That's right, I finally retired from the horrible music business that I devoted 38 years of my life to. It's been a long time coming. I haven't enjoyed playing for audiences since the late 80s. I plugged along, though, having in mind that I was just paying my dues - being sure I was going to get my shot at the next level. Well, it never happened. I've watched the music business - from top to bottom - deteriorate right before my eyes. In the old days, it was difficult, because most record executive types wouldn't know a good artist or band if it came up and kicked the in the teeth. The fact is, bands and artists "made it" in spite of the record labels, not because of them. I once had a guy - Jon DeMello - record executive in Hawaii, tell me, right there on a talk radio show, "What you musicians don't understand is, most of the artists we sign don't even recoup the money we spend on promotion". Well, hell, anybody in any job with that kind of track record would not be in business for very long. It's different in the music business, though. At the very top of the food chain, where money and status buys high powered publicists, complete with psychologists who advise these record company numbskulls how to trick people, who to trick, how to manipulate young minds, and desperate minds, and it works well for them. I'm sure it would work better if they would actually sign real artists, but from all I've seen, it will never happen. The result is that we will never see any more artists with the talent of Elvis, Jerry Lee, Hank, Johnny Cash, The Who, Led Zeppelin, and many others. These self serving, egotistical imbeciles have gone even further, making damn sure they lock any talented artist out to the best of their ability. Every once in a while, one does slip through the cracks (see Lady Gaga), but for the most part, what we must endure on mainstream TV, radio, downloading, streaming, and in concert, are a bunch of no talent blockheads who are so full of themselves that they can't even see how ridiculous they look, and sound, or why they were signed in the first place. The early 80s were about the end of the road for any talent to be put out for us to listen to.
Well, I'm on to my new adventure. I guess I better not say what it is, because with all the gaslighting I've lived through in my life, I figure whoever was screwing with me before will surely do their damnedest to stifle anything I might try to do - short of working at Walmart - which will never happen. On that, Google has buried me, and YouTube (owned by Google), has buried me, so...
My new adventure sounds like a million times more fun than sitting in front of a bunch of unappreciative people whose main objective seems to be to make me feel like some kind of vagrant. Nice try, people, I will never doubt me, nor will I feel bad about anything I've done. I retire from music knowing that I did everything right, and that I had some amount of talent. I know I had the stuff to have gotten a shot - beyond that, well, I'll never know. That part will probably eat at me till I drop dead, but that's the way of the world. So, on to new horizons, new exhilaration, new challenges, new experiences.
Later, people.
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