Art, Empire and Industry – Rowena Sian Morgan of BASCA on the photoshoot for the cover of The Music of Business – just before we were asked to leave the scene by security guards …
We stand just 72 hours away from the launch of my new book “The Music of Business”. The book is already available to buy at AMAZON.CO.UK, AMAZON.COM, and KINDLE. Signed copies directly from the book WEBPAGE. On 31 1 13, the book will be on special offer for the day. If you are planning to buy copies, it would help enormously if you did so on 31 1 13 to help secure a place in the Amazon charts in an interesting experiment to see if it’s possible to beat the major publishers at their own game.
To preview the book, this week I’m taking a break from my regular blogging content. Instead I’ve just selected some cool videos from some of the artists who feature in the book. Normal service will be resumed soon and I will stop being over excited!
Gaga controls the music business and is Queen of Social Media marketing.
I grew up on the Beatles, having blown my ear drums out screaming to Twist and Shout when I was 5 years old with an orange plastic Beatles guitar. This was the beginning of my 1st love and perhaps was the 1st inspiration for the book, swiftly followed by Jimi Hendrix.
AC / DC are a miracle in making a ‘formula’ work over nearly 40 years. Most of us have to flex and bend in order to stay alive.
Madonna is a reinvention guru. What made her that way? Read all about it in The Music of Business.
The best day of 2012 was the moment when I performed on stage with Bernie Tormé. Can business be this fun? Yes it can! We offer 24 hour strategy retreats that synthesise business excellence with the power of music.
Prince teaches us about the art and discipline of improvisation in the context of peak performance.
Scott McGill – a virtuoso jazz fusion musician and teacher gives valuable lessons in ‘musical escapology’ with important parallels for business creativity.
Richard Strange – Quoted as “The Godfather of Punk” by Johnny Rotten explores the dark side of creativity and innovation. If you are in London and wish to meet up, I often attend Richard’s alternative mixed media event Cabaret Futura.
Bill Nelson offers us lessons in principled leadership and reinvention in The Music of Business. Check this music master’s work out at Bill Nelson.
Ch, ch, ch, changes from the Thin White Duke, who has shape shifted many times over 40 years, keeping his audience. His latest work sees him turn full circle back to a reflective style that won him fans 40 years ago, but with a post-modern edge to it.
My life was never the same at the age of 13 when I discovered Marc Bolan. Bolan was a great innovator. Check out Lesley Ann-Jones’ book on Marc on Amazon.
And of course, the title of this blog from the Bard of Barking – what a great wordsmith:
Hoping your week rocks! Please spread the word about the book launch on 31 1 13 on social media, e-mail, carrier pigeon and any other mode of communication. Thank you for all your encouragement and supports, which have been pivotal in completing this project.
Four Symbols – Heavy metal explained by school kids
Heavy Metal. You either love it or hate it. Nonetheless it has an awesome power from the sheer volume and deathly riffs that lurk within the genre. Perhaps one of the most doom laden riffs of all time comes from Black Sabbath via the title song of their album Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, particularly the riff towards the end of the song (3 minutes 17 seconds on), which competes with Uranium, weighing in at 238 units on the ‘heavy metal’ scale in the Periodic Table.
Heavy metal sounds different to pop music and a quick musical note explains why. Heavy Metal tends to employ modal scales, in particular the Aeolian and Phrygian modes rather than the upbeat scales favoured in pop songs (Doh-Ray-Me-Far-So-La-Te-Doh, with third part harmonies such as those used in songs by The Beatles, Abba etc.). Although heavy metal has its critics, it has been argued that heavy metal has the most in common with classical music, especially Bach, Wagner and Vivaldi through the influence of Ritchie Blackmore, Randy Rhoads, Yngwie Malmsteen etc.
As if to illustrate the point, take a listen to Love Sculpture, featuring Dave Edmunds, doing Khachaturian’s ’Sabre Dance’ in 1968, containing many of the modal scales I mentioned above:
Music theory aside, what can we learn about business from Heavy Metal bands?
From Deep Purple, we get the insight that innovation in business requires discipline as much as it does creativity.
From Led Zeppelin and Peter Grant, we get the insight that, if the industry norms are killing your business opportunity, change the industry norms.
From Black Sabbath, we get the insight that limitations can assist creativity.
From Spinal Tap, we learn that plans are nothing if execution is poor.
About the Blogger: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock - Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics - Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk
Old Nipper now downloads his 78′s on Bit Torrent from the internet one track per artist …
Somebody wrote on Facebook – The Internet killed HMV. This is factually as incorrect as saying guns kill people. WE, the people killed HMV, albeit in a series of mostly unconscious but related acts:
Many people now download music for free without guilt or feeling that it is a criminal act. In the case of Ed Sheeran, apparently 9 million people have his album in the UK but he has actually sold 1.2 million copies. Go figure! No doubt, in Mr Sheeran’s case, he can make the difference up in merchandise, but it’s still a phenomenal statistic and most musicians are not in Ed’s position to make a living from T-Shirt sales.
We ‘graze’ on Spotify, Last FM et al without ever buying the music or considering that the artists who make the music have to make a living like the rest of us.
Our iPOD’s shuffle digital music without guidance or instruction from us, salami slicing our musical experience into slivers of music from artists that we may not even know the names of. Speaking recently with Bernie Tormé, he observed that bands now use his studio to record one song or an EP. Hardly anyone bothers to record albums because they know that people will only buy one track on iTunes.
Some of us cannot be arsed to go to a town centre to visit a music shop, if you can find one. Some local councils have also made it very unattractive to use town centres through draconian parking charges and makeovers that make it virtually impossible to run a music shop with character. I met Harvey Goldsmith a while back. He points out that that London’s nightlife is under threat through parking restrictions until midnight from ‘Government Grey People’.
A minority of people on Facebook today argued that HMV was disorganised and that the staff were not great at customer service, therefore they deserved their fate, in the Darwinian sense of the word. One or two said they feel intimidated by the ‘browsing’ mentality that HMV encouraged, especially those that did not know what they wanted. Perhaps these were weaknesses but not the major cause of their decline? On the pricing issue, HMV were undoubtedly dearer than the internet, yet, as someone that sells books on Amazon, I am deeply aware that they squeeze producers and publishers’ margins down to the point where some would consider it not worthwhile to make music, books and so on.
If we want to encourage original musical talent over and above the X-factor ‘karaoke music economy’, we need to change our behaviour. The food we buy at the supermarket is not free. We still contribute National Insurance but must pay for glasses and dentistry. Our water is now metered. Why, then, do we expect musicians and artists to work for nothing? That said, musicians have not been their own best friends by giving their work away etc. so it is a two-way street. Aside from the musical aspect of this story, HMV’s decline is testament to just how hard it is to operate in high street retailing in the current age. Looking forward 10 years, we may see the total reconstruction of high streets as a place for communities? Will shops still be part of that landscape?
HMV is gone and it certainly seems that the old dog did not learn any new tricks. Will we?
One is reminded of Elvis’ rendition of Old Shep … Reader warning, this song can make you cry!
Our new book “The Music of Business” is available to order at AMAZON.CO.UK, AMAZON.COM, and KINDLE. To sample the book have a look at a sneak preview via a SLIDESHARE presentation or visit the book WEBSITE.
OUT 31.1.13 Click the cover to pre-order signed copies
Music is my first love, And it will be my last, Music of the future, Music of the past John Miles
Thursday 31 January 2013 marks the launch date of my new book “The Music of Business” and I thought I’d give a heads up on the date in the hope that you will buy copies of the book and tell others about it, to give it an initial boost on Amazon. The book represents the culmination of many years work, looking at the parallels between business excellence and ideas from the field of music. There’s a healthy dose of totally new material plus major developments and expansions of ideas I have written about here and in other places. Pre-order copies of the book here. The book is also available to buy at AMAZON.CO.UK, AMAZON.COM, and KINDLE although it will be available at a discount on 31 1 13. Take a quick look at the Slideshare presentation.
Alongside Harvey Goldsmith’s quote, I was delighted to receive some spiffing reviews of the book:
“Original, perceptive, effective and amusing… Peter Cook’s unique take on the parallel universes of business and music never fails to stimulate, inspire and entertain” Richard Strange, Founder, The Doctors of Madness, Actor, Writer
“An engaging and accessible look at business issues through a musical lens – no MBA required!” – Dominic Brown – Finance Director, The Halcyon Gallery
“If you are in business and like music then The Music of Business is simply a ‘must have’. It puts across sound theories in a logical, digestible and illustrative manner, in ways that actually make sense compared with other business books” - Marc Don Francesco, Head of Group Marketing, Towergate Insurance
Organised into four sections : Strategy; Creativity; Innovation and; Change, the book is available as a hard copy with additional material and pictures. It will also be available as a Kindle download. I wonder if I dare ask some favours of you on this:
Please mention the book to contacts and colleagues, perhaps by sharing this blog on social media or posting a Tweet, LinkedIn, Google+1, Digg, Reddit, Stumbleupon or facebook mention.
Share the Slideshare presentation widely via the link SHARE
If anyone fancies doing a guest blog, interview or book review, that would be great. E-mail me at peter@humdyn.co.uk
Anything else you can think of Just do it
Pre-order signed copies at the book webpage: The Music of Business. To thank you for your help, I am also launching a free iPhone app – daily business tips mixed with music, which I will be happy to send you. This has been devised in partnership with data genius and bass player supremo Jason Bell of Datasentiment.
A date to remember – Just click to order
We leave with two songs that capture the essence of why music reaches the parts that spreadsheets do not, from John Miles and Madonna:
I attended a great event with John Lloyd, Producer of Blackadder, Not the Nine o’Clock News, Spitting Image and co-author of 1227 QI facts at the RSA a few weeks back. John’s talk was entitled “General Ignorance – It’s all about what you don’t know”. John and I had a pleasant conversation afterwards as it turned out that I was the 3rd Peter Cook he has met, having of course been good friends with the comic genius during his Perrin Walk years in Hampstead. Click on the image to listen to the full RSA event.
Ignorance is NOT Bliss
Uncertainty bedevils business decisions and all innovation projects, since they are all about the future. We all know that “the past ain’t what it used to be” and our algorithms for making decisions based on the past are pretty near redundant. We need better routines to handle decisions about the future these days. However, I’m pretty certain (sic) that uncertainty in business breaks down into two dimensions – uncertainty over the destination and uncertainty over the journey:
Smart leaders know that different strategies are required to deal with the different ‘zones’ of uncertainly. For more on this topic read ‘Sex, Leadership and Rock’n'Roll‘. These include:
Zone 3 – Finding a genuinely shared, potent and viable VISION
Zone 1 – Asking an expert or someone who knows (often overlooked in favour of a strategy summit! )
Zone 4 – Unpicking complex and conflicting issues where uncertainty is a constant – or SWAMP DRAINING
If you still haven’t found what you’re looking for re great decisions or innovation, get in touch. If you have, feel free to enjoy Bono’s anthem on uncertainty:
Coming on 31 1 13 the new book “The Music of Business” with whole sections on strategy and change. I can hardly believe my luck in getting the quote below from Harvey Goldsmith. “The Music of Business” is available to order at AMAZON.CO.UK, AMAZON.COM, and KINDLE with special discounts on 31 1 13. To sample the book have a look at a sneak preview via a SLIDESHARE presentation or visit the book WEBSITE.
In this new year post, I’m counting down 10 business tips as seen through the eyes and ears of punk rock. A kind of “Business Top of the Pops” but without the DJ. No need to pogo whilst reading these unless you must. Punk refers to brevity, simplicity and purity of thought in business. For more on all this, ping me a note with PUNK in the title to claim your new year’s gift – a copy of my micro book - Punk Rock People Management.
# 10 – What do you want from life? – The Tubes
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT - The Tubes’ revolting anthem on happiness in life and work, coming out of observations on their fans opulent lifestyle in San Francisco, points out that consumption per se does not lead to happiness. So, rewards given without there being some basic desire for the reward are worthless. We did not need The Tubes or the happiness movement to tell us this. All we had to do was to look carefully at Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory of Satisfiers and Dissatisfiers. Somehow The Tubes’ message is more potent. If you are not familiar with the song, listen to the rant at the end of this piece. In more recent times, Radiohead did something similar with “Fitter Happier”.
# 9 – Blank Generation – Richard Hell and the Voidoids
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT- This is perhaps the first and only time that Punk Rock and HR Guru Gary Hamel will find unity … Hamel recently said that “HR must help kill bureaucracy and encourage greater innovation within organistions“. Why? That comes down to the ‘blank generation’, aka people who are actively disengaged from work. We don’t need engagement taskforces to know this – it’s punk rock common sense. Less obvious is how to achieve that innnovation in HR, which, after all, is usually part of the risk reduction part of the enterprise. I spent a third of my life working on scientific innovation and quite a bit of time watching people wringing their hands about innovation on the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development Council and frankly, I don’t see innovation as a core HR competence.
# 8 – Oh bondage, up yours – X-Ray Spex
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT - Poly Styrene’s point was really all about female empowerment or girl power. This applies just as much to the guys. As Poly says “Bind me tie me, Chain me to the wall, I wanna be a slave to you all, Oh bondage up yours“. Simply put, if you want to get extra performance out of people, stop controlling every last detail of people’s performance through lengthy job descriptions, KPI’s, SMART goals for everything, yada, yada …
# 7 – Public Image – Public Image Ltd
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT- “You never listen to a word that I said, you only see me for the clothes that I wear” Do we look past people’s appearance towards their knowledge, skills and attitudes in interviews, appraisals etc? After all, it’s those things we desperately want rather than an illusion. In an age where virtually everything is choreographed at work, remember that Steve Jobs would probably have failed an interview at Apple.
# 6 – What do I get? – The Buzzcocks
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT – We know well enough from Frederick Herzberg and The Buzzcocks that pay is a ‘dissatisifier’. In other words, if you double people’s pay, they won’t work twice as hard for twice as long. Take away their pay and you know all about it if it is perceived as being out of balance with the effort as Starbucks are just about to discover. Pay people well enough, but don’t just focus on pay as the reward for work. This reinforces the conversation about ‘What do I get?’ After all RNR stands for Reward AND Recognition, not just Rock’n’Roll.
# 5 – Two Tribes – Frankie Goes to Hollywood
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT– The Bard of Barking, Billy Bragg, may not have been an employment lawyer, but he may have contributed more to our understanding of collective bargaining than all the employment law authors in the world if they were laid end to end, via his song ‘There is power in a union’. Frankie goes to Hollywood also reminded us of the classic pluralist assumption within classical thinking on unions in their 80’s anthem “Two Tribes”. OK, Frankie are not punks I know, but they conveyed the spirit of punk rock through their music.
Punk Rock HR offers us three chords on unions:
See unions as an advantage in a pluralist workplace due to the money and time they can save you if you get the relationship right.
Focus on interests rather than positions if you are to do collective bargaining well.
See negotiations from all viewpoints so that you can be most effective in reaching a solution. It is what pre-punk Scandinavians Abba would have called “Knowing me, knowing you”.
# 4 – Happy House – Siouxsie and the Banshees
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT – Siouxsie Sioux’s deeply ironic lyric flags up the problem with the ‘happiness movement’. She commented that “Happy House” contrasts the illusion of family bliss, where everyone smiles, has blond hair, has all-day sunshine, eats butter without fat, with the realities of life – depression, wife beating and so on. Grim stuff for a pop song! The happiness movement also seems to operate under the illusion that we are all becoming more self-actualised and self-driven, when the data seems to suggest that people are less happy than they were 50 years ago, even though we are considerably richer. Since work is a huge part of life, the implication is that we should design jobs and work which are fulfilling.
# 3 – Smash it up – The Damned
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT – Disruptive innovation inside companies takes considerable effort. Sometimes it’s necessary to destroy the status quo to make way for new practices. Smashing up existing organisational structures and cultures may look like vandalism, but given the permanence of cultures, sometimes it is the only way to make space for the new.
# 2 – What a Waste – Ian Dury
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT– “What a waste”, like “Sex and Drugs and Rock’n’Roll”, was a song about being in a job that makes you happy. Perhaps all that is needed to create a high performance workplace is to develop the HR habit of finding out what turns people on and ensuring that the work gives them these outcomes.
In some cases, as Dury points out, this does not have to be Chief Executive or Vice President of HR, it could simply involve becoming “the ticket man at Fulham Broadway Station”.
# 1 – Teenage Kicks – The Undertones
THE PUNKBUSINESS POINT – When I asked Professor Adrian Furnham earlier this year to identify out some factors that make for an agile innovative company, his first point was to ensure that youth has a voice in the affairs of the company. Youth brings ideas that are untrammelled by experience, as long as people feel able to voice those ideas. The smart HR person gives a voice to youthful and other naïve inputs to company strategy.
Send your suggestions for other punk rock songs with a business message by commenting on this blog. Order your copy of Punk Rock People Management by mailing me with PUNK in the title. Also available on Amazon Kindle and as a hard copy full colour book. Coming very soon now, the new book – The Music of Business – Here’s a quote: This book is a great tool for people in business. Harvey Goldsmith CBE
– Punk Rock People Management – Disruptive Innovation in Business
About the Blogger: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock - Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics - Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk
Computers are wonderful things and I personally could not live without my Mac. However, the old phrase GIGO (Garbage in Garbage out) still applies. It’s amazing what people seem to believe if it is on a flat screen. Here’s an example of what happens when people disengage their own intelligence in favour of a database:
I was phoned a few months ago by a company wanting to ‘conduct research’ on my washing machine. They refused to get off the line despite several polite attempts to persuade them to do so, so I told them I had a “Toyota” washing machine….
Two months later I had a call from another company offering me insurance, who proudly started the call with:
“We’re calling you today to offer you exclusive insurance cover for your Toyota USB2000 washing machine ….”
Sometime later: Me : “You do know that Toyota don’t make washing machines?”
Them : “Have you sold it?”
Me : “I have a Prius. As I said, Toyota make cars”
Toyota make great cars … but no washing machines
Them : “We know that sir. The washing machine you have is spelt differently. Have you sold it?”
Me (broken record) : “Toyota make cars, not washing machines”.
Them (still keen to insure my washing machine): “We bought the data from another company. Do you have a washing machine” ….
A hybrid washing machine?
I had a similar experience when I bought an advert from Yell.com (now Hibu.com) recently. The promise was articulated thus: ”We cannot get you business, but we can make the phone ring”. This seemed like an entirely reasonable premise. A couple of weeks later, the phone did ring:
“I’d like to buy some turf”
Me : “Aah, sorry, this is a business consultancy – you have the wrong number”
The following week, I got a call for Calor Gas. I was suspicious so asked where he got the number from – it was the Yellow Pages!
The following week, I got a call for plate glass. Yell insist on giving you a different phone number so they can track calls. Clearly this one had been round the block many times.
No problem, you would think – just call them and it would get sorted out. Well, no. Yell started off by trying to rewrite history, suggesting that it had not happened the way I described. They then tried to shift blame by telling me that Yellow Pages did not belong to them any more. It was only when I pointed out that their phone number was the root cause of the Yellow Pages calls and asked to speak to their CEO that they finally capitulated, after which time most people have given up.
What would have been better? Well, simply offering to investigate and fix the problem without fuss would have been a much better turnaround. Unfortunately they trusted the computer more than they did me to start with, wasting time and damaging their reputation, making me want to “Yell about it”.
Incidentally, saying you want to “Hibu about it” just does not work as well … Perhaps that’s why they renamed the company recently?
Life’s a Gas, Heart of Grass, The Green Green Glass of Home
On the upside, I have discovered a great business opportunity for a one stop shop that sells Grass, Glass and Gas … Hurry, hurry … Happy Christmas!
3G business for sale on Yell.com
Coming soon, my recent dealings with HR outsourcing company RSM Tenon and boutique solicitors Twenty Twenty Law make for an interesting story of disappointment and dishonour in dealing with others, Bah Humbug! To finish here is Pink Floyd’s prophetic tale of corporate cyber control where common sense is replaced by algorithms and bulls…t. Welcome to the Machine:
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About the Blogger: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock - Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics - Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk
I spent a night at the opera recently, when we went to see Rusalka, by Dvorak. In brief Rusalka develops the fairy story of a mermaid, who longs to leave her underwater kingdom. She falls in love with a handsome prince but must pay the price of losing her voice. Of course the opera ends in tragedy. Sounds innocent enough? Well, Daily Telegraph readers were outraged due to the modern adaptation, which recasts the mermaid as a hooker and the wicked witch as a brothel madam – pretty much Sex, Opera and Rock’n’Roll! Telegraph readers wrote in to complain of “girls running around in their scanties”.
Sex, Opera and Rock’n'Roll
Sex, Opera and Rock’n'Roll aside, I was fascinated to watch the workings of the orchestra during the three hour performance. There’s no room for free improvisation in such a setting, with up to 40 people performing together, alongside a similar number of people on stage. The role of the orchestra conductor is pivotal as the main communication medium between stage and orchestra pit. It’s an idea I have drawn parallels about in the book “Sex, Leadership and Rock’n'Roll” and am developing with “The Music of Business”. Quite by chance, I ended up having a conversation with Andy Wooler, an orchestral brass player, big band jazz fiend, conductor, music fanatic and Academy Technology Manager at Hitachi Data Systems.
What parallel lessons can businesses learn from this?
Size matters – It may be easy to jam in a small group where the task is simple. Once group size gets beyond a certain number and the task becomes complex, co-ordination of tasks is required if the music is to come out to the same quality standard on a consistent basis. In an orchestra this is accomplished by the use of sheet music and a conductor. In business, this may be achieved through procedures, standards and / or supervision and guidance.
Beauty and the Beast – What is often heard in an opera are the highlights / melodies. Yet, these rest on what my PhD music teacher friend calls the ‘boring bits’. Without a number of pieces of substructure music does not always have grace and beauty. In the pop music world, take a listen to some of the hidden arrangements in The Beatles work circa Sargent Pepper or Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen to hear what I mean.
Innovation and the Opera – Andy points out that, despite what conventional wisdom might suggest, there is room for innovation in the opera. Specifically, innovation manifests itself in two ways:
The choice of conductor – For example, Leonard Bernstein transformed the music of many works such as Romeo and Juliet, where he changed the story and added music. Bernstein was regarded as an eclectic composer, fusing jazz, Jewish music, and the work of other classical composers, such as Stravinsky. A kind of Jimi Hendrix of the classics
The storyline / staging – The other area where innovation occurs in opera is in the storyline. Andy recalls seeing “The Last Supper’ at Glyndbourne, where Judas was included in the guest list at a Last Supper reunion. Another example is the recasting of “The Marriage of Figaro” in the 1960’s. The transformation of Rusalka towards a more modern interpretation is just such an example of changing the setting to engage a new audience, even if Daily Telegraph readers were not amused!
In conclusion, superb performance often rests on a number of invisible substructures. Structure is not the enemy of creativity. Graceful performance in any field is often the product of a great deal of structure, some of which is non-obvious. More on this in the forthcoming book “The Music of Business“. Andy Wooler may be contacted at http://www.andywooler.info/wordpress or at Twitter @awooler
To finish, let’s hear the finale from Rusalka:
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About the Blogger: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock - Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics - Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk
The other week I was invited to a private viewing of classic photographs of The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan at The British Music Experience by the great people at MusicConnex with my friend Guy Cresswell. This afforded me the rare privilege of meeting Harvey Goldsmith and presenting him with a copy of “Sex, Leadership and Rock’n'Roll“. I pointed out that I’d been to a lot of Harvey’s gigs but he never seemed to show up at them! I am now waiting to find out if he enjoyed the book and whether he has time to give me a quote on the new book “The Music of Business” out in January 2013. That would be just awesome as young people say. Apart from all that, it was fascinating to learn about the transition of Dylan and the Stones life through the pictures and archive videos of their performances. What would you say we learned from them? How has this has a permanent impact on our culture? Post your thoughts on the blog.
Due for launch on 31 1 13
The new book “The Music of Business” has four themes: Strategy; Creativity; Innovation and; Change, with a wide selection of articles. I’m currently looking for endorsements from business people, senior academics and music luminaries so please get in touch if you fit the bill.
An unexpected surprise was to bump into the lead singer of The Blockheads, who seems to share a number of network contacts including John Otway. Here’s a picture of Derek the Blockhead with me and the Jester himself:
Blockheads
The British Music Experience exhibition on the Stones and Dylan runs until February 3rd at the O2. It’s well worth a visit, if you have a few hours to spend in London. Let’s remind ourselves of Dylan, Jagger et al’s work in their heyday:
Footnote: I did indeed get a reference – The hallmark of a great person is someone who makes you feel like you are the only person in the room even when they are themselves furiously busy. Harvey Goldsmith is such a person:
This book is a great tool for people in business. At the end it answers a lot of questions and then asks a lot more.
It’s one thing to be one step ahead. Quite another to be 30 years ahead. Bill Nelson has continuously innovated in music, sometimes so far ahead of the wave that he has only been noticed through those who have been influenced by him such as The Kaiser Chiefs, Ambulance Ltd, The Darkness, Foo Fighters et al.
This boxed set “Trial By Intimacy – The Book Splendours” preceded ambient electronica by a a good decade and has just been re-released, having been out of print for many years on Bill’s DIY Cocteau Records label. The box comprises recordings made by Nelson at his “Echo Observatory” home studio. Comprising some eighty pieces of music, the set is a fine example of Bill Nelson’s grasp of ambient music.
Check out this interview with the gorgeous Mariella Frostrup, which shows Bill Nelson composing material in this genre / period long before anyone owned an i Mac !
“Trial By Intimacy” contains four albums of mostly short ambient pieces of music that will provoke, inspire, question, comfort and challenge your views of what one man with a tape recorder can do in a day. Part of the charm of this material is that it was composed on primitive equipment in Nelson’s studio above the kitchen in his house. The instruments Nelson chooses vary from state of the art electronica available at the time to children’s Casio keyboards, plastic woodwind instruments, Marimbas and archive radio extracts. The contrasts and contradictions between futurama and distant memories, between grown up electronica and childhood musical toys provide the listener with a naïve charm and a connection into the inner soul of the artist. Many of the pieces were laid down in a native state, without over production and ‘polishing the grooves’ so hard that the artist is drowned in the process. Bill Nelson is a Yorkshireman – to misquote the bread advert, “Trial By Intimacy” is an album “with nowt taken out”.
Four albums of material that was 20 years ahead of Leftfield, Underworld, Lemon Jelly, Moby et al you get a timepiece of the age via Nelson’s arcane photographs and written words. So what are the transferable lessons for the business world here?
Sometimes your first idea is the best one – on occasion it’s best to go with your basic instinct.
Don’t be afraid of childlike approaches to creativity and innovation. If it feels good, try it.
Spot what’s obvious and dare to be different.
We’ll be doing some live improvisation with electronica on Tuesday 13 November at the University of Bedfordshire in our business event for the Chartered Management Institute of The Open University – Riffs and Myths of Leadership – some spaces available for booking now.
Click on the link to book
We will be talking about the event on BBC Radio Cambridgeshire on Monday 22 October at 7.20 pm. Listen again via The BBC.
Sue Marchant discusses Sex, Leadership and Rock’n'Roll – Monday 22 October 7.20 pm – click on the picture to listen again for a limited period – BBC Radio Cambridgeshire
p.s. It seems that Lady Gaga‘s World Tour support act Lady Starlight has been using Bill’s music as part of her performance art act. I’m on the case to get Bill connected. Watch this space. Sometimes strange and wonderful things can happen once I get started on a mission … Be careful, I’m an axe victim …
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About the Blogger: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock - Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics - Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk
