Sony's Payola exposed

[wmansir]

Payola Shocker: J-Lo Hits, Others Were 'Bought' by Sony (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,163537,00.html)

Spitzer released a bunch of internal Sony/BMG memos detailing who got paid, what they got, and who's hits were bought.

For Example, here's an Epic Records internal email: "Two weeks ago, it cost us over 4000.00 to get Franz [Ferdinand] on WKSE. That is what the four trips to Miami and hotel cost . . . At the end of the day, [David] Universal added GC [Good Charlotte] and Gretchen Wilson and hit Alex up for another grand and they settled for $750.00. So almost $5000.00 in two weeks for overnight airplay. He told me that Tommy really wanted him to do it so he cut the deal."


Here (http://www.oag.state.ny.us/press/2005/jul/jul25a_05.html)'s the NY AG's press release with the documents attached (PDF). Maybe the boys will recognize some names.

[TreeFortRichard]

Look I used the search and found this :) This was covered on primetime live tonight. They had the drummer from Semisonic, the band that sang Closing Time. It was revealed that the record company paid shit loads to get this song to #1. One of the record companies spent $800,000 in one year to get airplay. The breakdown was incredible. They had a former infinity PD who received some ridiculous amount of money to play songs, but claims it went to the companies bottom line and not his pockets...All in all there was a huge scam going on for years, and half of the bands/songs they named were songs that i thought really sucked and always wondered why they were so popular...Interestingly enough i didn't see a single 'rock' song mentioned....

[Evilpete]

payola!!!! waddle doodle!! they had to have the greaseman on if they were talking about payyyola!!!

but seriously, this stuff has gone on for so long it realyl isn't that much of a story to me. Instead of coke, its trips to concerts.

[mendoman1]

How long have we been saying that it's not downloading music that's killing the industry, but totally shitty bands?

So, every time we turned on terrestrial radio and thought "how can they keep playing this shit?" we now know why. There's a commercial running on one of the tv music networks for a band called "Action Action". I've never heard of this shitty band but I knew immediately that this was another case of promoting the lowest common denominator.

Can you all think of bands or songs that eventually rocketed up the charts without any rhyme or reason? Here's a few I can think of:

Sugar Ray - well documented that the band was PENNILESS after their rise to the top due to owing shitloads to the record company for promotional cost.

Smash Mouth
Fall Out Boy
Sum 41
Limp Bizkit

And old school song:

"We Built This City" - Starship