Brooks Albums to Only Be Sold at Wal-Mart

[Jaycint]

Not that this will affect me anyway since I am not a fan of Brooks or his musical genre but if a favorite artist of mine ever pulled a stunt like this it would ensure me never buying another album of theirs again.


Brooks Albums to Only Be Sold at Wal-Mart

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050821/ap_en_mu/people_garth_brooks


BENTONVILLE, Ark. - Country superstar
Garth Brooks has signed an exclusive multiyear contract with Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
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No details of the agreement were released by Wal-Mart officials Friday, but Billboard and the Los Angeles Times reported the deal will make Wal-Mart, Sam's Club and their online outlets the only places where Brooks' music will be commercially available.

Brooks, among the all-time best-selling recording artists, retired from performing in 2001.

"We understand the Wal-Mart customer and know that bringing them Garth Brooks exclusives in the upcoming years is something that'll excite them as much as it excites us," said David Porter, vice president and divisional merchandise manager for Wal-Mart, a leading retailer for country music sales.

Brooks' hits include "Friends in Low Places," "Shameless" and "Longneck Bottle."

[Larkin Fan]

Not a Brooks fan at all so it doesn't affect me either, but this was a stupid move that alienated any of his fans that aren't Walmart shoppers.

I wouldn't support anyone that pulled a stunt like this either.

[KronoRed]

This the wave of the future?

Sad.

[Unassisted]

This the wave of the future?

Sad.Only for artists with a well-defined fan base that matches well with WM's customer base.

I'm thinking Lawrence Welk and Randy Travis will be next to do this. ;)

[TC81190]

Not a Brooks fan at all so it doesn't affect me either, but this was a stupid move that alienated any of his fans that aren't Walmart shoppers.



Shouldn't hurt him then. :evil:

[macro]

I was a Garth fanatic when he first came out, not because of his hits, but because of the thoughtful, poetic, ballads he penned. That style of Garth was reminiscent of James Taylor, and every bit as good. People who didn't buy his CDs never got to hear those best songs, though, as radio played the often nonsensical ditties that would get people up out of their seats.

Garth admitted one time that his favorite songs were the ones that never made it to radio, and I agreed with him. He did have a few such songs make it big in the very early days (If Tomorrow Never Comes, The Dance, and The River come to mind), but most did not, especially in the second half of the 90s.

I will say this: Garth Brooks was the best act I've ever seen in concert, and I've seen over 50 shows including most of the top rock acts of the 80s and early 90s. Now, as for this latest marketing decision, I'm not so sure... :confused:

[RedsBaron]

I was never a big Garth Brooks fan, but I do agree with macro as to Brooks's best stuff: The Dance and If Tomorrow Never Comes were great, and sensitive, songs.
This is a strange career move, but he may not be selling many CDs anyway.

[MattyHo4Life]

I wouldn't write this off as a mistake just yet. Garth Brooks is known as a marketing genius, and has really only made one mistake (Chris Gaines) in his career. This may be just another sign that Garth will be making his long rumored comeback. If that's true, then I doubt his fans won't buy his new cd just because Walmart is the only place they can buy it.

[redsfanmia]

What's an album?

[CrackerJack]

I'm guessing most of Garth's fans are Wal-Mart shoppers any ways.

[MattyHo4Life]

I'm guessing most of Garth's fans are Wal-Mart shoppers any ways.

That's probably true! I'd imagine that's also the case for most pop and country artists.

[KronoRed]

What's an album?
I know my local station calls them "projects" :lol:

[RBA]

When Martha Steward sign with K-Mart everybody thought it wouldn't work. Martha Stewart signing has been highly profitable for both parties. I don't think the Brooks deal would do any harm to either WalMart or Brooks. It will probably be a boost.

[Mutaman]

Who cares? Garth became irrelevant a long time ago. There are still plenty of people out there making real country music ( The Derailers, Dwight Yoakam. Drive By Truckers, Robert Earl Keen, ect.) and we can buy their records anyplace.

[creek14]

Garth who?

[Jaycint]

Who cares? Garth became irrelevant a long time ago. There are still plenty of people out there making real country music ( The Derailers, Dwight Yoakam. Drive By Truckers, Robert Earl Keen, ect.) and we can buy their records anyplace.

The principle of it is what I care about and why I posted the article. If I never heard a country song again by ANY artist it would be too soon (no offense to anybody).

[PickOff]

Must be a lucrative deal for Brooks. With all the bad press that Walmart has been getting for treating their employess poorly, stong arming unions, and bullying producers, it would have to be. I guess Garth is betting that the anti-Walmart sentiment won't become widespread.

[Mutaman]

The principle of it is what I care about and why I posted the article. If I never heard a country song again by ANY artist it would be too soon (no offense to anybody).


I understand the principle and the principle is important. But I'm more concerned about all of you that just close yourself off to certain genres of music. Whats country? The older I get, the more I start to believe Duke Ellington-- "there's only two kinds of music- good music and bad music". Once you get rid of labels, it opens you up to a whole new world. Like I've said before, Hank Williams and the Clash have a lot in common. Thats why Jack White can produce a great Loretta Lynn album. Garth is irrelevant because he has tried to become all things to all people. But if you're turning off any music with a little twang in it, your're really missing something.

[redsfanmia]

I understand the principle and the principle is important. But I'm more concerned about all of you that just close yourself off to certain genres of music. Whats country? The older I get, the more I start to believe Duke Ellington-- "there's only two kinds of music- good music and bad music". Once you get rid of labels, it opens you up to a whole new world. Like I've said before, Hank Williams and the Clash have a lot in common. Thats why Jack White can produce a great Loretta Lynn album. Garth is irrelevant because he has tried to become all things to all people. But if you're turning off any music with a little twang in it, your're really missing something.
Right on!

[RBA]

Very good. I'm always ask what type of music I like and I reply I like all kinds. I get a lot of shocked expressions when I say that as how can someone like "all kinds". As long as it's good I can listen to it. However, I don't go out of my way to listen to music, if it's on and it's good I don't mind. If it's on and it's awful, I do mind.

[Cedric]

I don't listen to pop country, which frankly isn't country. True country is alive and well. I love Hank, Merle, Conway, Cash, Guthrie all that. Today my favorite artists and bands usually have that kind of country in them. Ryan Adams, Wilco, Handsome family, Sun Kil Moon. That kind of country is doing well and isn't dying.

[WVRed]

IIRC, Allison Krauss did the same thing, except Cracker Barrel was the beneficiary of that move. I think it was for her newest CD though, not her older ones.

[Tony Cloninger]

A true musician......can understand and appreciate country.

The Beatles were my favorite band for years, after i turned 18......could never understand why they covered country songs.....but since i was not a true musician....I did not get it. I did not understand how this stuff influenced them in the ways that it did.

Johnny Cash was Country "Punk"......i just did not get that when i was 13-16 years old and into hardcore punk in the early 80's. Never would allow myself to think that someone like Johnny Cash could actually influence someone like John Doe of X or the Circle Jerks.

[BoydsOfSummer]

Can Garth pitch?

[Falls City Beer]

A true musician......can understand and appreciate country.

The Beatles were my favorite band for years, after i turned 18......could never understand why they covered country songs.....but since i was not a true musician....I did not get it. I did not understand how this stuff influenced them in the ways that it did.

Johnny Cash was Country "Punk"......i just did not get that when i was 13-16 years old and into hardcore punk in the early 80's. Never would allow myself to think that someone like Johnny Cash could actually influence someone like John Doe of X or the Circle Jerks.

Good points all. I was stunned to discover that a poet like T.S. Eliot, effete and snobbish, could have drawn so much influence from Mark Twain, demotic, effusive, hilarious. But Eliot drew tremendously from "Huck Finn"--which, when you look past the dialect and the witticisms, is a book about being tremendously disenchanted and horrified with one's surroundings--kind of like, oh, "The Waste Land."

[reds1869]

I am a K-8 music teacher, and my kids are always shocked the first time they ask what I listen too. When I say a little bit of everything, I mean it! The poster who quoted Duke Ellington is correct; there are only two types of music: good and bad. Genre is irrelevant to me.

[Mutaman]

"I never heard real country music-George Jones, Buck Owens-growing up in England,when I did it was a real shock. They were like punks; they didn't put a barrier between themselves and their audience. They sang real songs about real people in real situations. The best punk and the best country addresses the lives of the working class peer groups that helped create and support it. Country had a working class feel that you didn 't get in English music, at least before punk.

"After moving to America, I felt that understanding the soul of Hank Williams was crucial to understanding the American psyche. Hank, Merle Haggard, Johnny Paycheck, Ernest Tubb and others wrote about the everyday lives of everyday people in a way that was quite radical, and took those ideas to the mainstream. But by the '90s they'd been replaced by white suburban rock musicians wearing cowboy hats. Today's country music is fantasy music, like most pop."

John Langford
The Mekons

[bucksfan]

I understand the principle and the principle is important. But I'm more concerned about all of you that just close yourself off to certain genres of music. Whats country? The older I get, the more I start to believe Duke Ellington-- "there's only two kinds of music- good music and bad music". Once you get rid of labels, it opens you up to a whole new world. Like I've said before, Hank Williams and the Clash have a lot in common. Thats why Jack White can produce a great Loretta Lynn album. Garth is irrelevant because he has tried to become all things to all people. But if you're turning off any music with a little twang in it, your're really missing something.

This was, IMO, the best post on the subject of music that I have seen on this forum.

[Larkin Fan]

This was, IMO, the best post on the subject of music that I have seen on this forum.

I concur. Great post, Mutaman.

[macro]

Put me in the "appreciates all good music regardless of genre" category, as well. I am not proud to admit it, but I never had any appreciation for polka, at least until recently. Directv has a channel called the RFD Network, and Saturday nights they have something called The Big Joe Polka Show. It has various polka bands playing on a stage and people dancing on a makeshift plywood floor. Judging from the fashions and the hair, it appears to have been taped sometime in the 80s. My wife and I watched for a few minutes one night, partly to try and figure out what year it was taped and also because we were amused at some of the fashions and big hair that were characteristic of the 80s.

It turns out that this has become something of a Saturday night ritual for us (sad life we live, I know, but she's very pregnant and we don't get out much right now :laugh: ). In the process, I have really started to enjoy the music! For the first time in my life, I enjoy polka!

By the way, if anyone is tempted to check out Big Joe, it's on RFD (satellites only, I assume) Saturdays at 10pm eastern. Also, they've apparently just finished taping all brand new stuff, due to the popularity of this show's reruns.

[flyer85]

Garth who?that's what I thought. I am serious to the extent I can't name even one song of his.

[flyer85]

I enjoy polka! each of have an empty spot inside that can only be filled by accordion music.:D

[oneupper]

This was, IMO, the best post on the subject of music that I have seen on this forum.

Substitute "music" for "anything" and it becomes even better.

[Mutaman]

each of have an empty spot inside that can only be filled by accordion music.:D

I'm really into Dick Contina. Any James Ellroy fans out there.

[REDREAD]

This the wave of the future?

Sad.

Yes, the next logical step is having Walmart (or someone else) buy exclusive rights to an artist we care about and then charging a premium for the CD.

Right now, Walmart is probably doing it as a way to lure customers into the store (you can only get it here). Long term, this is another way that the smaller chains are going to get squeezed out of business. It's going to stink when you have to call around to find out which exclusive store carries the CD you want to buy.

[wally post]

well, the music biz is fragmented now - so the artists are adjusting. I just recorded a Christmas album with Joan Osborne that wil be sold ONLY at Barnes and Noble. I think it's a good thing personally; no more business meetings to determine whether to add strings or which songs to record. In the end (eventually), I hope the music gets better.

[RedsBaron]

Some artists have recorded CDs that have an "extra" song if sold at a particular store. For example, Martina McBride's CD "Martina" had the song "Show Me" on copies sold at Wal-Mart; copies of the CD sold elsewhere didn't include that song. Martina also released a limited edition mini-CD sold only at Hallmark stores around Valentine's Day this year.

[Cedric]

Buy from your local independent record store. And buy vinyl, it's better.

[registerthis]

But if you're turning off any music with a little twang in it, your're really missing something.Well, if you're someone who can appreciate twang, then yes I would say so. But there are inherent preferences that each of us have--not everyone "likes" or appreciates all kinds of music.

I consider myself rather well-versed in the musical world...I own over 1,000 albums, I play piano, drums and guitar, love jazz and rock and try to attend as many concerts as I can. And I loathe country music. Can't stand it. I don't like the twangy sound, I don't like the lyrical content of many of the songs, I don't relate to the lifestyle...I just plain, flat-out don't like it. I've no doubt that there are many accomplished and gifted country songwriters and performers out there. But it's simply something I don't "get". I have had dozens of people suggest hundreds of songs and artists to me, saying things like "This is country music for people who don't like country", and more often than not I still don't like it.

Some people have no tolerance for jazz, some rue the day synthesizers ever made an appearance, some think hard rock is just a bunch of noise...it's all personal preference. So, if someone doesn't like all things twang, they're probably not missing as much as you think they are. They probably just don't like it, and there's nothing inherently wrong with that. I certainly don't fall into the "likes a little bit of everything" crowd, and as most people who know me would attest to, music is my oxygen.

[registerthis]

And buy vinyl, it's better.Only it's not.

[Larry Schuler]

The only people I know who like popular country are rich white girls.

[Falls City Beer]

Only it's not.

I agree and disagree. Albums have their merits--as I'm sure you know, albums have, to some extent, greater fidelity to a live sound than do CDs; albums are, literally, a "cut" of sound. CDs for all their crystal clarity tend to "flatten" the sound a bit, homogenize it.

I like both media a lot--they both offer tremendous windows onto recordings and both have archived sound wonderfully. I'll keep 'em both.

[Mutaman]

And I loathe country music. Can't stand it.

Even Hank?

[Falls City Beer]

Even Hank?

Country music is fine--but it involves much more work to find the good stuff than in, say, jazz or even rock for that matter. There was a time when I could devote great chunks of time to digging up good stuff, but those days, frankly and sadly, are gone.

[westofyou]

Country music is fine--but it involves much more work to find the good stuff than in, say, jazz or even rock for that matter. There was a time when I could devote great chunks of time to digging up good stuff, but those days, frankly and sadly, are gone.

No, there will never be another
Red-headed stranger
A Man in Black and Folsom Prison Blues
The Okie from Muskogee
Or Hello Darling
Lord I wonder, who's gonna fill their shoes

[redsfanmia]

I personally enjoy older country music and a few of the new "country" songs. I feel that the new "country" is just watered down pop completely contrived in a studio by singers who are just puppets in a cowboy hat. There are a few good country acts but for the most part just listen to 5 year old pop music and you will get basically the same sound as new "country" music. I often times think that Hank, Johnny, Ernest, and Mr. Acuff would roll in their graves if they heard some of the music that passes for country these days.

[BoydsOfSummer]

http://www.gaelicstorm.com/

[macro]

There are a few good country acts but for the most part just listen to 5 year old pop music and you will get basically the same sound as new "country" music.

And we can probably thank Mutt Lange for that. He brought the Foreigner/Def Leppard sound to "country" music ten years ago when he produced his wife's CD.

Country seems to have run in cycles over the past 25 years. Kenny Rogers and others brought us country pop in the early 80s, and then the album sales hit rock bottom by 1985. Then the traditionalists like Randy Travis, Mark Chesnutt, Clint Black, and Alan Jackson came on the scene and ignited the revolution that sent country album sales through the roof and sold out arenas coast-to-coast in the early 90s. The current wave of country pop will run its course soon enough, and then Nashville will come calling for a new generation of traditionalists.

Oh, and speaking of "puppets in cowboy hats", that has and always has been such a joke. Most of the current acts were teetering between a career in a pop music boy band and "country" music. "Country" was where they got their break, so they popped on hat and they were all set. It's nauseating watching some of these guys pretending to be cowboys or country or whatever it is that they are supposing to be. :laugh: