Page 65 - The Westerner Magazine Halloween 2018
P. 65
All the good musicians, producers, You don’t even have to perform live
places to prepare the artists for live anymore. Use whatever it is that you
performances. You have to have the have to create impact.” You have to
artist development going for you or it have this brain trust and create images
doesn’t work. that are bigger than the business. They
don’t do that anymore.
Creating and maintaining product and
artists is a bigger task than people may It does seem that the industry has lost
realize. Do you think modern all of it’s magic—they don’t hype
technology has made it easier? things like they used to.
Today it’s very interesting. It’s different That’s exactly right. The consumer
but you can create your own version. knows it all. They tell you exactly who
Technology can kill you—but it can help you are, exactly how deep it goes and
you if you know how to use it properly. how long it goes if you know how to
I told a lot of my guys, and I’m an old listen. In 1968 I was working for RCA.
guy now, “You can do it yourself if you Do you remember Jose Feliciano?
have some resources—you’ve got
Yeah!
people who know the social media
business, you have people that can He was very big at the time. He was a
create videos. What is a video? A video folk singer and we worked with him for
gives you exposure. five or ten years with the coffee house
shit and his bad jokes. He was pretty
good. We did a couple of R&B things
with him and he was playing Vegas.
The Detroit Tigers won the American
League and were hosting the World
Series at that time. The Tigers’
broadcaster was a friend of mine and he
wanted to put together some artists for
the anthem during the home game. I
suggested Jose. Ernie was an amateur
Jose Feliciano performs the national
songwriter and loved the idea. I
anthem.
suggested we could fly Jose in and out
just to do it. Jose said he would love to
