Frank Gutch Jr: Daisy House— An A&R Dream

In all my years in music, I never worked for a label.  I wanted to.  But I wanted to work only in A&R.  Artists and Repertoire.  They were the people who found the artists, who were liaison between the artist and label management, who groomed the performers and worked with them on the songs for their albums and maybe just the direction of focus.  I knew a few A&R people in L.A.  They loved it.  They wouldn’t have done anything else.  Most of them, when their A&R gigs ended, got out of the business because it was a sewer everywhere else.  Sales?  The pits.  Promotion?  Real work.  Management?  A path, most of the time, to disaster.  I mean, A&R was where the adventure was.  And is.

Frank Gutch Jr: It Is Catch-UP Time Again, But First, Let’s Talk Petunia (In a Viperly Sort of Way)… Plus Note(s)

I don’t know if it’s music or it is just the way things are and I just miss it all the time, but there is a tsunami of music headed our way and I can’t keep up.  As many videos and songs and albums as I can find, there are mountains awaiting to be discovered on what seems a daily basis.  I don’t know what to do.  I’m drowning and I’m on the freaking shore.  So set yourself.  We are going on a little ride which might be a long one because I am going to pack as much as I can into one column if for no other reason than to ease my conscience.  That’s right.  It bothers me when so many musicians cannot even scratch the surface— the good ones anyway.

Frank Gutch Jr: Before Radio Was Radio, It Was Television (Plus Notes)

In a way.  In a very meaningful way, too.  It changed the world.  More specifically, it changed the United States.  I’m convinced.  I studied it in college.  I have been studying it ever since, though now it is called communications (or do they have some other newfangled name) and includes the Internet and God knows what else.  As much as some of my friends think I was there at the beginning, I was not.  I was there when it was forced to adapt to the new kid on the block, television, though, and I hung on as long as I could.  The idiot box was unfortunately too strong and kicked radio to the curb where it reinvented itself into a provider of music, sports and talk— mostly music.  Without the radio, the music business might have been just another part of the entertainment conglomeration, but for awhile, in spite of the attempts to push it into the background, it ruled the roost.  There were reasons and it was regional, at first, but it did.  More on that later.

Frank Gutch Jr: Brian Cullman, David Bullock, Bill Jackson, and Tom House: People and Stories Behind My Favorite New Music, Plus Notes From the Musical Underground…..

 

I want to tell you about four musicians— people, really— but I don’t know if I can.  Oh, I could tell a few stories, wrangle up some comments and maybe tell you about their music, which is more than likely what I will attempt to do, but I will not be able to really tell you anything about them.  Does a resume ever say anything about the person?  I don’t think so.   But it may be the place to start.

Frank Gutch Jr: My Music Bubbleth Under

It should be no secret by now that when it comes to music I am drawn to the non-hits, the non-charters, and the obscure.  Some of the most beloved music of my past have consisted of  artists and songs only the most avant of the garde have treasured— the Little John & The Monks and the Cargoes and, until their fairly recent deification, the Big Stars.  It started innocently enough— the placement of Jimmy Bowen‘s By the Light of the Silv’ry Moon on radio station KEX‘s Barney Keep‘s playlist, but it was enough.