Fleetwood Mac singer complains the Internet has made it impossible for new bands to make it these days, and that if they don’t have a hit single their record label will drop them.
Fleetwood Mac singer Stevie Nicks made some interesting comments to the NY Daily News a few days ago in which she blasted the Internet for having “destroyed rock” and the apparent “social graces” of young children.
“The Internet has destroyed rock. Children no longer develop social graces. They don’t hang out anymore,” she says.
I’m not sure what one has to do with the other, but she goes on to suggest that the Internet has made it harder than ever for bands to be successful because record labels are quick to drop those that don’t come up with a lucrative hit single.
“I’m financially stable,” she continues. “I’m okay. But what about the kids trying to make it in this business? If you’re not an established band, if you don’t have a hit single, they’re gonna drop you.”
That may be the case, but isn’t it also possible that the Internet’s allowing bands to take control of their own work? The Internet has put the power of distribution back into the hands of artists where it belongs. Giving bands greater control can will hardly “destroy rock” as we know it.
“There are a lot of people out there as talented as we were, but they can’t sustain being in a rock ‘n’ roll band for long without success,” she says. “We were able to, but we’re going to die out.”
How many bands can say they’ve enjoyed the kind of success that Fleetwood Mac has? Most bands don’t and never will. That’s just the nature of the business. Even if CD sales were what they used to be, that’d still only put $23.40 in the hand of each artist for every $1,000 in music sold. That’s hardly “sustainable” unless you have the luck and talent to make repeated hit singles.
With the number of albums produced since 2000 having more than doubled to 79,695 just seven years later, it’s hard to make the case that anything is in danger of being “destroyed” by the Internet. On the contrary, the Internet, and P2P in particular, has given artists the power to put their works in the hands of music fans where it belongs.
Artists like 50 Cent and Wale see the Internet as important way to get their music out there, and don’t see it as some sort of ominous threat that Stevie Nicks seems to think it is.
I think Nicks is just sad that the Internet has changed the world so dramatically. It may have ruined the “social graces” of children, but it certainly hasn’t “destroyed rock.”
Stay tuned.
[Hat Tip]
All she is trying to say is that the music industry has changed, looked at the big drop in music sells since the 90′s . Albums that sell 70,000 copies in one week are now sitting on top of the billboard charts, these albums wouldnt have even cracked the top 10 back then. We don’t listen to whole albums anymore, we grab songs off the internet and miss the true feeling an artist is trying to convey. Not to mention all the music that is stolen from these artist that they get no compensation for. Don’t think she doesnt know what she is talking about she has been making albums since 1973. Her latest album In Your Dreams sold 52,000 copies in its first week and landed her at number 6 on the billboard charts in May 2011. Compare that to some of her other albums first week sells and where they landed on Billboard. 1981 Bella Donna 300,000 debuted at #1, 1983 The Wild Heart 225,000 debuted at #5, 2001 Trouble In Shangri-la 110,000 debuted at #5. 1994 Street Angel 40,000 debut at #45, hell 40,000 would put her in top 10 today, and those sells were considered a big flop for her back in 1994. The music industry is not the big money maker it use to be, which means less money to promote new bands.
Artists should not worry about competition. If you can create good music, we are more than willing to buy the original CD. We will even act as prosumers. The Internet has brought music to millions. It has widened the scenario. So stop cribbing and start playing.
YOU ASSHOLES DONT KNOW GREAT TALENT IF IT BIT YOU ON THE ASS. SHES SECCEFUL BECAUCE SHE IS TALENTED. THIERS NOBODY IN THE SAME CLASS AS STEVIE. SHE IS ONE OF A KIND. SO GO FUCK YOUR SELF.
i agree with william bryant you retarts dont know real talent when you hear it, thiers a reason stevie has been around for four decades she is very talented. AND SHE IS THE QUEEN OF ROCK AND ROLL.and i agree with william. SO YOU RETARTS CAN GO FUCK YOUR SELFS
What she means is there’s no more room for extremely dull and uninventive manufactured corporate crap such as the rubbish she put out for years.
Yeah, well good fucking riddance.
And take those fucking screechers Cyrus and Bieber with you, will you?
Shut the fuck up bitch. You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. Go do your cocaine.
So what she says is that in 1980, the video killed the radio star and in 2010, the internet killed the rock star. hmmmm I still see that the music survived.
rock is pretty stagnant nowadays, most of it that my group listens to is from the 80′s & 90′s
oh yeah a burned out uneducated hippie is an expert on internet business models.
Now that these kids don’t have social graces and hang out maybe they’ll stay off my damn lawn….
I’m bothered by her argument that kids nowadays don’t hang out because of the Internet.
Mrs. Nicks: Your High. Kids CAN’T hang out places now. hell, the past decade for that matter. If you’re under 18 in a CD store you’re a thief as far as the proprietor is concerned. the labels and the shops all ignored, condemned or at worst prosecuted the 15-25 year old with disposable incomes demographic.
You think it’s sad that kids are socially maladjusted, because they don’t hang out anymore….
It’s cause everyone else calls it “Loitering”
No, Ms Nicks, the internet hasn’t destroyed rock. Simon Cowell, Pete Waterman and others like them, churning out endless streams of lowest common denominator pap for semi-literate think nothings, have done that.
Popular Culture 2.0: optimised for morons.
Hey she was talented in her time and so are many others but we have all this pop junk that have one hit wonders and are never to be heard again but there are many legendary bands out there that live on. it just shows that record companies dont support bands anymore and they want a larger slice of the pie. (greed) How many of these pop artists are gonna be around in the next 20 or so years and i tell you they are not gonna be, just a faded memory of what once was but if you take a established band like fleetwood mac who have started out in the 60s and have had been going for a long time then you know what im talking about and more over they are not the only established artists around. Do your research
Now that her drug-induced ’70s coma has worn off, she’s realizing much has changed. This ain’t 8-tracks anymore honey!
The Internet: Who the fuck is Stevie Nicks?
you need as many pairs of shoes as Imelda Marcos to fit enough in your mouth for such a deluded point of view. Stevie, please go away!
From “Powder” by Kevin Sampson:
“Music. Business. Two words which should never live side by side. Coming to MGR as a wide-eyed romantic, he was, at first, shocked, then quickly disillusioned by the callous disregard of his colleagues for the talent of their bands…. Only when bands reached lunar earning potential were they given human consideration, and then it was a trade-off. It was all a bid to keep them sweet. At all times, all bands and artists were product and their treatment reflected their marketability.”
She sounds like she spends too much time in front of her Fleetwood Macbook.
The major always dropped you if you don’t have a hit. It has always been engraved in every artist contract I ever saw.
The real question nowadays rather is whether the majors are able to really help new artists making it or not. Personally, I doubt it very much.
lol! “I’m fine, but what about everyone else today?” Er, what about everyone else before as well? What percentage of artists “made it” even before the internet? I note a distinct lack of historical precedent with her argument.
I also note how she forgets how much the major record labels own the artists music after signing in to a “deal”. Is it really so destructive to let artists make a living off of works they not only create, but own full rights to? The ownership rules with major record labels is one of my biggest gripes with them and one of the biggest reasons I would never sign a “deal” with them. It’s almost a sign of general stupidity or lack of foresight today to sign a record “deal” with major record labels.
I also don’t believe in the mythical “hit single” as how artists “makes it”. There is no shortage of artists who produced hit singles that went bankrupt some time later. I recall ATC being one example. The system record labels set up is explicitly designed to destroy artists careers if not immediately, then in the long term. Artists that come out through the system on the other side alive are examples of how the system didn’t work and those examples are few and far between in the grand scheme of things. Before you say it, I’m not saying hit singles are a myth, just the image surrounding it that is clearly shown by this person.
The myth that the internet has devalued music is one that drives me nuts because the record labels did that long before the internet became a hit medium to transfer music. When the artist can’t make music off of a song after a sale because the record deal is skewed in such a way that earns the artist next to nothing off of sales, as far as the artist is concerned, the music holds no value. If you make a sale and you earn nothing as a result, there is no attached value to that sale. If someone else makes all the money off of that sale (record labels), I call that contractual theft.
There’s a reason I distribute my music online for free – I’m not a moron.
Frankly if a band can’t produce ONE good song, maybe they should be pushed aside. Being an artist is great, doing it for a living means making it work for the buyer more than your artistic whims when starting out.
Stupid old crone is probably just mad that she doesn’t know how to use her newfangled netbook.