Music – Page 2 – NOLAmotion Blog

Caynebration #1 Wed Feb 11 @ Le Bon Temps

Friends are throwing a fundraiser/musical event in honor of Cayne Miceli at Le Bon Temps Roule on Magazine St this week on Wed, Feb 11.

Here’s a link to the Facebook invitation.

Here’s another great link to Cayne-related events.

Artists scheduled to perform include George Porter Jr., Juice with Joe Krown, Billy Iuso, Big Chief Alfred Doucette, Margie Perez, Dr. Bone and many more!

A special thanks to Laura Maggi of the Times-Picayune for her ongoing stories of abuse and death in Orleans Parish Prison. Here’s the latest.

Wilbert “Junkyard Dog” Arnold, R.I.P.

We’re sad to learn that New Orleans drummer Wilbert “Junkyard Dog” Arnold died. Junkyard was a special person, sort of New Orleans’ answer to Keith Moon–a talented, unique drummer whose life was filled with joy, pain and a drumming technique all his own. As the longtime drummer for Walter “Wolfman” Washington, we spent many hours enjoying his special sense of rhythm and one-of-a-kind style. Junkyard’s kit was always tied together with chains to symbolize the history of slavery. He was also a good singer, and, along with his very talented wife Marilyn, his latest band performed regularly in the French Market and at Ray’s Boom Boom Room on Frenchmen. Some of his best work can be heard on the New Orleans Rhythm Conspiracy CD released just after Katrina. See more about Junkyard on this site. He will be missed.

The New Fame

In this economy, nothing is what it was. And that’s bad news for the once-famous. Celebrity has changed. Thanks in no small part to the plethora of channels/movies/sites, the machinery of fame suffers from the media’s general state of dilution: there are too many sources pushing too many vapid “products” into a system that continues to expand.

Even athletes are losing ground. As business declines, endorsements are being withdrawn. You’ll be seeing less of Tiger Woods. And this year’s Olympic champions, despite record audiences and name recognition, are finding few companies interested in using their images. It’s a new world.

The narcissistic shallowness that is Hollywood will not respond well to being ignored. But the fact is, as things get worse, who cares about most of the pathetic tripe emanating from the movie and television industry?

I’ve said for more than ten years that the media giants are doomed. They played games with their accounting by constantly growing, masking their debt and overhead. Now, as the auto industry, which accounts for some 25% of ad revenues on television, pulls back, the media’s naked butts are showing.

Not that any of this is going to change the brothel-like affair Louisiana continues to have with the film and television industry. Consider this: if the State of Louisiana is willing to pay a percentage of the film business’ bill based on budget and impact, why can’t it do the same for music? Using the methodology of the film tax credit system, the state ought to be putting up millions to support our multibillion dollar music industry. Instead it continues to do nothing for music.

The silence from our tiny world of music writers and publishers is inexcusable.

Not that Louisiana can buy fame for our musicians. Fame will never be the same. But, the state shouldn’t be so in love with only one component of the media. Louisiana should love its music even more than it loves film.

The Louisiana Film Investment Company:Where’s Our Share?

Louisiana’s overly generous film tax credits finally made the New York Times. Thanks in no small part to the ease (caused by lax oversight) with which budgets are overstated and credits overpaid, film tax credits are being challenged around the country. Economists are having a difficult time justifying the state paying $27 million of a $167 million budget, for example. And if one compares other industries and businesses to the way film is treated by governments around the world, it’s no wonder people are starting to complain. Besides being unfair to every other industry, the tax credits have not been proven to be cost-effective.

To their credit, Louisiana commissioned a study to determine the economic impact of the film subsidies; and, lots of people are waiting to see the results. I’m sure few would like to see anything but a positive return on this creative investment. However, there are myriad questions that arise when the taxpayers become major partners in productions. Why, for example, are we not entitled to a piece of the pie?

If an investor puts up millions of dollars for a production company to produce a film, the investor is a partner. So, why aren’t we partners? If we put up 16% of the budget of a $167 million picture, shouldn’t we be entitled to the same financial arrangements as the other investors? And the same goes for sports and all other economic bailouts or investments by the taxpayers.

I’d ask former Louisiana film commissioner Mark Smith what he thinks, but he’s busy talking to the feds.

Of course my ongoing criticism of this investment of public money into the film industry is that Louisiana isn’t known for producing Spielbergs the way we’ve produced Nevilles or Marsalises. Why, then, can’t the state commit to properly funding work to support its historic music resources?

As has always been the case, Louisiana would rather support sports, film, petrochemicals and agriculture and do what it has always done: take music for granted.

The REAL Louisiana Music Commission

With the State of Louisiana annually funding the Tipitina’s Foundation at a higher rate than it ever budgeted for the Louisiana Music Commission, it’s becoming more and more obvious that Tip’s has become the state’s de facto music commission. That’s fine because the foundation has done an amazing job establishing it’s model and growing it for the benefit of all concerned. Not only does the foundation create an invaluable networking opportunity for musicians via it’s offices and workshops, but it also provides jobs within its growing structure. And in an industry in which real, full time jobs are harder and harder to come by, this is no small feat.

I say kudos to Roland and Mary Von Kurnatowski, Bill Taylor and the staff of Tipitina’s Foundation. While the state neglects its own formal music responsibilities via a budget-less, office-less, website-less and functionally broken music commission, the foundation keeps chugging along, helping musicians connect with resources and, most significantly, each other as they struggle in the ever-more-difficult business of music. My hat’s off to Tipitina’s as they continue to grow.

Not that the Louisiana Music Commission is totally dormant. They’ve been planning, studying and meeting for more than 2 years now, having actually accomplished nothing. This is in sharp contrast to the work of the LMC in years past.

In our first two years, 1992 to 1994, with a total annual budget of $56,000, the LMC was a busy and productive entity. We created and produced two commercial radio shows, developed a live television show (LTV that went on to air 100 unique episodes featuring a total of nearly 300 musical guests), created New Orleans Jazz Centennial Celebration, secured the launch ceremonies for the Louis Armstrong stamp, saved the Aaron Neville Christmas Special which resulted in securing a $10,000 donation to Farm Aid (held at the Superdome that year), and more. Here’s a copy of a report from back then. It was on the agency’s website. But, as I’ve noted before, the url and 8 years of web postings were thrown away during the Blanco years. Interestingly, Gov. Jindal has reappointed one of the contributors to the LMC’s demise.

The LMC recently met in Shreveport and announced plans to try to attend MIDEM (a very costly undertaking) and to study Branson and Austin–all things that have been done before. They continue to be mired in outdated perceptions of the music industry based on the tired and often self-serving rhetoric of the commission’s reappointed chair, Maggie Warwick. And now, after 2 years of dawdling I believe it’s time for everyone to admit that the LMC is dead and that Tipitina’s Foundation is the best hope for Louisiana’s musicians seeking to improve their lives and business models.

But what do I know.

Here are more links to past pages on the defunct LMC site:

Unsolicited Quotes and Press: 1992-95

Unsolicited Quotes and Press: 1995-98

LMC Site Map Page Here is the overview of all the pages that were lost, including a vast Louisiana music News archive from 1997-2005

Here is a link to 43 LMC Press Releases issued between 1999 and 2003. Have you seen any of the releases issued by the current LMC?

Recruiting Our Way to Success?

Too many folks in economic development overemphasize recruiting. At a time when most admit that Louisiana’s greatest export is our smart, talented, innovative people, highly paid government “leaders” continue to believe they can recruit outsiders to save us.

When I was at the Louisiana Music Commission, we used to joke that to economic development people an expert was someone from out of town carrying a briefcase. Nobody, it seemed, wanted to hear what “we” all have to say. Only the “experts” seemed to know up from down. Though we tried at every opportunity to bring an appreciation for indigenous talent to economic development, and tried our best to be a part of all aspects of the department, nobody wanted to hear anything from us unless it was about music; and, all-to-often only if it involved access to backstage passes.

I recently met with an important person from Louisiana Economic Development who believed that the music director needed to be “working the phones and recruiting.” I said that Louisiana’s music industry can’t recruit its way to success–unless someone has a line on Steve Jobs. I don’t know if I made my point; but I know it’s true. Unfortunately, the folks in charge of music at the state level just don’t get it and remain overwhelmed by the demands of the film industry. Music is still being taken for granted, and the potential of the state to be helpful continues to be untapped.

Our unique music resources, it seems, are still perceived as lacking only what outsiders can bring to it. Well, as far as I (and I’m sure most musicians seeking to make a living) am concerned, the main thing outsiders can bring to our music is their appreciation and their money. And if anyone wants to move their booking or management company here, I’m sure there are incentives that can be utilized. No doubt music could use some help. But what the state is (or rather isn’t) doing is about as useful as a one person sailboat with no rudder on a landlocked pond with no wind or even a paddle.

There are no miracle workers in the music industry anymore. There are no simple solutions to the difficulties of being a musician. The era of the music moguls is long over. And legendary music mogul Clive Davis lost his job (again) this week. Blame whatever you want for the demise of the industry: downloads, supply & demand, competition from video games, all of the above. Whatever you want to call it, the international music industry has changed and the state doesn’t get it. Meanwhile, Louisiana continues to produce some of the world’s best and most interesting music.

But don’t expect the state to fix things anytime soon. Instead of building upon the more than a decade of work that Chairman Ellis Marsalis fostered, the current folks at the LMC continue on their “rebuilding” path by starting from scratch and proceeding at a snail’s pace.

I also learned that nobody at the state’s entertainment office has access to any of the voluminous paperwork we generated in our 13+ years of running the Louisiana Music Commission. The people in charge don’t even know where the ring binders are that hold the reports, plans and the printed version of the (defunct) website. So, again, here is the comprehensive report covering 1992 to 2003, a summary version (bullet text and easy to read) and our last Strategic Plan. And of course anyone can view the old website by visiting Archive.org and typing “louisianamusic.org” into the Internet Wayback Machine.

I know I’m boring some of you with this stuff. But the fact remains that you can’t just erase what we did; and, I won’t let the opinions of openly hostile, manipulative people be the only version of history. I know what I did and I know what we did. And it’s far more than anyone is doing now.

The State of Louisiana continues to neglect its responsibility to nurture our precious music legacy. Our musicians deserve better.