and were paired with a new producer, Eumir Deodato.

Deodato’s first record with the band was 1979’s Ladies Night, whose title track returned the group to the top ten. This was quickly followed by the top ten hit “Too Hot.”

Deodato’s next record with the band was Celebrate!, from which “Celebration” was taken. To this day the song is played at a myriad of celebratory events, making it a dance classic.

hello

It’s Friday And I Need To Dance!

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A Wisconsin artist named Molly Evans started an art project in which she stitches Lionel Richie lyrics on discarded furniture. She calls the project Lionel Stitchie. You can view her tumblr here.

hello

Today’s Friday dance party kicks off with Richie’s “All Night Long (All Night).” I want a couch that says “Tom bo li de say de moi ya,” which means exactly what you think it means. To get his Jamaican accent down, Alabama-born Richie phoned his wife’s gynecologist, who is Jamaican. The doctor asked Lionel to not interrupt his appointments.

Enjoy!

h/t mollyeeeee.com via Dangerous Minds

It’s Friday And I Need To Dance!

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Every Friday, Tunes du Jour’s playlist is designed to get you dancing into the weekend. Today we kick off with The Spinners’ “The Rubberband Man,” written by the songwriting team of Thom Bell and Linda Creed, as today is Creed’s birthday.

You may not know her name, but chances are you know some of her work. With Bell, she composed several hits for 70s soul group The Stylistics, including “You Make Me Feel Brand New,” “You Are Everything,” “Break Up to Make Up,” “I’m Stone in Love With You,” “Rockin’ Roll Baby” and “Betcha By Golly Wow.” If any readers plan on marrying me, note that I insist the latter be our wedding song.

With Michael Masser, Creed wrote “The Greatest Love of All” for the Muhammad Ali biopic The Greatest. George Benson took the film’s theme song to #24 in 1977. The week of May 17, 1986, Whitney Houston took her remake of the song to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100. However, Creed didn’t get to see that. She died one month earlier of breast cancer at age 37.

I Tina

Happy Tina Turner’s Birthday!

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Down the street from my first job in midtown Manhattan was a bookstore that often hosted book signings. There was also a record store one block over that held album/cassette/CD signings. Between these two places I got to meet many great artists, including Prince, Joan Rivers, Liberace and Tipper Gore. I also met Tina Turner, who turns 74 today.

I Tina

My main memory about that meeting was how flawless her skin was. She was 46 and there was not a wrinkle to be found. I’m now older than she was then and my face is devoid of wrinkles, which is why I’m often mistaken for Tina.

Tina-mania was high in 1986. After separating from her abusive husband Ike, she toiled in relative obscurity until her 1984 album Private Dancer put her back on the map in a big way. The album sold around twenty million copies worldwide and earned Tina a Grammy nomination for Album of the Year (alongside three other great albums – Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the U.S.A., Prince & the Revolution’s Purple Rain and Cyndi Lauper’s She’s So Unusual, as well as Lionel Richie’s Can’t Slow Down. Guess who won.), with its single “What’s Love Got to Do With It” winning Record of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female and its “Better Be Good To Me” winning Best Rock Vocal Performance, Female. In 1986 she released her best-selling autobiography, I, Tina, and her follow-up to Private Dancer, Break Every Rule, which produced three top forty hits in the U.S.

Enjoy this Tina Turner-inspired playlist.