Getting to the art of the matter
THREE heavy hitters in the contemporary adult section of our record recollections have dropped new content: Adele, Bruce Springsteen and Sting.
Springsteen needs no introduction.
He has been chronicling the American experience for more than 50 years. Spent his life on stage and toured the world pretty much constantly, and now he has collected, on film, some of his most famous performances from 1979. His appearances in the No Nukes concerts are already celebrated. This footage is grainy and high contrast. It captures a young Bruce at the peak of his physical and poetic powers. He is bursting with energy and ideas and his E Street Band is pounding right with him, every step of the way.
In addition to this, Sting has put out a new album of work, The Bridge.
Sting is his own music industry. You may remember him from last century when he came to prominence as the front man for the Police. He had that gig from 1977 to 1984 and since then he has journeyed through jazz, blues and rock, and a variety of experimental genres and line-ups. He has released (something like) 14 studio albums. The bloke is 70 years old now, but he still has music to make.
And then there’s Adele.
Adele is only in her 30s, but she has sold more than 120 million albums. Count them. She is like the opposite of the 1979 Springsteen or the 70-year-old Sting, but I bet they all have a space in their hearts for the songwriting of one another.
Adele has written her own life in her songs. An extraordinary artist who has experienced very public battles with her own vocal cords, personal relationships and alcohol.
Personally, I’m interested in hearing all three of these releases. I mean, if you’re interested in contemporary music, why wouldn’t you listen to these albums? Why wouldn’t you want to spend some time talking to these performers?
If you had that kind of an opportunity, you would want to listen to the new release right before the conversation. Right? If you were a professional journalist, listening to the record would be the first step in the research process, yes? The internet is groaning with information on these megastars. There’s not a lot to talk about if you’re not talking about their new stuff.
So, it came as a shock to hear Channel 7 reporter Matt Doran, had flown to the UK to do an exclusive interview with Adele about her new record (entitled 30) and he didn’t listen to the music before he started the interview.
Just think about that for a second. Is this how we value our artists?
We rely on specialist reporters to provide us with “sports reports” in every news update.
Sports can only be reported by journalists with great contacts into the elite sports world, or former sports stars themselves. It’s given equal weighting to politics, weather and finance.
But arts and culture are not reported regularly in mainstream media and so apparently they only need a generalist journalist to ask broadsided questions about how it feels to be successful, or popular.
Imagine Channel 7 sending a reporter to London to interview Joe Root about the upcoming Ashes series. It’s a fair bet they wouldn’t be sending a musician or a crime reporter.
It’s understandable that Sony has refused to release the Doran interview with Adele. If you’re not going to listen to the album before you do the interview, it’s not going to be worth broadcasting, is it? It can’t be much more than an exercise in surface scratching.
It’s understandable Doran is embarrassed beyond belief.
He has apologised and explained that the link to the new record was in an email that he must have missed . . . Fair enough. But wouldn’t it be a great New Year resolution for mainstream media companies to admit the gap in their schedules?
How about the media moguls commit to creating space for genuine news reporting on arts, culture and music?
The pandemic years have reminded us just how much we need and want artists in our lives. How about we take the discussion about their new works seriously? That’d be cool.
IMAGINE CHANNEL 7 SENDING A REPORTER TO LONDON TO INTERVIEW JOE ROOT ABOUT THE UPCOMING ASHES SERIES. IT’S A FAIR BET THEY WOULDN’T BE SENDING A MUSICIAN OR A CRIME REPORTER.