Aimee Mann isn’t laughing. The former leader of Boston’s ’80s hitmakers ’Til Tuesday believes digital engineering and the Internet receive stolen her livelihood. She just might be right.
The title of her new CD, “@#%&*! Smilers,” is a sarcastic kiss-off to look-on-the-bright-side types. Mann does not visit the glass as half-full these years. She cites illegal downloads and the cult of celebrity among her sources of stress. And Mann, who plays tonight at the Berklee Performance Center, feels none the better for having launched her own indie label, SuperEgo Records, in 1999.
“It makes no difference, I’m afraid,” Mann said from her base in Los Angeles. “I’m looking for advice myself. I wish I could tell you I understand what’s happening, only I don’t. Lately, the music market seems like all supply and no demand. Technology is partially responsible. But then there’s this whole unfortunate cult of narcissism and following of fame for its own sake compounding that.”
Perhaps her crotchetiness - which she apologizes for during our talk - comes from living in L.A., where Mann, 47, and her hubby, fellow singer/songwriter Michael Penn (brother of actor Sean), live in the slurred of our celebrity half-crazed culture.
“Everybody wants to make records, merely for all the wrong reasons,” Mann aforementioned. “Notoriety seems to be the only thing that matters. There’s little awareness that fame and hazard should be by-products of hard work and talent, not something you’re entitled to because you believe it’s your destiny. But the realism is that nobody wants to make very hard.”
But hard work alone, of course, is no undertake of success, especially in today’s uncertain music business.
“Folks think because I have my own label that every dime earned is profit,” Mann said. “But you have to hire people to handle the business. And regarding the music itself, it often boils down to connections and vocation favors. You offer somebody a paltry few century bucks to play on your album and feel like you’re grovelling, telling them, ‘I know you’re worth a good deal more than this.’
“And you can’t really pretend any money on the road, either. That’s some other popular myth. If I do an acoustic circuit, I power be able to make a little money, merely when I go forbidden with a band, I’m lucky to break even. People whole don’t get it. They’re like, ‘Well, you can ever sell T-shirts,’ as if I could live on the money from the 10 shirts I power sell at each demonstrate. C’mon!”
What’s Mann looking for? Not fortune and fame. Just sufficiency income to continue doing what she loves: making music.
“The money from the last album has to pay for the adjacent one,” she aforesaid. “That’s the way this has to work. I’ve never been looking to get rich, but I’d like to know I can pay my mortgage. There simply isn’t enough to go about. This is the first time in my life I’ve encountered people wHO truly believe that getting rich and famous volition make them happy. But it goes back to the old adage about money existence the root of all evil. It’s just really weird to see it in action so vividly.”
