In England there is a famous explorer - Ranolph Fynnes - who is currently half way up the North face of the Eiger. The man is reknown for tramping across deserts and arctic tundra with nothing but a tootpick and a pair of Damart thermals for protection. He is the sort of guy that eats polar bears for breakfast and eskimo's for lunch.
A genuine throwback.
He is also a total twat!
Thanks to Sir Ran (as he likes to be known) there are corpses of young men scattered across the globe. Most of them were trying to help with some madcap escapade and got just got caught in the cross fire.
Promises of glory, fame and self achievement all amounted to nothing when the chips were down and Ran needed to run.
These days he makes a living from motivational speaking and from the accounts I have heard 80% of the men (it is always men) who hear him think that he is an icon and the other 20% think - like me - that he is a tit.
Which is worth thinking about for a minute. Why would there be such a discrepancy?
Well, it all comes down to experience.
You see, if you have been on one of his "trips" and got out alive you would no doubt have realised that Ran and his kind are ego manical toss pots who only do things for their own self gratification. Oh, of course there is the pretence that its all for science or to test mans endurance bollocks but really its all about having a collosal ego. Once you have breen bruised by that kind of obsession there is no way you want to go near it again.
Which brings me on to signing new bands.
You see the thing with finding new acts - or A&R as we oldies like to call it - is that you need to find acts just before the masses do. But at the same time they need to be "bubbling" and building a fan base.
The latest one to cross my path is Maldroid from San Francisco.
These guys popped up on my screen last year and we have been following them since. They have really worked the system well and have won you tube video competitions and have created a bit of a buzz around the bay and beyond.
So when I spoke to Ryan from the band at first a few months ago it all seemed great. I liked their work and wanted to release it for them with an eye to taking them on if things worked out well. I was quite excited about the prospect and I thought we could do something with them that would be productive and let's be honest lucrative.
Since then the massed ranks of A&R have found out about them too and now I hear from a birdie that in the line at sxsw they are one of the buzz bands of the festivities.
Now for us that's bad. It means a bidding war and there is no way we will get close to a band I really rate. For them its excellent and I wish them all the best but it also means the inevitable "Ran Ego" will be growing deep in the brain of at least one of them. Sooner or later someone will get their fingers burnt / frostbitten or gnawed off by beavers and that will be that.
The monster that is music has reared its ugly head and if it's like this now it will only get bigger and bolder as time goes on. Either they will emerge as monsters of rock themselves or they will be chewed up and spat out. Who knows?
Anyway, all that means that we aren't even going to try to compete. We can't offer what the others offer. There are no big cheques or groupies on draft. We aren't climbing the north face of the Eiger. We are sitting on a pretty terrace with a pot of herbal tea and a copy of the Times crossword as the sun sets over the Matterhorn.
I know where I would rather be right now.
How about you?
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