Ongoing History of New Music

On the afternoon of October 1, 1982, Sony introduced a new home stereo gizmo… it was the world’s first compact disc player… they called it the CDP-101… Weird name, but if you take it apart, it makes sense…”CDP” stands for “compact disc player…and “101” is binary notation for the number 5…that’s because the head of the audio division considered this first model to be in the middle of Sony’s future lineup of cd players…so “5” on a scale of one to ten, I guess… Sony had been working on compact disc technology with a Dutch company called Philips for a number of years, which released their own machine, the cd100, about a month later… Compact disc technology was rolled out worldwide in march 1983…and for the next seventeen years, the recorded music industry experienced a boom unlike it had ever seen before…music fans were convinced to buy all their favourite albums again…and as the popularity of vinyl and cassettes waned, the cd became the currency of the realm… And lo, it was good…insane amounts of money were made year after year after year… But nothing lasts forever and in about 2000, the bloom started to come off the cd rose…and now, cd sales are in a total free-fall as streaming becomes the way most people access music… The compact disc isn’t dead yet, but it’s never going to be the juggernaut it once was…what happened?...and how?...it’s actually a fascinating story… This is the rise and fall of the CD… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It runs in the family…like father, like son (or mother like daughter…or some variation of that)…the apple never falls far from the tree… All these sayings have something to do with some sort of hereditary characteristics or learned abilities passed down from parent to child… I suppose if you grow up in a creative household, something is gonna run off, whether it be something in your genes or just because of what goes on around you as you’re growing up… Take the case of Patrick Schwarzenegger, son of Arnold…not only has he done some acting, but he’s got a clothing company called #project360 that donates a chunk of profits to charity… Duncan Jones is the son of David Bowie…he’s a really good film director…Sasha Spielberg is the daughter of Stephen and Kate Capshaw…she’s become quite the screenwriter…Ben Stiller is the son of Jerry Stiller…most people know Jerry as George’s father on “Seinfeld”… What about music?...Johnny Cash and daughter Roseanne…Billy Ray, dad of Miley Cyrus…Norah Jones is the daughter of Ravi Shankar….Jason Bonham is the son of Zep drummer John…he’s not only been in a bunch of bands of his own, but he’s sat in for his dad on drums a couple of times when Jimmy Page and Robert Plant needed someone to keep time… Okay, this is fun…how many other parent-sibling combinations can we name—if we just focus on the world of alt-rock…sounds like it’s time to make a list… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Every industry has its own language…think about what it’s like to be a doctor and all the terms and phrases you must learn if you’re going to communicate with your patients and other medical professionals…what’s the difference between and otolanryingolist and a nephrologist?...iatrogenic and idiopathic?...hypotension and hypertension?... What if you’re working in the world of finance?…you need to know about things like “shorts” and “yield curves” and my favourite, “ebidta”—earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization… Or maybe you’re a coder…think of all the jargon you use when you’re working on a project… I have a list of coder slang in front of me…I’m told these are real terms used in that world… “rubber ducking is a discussion with other engineers to solve a problem…a “jimmy” is a new and clueless new member of the team…and a “hydra” is a bug that can’t be fixed because every time you try something, two or more new bugs pop up… So you see what I’m saying about jargon and a language created by the people who work in a certain area… This applies to the music industry…and if you’re not familiar with the terms that are always thrown about, you might excluded, out of the loop, or a little dumb… I’ll say it again: that’s wrong…and you shouldn’t be afraid to ask what some of these terms mean…that’s brings us to part two of our music industry glossary… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Maybe it was the first time you saw your favourite musical. Maybe they played a set list that you thought was perfection. Maybe you were front and centre and the singer crowd surfed right over your head! So sure...an absolutely legendary gig! But what about those gigs that redefined alt-rock? Those concerts or shows that stand out as legendary for what came after them? The bands they inspired or the lasting legacy of that show on the audience? Well we're going take a look at 8 of them and try to explain why they are so legendary in the history of alt-rock Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I’m really bad with jargon…I hate it…jargon is by its very nature exclusive…if you don’t know the language, don’t know the codes, don’t know the usage rules, then you’re locked out of the discussion… I remember one financial guy who wanted to talk to me about a retirement savings plan…and his schpiel went something like this: “When it comes to diversification of your asset classes, consider taking out some warrants on pink sheet stocks on the vix, backing them up with shorts on fang stocks for a few months before rebalancing your portfolio through dollar-cost averaging”…I have no idea what I just said… Now let’s switch to music…if you do any exploring of how the music business works, you inevitably run into words that seem important, but you don’t know what they mean…you could ask, but then it might show that you’re, err, lacking in knowledge… “Newbie!...ignoramus!...rookie!”…no one wants that, so you just keep it to yourself…no one wants to be made fun of…and if someone does deign to explain things to you, there’s always the risk that they’ll be condescending…so you say to yourself “I’ll figure it out…eventually…I hope”… But that’s not right…music should be for everyone…if you’re interested in how things work with the recorded music industry, your curiosity should be rewarded…and that’s what we’re going to do right now…this is an audio glossary of music industry terms…and once we’re done, you’ll be able to converse with the best of them… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Back in 2007, Trent Reznor did something a little different with the release of "Year Zero". He essentially created a game...a mystery...a unique marketing campaign. This was an incredibly complex campaign with clues buried all over the world.  Basically all of this was done because Trent was bored. He wanted to shake things up with his music, his concerts, his fans...and with his image.  This is the story behind Year Zero Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A band is like a plant…stay with me on this…like a plant, a band grows from seeds to maturity, bursts for with new seeds and then eventually withers and dies…it’s the cycle of life, you know?... But like plants (or animals or any other living thing), the lifespan of bands varies greatly…you could last as long as rehearsal—kinda like, what, a dandelion?…or you might find yourself on some kind of 50-year-anniversary tour—the equivalent of a bristlecone pine tree that can live as long as 5,000 years… Okay, I think we’ve tortured this metaphor long enough… Then we have bands that form, rise to a peak, hit something of a downhill slope, and break-up, only to reform again for—well, there could be any number of reasons…and this leads into completely new second act…and thus things begin again—and maybe even under better circumstances than anyone thought possible… Let’s do a case study…let’s have a specific band deconstruct their journey from formation to breakup to reunion…this is the history of Alexisonfire—in their own words… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There are a lot of songs about Murder...but what about actual events where there are real killings involving real personalities in music?Well we've gathered a bunch. Actions are motivated by jealousy or sex or fear or revenge or anger...or someone just gets very unlucky. And in the end...someone ends up dead! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There was nothing particular special about April 8, 1994…I came to work as usual, saw the usual people, and prepared for my radio show in the usual way…I made note that the Toronto Blue Jays were playing a sold-out home game…one of the stories in the news was that American troops were upset about a smoking ban that had come into effect on some military bases…that was about it… But at about 1:45—fifteen minutes before airtime—Anita, who was working in the newsroom—popped her into the studio… “Just a heads-up,” she said, “something’s going on in Seattle…it looks like it has something to do with Kurt Cobain”… If I’m honest, most of us were prepared for some bad news…we knew that Kurt had his issues…his health problems…his heroin addiction…his crazy marriage to Courtney Love…the canceled European tour…and, of course, an apparent suicide attempt in a Rome hotel room about a month earlier… Still, all that was abstract, gossip, stories in magazines…but over the next 90 minutes, everything resolved into harsh, terrible, awful, reality… If you were around then, you probably remember exactly where you were and what you were doing when you heard the news… it was one of those rare, rare moments, the same sort of thing felt with the assassination of John Lennon on Monday, December 8, 1980, and the death of Elvis on Tuesday, August 16, 1977…. Was that really 25 years ago?...yes, it was…if you were there, let’s revisit things…if you weren’t, here’s how dramatic and sad it was…this is Kurt Cobain, 25 years after he died… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Just because you're a successful musician or are in a band doesn't mean you don't want to try something else. Maybe you want to open up your own side business in something related to music. Maybe it's in a completely different part of the economy.  Whatever the case...you want to try something different while still doing your day-job. In this podcast we look at various side business that musicians have tried over the years. Now granted this show was done a number of years ago, and some of these business may no longer exist, but what it shows is how musicians have taken on more than just touring over the years. These are musicians who moonlight.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices