Cowboys and Indies is the definitive record-business bible, chronicling the pioneers who set the stylus on the most important labels and musical discoveries of the last century. The narrative follows all the musical trends and developments from the phonograph to the Internet age as it delves behind the big business of corporate hit machines and the diligent industry of small, curated labels. Drawing from memoirs, archives, and over one hundred exclusive interviews with legends of the record industry-including the founders and CEOs of Virgin, United Artists, Atlantic, and A&M Records-this book reveals the secrets behind the hit-making craft.
Cowboys and Indies focuses on the game changers-the indie founders, talent scouts, legendary A&R men-believers who understood the music business was two distinct parts: first music, then business. An industry insider himself, Gareth Murphy culls numerous behind-the-scenes anecdotes to bring together a clear genealogical map of the record industry's 130-year international history. Among its revelations, Cowboys and Indies highlights the remarkable similarities between the industry crash of the 1920s and '30s and the recent CD crash.
Witty and evocative, Cowboys and Indies offers a fresh panoramic view of the cycles and grooves of pop music and is sure to top the charts with music industry classics like Hitmaker and The Mansion on the Hill. Title Info. Preface
Chapter 1. Talking Machines
Chapter 2. Judgments
Chapter 3. His Master's Voice
Chapter 4. Exodus
Chapter 5. The Invisible Wave
Chapter 6. Survivors
Chapter 7. Dead Sea Crossing
Chapter 8. Homesick Medicine
Chapter 9. SunRise
Chapter 10. Lucky Children
Chapter 11. Numbers
Chapter 12. The Invasion
Chapter 13. Acts
Chapter 14. A Slow Eclipse
Chapter 15. Terra Nova
Chapter 16. On Black Canvas
Chapter 17. Forbidden Fruit
Chapter 18. Taurus
Chapter 19. Kings
Chapter 20. Psalms
Chapter 21. The Island
Chapter 22. High Tide
Chapter 23. Sources
Chapter 24. Sodom & Gomorrah
Chapter 25. Shadows
Chapter 26. Cyclops
Chapter 27. Legends
Chapter 28. Romans
Chapter 29. Lamentations
Chapter 30. Bubblegum Forest
Chapter 31. Revelations
"Just when you thought the record label beast
was dead and buried, along comes Gareth Murphy with a tour de force that makes
you almost want to dance with that devil again. Through Cowboys and Indies, new artists will get a sense of history that
will enlighten their success and lessen the pain of being ripped off!"
"Thought I knew everything about the music
business. Must admit, I learned quite a bit inside these pages. Highly
recommended!"
"In his first book, freelance writer and record producer Murphy captures
the ever-changing nature of the record industry as it ebbs and flows
with trends, technology, and time…Through setting out to document the lineage of the record industry,
which he's done, Murphy has as well created a history of popular music
told from the inside out to give music fans and historians a new and
dynamic perspective of this oft-covered topic."
"This is a straight-ahead
chronological history of the record business-the performers and 'record
men' in America and the UK-from early innovations in sound technology to
the present…There are enough gems and oddities (a
brawl between the burly Grossman and Alan Lomax; the Beatles first
experiences smoking marijuana, when meeting Dylan; and, apparently
unrelatedly, a quite funny misunderstanding of Beatles' lyrics by Dylan)
to make the book an enjoyable…addition to
the musical bookshelf."
"Record labels, at their best, are invariably
driven by the taste, the personality, and the ambition of one man, or woman-this
book fascinatingly charts their course, their perversity, their bloody-mindedness. It's those men, those labels, that found and broke the artists who
have created our musical world."
"Spectacular, compelling, evoc
