Sex 'n Drugs 'n Corporate Hospitality

Hairy Homer

I'm fat, bald and 40. Most of my music collection is on vinyl, not because I like ASEEEED dance music (I don't) but because it was bought before the CD became the default means of selling music.

I don't watch Top of the Pops any more (haven't for decades) and I only occasionally make time to watch the Jools Holland show or whatever it's called now. Most of the acts I ever wanted to see, I've seen already or are dead. I'm quite happy with my collection of Deep Purple, Genesis and Emerson Lake & Palmer records. Yet I can now go to more headline gigs than ever, even though I'll be running the risk of bumping into my kids there soon. Why?

Corporate bleeding hospitality.

As a middle ranking executive I have to 'suffer' as part of my daily grind the attentions of obsequious business associates trying to worm their way into my good books. Usually this takes the form of their enquiring whether I've had a nice weekend. (Like they think I think they care) Then come summer and Christmas in come the invites to 'Major Events' usually the sort of things that I wouldn't dream of paying to see myself in a million years.

Like Robbie bloody Williams. Did anyone over the age of 25 pay to see that pile of poo themselves? Not counting those unfortunates who had to pay to get their teenybopper daughters (along with boyfriend escort) into Lansdowne Road.

I received two personal invitations myself. (declined politely of course) Just about everybody I work with headed along on somebody else's dime. Some were even put up in a plush Ballsbridge hotel so they wouldn't have to suffer the stress of booking a taxi all the way out to.... Donnybrook or Cabra.

Poor dears. Sipping sherry before getting down to some gentle slam dancing to the sound of 'Let me entertain you' does take it out of one.

Is this what Rock and Roll has become? Are punters now merely the pawns of some corporate sugar daddy who reckons that the memory of burning your fingers with a lighter during 'Angel' will somehow make you more likely to buy your rubber bands and paper clips from Office Supplies Ltd as opposed to Office Solutions Inc? (All those matches and Robbie still walked away uncharred. Why?)

What about the real fans? I know there are such people. That gig was advertised over a year ago. Seems like the corporates cynically snaffled a lot of the tickets, (probably for a song) thereby driving up the apparent price for the kids or their poor long suffering parents on the basis that what is scarce is expensive.

And could the corporates fill all the places they felt they needed? Could they hell. What 30-something with a brain, a modicum of taste and even a vague memory of what gigs used to be all about, would want to spend their evening gyrating to that talentless, hermaphrodite woofter while remembering not to compromise their dignity in front of important business contacts?

Death to corporate sponsoring of rock gigs. Let Sting make his money from record sales, not from sponsorship by the world's largest PC maker. This remember is the man who had so much money that he didn't realise for years that his agent had taken him for millions.

And let real punters get into gigs for something like a genuine price.

Forty quid to see that jumped up boy-band Puss artist. Bah! Humbug!

bettyboo

Originally posted by Hairy Homer:
I'm fat, bald and 40. Most of my music collection is on vinyl, not because I like ASEEEED dance music (I don't) but because it was bought before the CD became the default means of selling music. GO BACK TO YOUR EIGHT TRACK GRANDAD





[This message has been edited by bettyboo (edited 10-07-2001).]

GreenHell

Yea thats all well and good but can you get me some free tickets

Did you have a good weekend

GreenHell

umm where was the point in quoting everything then not commenting.

Hairy Homer

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by bettyboo:

Originally posted by Hairy Homer:
I'm fat, bald and 40. Most of my music collection is on vinyl, not because I like ASEEEED dance music (I don't) but because it was bought before the CD became the default means of selling music. GO BACK TO YOUR EIGHT TRACK GRANDAD

You can mock. But if you're of the generation that tries to play Bach and Mozart through a mobile phone speaker you ain't got much credibility.


Ba ba ba bongggggg

Ba ba ba bonggggggg

Oh. That must be for me!

[This message has been edited by bettyboo (edited 10-07-2001).]</font>

Lolo

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Hairy Homer:


It I can now go to more headline gigs than ever, even though I'll be running the risk of bumping into my kids there soon. Why?

Corporate bleeding hospitality.
</font>

What I can't understand is why they don't invite corporate heads to gigs that might be a bit more enticing for 30+somethings.