Dammit Zammit: The Weekly Publisher's Warble, August 8

08 August 2011

by Adam Zammit

Coming down... from Splendour... is a long drive.

But with decent drop in ticket sales for what is one of the hottest annual events is probably easily explained by the decline in the number of New South Welshmen (and women for Christsake!) making the trip this year.

Yes, a plane ticket + a $500 festival ticket +...well you know the what else, is a very expensive weekend for the core 18-24-year-old whose parents just sold the investment studio apartment in Potts Point out from under them and sent them off to McDonalds six years too late for work experience.

Times are tough and given the last week of economic data, the moola hoopla ain’t getting any better any time soon.

That’s why it’s great to be in the music industry again. We have had bad news for a goddamn decade already before everyone else. Our hopes have been dashed, smiles wiped off our faces, sand kicked in our eyes, wind knocked out of us and kicked to the curb for so long we’ve stopped singing “What about me” (mainly cause Shannon started singing it) and gotten on with doing what all good Australians do when they are down. Wait for everyone else to fuck up too. Not quite the Tall Poppy syndrome, they get cut down quickly; in this case, greater patience is required.

With any luck, all the excessive venture capital pouring into start ups trying to make the cloud rain gold might slow down just enough for us music types to work out how to seed the fluffy thing ourselves! So what are the upsides to our first recession in 20 years, and a double dip in the uS and Europe? (Forget Asia - Japan’s musical underground is still dangerously attached to The Beatles and South East Asia has been pirating western music so long, it’s more lucrative banging coconut shells together as a Presets cover band in Cambodian backpacker hostels than trying to sell records.

So the good news:

1. More ex pats returning home to mispronounce our names and forget where we met ten years ago, while linkedin-ing the shit out of us and asking us for a job we can’t give them. (Don’t worry Lisa Spunner, your forthcoming EMI exchange program is an exception!)

2. If the USA lose their AAA credit rating, you may be able to get backstage at Coachella or Lollapalooza with a VIP wristband from Big Day Out alone!

3. If Greece, Spain and Italy default on their sovereign debts then surely the Eurovision contest is a frickin’ shoo-in for Australia... if Cadel can beat them in cycling, then that kid who sang Wasabi is an odds on.

4. If all the baby boomer promoters start crashing and burning then Mark Poston, Colin Daniels, Danny Rogers and I would have to be getting a good look in for the Ted Albert lifetime achievement award... if only for our commitment to dressing like 20-year-old graff artists in our late 30’s...surely??

So that’s all gotta make you feel better, although rumours persists Gudinski has lost 16 kgs just dragging Meat Loaf all the way back over here and is fighting fit and not ready to hand over any awards or platitudes to us whippersnappers just yet.

Chin up...or for those struggling with winter weight, all three chins up. When it comes to economic crisis, the rest of the economy can rely on us music folk to show ‘em how to suck it in and bring it on.