Read the Real Frank Zappa book for other sinister ways the companies fluff their bankrolls and pimp the "big stars" while starving others. But one chapter talks about focus groups for record company.  I just took that idea and ran with it.  So, here's some record buyer profiles to consider.

The consumers:

1. Schuler: 13 years old, not very popular but she wants to be.  She see's the 8th grade cheerleaders listening to Brittany Spears and they are popular, so in an effort to seem like them, she buys the same music.  She will eventually grow up to like Jam Bands and spend lots of money following them around the country on her Sophmore Year at a Liberal Arts College.

2. Dylan:15 years old.  His father is wealthy and not around much. His mother is involved in civic activities and the soccer career of his younger sister. He watches TRL a lot. He used to like dance/pop music but is finding it increasingly unappealing in the face of his growing defiance of his parent's rules.  So, one day, he's out smoking during 4th hour with an older kid and suddenly he hears the Neo-Clean and Shiny-Punk band Good Charlotte.  He thinks to himself, "Hmmm...that's awfully loud and angry sounding. I'll buy that album to upset my parents!"

3. Tawnya: 14 years old:  Tawnya's parents divorced when she was 7 and her mother works at a company that rebuilds alternators and car generators and she smells like aluminum whenever she gets off her 2nd shift job around 11 p.m.  Tawnya's mother LOVES Lynard Skynrd (sp?) and drives a truck.  Tawnya's mother is VOCAL about her distrust of other "colored folks" but Tawnya really enjoys Rap, much to her mother's chagrin.  She's satisfied by the transient nature of many rap artists and likes how they don't stick around long enough to get old and "out."  She liked 50 Cent last month.  This month she likes Obie Trice. 

4. Justice:  12 years old.  Justice was concieved during Gulf War I and he likes Toby Keith because he wants the US to blow those towel heads up.  His father likes George Strait but he doesn't because that stuff is too old and twangy.  Someday, he wants to kill a bear with the 30/30 he got for christmas when he was 10.

5. Tanner: 17 years old.  Tanner has real political views about how things should be, he hates his parents, goes to an Alternative School and he loves Linkin Park.  He is considered Gifted by the school district but his defiance in the classroom makes him a challenge.  He smokes a lot of marijuana.  He tatoo'd a peace symbol onto his forearm along with a 4:20 and what he thought was a Marijuana leaf. (It turned out to be a Japanese Maple.)  And if that Prep-Assed Bitch Tyler, the football star looks at him one more time during home room, he's going to kick his ass after school.

6. Tyler: 17 Years Old: Tyler plays football and drives a Cadillac Escalade with Spinners. His father gave it to him when he was 16. He doesn't have a favorite band but buys music in collections like Jock Rock.  He likes to party, and is being recruited by a state college in the Midwest to be an offensive lineman.  He makes up for a lack of emotional development by terrorizing the kids at the Alt.School on the weekends.  He will lose his life over the summer in a car wreck and he will be remembered as talented, caring and funny.

OK musicians.  There's your audience.  Popular music is focused on kids who are in TRANSITION.  They want kids who will ride the new wave, not make lifetime fans out of them.  Record contracts are short and if things don't look good for the artist, the record company drops them.

Lined up like Sharks Teeth:

The company isn't looking for loyalty. They're just looking for quick cash.  And when today's flavor grows old...or too political...or kills themselves on drugs or goes out of style...there's a new crop of flavors waiting...and a new crop of needy adolescents with money. 

Sorry,

PRH