I read about the following book in February’s Wired and now really want to get it: Rock On, by Dan Kennedy.
McSweeney‘s contributor Dan Kennedy took a job at a big record label in New York so he could rock and roll. Instead, he found himself cross-promoting Jewel with the Lady Schick razor. The decline of the major labels has inspired plenty of rancor, but Kennedy uses it as the basis for a hilarious — and damning — insider’s memoir about how the suits managed to scuttle the ship and pad their expense accounts.
From Amazon:
Kennedy offeres an entertaining explanation of how, after years of stumbling through adulthood, he landed an improbable gig writing and producing ads for Atlantic Records. For a kid who grew up dressing like Gene Simmons each Halloween in the 1970s, this should be a dream job—hobnobbing with rock stars and industry legends while making more money than he ever had before. The trouble is that, by the early 21st century, he finds that Atlantic is more corporate than rock. Kennedy’s run-ins with rock stars involve helping Jewel sell razors and mistaking Duran Duran’s manager for a member of the band. When he’s not inadvertently insulting aging rockers, Kennedy worries incessantly about office politics—whether he’s made a permanent enemy of a co-worker by asking what kind of muffin she’s eating, which executives to greet in the hallway and which to ignore. Kennedy’s style—hilarious, paranoid and vulnerable—captures wonderfully the absurdity of the corporate music industry. Readers will appreciate the many lists that pepper the book, including Inappropriate Greetings and Salutations for Middle-Aged White Record Executives to Exchange: #1. Hello, Dawg.
If this book interests you, check out this post from Kevin’s Meandering Mind, in which the blog”s author gives a short (favorable) review of Rock On and then includes an email exchange between himself and Dan Kennedy.