We’ve become instant fans of London alternative pop act Osca. The band has been performing a slew of festivals including including the Calling Festival & Barn On The Farm. According the lead the singer Jack Kenworthy the name of the band OSCA is short for Oscar Peterson, who was a musical inspiration introduced by his father. Their forthcoming EP is due in October.
lucy@nightswimming-management.com
Lana Del Ray has successfully crafted her image as a retro 60’s songwriter that glorifies death, gloom, & suicide. Not bad for a millionaires daughter. We often her terms thrown around such as a manufactured & authentic. The manufactured artist is the creation by a machine such as a music company while authenticity is truthful in origin, not a copy, and genuine.
Is it possible to manufacture authenticity? Absolutely. “Starbucks decided to force/encourage their staff to request the names of customers when taking orders and then announce them when the drinks were ready. It was an attempt to manufacture authenticity — to artificially create the social bond that might naturally grow between a vendor and customer in a bygone era when local customers patronized local shops staffed by local employees where everybody was on a first name basis” (Kent Valentine)
“Pop artist Lana Del Rey has sold seven million copies of Born To Die Album. “Her rise to fame was flawless, in spite of constant probing about her authenticity, her penchant for being choked in her music videos and the strength of her voice.
“In 2010, she released one bland album under her own name, Lizzie Grant, before she wiped the slate clean, deleted her old material from iTunes and relaunched herself as a ‘gangsta Nancy Sinatra’ – a heartland bad girl in Daisy Duke shorts with a taste for bourbon and older men. Her music was cinematic, melancholic yet pretty catchy, propelled by 808 drumbeats and glossed with vintage Bond theme strings. She appeared a new cross-over force in pop: glamorous, artsy and ‘real’.
But when music hacks sniffed out her previous material, found out she was the daughter of a dot-com New York millionaire, clearly had major label backing, and, with one crushing Saturday Night Live performance, realised she was seemingly incapable of carrying a tune outside of the recording booth, they smelt a rat.
Del Rey went from blogosphere darling to heretic in a matter of weeks, her rise recast as a rouse to lure hapless musos into liking another manufactured pop princess. But does any of that really matter? From Motown to Madonna, some of the best pop music has been made by committee. And some of the greatest pop icons have built their legends on complete lies. Bob Dylan used to claim he ran away from the circus – he, in fact, dropped out of college. No one believed for a second that Michael Jackson really was ‘bad’. Whether or not Del Rey really did ride around in the back of an Al Camino with drug dealers is beside the point.” (Tom Slater)
Not living up to the hype is the biggest risk when manufacturing authenticity & of course you will always loose to authenticity.
Anyhow, if you attend to manufacture authenticity, these key points are worth considering:
Oh So Quiet has becomes a Kings favorite. Following a move to the UK, “Oh So Quiet” began as a solo home project for Argentine-born Lucas Zavala. However, feeling too shy to sing some of his songs, Lucas asked his sister, Malena, to fill in. Following this they gathered band members Harry Clarke, Axel Martinez and Nick Wallis to complete the five-piece. Beautifully layered with syncopated rhythms and timbres of the Latin Americas, their soaring melodies and infectious, indie sounds have gained support thus far at the likes of XFM, 6 Music, BBC London, Line of Best Fit, Wild Honey Pie and Clash.
seb@yucatanrecords.com
Record contracts are just like — I’m gonna say the word – slavery,” Prince said, according to NPR. “I would tell any young artist … don’t sign.”
“Once we have our own resources, we can provide what we need for ourselves,” Prince said. “Jay Z spent $100 million of his own money to build his own service. We have to show support for artists who are trying to own things for themselves.”
Although record contracts benefit the music label, they can still benefit the artist when it comes to mass exposure. In fact, Prince spent the majority of his career signed to a music label that released his music worldwide.
Today, an artist can release their music without a major record label and garner thousands of fans, and under the right circumstances, millions through social media.
Model Aeroplanes are a Dundee based rock band, formed in 2013. Since the release of the first single, Crazy, the band secured a slot on the BBC Introducing Stage at Scotland’s T in the Park music festival. The band band received coverage on several international music sites such as Clash, This Is Fake DIY and Indie Shuffle, and received airplay on Radio 1 along with regional stations. Look for this band to break out on the Scottish music scene.
benbuist@live.co.uk
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