Kevin,

I can't tell you. I imagine it has to do with the promotion budgets of newer artists. Radio is only one part of strategy's to launch new artists. There are hundreds of things going on that cost a lot of money. There are full page trade magazines ads, promotional tours, billboards, television and radio commerical time. On a modern mainstream release, it is about 60-70% of the budget it tied up in promotion.

So this might be an overall way to spend less money on new artists. If you just play oldies, you don't have to deal with some of the modern problems. The same as putting money into the development of Rock Band and Guitar Idol, takes money away from the new development budgets of artists.

Everything about the music business is about issues other than the music. For every step you think of about writing, recording, performances, etc. there are fifty that have to do with orginization, promotion, money, etc. And as hard as people will find this to believe, it has been that way since the Big Band Era in the 30's-40's. It just gets bigger business.

I can't tell you what is going to turn out. But I was with a producer friend of mine last night. He works for Disney, and has done some VERY big projects. He is out of projects in a couple of months and doesn't know what is going to happen. Everybody in the music industry is really worried. In their eyes, labels are going to shut down, radio is going to end. Of course it won't, but the way it has done business sure will. But mechanicals are going to end. That means songwriters are about to lose all sources of income.

We saw this coming a long time ago with downloading but thought we could fight it. I don't know that we can now. My friend thinks that music is going to be made free. Artists will derive their source of revenue totally from touring, and merchandising which of course ends money to writers completely. Which is why you see more artists writing all their own stuff and allowing no outside cuts. I heard this same thing about 12 years ago with some tech guys represented in the industry, I have heard it in the halls of Congress, I have heard it echoed throughout the world through the Internet.

You have to look at all of this in a broader perspective. The Ellen show. Refusal of governments everywhere simply refusing to comply with any laws whatsoever. A generation of people who have expected and gotten music for free. The Internet which has increased the amount of people trying to get into the game who are giving everything away for free. Radio that completely gives up on formats due to loss of advertising revenue. All of this pile on and pile on where there simply isn't much of a record business anymore.

What to do? Get used to less or no money, do it for the love of it. Find and build fan base on a more local and regional levels. I think sooner or later pretty much every one is going to come to that conclusion. Many of us here have just come to it sooner.

MAB