Selling out to fight hunger?
It’s rare that I get a chance to combine my admittedly irrational Bob Dylan fandom with reporting on business, but, hey, this is a Jewish News blog, and Dylan is Jewish, sort of. No comments yet. You can be the first!
Dylan’s label confirmed Aug. 25 that he was recording a Christmas album. It seemed a bit hard to swallow given that the former Robert Zimmerman has appeared on at least one Chabad fundraising telethon in recent years. But what’s good enough for Irving Berlin (the Jewish writer of “White Christmas”), Neil Diamond (who has two Christmas albums and counting) and Barbra Streisand (who has just one) appears to be good enough for the folk-rock-country bard.
(What’s the local angle? Mr. D has a show planned for 7 p.m. Oct. 17 at the Arizona State Fair with reserved seats going for $20, while the remainder of the seats are free on a first come, first served basis after you’ve paid fair admission.)
Now, part A of business and finance: Rolling Stone reported in its Sept. 17 issue that Columbia Records, his label, has been begging him for a Christmas album for decades because “they’re perennial sellers, and that’s what every label wants.”
Given that most of Dylan’s albums are perennial sellers, a Dylan Christmas album is like a double whammy of perennial-ness. Hence “Christmas in the Heart,” due out Oct. 13.
I can’t imagine that there are millions of listeners who will wax sentimental over the 68-year-old’s phlegmatic croak tackling such tunes as “Winter Wonderland” and “Little Drummer Boy,” even if it does have a cover fit for a Currier & Ives print. However, there are probably several hundred thousand who’ll buy anything he records. I’ll admit I’ve done it, even when the results were extremely ugly. Anybody remember the outtakes album called “Dylan”?
Now, part B: Citigroup announced Sept. 30 that its Thank You network, which it describes as one of the world’s largest loyalty programs, is partnering with Sony Music Entertainment (the parent company of the Columbia label) to allow Thank You members to use their loyalty points to download Sony albums, both new releases and catalog (read “perennial seller”) albums.
And there will be special promotions via this relationship. The kick-off promotion is none other than “Christmas in the Heart.” Thank You members can download the 15-song album beginning Oct. 6, a full week before the official release and at a discount, just 1,000 Thank You points. The nonpromotional price per song download will be 100 Thank You points.
Finally, part C: In the scramble to get this story out, most sites and news outlets (even my favorite radio report, “Marketplace”) have told it as though Dylan created an exclusive relationship with Citigroup, with nary a mention of the Sony-Citi nexus, a partnership of industry titans. As Citi stresses in its press release, Thank You members “will be able to access and preview the entire Sony Music digital catalog of songs from artists such as Brad Paisley, Britney Spears, Daughtry, The Fray, and many more. (I wonder whether that includes the late Michael Jackson, who has been a Sony artist since “Off the Wall” and “Thriller.”)
Business and finance postscript: This is a charity record. Press releases published at bobdylan.com say that Dylan is donating all U.S. royalties from the record in perpetuity to Feeding America. The Chicago-based charity, formerly known as America’s Second Harvest, helps fight hunger through a nationwide network of food banks. International royalties will be donated in perpetuity to two hunger charities: World Hunger Programme and Crisis UK. The former fights food insecurity in the developing world while the latter focuses on the United Kingdom. The label estimates that proceeds from the release will help feed 1.4 million Americans, 500,000 schoolchildren in the developing world, and 15,000 homeless people in the U.K. during the Christmas season.
Dylan and business post-postscript: Part of the tone of the reporting on the Dylan Christmas album played on the implied irony of Dylan, once a dean of protest songs, “selling out” to commercial interests. After all, Dylan refused to appear on Ed Sullivan’s show when Sullivan wouldn’t let him sing “Talking John Birch Society Blues.”
Well, the so-called “sell out” is old news, folks. Dylan tunes have been licensed for commercials since the 1990s. (I believe I wrote a column when “The Times They Are A-Changin’” was used in a commercial for a Wall Street firm. Can’t remember which one though, and the Web is no help.) His “Forever Young” helped sell Apple computers in 2000.
And in 2004, Dylan himself appeared as a commercial pitch man in a Victoria’s Secret TV ad, accompanied by his 1997 tune “Love Sick.” The tune had made an appearance in a 2003 Victoria’s ad without its composer. In 2007, Dylan appeared in an “integrated marketing campaign” commercial that hawked XM Satellite Radio (home of his “Theme Time Radio” show) as standard equipment aboard Cadillac vehicles.
Finally, let’s not forget the “Refresh Anthem.” That’s the mash-up of Dylan’s “Forever Young” with an Obama-era version by Black Eye Peas guru will.i.am. The Pepsi TV campaign has been in heavy rotation during televised sports ever since it debuted during this year’s Super Bowl.
01 Oct, 2009 >