Bon Jovi Circle

Cover of Lost Highway

How do we want to spin this? That few want Bon Jovi's new music or NBC is in the crapper?

Yes, follow the stories. NBC/Universal may end up being controlled by Comcast. This has got more to do with Vivendi exercising an exit clause than NBC sucking, but the network does. Blame it on Jay Leno at 10 or a general lack of creativity, but the ratings are terrible, the network is far-removed from the leaders of the pack, just like Bon Jovi is far-removed from the audience.

Jon Bon Jovi even did the Actors Studio. I guess it speaks more to the lost credibility of James Lipton than the becoiffed one's lack of a distinguished film career, but still...what's next? Bon Jovi suiting up for the Jets? Or the New England Patriots?

You've got to give us a reason to care. And most people don't anyway. So, you're speaking to your core audience at most, and it turns out these people don't want new Bon Jovi music, they just want to hear that Tommy used to work on the docks.

In case you missed the memo, "Circle", with all its shenanigans, the incredible hype, the $3.99 offer, sold 163,000 copies last week. Which might sound somewhat impressive, since the album debuted at number one, but their 2007 country effort, "Lost Highway", also entered at the top of the chart, yet it sold 292,000 copies! Meaning that even though they were selling out, being crass commercial marketers, going country was a better idea than playing the mainstream game. Sure, sales have dropped in the past two years, but not THIS much!

Bon Jovi got it all wrong. They should have put out ONE song. Woodshed until they got one right. Then licensed this one cut to the NFL or ESPN and had it banged ad infinitum. Most of the NBC hype fell on deaf ears. Today's story is we avoid anything we're not interested in. We had to sit through Bon Jovi on MTV in the eighties, today we flip the channel or surf to another site.

Speaking of sites, Bon Jovi even advertised on CNN!

Who took the band's money? Who is so out of touch with today's market conditions? In a time of upheaval you don't play by the old rules, you revolt and do something completely new. And believe me, lining up with a major TV network is positively last century. That shotgun approach, hit everybody and hope they're interested, leaves you with a ton of wasted impressions, people who don't give a shit.

It's all about the tour. That's where the money is. So, I'd juice up the tour. Whether it be by playing "Slippery When Wet" from start to finish, the only album people truly care about, or creating a live extravaganza like Kenny Chesney's multi-bill stadium shows. Every hair band come back to life! You know the female Bon Jovi audience, the act's main driver, loved Slaughter and Cinderella and Winger and White Lion too...

And where's the online contest? Find the right clues, and you get a song written just for you, the winner!

Where's the promotional tour where you show up at diehard winners' houses? Yup, you compete online and then Jon and Richie show up unannounced, like the Publishers Clearing House, and perform "Wanted Dead Or Alive" in your living room.

And speaking of "Wanted Dead Or Alive"... Where's the live rendition from Phil, from "Deadliest Catch"? With a video to match? This barely alive skipper with a Marlboro habit should be featured, just like the song that leads off this series so well.

In other words, where's the creativity? Shit, Josh Freese got more ink and had more penetration of the public consciousness with one good idea than Bon Jovi achieved playing by the old rules.

Because creativity rules. And when you get to superstar level, the acts are creatively bankrupt. Just playing by the old rules, looking for a paycheck. Even though so many broke the rules in order to achieve their success.

You've got to risk. You've got to take chances. You've got to realize we live in 2009, not 1989.

Used to be music was the cutting edge artistic medium. Then, you had a better chance of seeing present-day reality in "Law & Order" than hearing it on a record album. Shit, "South Park" still takes chances. Why can't Bon Jovi?

The best Bon Jovi bit of the last ten years, eclipsing all of their music, was their interview with Triumph the Insult Comic Dog. Why didn't they have Triumph do their new interview? Make a deal with YouTube to get it on the home page?

As for the album itself... It may trigger a revenue-producing event, but it's a circle jerk between the act and the label. It's about music. Create some music that we truly want to hear, that we can sink our teeth into. Otherwise, it's all just marketing. And you can't sell what the public doesn't want.

Bon Jovi and NBC Universal Team Up For First-Ever Artists In Residence Project: http://www.nbc.com/news/2009/10/15/bon-jovi-and-nbc-universal-team-up-for-first-ever-artists-in-residence-project/

Triumph the Insult Comic Dog: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1z09v_triumph-the-insult-comic-dog-bon-jo_animals

The CMA Opinion

Image via Wikipedia

What kind of crazy screwed up world do we live in where the CMAs are better than the VMAs?

One in which the big winner is an MTV castoff, considered to be too old and too unhip for the mainstream.

No, I'm not talking about Taylor Swift, I'm talking about Hootie! Yup, Darius Rucker!

He may have only won Best New Artist, but he won the evening, he was the only award winner to get a spontaneous standing ovation, for not only his achievement, but the sincerity and honesty of his acceptance speech.

Darius was the anti-Kanye. Without going all Uncle Tom, he spoke of acceptance by the community. Like Nashville and country radio are really going to embrace a faded black rocker from South Carolina? And he thanked his wife and three kids. For being understanding while he was gone, on the road, trying to earn a living. And believe me, that's what it takes. Show me a divorced country singer and you might find evidence of infidelity, but the true breaking point was the absence, the lack of contact, as the performer traipsed around the country, in much less glamorous circumstances than the public believes, hawking himself and his music, just to stay in the game. And Darius thanked Doc McGhee. Isn't it fascinating that Bon Jovi's old manager had Nashville success with a rocker with one tenth the footprint of his old client and Bon Jovi failed miserably in the country sphere? Maybe because Darius Rucker seemed to play by Nashville's rules. Rather than just add a banjo, he focused on songwriting, telling stories, not looking to crash the party so much as gain entrance.

And for all the flash on the VMAs, isn't it honesty and human emotion that truly sells music? Whilst the rappers are beating us over the head, telling us how great they are, in Nashville you lead with your music. Mr. Rucker played by the rules and won. A heartwarming story.

And although hokey, Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood were great hosts. Made me wonder whether musicians should act, play roles, read lines at all, but they made the most of it. Rather than being wooden, they played along with the script, almost seeming to exist outside of it. To the point where you felt like members of your family were on stage performing. And stunningly, since they seem to fail in every awards show in which they're used, their comedy songs were actually funny, and endearing.

The performances?

Too many acts were hyping their next single as opposed to the hit fans wanted to hear. Instead of being a celebration, it was a marketing opportunity.

And then there were strange choices. Why did Zac Brown and his band perform "The Devil Went Down To Georgia"? I expected Charlie Daniels to come out on stage. But he didn't. At least not in the fast-forwarded images that flew by on my screen. You couldn't play "Chicken Fried" or "Toes"?

And there's something about Ronnie Dunn that just bugs me. I guess it's the hair most. How much time and goop did you expend getting it to look like that? And while I'm at it, what's up with Kix Brooks' porn star moustache? Still, they truly rocked. And my buddy Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top sat in with them. Although their regular guitarist got most of the licks. Which is deserving, since he's on the road and the band is expiring. For how long? Who knows? You know the comeback is near...

And speaking of comebacks... How weird is Naomi Judd? Hi-def makes those facelifts unmistakable. And Wynonna, I feel for you, having that mother. But can you spend a little less time in the tanning booth? Or just have them spray on a lighter layer of brown/gold?

Tim McGraw needed a better song.

Miranda Lambert performed better than when I saw her in that club, but "Gunpowder & Lead" was a scorcher, a "Tumbling Dice" with "Rocks Off" speed. "White Liar" may be a single, but it's an album track.

And Carrie, you're lovable, but can you release a different album? The formula is so curdled, even a baby couldn't swallow this milk. How about a down and dirty record about how you really feel. How about a little Loretta Lynn with the gloss.

And speaking of rockers, Dave Matthews got a big ovation sitting in with Kenny Chesney. Dave can't get arrested on MTV, but he does boffo at the b.o., and his fans scooped up more of his new album than that of almost any MTV star. Who's the winner here? Certainly not the flavor of the moment on the VMAs.

And it wouldn't be a CMA Awards show without Kid Rock, who handled himself admirably. But what's up with the seventies sunglasses? Are they coming back?

And I like Lady Antebellum, but who could love them? Their material is so bland. Kind of substandard Brewer & Shipley. But credit Gary Borman. He built them into award winners. And Keith Urban is on a juggernaut!

I guess you're wondering how good the show could have been if I'm making these criticisms.

Yes, too much of today's country is formula, not exceptional.

But at least they're promoting songs. Which you can sing along to, however evanescent they might be.

And Taylor Swift is the entertainer of the year. Not only in country, but America at large. When you're nineteen, and everybody tells you they love you, you're gonna believe them. But they'll forget about you soon if you don't keep working, keep delivering the hits. Her performance of Fifteen was absolutely horrible...where the hell was the Melodyne program last night? That's the reality Hootie spoke of.

And that's the truth.