Review

Author(s): Pekka Gronow

Review by: Pekka Gronow
Source: Popular Music, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Jan., 1987), pp. 122-123
Published by: Cambridge University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/853180
Accessed: 18-03-2015 23:26 UTC

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ShorterNotices
The Music Industry: the End of Vinyl? By tion of video recorders(p.7) gives both the
John Qualen. London: Comedia, 1985. number of recordersand the percentage of
37 pp. households having one. For Indonesia, the
numberofvideo recordersis givenas 280,000
This slim volume is part of a 'media and and penetrationas 19.3 per cent in 1984. As
communications industry profile series'. Indonesia has over a hundredmillioninhabi-
Other studies in the series cover television, tants, one of these figureshas to be wrong.
film, electronic publishing, marketing re- The percentage could be based on the
search and othersimilartopics. The focus of number of households in certain income
TheMusic Industryis thus on industryrather classes, but there is no indication of this.
than music. Nevertheless,forreaderswhose There are othersimilardiscrepanciesin this
main interestis music, the book is a useful table.
reminderof the realitiesof the music busi- The figures for video recorders are
ness. given for more than fortycountries. Sales
The record industry has obviously figuresforrecords and pre-recordedcasset-
reached a watershed.Aftertheboom yearsof tes are given for fourteen countries only,
the 1970s, sales have come to a standstillor although theyare easily available fordouble
even declinedin some countries.A historical- that number. No figures are given on the
ly-orientatedcommentatormightpoint out sales of blank audio cassettes. The musico-
thatsales are stillfarabove thelevels of 1970, logist might also be interestedin a more
but this would offerlittleconsolation to the detailed analysis of productioncosts and the
industryexecutiveresponsibleforthebottom creative process in the industry. Qualen,
line. At the same timethe industryis rapidly however,passes thisoverlightlyand concen-
changing, as music videos and the compact trateson the developmentofrecorddistribu-
disc pointtheway to a distantfuturein which tion and retailingin the UK.
the music industrysells rightsratherthan At firstsightthismightappear to be of
records- hence 'the end of vinyl'. slight interest to the student of music.
Qualen startswitha briefsurveyofthe Nevertheless,thecase studyoftheLightning
Britishrecordingindustryand the interna- group of companies quickly convinces the
tional scene. Most of the informationwill be reader that record distributionand retailing
familiarto readers of the trade press. UK indeed have a decisive influence on the
sales started declining in 1975, and only development of the recordingindustryand,
during the past few years have they risen in turn,on the productionofpopular music.
again. Industryprofitability has followed a Qualen also presents case studies of
similar curve. Qualen presents statisticson the proposed WCI-Polygrammerger,illus-
sales, production costs, marketshares, and tratingthe role of the multinationalsin the
the penetrationof video recorders. music business, and of the industry'scam-
This is a good startingpoint,but some paign againsthome taping.As he pointsout,
ofthefigurescall fora morecriticalapproach. the industry's estimates of the effectsof
Although the statisticscome from reliable home-taping on record sales appear to be
sources such as BPI (British Phonograph somewhat unrealistic.However, home-tap-
IndustryLtd) and IFPI (InternationalFedera- ing has unquestionablybecome an important
tion of Phonogram and Videogram Produc- formofthe consumptionof music,and a few
ers), the music industryis notoriouslydif- European countrieshave already imposed a
ficult to pin down on numbers. In some levy or tax on the sale of blank audio
countriessales figuresinclude IFPI member cassettes, as suggested by the industry.
companies only, while other figures are This illustratesa trendwhich is central
estimates of total sales. Without knowing to Qualen's predictionof the futureof the
how the figureshave been compiled in each recording industry. He sees the industry
case, one has to be prepared fora marginof movinggraduallyfromthe sale ofrecordings
error. as physical objects towards the exploitation
Some of Qualen's figures are quite of copyrights,collectingrevenue fromthe
obviously wrong. The table of the penetra- use ofmusicon radio,television,satelliteand
122

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 Shorter
notices 123

cable, fromthe rental of music videos, and The discographicalinformationin the

even fromhome-taping. originalis now listed elsewhere in the book,
In this scenario, the big companies while a brief'Guide to Recordings'suggests
would concentrate on such investment- collections of music, sources and other list-
heavy fields as the production of compact ings. More importantly,the valuable but
discs and music videos, as well as on the visually messy footnotesof the 1968 edition
exploitation of rights to performancesac- have been gathered and expanded into a
quired fromother producers. The indepen- magnificentseries of bibliographicalessays
dents would retain the production and which are essentialforany scholarofcountry
distributionof black vinyland music casset- music. The otherchanges are a consequence
tes, creatingnew hitsand trends.But Qualen of the passage of time. There is an extra
concludes: chapter,'CountryMusic, 1972-1984',and the
materialon the urban folkrevival has been
It is unlikelythatthechoicesfacingthebusiness moved into the
will ever be presentedin such a hard-edged Malone to devote previous chapter, enabling
fashion.Theprobability is thatthemusicbusiness Chapter Ten entirelyto
bluegrass and bringit up to date. This now
willstumbleintothefuture justas itis stumbling includes a concise and
fascinatingaccount of
throughthepresent,withtheactorsonlymaking bluegrass festivals,with their camaraderie
positivedecisionswhenforcedto by crisissitua- and their'broad diversityof age, economic,
tions. and philosophicalgroupings'(but not,as the
A recentissue of the IFPI Newsletter (4, No. 2 author points out, of race): 'Hippies and
(Feb-March 1986), p. 6) contains the most rednecks,college studentsand truckdrivers,
complete statistics on the world sales of governmentworkersand farmers,and liber-
records and tapes published so far. It is als and conservativesshare festivalbenches
estimatedthattherewere about 1550 million and oftenplay in the same bands' (p. 357).
records, 800 million pre-recordedcassettes As the general index demonstrates,
and 20 million compact discs sold in the CountryMusic, USA is both a historyand an
world in 1984. The end of vinylmay not yet encyclopaedia, and it is difficultto imagine
be lurkingaround the corner.But thereis a this balancing act performed with more
change coming, and we can expect interest- expertise.Occasionally, the necessaryrecital
ing developmentsbothin the music industry of personnel, songs, gigs and recording
and in popular music. sessions becomes wearisome. Atthemoment
this sensation is felt,however, the authoris
Pekka Gronow seen providing another
persuasive account
Finnish Instituteof Recorded Sound, of sociological
phenomena or social history:
Helsinki
'country music, the silent majority and
Vietnam', say, or 'the significanceof honky-
tonks in the thirties'.
CountryMusic, USA. By Bill C. Malone. 2nd Malone freelyconfesseshis preference
edn, Austin: Universityof Texas Press, 1985. forhard-corecountryand 'singers[who] ...
562 pp. reflecttheirruralor working-classorigins'(p.
xi). Nevertheless, CountryMusic USA is a
Witha singing,fiddlingcowboyon thecover, celebration of its
subject matter,one char-
BillMalone's classic surveycomes up freshas acterised by fairand reasonable comments.
paint for a new generation. In this revised Only those who have succumbedto and who
and enlarged edition, the photographs, foster the
homogenisation and commer-
which range from old-time fiddlersin the cialisationof
countrymusic,such as ignorant
1920s to EmmylouHarris and RickySkaggs, djs and
slicklypackaged middle-of-the-road
are now distributedthroughoutthe book. artists,are shown little
mercy.
Unfortunately,these are again restrictedto Malone has not found space to investi-
of
pictures performers; there are no pictorial gate the new, young, country-influenced
ephemera (such as posters or recordlabels), bands of the 1980s, such as REM and the
no shots of places and, with the possible Knitters.A more unaccountable omission is
exception of the Light Crust Doughboys in the coconuts-and-tropicanasound of the
their own coach bound for Chicago, no Coral ReeferBand and itsboss. It's
midnight,
images of countrymusic as industry.Even Jimmyand you're not famous yet.
the curious movie stillof Roy Acuffand his
group in SmokyMountainMelodyhas been Ralph Willett
axed.
Universityof Hull

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