What? The major recording companies are being investigated for possible shady dealings with radio stations in getting their shitty music played?

Well, DUH.

Like, gee, you never could have seen THAT one coming.

Big Fat Clue: turn on any corporate-owned radio station in any American market today, and you will hear songs by artists on the air because some slimy schmuck indirectly greased all the right palms of the station management.

Ooooh, no, some folks will say, that’s illegal. Record companies can’t pay off stations in cash, goods or anything of that sort.

Wrong, me pilgrims. That’s exactly in the area where recording labels have all of these convenient stooges doing all of that shitwork. They’re known collectively under the dubious moniker of “independent promoters.” A more appropriate term would be “kickback facilitators.” Basically, the promoters get paid fairly big bucks by the labels to promote their chosen limited crop of no-substance losers, and the promo people in turn pay the stations an annual “retainer” to be their, um, sagely advice on what records to put on the respective stations’ playlists. This has become the standard for just about every type of format. Rock, R&B, Rap, Country, you name it. Even oldies stations aren’t free of this shit. For many of those, some dork is probably their “certified golden oldies” promoter (read; providing a list of songs that, e.g., Time-Life is presently regurgitating on infomercials for overpriced CD collections.)

Yes, that type of business in which the music biz participates in every day is basically fucked up. Yes, it does stagnate the variety of music offered by commercial stations. No, it probably won’t change or even slightly improve anytime soon. Although it is nice to see an investigation by the New York Attorney General’s office being carried out, I’m not going to hold my breath.


Here's the latest story about the alleged (not so) New Payola