Remaining civil while in conversation with unsolicited calls from sharks – people greedy for your money – is something I’ve learned to do now for my own amusement.
As a musician and like all other musicians, I occasionally send out my music in the hope that more people will listen to it, the only responses are from people wanting my money. Their tentacles stretch from all points of the globe.
Yawn.
Of course there’s another imminent layer being built between a common man or woman reaching out to make a song a success. That of course is the advent of Artificial Intelligence. This will prove that machines have feelings too and can write better songs than humans. It will copy the best existing writers. Cole Porter, Lennon & McArtney etc. Songwriters will be out of a job.
But here’s today’s conversation direct from Kansas. A company called Orange. Pretty bright colour for first thing in a morning.
HIM: Hello man. How are you?
ME: Fine.
HIM: Hope you’re doing great with your music career?
ME: Doing fine thanks.
HIM Do you have any song that we can give massive airplay to on our station????????
ME: I send them a Bandcamp link to Johnny Dysfunctional’s opening track on the ‘Weird & Wonderful’ new album. It’s The Beast.
HIM Checking it out. Great. Where are you based.
ME England. And you …?
HIM Great! We are Kansas City, USA and we had a branch in Africa
ME Good morning Kansas. I’m the Wizard of OZ .What happened to the branch in Africa.
HIM Africa?
ME: You said you had a branch. Past tense.
HIM Oh no sorry. We do have a branch in Africa. (He’d lost a whole continent for just a few minutes …) We have huge listeners and huge audience (with huge ears, surely?) For just 30 dollars your song will be played for four months and three times daily. Let’s make your song viral.
ME And I’m just a poor boy from a poor family ….30 dollars will feed us today. Just the way it is. I’ll check out somebody who can promote the music without me having to pay. I already paid enough to record it. I’m sure you understand. Hope the weather’s good in Kansas and wishing the best for the day.
He didn’t reply. I thought we’d become firm friends. The shark swam off. Didn’t want to help a poor boy from a poor family and I’m 30 dollars better off than I could have been..
https://johnnydysfunctional.bandcamp.com/track/the-beast