Joined: 04 Nov 2003 Posts: 886 Location: SF Bay Area
Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 10:20 am Post subject:
Woody, I appreciate your frustration. I too have funds out on PayPal for the live CD. But when I went into this, I realized that I was not dealing with Amazon.com but an individual artist without the full blown marketing infrastructure. It could have been the pre-PayPal days where you just send in a check and wait for someone to get around to sending out a copy. When I ordered a copy of Hil's CD it was a similar thing. The order seemed to fall in a black hole. I sent an e-mail and didn't get a response right away. But I realize that she is just one person, trying to eek out a living in a very tough business, and might be overloaded. Actually, I have mutual friends and could have gotten hold of her if it was that critical. but having many friends in that "sideman to the stars" catagory, I realize what they are going though and how limited they are in resources. I eventually got a very nice appologetic note from Hil and then the CD came a few weeks later with some extra trinkets tossed in.
Closer to home, the Ojai clinics are another example. A totally loose and amateur get together. It is really fortunate that everybody really appreciates the efforts Anne and Robben go through to make Robben available to us for a day of sharing music. And that no one has wrecked it for the rest. Our own RoadWarrior is a professional at such logistics and knows all the in's and out's. Promotion, contracts, liability, registration, payment set ups, internet, ect... The large scale folks who hire her can afford a professional and to support all the overhead that comes with putting on a big production. Getting 35 folks into a room 3 times a year is a bit smaller undertaking. And doesn't produce the income that would support all that professional overhead. So Anne and Robben do it by themselves. And we mail checks in with handwritten registration forms, rather than put our Visa numbers into an online registration site. I for one, would rather than money go to them, than pay for convienent overhead.
How many folks have a box of CD's that they produced themselves and sell at gigs? And if you find a way to get hold of them, you can work out getting them to put one in the mail for you.
So if Mike Landau wants to produce some live recordings himself, and try to set up someway of distributing them that doesn't involve Amazon or whoever, I will deal with the reality of how he manages that. I believe there is too much made of this sense of "entitlement" these days. Folks seem to think the world revolves around their expectations and desires. And that just because they can see a way things can be, that is the way that they should be. Everyone is different. One person's right is another persons enigma, they don't see it at all.
I don't mean to attack anyone personally, it's a current cultural thing. "I deserve to be happy and pampered in my relationship","I deserve a great paying job that doesn't stress me out", "Why won't Howard Dumble build little nobody me an amplifier just as good as Robben's for a reasonable price?", and on and on.
I'll leave this with a quote I saw from Louis Rukesyer once: "Never presume malice where incompetence will suffice". Meaning, Mike is not a lowlife cheat, he's just better at playing guitar than he is at running a CD distribution business. _________________ There are no such things as wrong notes, there's only the look on your face.
My Stuff: www.stevekirbymusic.com
Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 11:02 am Post subject: More on
Steve , though i have no concern in this (I don't like to pay with internet, i'm kinda ol' fashioned stubborn guy even a little paranoid) i think your arguments are a little low budget. Prince started this way back , and he succeeded.
I , too have my own personnal story : when i decide to be an univibes Reader i ordered the whole collection + the CD's + the current annual price
then i sent a check (in euros , i liked that a lot) . Then Black Hole , so i mailed him 3 or 4 times (really upset) and three months later i 've got an E-Mail explaining me he was gone doing Hendrix investigations during 3 months and he was doing it all alone ,and he got my mails and i received my BIG package. He is just a Terminal fan making a living out of that or this (let me know).And he does it very well .
I am not gonna crie over Artists , give me a break . I don't think Hil, or Mike Landau( just look his studio business) or Robben are starving and internet is their last issue to get a decent living. Don't mix it all over please , Robben is doing clinics with the help of his wife, great , that's fine with me and i'm sure they're very pleased to do it in that way : not far from their house, using the women's building from the village (almost an historic monument, easy to rent), i was more wrecked comin' from San Francisco than Robben ...
That kind of incompetence doesn't imply any malice at all it just implies a lot of about being bored to death for the others(and i want my money back).
I hope he is not being trapped in the "artiste maudit" concept, like : oh i am
a very confidential musician , a few people knows my music, Tales from the Bulge is gonna be a collector so i'm gonna do this myself. One thing is to play à la Hendrix (& with muchos sentimientos), one other is to do average things. I don't think jimi alive would have start an internet connection (but that's another story). i don't mean to attack u personally too but the way u look at it makes feel like you've missed something . Just try to forget you know people in the bizness that might help you or you understand them and get back on the average street point , like said Woody , imagine a teenager saving money to get Cd's from God .............
Better go in Tower records ..................All of this being writed while listening to Burning Water _________________ http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_music.cfm?bandID=147748
Joined: 09 Feb 2005 Posts: 197 Location: San Jose Ca.
Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 12:03 pm Post subject: CD sales
If you're going to do something, do it at a professional level, or get a team of people that know how to do it, or you're going to upset the very people you want supporting you. To do what he is trying to do (CD sales and marketing) takes more time and energy than playing does, so he might want to look at the Steve Vai blueprint for success in this area.
If Landau cannot handle the CD business on his side, he should just stop selling them through his website, it's just that simple. Other than that it's just ripping people off, intentional or not. There are other channels for him to use than Amazon : Audiophile Imports, Abstract Logix, Guitar 9... or he could let somebody else handle his website.
But by just letting things as they are, that is giving him a bad reputation which he certainly does not deserve, but he is the only one who can change that.
Joined: 23 Jan 2004 Posts: 262 Location: Las Vegas
Posted: Tue May 17, 2005 8:38 pm Post subject:
The power of the people! You all make very valid points to me. My hole privet working life is big business, I have to keep it together.
I ordered "Live 2000" and "Bulge" from his sight about 2 years ago. I sent 2 -- $20.00 bills to his PO box, I do not recommend this!! Money order is the best IMHO!!! I got my disks in 4 weeks, that is my experience.
I would fix this if I could, I hope he gets some good people to man his CD sales, or gets a good connection to Pay Pal. I want to buy about 3 sets of his next live or studio release, from him.
Robben Ford, and Michael Landau are gurus for me. I worship the guitar, and music.
Joined: 29 Jan 2004 Posts: 1504 Location: Methuen, MA
Posted: Thu May 19, 2005 6:01 am Post subject:
Rainmaker,
I've been trying to unload my Live 2000 cds, and I'll gladly send them to you for free. Send me a pm with your mailing address. I've tried to listen to it twice, and I just can't get through it. It's way too slow and boring for me. Perhaps it's one of those shows that you had to be there in person to appreciate.
I bought this cd as an intro to Michael Landau, but it failed miserably. Any recommendations on a cd that would show me what he's really about?
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