Johnny Clegg (center) with dancers from his band Savuka, Paris, May 9, 1988.
(Frédéric Reglain/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images)
Johnny Clegg (center) with dancers from his band Savuka, Paris, May 9, 1988.
(Frédéric Reglain/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images)
MUSICREDEF PICKS
Indie Record Store Chaos, The National, Johnny Clegg, Shawn Mendes, Jimi Hendrix...
Matty Karas, curator July 17, 2019
QUOTABLES!
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It is music and dancing that makes me at peace with the world, and at peace with myself.
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If you showed up at an old-school record store—you know who you are—a few weeks ago in search of the new BLACK KEYS album, you may have been in for a rock and roll disappointment. The Keys' LET'S ROCK is among a slew of albums that have had trouble finding their way into indie record stores by street date in recent months. The problem, according to an open letter to major labels from stores around the country including AMOEBA, WATERLOO, ROUGH TRADE and NEWBURY COMICS, is that the three majors as well as some large indie distributors are all, for the first time, using the same fulfillment company to ship product. And that company, DIRECT SHOT, based in Franklin, Ind., is overwhelmed, the retailers say. Sometimes streamlining and efficiency work better in theory than in practice. Some titles are missing release date by weeks if not months, some are getting sent to the wrong store or in the wrong quantity, artists are showing up for in-stores with no product to sell—and the retailers can't get anyone on the phone. Catalog titles are going missing, too. BILLBOARD reports that a number of other factors are contributing to a chaotic situation in which, as one store owner told the magazine, "customers are losing confidence that we will have the music they want." The labels and Direct Shot are working on solutions, and there are conflicting numbers as to whether business is actually declining. But the retailers write that "extensive harm has already been done: lost sales, lost customers and lost confidence," and they're asking for a solution in "weeks," not months. Physical product is obviously not the future of this or any other media industry. But it seems odd, in an environment where labels, publishers and artists all say there's more profit in physical, and all have deep-seated complaints about streaming economics, that the labels aren't bringing their A games to milk whatever's left of the physical economy. Has the very idea of shipping a Black Keys CD or vinyl record turned into a dark art? Did the institutional knowledge of physical distribution wither away? Do distributors and fulfillment houses still have phones? And phone service? Will AMOEBA MUSIC in LA have BEYONCÉ's LION KING soundtrack on Friday? Can we be as sure of that as we can be sure that the ARCLIGHT across the street will have the movie that day?... If you want to understand what it means to immerse yourself in, and contribute to, a culture rather than appropriating it, you could do worse, a lot worse, than study the life of JOHNNY CLEGG, who died Tuesday at age 66. He was a white, Jewish Briton who moved with his family to South Africa when he was 6. And who became obsessed, inside and out, with a culture that wasn't his birthright and that was all but illegal for him to interact with under apartheid laws. His life, both onstage and in academia (he was a university professor), was a collaboration with that culture, a fight *for* the culture and a nonstop journey of music, dance, politics and discovery. And one of the 1980s' unlikeliest pop hits. RIP... Documentaries on R. KELLY, MICHAEL JACKSON and the FYRE FESTIVAL are all nominated for EMMYS, along with BEYONCÉ, PAUL MCCARTNEY and (going for an EGOT) BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN... R. Kelly's lawyer actually told a judge Tuesday, "There’s no evidence that he’s a risk to minors at all at this point." There's an Emmy-nominated documentary, though, which has a lot to do with why he was in court and why he's now being held without bail... WOODSTOCK 50 is one step closer to not happening... "OLD TOWN ROAD" is two weeks away from being the longest-charting #1 single ever. Pop still working in mysterious and magical ways.

Matty Karas, curator

July 17, 2019