3 - 8 - The Day the Music Died (1119)

8/9/2019 3 - 8 - The Day the Music Died (1119)

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As I said in the last video, by 1959,rock was up against some very significantchallenges.This early period of rock and roll thatstarted with Little Richard, and ChuckBarry, and Bill Haley and The Comets.And Fats Domino, went through ElvisPresley, and then the artist that we'vebeen talking about, just most recentlyBuddy Holly and, and people like that.there's some real problems that start tohit at the end of the decade.Maybe the most obvious one being as wesaid when we're talking about Elvis.In 1958, Elvis goes into the army.Now, Colonel Tom Parker was smart abouthaving a bunch of, of tunes, recorded up.So that he could continue to releaseElvis, new Elvis stuff while Elvis wasunable to record to sort of sustain hiscareer so that his career didn't die whenhe was unavailable for a couple of years.But nevertheless he went into the army.

And so he was off the scene to a certainextent.It turns out some stories go, that Elviscould have actually gotten not a, he didget a deferment.But he could have gone with the USO andbeen a performer.but no, I mean what he really wanted todo was serve.I think the Colonel thought since Elvishad been so controversial earlier it wasgood to show that he was an honest,upstanding, young American boy who was

happy to fight for his country.And the whole idea the Colonel had wasabout mainstreaming Elvis Presley so thatwhen rock and roll died, Elvis's careerwouldn't die.And the people at RCA were behind, were,were behind that idea, too.So that's sort of the way.But, you know, either, either way, by '58Elvis was out of the picture.We talked in the last video about howBuddy Holly died in a plane crash inFebruary of 1959.

Little Richard quit rock and roll topreach in late 1957 figuring that rockand roll was the devil's music.This goes to this idea of a, of aconflict between, you know, gospel andthe church as being the, the work of God.And rock and roll being sort of the devildrawing people into, you know, dark clubsat night, this kind of thing.And so, Little Richard, as the story



goes, was on a flight and it was a very,very bumpy flight.And he was afraid he was going to die,and he made a prayer saying he had made apromise to God saying if you get me downfrom this plane alive, I will quit rockand roll and I will serve you.And the flight landed safely and he kepthis word and quit.Anyway, he was out by late 1957.Chuck Ber, Chuck Berry in late 1959 wasarrested for violating what's called theMann Act, which is transporting a minoracross state lines.He always maintained this were trumped upcharges that were basically a way oftrying to strike back at a successfulblack American in this country.He appealed the conviction and ended uphaving to do some prison time for that.But anyway he was, he was out for a whileby late 1959.There was the Jerry Lee Lewis scandal inMay of 1958.

his third wife, Myra, was actually hiscousin, once removed.It turns out that she was 13 at the timethey were married.And his second marriage had not quitebeen final at the time.This was such a scandal that it basicallyforced Jerry Lee Lewis out of out of themainstream pop world, at least for acouple of years.He, he went on to have a very successfulcareer in country and western music inthe 60s.

And I think all is forgiven now.But back at the time.it just, that kind of thing really fit intoo much with the negative stereotypesthat had to do with southern southernlife.And so, by that time, we're talking aboutElvis, Buddy Holly, Little Richard, ChuckBerry, Jerry Lee Lewis all being out ofthe scene by some time in 1959.So, rock and roll was in trouble in termsof its performers.And then, come The Payola Investigations

in late 1959.And I think it's important for us tounderstand that rock and roll, with allthis crossover, these independent labelsand these unwieldy, unmanageablemusicians.Had cut a significant, had cut out asignificant amount of market share forthemselves of, of, of market share thatused to belong to the major labels.



and all of these Tin Pan Alley composerswho just not too long ago, publishes hadbeen selling all kinds of music, were nowhaving a problem having to deal with thisrock and roll thing.They thought, they, they kept thinkingthat music would just go back to the wayit was in 1945.When people go over this rock and rollfever and came to their senses.somebody like Mitch Miller, for example,st, at Columbia was proud not to have anyrock and roll artists on their label.He was staying true to what was realmusic.Most of these guys in the music business,the older guys who ran the recordcompanies had no respect for rock androll.They thought that rock and roll musicianswere kind of cretins, and the fans werestupid and gullible.And they couldn't believe how it hadgotten so popular.

And mostly they just wanted their marketshare back, it seems.But, to a certain extent, they thoughtthat perhaps it was because these indielabels were cheating.and they were able to convince people inWashington that, that was in fact thatcase.Now, as it turned out, a CongressionalCommittee in Washington was justfinishing up and investigation of quizshows.Maybe you know that relatively recent

movie about that, where there was a quizshow, that turned out was rigged.And so the idea that hits on the radiowould be rigged.And that's how this lousy rock and rollmusic could overtake what we all know asgood, traditional, tin pan ally music.That must be what's going on.So, this Congressional Committee decidedto turn its attention, after havingfinished up with the quiz show, to whatwas going on in the music business.And especially, in radio, and to a

certain extent television.So, the House Special Subcommittee onLegislative Oversight got to work andstarted interviewing people about this.Now, their whole contention was that thatthere was this pay for play thing goingon.That people were, the record labels,especially indies, were paying discjockeys to play these records.



That's why they were getting on the air.That's why they were becoming hits.And, these investigations adverselyaffected both the major labels and theindie labels, because they were all doingit.It's just that the major labels were ableto endure this and it drove a lot of theIndie labels out of business.Just having to defend yourself legallyand, and all that goes with it.anyway, Payola, this idea of paying forplay has a long history in popular music.There was nothing really new about whatwas going on.the major labels spent probably a lotmore money than the indie labels didpaying to get plays on the radio.But anyway, the Congress got in there andthey started asking questions and itbecame a big scandal.There were two people who were sort ofwho, who were the biggest stars to bequestioned on all this.

The first was Dick Clark, who was justgetting started in his American bandstand career out of Philidelphia, thetelevision show he'd been involved in,radio.But it turns out, Dick Clark, thinking hewas being a smart businessman, hadinvested in, had a portfolio of products.He was, he owned publishing, he ownedshares in record manufacturing.He owned shares on the show that he washe was producing.And so, you can get the idea that there

could be a conflict of interest thatcould arise when you own a part of therecord company.And the publishing on a record thatyou're playing on your television showthat's nationally syndicated, right?That could be a kind of a conflict ofinterest.The way he portrayed himself in Congress,however, was, fellows I'm, I'm justtrying to make a living here.Whatever you tell me you think I shoulddo in order to keep this as clean as

possible, that's what I want to do.But I'm just a businessman trying to makemy, my fortune in the music business.I'm trying to play by the rules here, ifthere's something here that's wrong, youknow, I'm happy to do whatever I can toaccommodate.And so they ended up thinking that DickClark was just a fantastic young man, amodel sort of citizen, a great



businessman, that kind of thing.He came out of the whole thing almostentirely unscathed, with his reputationintact, even though there was some veryedgy moments for him.And some possibility of his careercollapsing, he came through it withflying colors and was praised.Alan Freed, on the other hand, did not.He continually resisted and was, was notparticularly cooperative.he eventually pleaded guilty to takingbribes.he was he got a suspended sentence and a$300 fine.But he, by that time, he'd already beenfired from every job that he had when hewas at the height of his career.So no more radio, no more TV, no morenothing.and by 1965, he was sort of died kind ofa broken man.And so, it's too bad about how all ofthat turned out for Alan Freed and Dick

Clark was able to get through it all.one of the effects, or the, I guess theremany effects to the PayolaInvestigations.One of them is that it made radiostations much more conservative in the,in the sense that they were fearful oflosing their licenses.I mean, a radio station can onlybroadcast if it has a license by theFederal Government.So, the Federal Government decides topull your license, you're out of

business.So, you really better be sure you're, youknow, minding your, minding your businessclosely and, and, and not transgressingagainst anything that can get you into,into trouble.And so, after all the rock and rollcraziness that had gone on with DJs andall this kind of thing.This music business pros decide that, youknow, they had better take a little bitmore control over what music gets on theradio so they get into trouble this way.

And in fact, one of the things we can sayabout this next era is if the period from1955 through '59 had been dominated byindependent labels and artists.Who, you know defied tradition and maybepolite, regular polite behavior and thatkind of thing.If it was kind of like the wild west ofthe music business.After that, after all this Payola thing



and various musicians were out of it, thenext era was the music business takingcontrol of rock and roll again.That is they liked the idea that therewas this youth, youth market that hadbeen created, that they could sellrecords to.But they figured, they could probably doit better and more efficiently if theytook it over.And so, that's essentially what happened.So, what we're going to try and figureout next week is when this happens.All these years from 1960 through the endof 1963, The Beatles hit this country inearly 1964, that period between Elvis andThe Beatles.is this period a kind of a dark ages forrock music?When rock music becomes, sort of,homogenized and family friendly.And lacking all the kind of excitement,and interest, and edginess that it had inthose first years.

Or, are these golden years, as new stylesbegin to develop, and new kinds of thingsstart to happen in popular music.that really were cut short perhaps, bythe arrival of the British invasion andThe Beatles, and the Rolling Stones andthe rest of them.We'll consider all that next week.

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3 - 8 - The Day the Music Died (1119)