LIES AND MARKETING

Be careful what you read.


There is an artist who is currently stirring up the music and celebrity media into a froth to publicise her forthcoming album. I will not name the individual, so as not to add weight to her marketing machine, but those in the know, will know exactly who this person is.
What I find fascinating about this person, and the media’s perception of them, is that her entire back story is a lie.

Again we have the leaked stories about how she ‘just uploaded a song onto Youtube and within a week a million people loved it so much, they viewed it’ - the headlines were something in the order of ‘Internet Overnight Sensation’, or the like. Even though it is completely obvious to anyone with even a tiny bit of intelligence that this never happens by accident, the national press still quote this occurrence in their articles as justification for writing the article. It is widely known that Youtube ‘hits’ and Twitter/FB ‘friends’, ‘followers’ & ‘likes’, are all created by the artist’s publicity team, to make it look as if there is a sensation. It happens all the time, not just in the music business, but also in the advertising campaigns of normal everyday household products - a buzz created to make something dull look talked about and consequently worth talking about. Of course this type of advertising is not available to all; only to those with a lot of money.

So here we find our emerging artist, an innocent miss from a trailer park - apparently. Who has just astounded millions of eye and earballs. Despite millions of videos and songs on the internet, millions of souls have found this very video on Youtube and liked it.... come on, let’s look more closely at the back story of this trailer girl... oh there you go, she did live in a trailer park for a year whilst writing songs for this new album. She was studying in a New York University, living in Brooklyn... getting produced by a world famous producer... made an album that no one liked... it was released, didn’t sell and then was deleted... she disappeared and returned with new face and tits... and now the marketing machine really kicks in and she is everywhere: TV, magazines, newspaper, internet news, album reviews, blog, tweets... hmmm. Something does not add up.

The missing piece of the puzzle is this: her dad is a multi-millionaire property investor. Now I get it. Money.. money paid for all this to happen. Money paid a team to make and construct this pop star.

The thing is though, despite the manufacturing process, and the bulldozer marketing, there is a songwriter and performer underneath the silicone and trout-pout. But how do we as ‘elementary’ artists believe in an artist like this? She produces songs that have an appearance of being genuine and she sings as if her heart is really breaking; but how do you relate to a writer from such a privileged position in society? Does she really understand and feel the things she is saying, or like her marketing campaign, is it all just one big lie? She sings “Sometimes love is not enough and the road gets tough” (Born To Die); I don’t for one minute believe she has ever known a tough road (and I mean a really tough road, not a bad day in the recording studio), and if she ever walked along one, it was to see what it felt like before stepping back into a limousine... not really the same thing. Compare this to neilson’s: “Sometimes it seems this road we’re running on just gets longer and longer” (Harry, Lyn & Me) and see which performance is the more believable.

I suppose you may think this is all sour grapes and another no hoper whining about how unfair it all is and how it is the hardest game in the world, forty years man and boy etc. And I suppose it is, but the point of the article is this, when you are not working 8 hours a day, 5 days a week at a menial job, you tend to have a bit of extra time for crafting songs. When doors are opened for you instead of closed in your face, you are more likely to have enough self-worth to keep going despite inner demons. When millions of dollars are spent advertising your new album, how can you fail... so is it about the music, or is it about the money?

So the album is released on Monday, and I bet now that it will be front page of all the download stores - it will be pride of place; she will probably be a guest on one of the chat shows or magazine programmes aired that week; she will have reviews in all the main papers; her product will be placed for all to see; placed there by money. And you have to ask yourself a question, is this very expensive fake worth your attention?

By the way, I do like Born To Die and on first listen I was intrigued. My interest was just soured when I learned the truth. Part of me wishes I was as ignorant as the average man; gloriously happy in my idiocy.