Archive for December 2009
Murder Most Cowell – or, Why the RATM Christmas campaign is a big load of nonsense
By Mat Morrisroe of Culture Karma
You either love or hate The X Factor. I love it. It gets me booing like I’m at a pantomime, extolling my “expert” views on A&R much more fluidly than in the pub and swearing more when I stub a toe. I also have to admit that Simon Cowell is one of my heroes. In my first day in my first proper job, I had to take some photocopies into his office. Noticing that he hadn’t met me before, Simon invited me in, told me to sit down and chatted to me. I was a nervous wreck on my first day and very much appreciated this – not everyone was as supportive or as welcoming. It may have been cheesy but he ended the conversation by telling me that “I started in the post room and you’re already a level above that. You’ll be my boss in 10 years time.”
Thirteen years later I’m clearly not his boss, but I’ve followed his work and tried to apply some of his thinking to mine, with some success (I think anyway). Simon doesn’t care about cool and he always seems to know what he doesn’t know. This allows him to operate in areas that the music industry as a whole wouldn’t consider, and to think about different ways to reach his audience. Now that both musicians and critics have been forced to take a more realistic view of forming partnerships with brands, you could argue that the music business is coming round to Simon’s way of thinking. Hallelujah! I tell you all this so you know my biases before I get into the point of today’s blog.
You may have noticed a Facebook campaign to make Rage Against The Machine’s Killing In The Name this year’s Christmas Number One. This is their mission, as taken from Facebook:
“Fed up of Simon Cowell’s latest karaoke act being Christmas No.1? Me too… So who’s up for a mass-purchase of the track KILLING IN THE NAME from December 13th (DON’T BUY IT YET!) as a protest to the X-Factor monotony?”
Now, I can see why many may think this is Karma-positive. Obviously an artist with such passion performing alternative rock and, you know, using the actual ‘F’ word must be superior culturally than someone who has just won a talent competition? Well guess what? I reckon it’s an epic Karma fail. Read the rest of this entry »
