So, I've got this idea for a new program and I'm pitching it to the radio stations around the country. It's basically a new twist on an old idea (what isn't, right, Solomon?). You've seen these shows on PBS where artists teach painting and paint landscapes in, like, thirty minutes? Well, I want to do the same thing with albums. Each day, on each show, I demonstrate to the audience how to write, compose, record, produce and market an album of a different genre. Rock music, country music, polka music, easy listening, jazz, you name it, we're going to do it. It will be awesome!
I'm calling the show In Front of the Music.
Okay, I know, I know, expressing the nuances of marketing in the music industry over the radio, using only audio, will be complicated. My idea, though, is to record the marketing process and to have real industry hard-hitters narrate like the producer's commentary on DVDs.
You're probably wondering where I got this idea. Well, I'll tell you. I spent about four years pitching the world's first radio landscape painting show, called Talking Pictures. Radio producers just don't have vision, however, and they weren't able to picture how painting could work over audio alone. This lack of vision in radio as a whole eventually discouraged me, and I gave up on that dream. Then, one day, it hit me: Why not do something more sound-centric and less sight-centric. What art form is sound-centric? Well, according to our market research, the art form people associate most with sound and radio is music. So, we redesigned the whole show from the ground up.
The primary conceptual hurdle we're getting over now with the broadcasting companies is the idea that it's possible to accomplish what we hope to accomplish in thirty minutes. It seems to me, however, that all you need is a technique you can follow each time, like the PBS oil painters use. So, I developed a technique I call "LANDSCAPE". I wanted it to be an acronym, but I couldn't think of good words for all the letters. In this technique, each major activity in the album recording and marketing process becomes a different landscape element. The writing might be the blue you paint on first for the sky and water. The recording might be the mountains in the distance. The production might be the triangular pine trees you paint with a palette knife. I don't know. I don't have it all worked out yet.
Anyway, I'm jazzed! This show is going to be wicked awesome! Watch out Howard Stern and Garrison Keillor. Working together, you two have held a death grip on the radio program industry for too long. We're bustin' through, boys!
In Front of the Music! Listen. Learn. Who knows? The next album you buy may just be your own!
Later. Love.
