Corrected Podcast Transcript: John Raso Interview

[Start of recorded material, 00:00:54]

John Raso: Are you making any noise?

Interviewer: Hello, hello.

John Raso: You can hear me obviously. And you probably can hear my air conditioner, which I need to turn off, too. No? That's good, OK. Why can't I hear you? [Audio Gap, 00:01:10 - 00:05:33]

Interviewer: I feel to do this right, man, we have so much ground to cover – I was – I know I was making some notes before calling you and I was trying to figure out – I just can't figure out which path to go down. So I'm going to start – I'm going to take the high road first and then we can decide which tributaries to go down. Because I think it would be a lost opportunity not to go down all of them. But I don't like to make any assumptions for listeners, right, so can you tell people what Harry Fox Agency does? Let's start there.

John Raso: Sure, sure, sure, sure. Happy to do that. Are we starting now?

Interviewer: Oh yeah, we're starting. We'll edit out the beginning, but yeah we're starting now.

John Raso: OK, didn't realize that was an actual question, but–

Interviewer: Yeah it's cool, we just go right in.

John Raso: So the Harry Fox Agency is about 95 years old, started in 1921, well actually no, 1927, so we have another six years. And it was founded by, actually, someone named Harry Fox.

Interviewer: No longer with us?

John Raso: No, died in the sixties. But one of the mysteries of the Harry Fox business, we cannot find a picture of Harry. And then people, all the time, send us pictures of Harry Fox the Vaudevillian, not the same Harry Fox, but people send that picture all the time. So I was hoping to have a picture on our wall that said "our founder," but – so it's the original U.S. Mechanical Licensing Agency, mechanical license as being a public – a music royalty publishing use. It's literally at the time it was for the mechanical reproduction of a song. So if you pressed a piano roll at the time or a piece of shellac at the time and eventually vinyl and cassettes and now downloads and streaming, that reproduction of the composition itself is a copyright that anybody who makes one of those things and distributes them has to pay a U.S. statutory rate currently of nine point one cents is the current rate.

There's a lot of debate going on; that rate has not changed in a long time. But it also spent decades at one cent, so there was a huge jump to nine cents, but now obviously people are itching for that to go up and that's for downloads, that's for everything. And so the Harry Fox Agency represents music – it was actually, at one point, owned by the National Music Publishers Association and with that they said, "Oh, you need record label, you need a license to do this, send a letter to Harry." And literally it was the Harry Fox Agency and everyone would register whatever songs they had written and the record label would get their license through the Harry Fox Agency and then every quarter they'd have to pay their royalties.

There's a lot more to that, obviously rates are different with streaming now and – but historically that was – just the quick modernization of that was, right. So Warner owns a publishing company, Warner Chappell, and they also own Warner Brothers Records and whatever. So they no longer go through the Harry Fox Agency, because it's essentially an intercompany exchange, so that [audio gap 00:09:12] started evolving the business and then with streaming you now had companies like Spotify and Apple and Amazon creating these streaming services and yet they were – that was – the law requires them to get that license but they are – they obviously license the sound recordings they're using themselves. So that as they get farther away from the knowledge of what song called, Angel, it is, they in turn had to rely on companies like the Harry Fox Agency.

It's like, "Hey we have this thing that's performed by this artist and it's this song called Angel," and we're like, "Oh, well we actually licensed the original recording on Warner Brothers from that artist and so we know it's this composition, written by this person; we could connect you to the publisher," and then we would issue a license that way. And then ultimately there was a competitor called Music Reports that came out, that did the same service for other competing digital services. And then the big blowup that happened in the last couple years; there was the signing of this thing called The Music Modernization Act, which was the first real upgrade to copyright since the 1976 act.

And that created this thing called the Mechanical Licensing Collective, people lovingly call it the MLC, which started just in January of this year and they are handling all of the streaming services and the downloads for Mechanical Licenses, essentially moving it away from these individual companies, Music Reports and the Harry Fox Agency. So it's – I don't even want to call it quasi-governmental, but as a result there is now this independent group run really by the music publishers. Now all of those streaming services report their streaming mechanical royalties into this company and then they do the math, so all the money sits there and it – there's a ton of rules around it, whatever. But essentially that's been the evolution of the Mechanical License and really the central piece of what the Harry Fox Agency has done for 94 years now.

Interviewer: So, with the advent of the MLC and with the consolidation of so much publishing into the major label groups, what's that meant for your business?

John Raso: So, it's just, we've evolved. Really – so historically our only business was we were owned by the NMPA, the National Music Publishers Association and was essentially their administration arm. As a result of that, we – everyone came to us for a mechanical license, that's separate from ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, that's the performance side and people confuse us with that – we're the only people doing mechanicals. So mechanicals became – so the first evolution where we had to adapt was the inter – these companies getting bigger and doing that business a lot more direct, that essentially shrunk our business, but it was just the expectation. It was still – it was a better process for the people that essentially owned us.

Then the big change came with digital and streaming and they started using something called the notice of intent, because a mechanical license – I'm sorry I'm going to sound like a lawyer too much here.

But it's a – you can't tell someone they can't cover your song, once someone records a song, anybody could do a cover. And as a result, that's – they call it a compulsory notice and so you could actually then serve a letter to someone and have to follow all the obligations that are established in the Copyright Act. It's like you have to report every month, you have to send a note – the notice at a certain time, lot of hoops to jump through. And so that – and that became the growth of these companies like Music Reports and there was another company that got bought by Google, called RightsFlow.

And as a result HFA then got into that business too, we only used to work on the publisher side of the business. So HFA, as it's called, we then centralized and really our first client was the probably iteration four of Napster, which is now – Napster is now the name – the brand that Rhapsody Streaming Service uses, but at one point it was owned by BMG and it moved around the brand. Best Buy owned it for a while and so we worked with several of those iterations. And so we ended up filling the gap of not doing the mechanical publishing by working on the side of the people who needed licenses but had no idea how to get them. So we became much more the racetrack as opposed to a horse, right, we used to work for the stable, then we now working for the fans and then now we're just the racetrack and we're on both sides of it.

And then the MLC took the fan side of it, the way, so we aren't really working for the DSPs at this point. But the interesting piece is, so the MLC needed a technological and a database support to do it, so we're now a vendor to the MLC to essentially do what we were doing independently as a support process for the MLC, which is now funded by all of these DSPs, so it's a bit of a – for us it's been an interesting change. We've essentially sat in the same place and the business has changed around us and we've just had relationships with different players in it.

Interviewer: That's interesting, yeah.

John Raso: Yeah, so that's always been – and I should tell you the other piece that we've adapted on is now we don't do just mechanical rights anymore, so we do clearances for karaoke services and jukeboxes and we even do performance administration that some people do direct deals and withdraw their rights from ASCAP or BMI, but they still need someone to do the administration royalties. So we – it's interesting, we've actually moved from pretty much a pure publishing side and we audited record labels to make sure they were paying their royalties, to now we are – we built, essentially the database of record that is now being used by the Mechanical Licensing Collective and being expanded on there and we still continue to – at the end of the day, it's been our relationships and just our basic knowledge of how all the moving parts work.

And as you could hear, it's so legalistic, just having that depth and knowledge of how you do it legally has been our greatest value, so…

Interviewer: When you were owned by the publishers, was Harry Fox a nonprofit or what was the legal structure or the corporate structure versus what it is now, are you a for-profit entity?

John Raso: So I should – the one piece we're missing here, so in 2015 we were bought by the – the Harry Fox Agency was bought by the SESAC Music Group, which also owns the SESAC Performing Group, they also own a company called Mint, which is a joint venture for international royalty. So essentially the SESAC Music Group is essentially putting all the pieces together of music publishing so that a company could do an à la carte or an all-in so they could continue to focus on the creative side and then all of that back room stuff, you don't need a big infrastructure. But anyway, so the historic piece was the NMPA was funded by the profits of the Harry Fox Agency.

So there wasn't – so if – you had to become a member of the National Publisher's Association in order to benefit from all their lobbying, well directly, I should say, they would do settlements and stuff too. But – and so HFA had a running budget and anything above the budget was what funded the NMPA's, mostly legal fund. And so we had – we would, every year, go and – we need to increase our budget or – so it was – one of the interesting challenges in that model was the people that are getting the benefit of the service wanted to be as inexpensive as possible, but they also control the purse strings of how are you going to get better, you needed to do the investment too, so that was always interesting. And in fact until around 2001, somewhere around there, 2000, the head of the NMPA and the head of the Harry Fox Agency were the same person.

And one of the beginnings of the real modernization of the Harry Fox Agency is they created essentially a lobbyist, the president of the NMPA who, I think, is almost that entire time really has been David Israelite and then a CEO for the Harry Fox Agency, which their first one was Gary Churgin and now it's the second one, the current one is Michael Simon. And so they've actually truly divided it into an operations group and a lobbying group and the two used to be the same, so that's where that's evolved. And now it's a for-profit, which has actually been – we're now an actual competitive group because people invest – we have an investor that, or I shouldn't say – we have an owner with cash that we actually make a legitimate business request as opposed to begging from the people who are also our customers.

Interviewer: That's not the funnest dynamic. And so what do you do there?

John Raso: So my role – my title is Senior Vice President of Client Relations our publisher services and essentially anything external with the company rolls up to me, so with that I have a team of publisher agents and their role is to answer questions for music publishers who – I need to get my songs registered. Or really the question always comes down to is where is my money, right, that's – it's sort of – and it could be a data issue, it could be a managing issue, it could be you haven't registered that song or we didn't have this information and now we could – or someone's not reporting and we have to go again. Then there's also a licensing team and the licensing team is – they get requests from record labels or digital services saying, "I'm seeking a license for this sound recording I have that I'm distributing and it's this composition issue license to me."

And then the third group is the more contemporary department, which is our client relation managers, our CRMs, and they're the ones that work with the different DSPs who now, "Hey the Harry Fox Agency has this information and knowledge and we need to attain the rights," and that might be through a traditional mechanical license, but more than – more common now is a direct license where they've sought out and gotten certain rights to use the catalogs of the major publishers and then a lot of the big publishers and through the Harry Fox Agency you could opt in smaller publishers too that we – so it's a little beyond just, I'm going to reproduce a song. Now it's, "I have an exercise app and it's going to be in synchronization with these workouts," and so it goes beyond what the compulsory would allow.

So you now actually have to negotiate terms and rates and there's usually a rev share. And so our team essentially oversees, "OK, you're using this music and we're putting it through our system and we're going to tell you, OK we were able to find and get you licenses for these. So these are the ones that are available to your service." And then they report royalties.

Interviewer: In the time you've been at HFA, never mind the time you've been in the music business overall, but just in the time you've been at HFA, is it generally true that music is used in more ways than ever before?

John Raso: Oh, absolutely, yeah it's pretty funny, you know you were around when it was all of a sudden people were freaking out, it's like, music – the model's changing, it's the whole move my cheese thing, where music is free now and it's cheaper and whatever, and it was just a matter of figuring out how to monetize it and now that's just been coming back in such a huge way, so absolutely. The early movers were, right, the people, "Well we're just going to go and do it and then when it gets really popular, we'll negotiate because everyone's want to keep that – so that was probably the big gorilla in that is probably first the Napster who got beaten up, but then YouTube comes along and you have the Google power and the lawyers and everything. And so now that model doesn't work anymore, where I'm going to use it now, sue me later and we'll figure it out –

Interviewer: Steal my way to legitimacy.

John Raso: Exactly, exactly. So now people – there's the smaller companies within a legitimacy start off with a conversation with us, actually. They go, it's like, "We just made a deal with so and so, and now they told us we have to get publishing licenses. Can you tell us what that is?" And yeah and as the audience gets more sophisticated, it becomes easier too, but yeah music is everywhere.

Interviewer: Has it gotten easier in the last, pick an interval, five years, seven years for a new user of music, like a technology upstart to get licensed? Because I remember maybe going five to 10 years there were so many entrants and it was too hard for all of the, especially corporate stakeholders to figure out who to do business with and who not to, has that problem been solved at all?

John Raso: Not solved, but it's certainly a lot easier, right, and I think to your point, that was – as where the money goes is what drives the business and it became ooh, music is too scary, because people get sued. And we can't get clearances, we don't want to all of a sudden be shut down because of this, right. Even though we have this great product demand, the – being able to use it without the compensating the creators was a problem. And I think as a result that started the conversations which now have mostly been resolved. There is the consolidation to a certain extent makes that process a little easier, OK I have to go have a conversation with the big three. And usually the first one of the big three in who gets the negotiation, all the models then are identical or close to that and you find out and then that gets dropped into – we have this thing called the agreement portal and we'll drop in, we'll literally drop in, "Hey we just – so and so's just come to us with this app, it does this, it does these other things, it's looking for these rights for this term, for this rate. Do you want to participate, yes or no?"

And 99% of the time people are going to say yes, because it's like – their job is to – I'm trying to monetize my revenue or my copyrights and so that – right. And usually that first agreement that gets dropped into our portal doesn't exist until there is a big negotiation where someone brings on the first mover that everyone lines up behind, right. So as a result, that – so the fact that those conversations are being had, I mean in our days we used to go and try to beg people about doing custom compilations and it's like, maybe they would go, "Go talk to the special markets people, you might be able to get some – the same stuff that you see at road stops on those cassettes back in the seventies and eighties for your – and now the walls are broken down, because it's the primary source of recorded revenue is that.

So obviously once again the labels, the publishers are the same entity in a lot of cases too, so it's moved quickly. But yeah 10 years ago, really hard, last four or five years, accelerating, there's too many deals for us to even talk to.

Interviewer: And in that same period of time, what's been the evolution of the state of metadata, is it still the thorn in everybody's side or has that been improved upon?

John Raso: It's still a thorn, but it has moved greatly and I think this is going to be the big mover with the MLC, the MLC essentially now has public – made a public database and the law that passed requires the visibility of so much more. And so one of the challenges in the past was you only have so much visibility because essentially it became, OK, I can now go look in this database and see that my song is getting used here, so now I can go sue these people or I could go – and it became – there was a world of litigation that was driving the marketplace and rather than – How can I make this more efficient? There was more money in litigation than there was in your number of streams, so the cost, right, it's always follow the money.

So now it's the fact that now everyone can see what copyrights they have registered, who controls them, what sound recordings are matched to them, all of that stuff, all of those tools are now being built out of the MLC. Anybody now could go to the MLC.com and search and find any song. And to a certain extent of who controls it, so I think it's one of those classic, the more sunshine on it, you could – it's almost like people talked about how Blockchain was going to be, OK, everyone's going to see it and it's going to have this certain – now it's just going to be out in the open. If there is a bad claim, people will see who the person is claiming it that's making the bad claim. So it'll be – they'll be a lot of self policing and that, so if anything else, I think that's going to be – we're going to have the opposite problem, there's going to be probably more conflicts, because things that people didn't know were in conflict are going to be a lot more visible.

Interviewer: Oh, wow. And then does that process play itself out to at some point all that's left are some remaining border skirmishes but the right thing finally happens and –

John Raso: I think so.

Interviewer: Established?

John Raso: Yeah I think so, I really do, I actually – and to a certain extent the complexities of deals, I think are going to get simpler, because at this point, right, a publisher frequently represents a territory, in some cases, limited rights. Because it's almost like, OK, I wrote a song, I've owned these and now I'm going to sell it out – I'm going to sell out a piece of the pie all over the place of who works this and who works that. And then it just becomes too complicated, because then now, OK, I have my performing rights database, I have mechanical database, I have my synch rights database, I have lyric rights, I have – right. So and it's different in England than it is in Japan and the United States, so I think we're moving in a much more global centralized – so the less complicated you keep it, the more likely the revenue will come in.

But of course – and that will be the evolution, I think administration will drive the cleaning of the data, I mean just in the past year, it's been amazing how much more data we've gotten delivered to us since people now know – the market just knows a lot better of, "Oh I have to make sure my songs are in this database." Where in the past it would be like, "How come so and so's not paying me?" It's like, "Well because how do they find you? You haven't – " it's like, "Well my publisher ASCAP," "Well you know actually ASCAP's not your publisher, that's your performing right, they collect your performing rights. Who's collecting your mechanical? How are you getting your YouTube money?"

And so that's – this goes back to ultimately we – what we're trying to put together is the solution with the SESAC Music Group is, you come to us and all of those things are available to you. It could be global, it could be local, it could be YouTube only, it could be mechanical only, it could be performance through SESAC, it could be – right. So all of those things used to be I had to find a person to do that for or someone at a big publishing company took over your publishing. But now we're in a [unintelligible 00:29:28] market, so not a lot of knowledge there.

Interviewer: So just to be clear, who in the value chain or if it's more than one stakeholder, who is primarily doing the cleanup of the metadata? Is it the content creator or the right's holder? Is what you're saying, is it's ultimately the person who's getting the biggest chunk of the money is taking the biggest initiative to clean it?

John Raso: I think you've really hit on what the big issue is, right. It's who's responsible for it? And that's been part of the argument, is well – and all of these arguments I think make sense to me, is well you're using it, so you should – you have to find me, you're making all the money from it, and you need to pay me. And historically the Harry Fox Agency, right, they – of that nine cents that would come in, the Harry Fox Agency would take a commission off of it to pay for those administrations. Right? That was what our – right, so essentially that's coming out of the publisher side. Right? So out of the publisher's money, they had to pay for the administration of the – so now with the MLC, the Mechanical Licensing Collective, the DSPs, that was part of negotiating, they got some risk relief from not being sued by everybody because they licensed this entire record catalog, it's up there.

But someone's share's missing or they don't know who the publishing is, and as a result, technically shouldn't be available on the site, but it was and historically record companies, all the time, put out records having not cleared the publishing. And so as a result, now the DSPs have funded the Mechanical Licensing Collective, so they're paying for it. However, the motto of the MLC is do your part, because still at the same time, you have to register – your songs aren't just going to magically get [unintelligible 00:31:31] in there. And there is a frustration of, "Well I put the title and I put my name on it," it's like, "Well, you also have a co-writer, so now in the database we have Angel written by John and Angel written by Larry, when they're only should be one Angel, co-written by Larry and John, right.

So – and it's like, "OK, I get you didn't know that, and OK, so I'm going to put in there and –" then the other problem is, "OK, I'm going to put in Angel written by Larry and John and I'm claiming a 100% of it because that's what I think I control." Well Larry doesn't think that, so Larry you need to make sure you get in there and you go, and when they'd say, "Oh, that's right, oh I thought I was collecting your publishing for you Larry, OK, we'll make it 50/50 that's fine you –" It's – everyone has to be responsible for it and so that's where it becomes the classical, I'm going to negotiate it for complete artistic control, well with that comes responsibility, right. You can't just simply – it's like now you're responsible for –

I'm a self published artist, I now need to know how to be a publisher. Right? There is a value in that expertise and the money they take, it's not just a, hey I got them to write me a big check, no they do something for that. And so that – this has been the sticky piece and so as a result, companies have grown out of this business for the DIY mark – as you know people always start up businesses chasing that DIY dollar. "Oh, I'm going to be famous," right, so they're becomes the ambition is ahead of the knowledge, so you – right, it's like the end of the day, yeah but it's – which is great, that's what drives everything. It's almost like right, the best entrepreneurs aren't smart enough to be scared sometimes and they're the ones that are most successful.

So – but there's companies out there, there's companies like Audium, there's companies like Song Trust, there's companies like – on a bigger scale, you can't just walk in like Cobalt essentially works that way too, where they don't own copyrights, they provide administrative services. And the Harry Fox Agency itself works that way to, except we're – as I said, we're not 360 as far as doing all of that stuff, but we – but you could – essentially we're putting those pieces together. I'm trying to think if there's any other players out there, but there's that – even TuneCore, DistroKid offers, I think – the Orchard also offers publishing administration. But from the – most people start off of, "I'm going to make a record, I'm going to make a recording," and then, "Oh what's this publishing piece that I wrote a song," and that becomes –

I'm sorry I keep going all day, but now it's like, "Hey, why are you trying to claim that song? That's my version of the Rolling Stones song." It's like, well they own the composition that you covered, so you have no publishing on this, so there's – so you hit those obstacles all the time, so…

Interviewer: Yeah, that's funny. All right, so what was your first gig in music?

John Raso: My – let's see, I'm trying to define what my very first gig in music would be. Outside of DIY stuff, my first gig was working – I moved to L.A. and I answered an ad and became the publicist for SST Records. So it was kind of a cool – I knew – very well knew what SST was, but the fact that I was now – my boss was Greg Ginn from Black Flag was pretty damn cool. And so that was a bit of a baptism by fire of – it was great to be a publicist where writers loved all the bands on that label.

Interviewer: Yeah, yeah. What qualified you to be the publicist for SST?

John Raso: I still don't know, I actually – I probably was – as I went in I had an interview and it's like this is a well spoken young man, unlike the dirty punks that we have here. It was like, oh, because – and it was just – so we had – actually that's not real – everyone there was – have gone on to actually very impressive music careers there. The radio promo team, the booking agents, the salespeople, all ended up Geffen and Caroline and some of the big agencies, but I just think it was my excitement about the music and literally the fact, I wasn't afraid to pick up the phone and just talk shit for a while with a writer. And just talk music and it was like, "Great, well thanks, send me the new records." I –

Interviewer: What were some of the first records you worked?

John Raso: When I got there, the Dinosaur Junior Album was – You're Living All Over Me, was the record that was happening that had me excited, as well as the first – second Screaming Trees Album, Sonic Youth still had Sister, the Meat Puppets had Huevos. So it was like – oh and Firehose If'n, these were all top 10, like CMJ college radio bands. But it was an interesting time because that's when a lot of the bands started, like Husker Du had – Black Flag had broken up, D. Boon from the Minutemen had the previous Christmas died in a car accident and so Husker Du had signed to Warner. So it was like the end of the big Indie era and that they were now the major labels were going to start getting interested in this. And Husker Du was like ooh, this is a real credible band over there.

And so one of the first bands that signed was Soundgarden and my understanding was Soundgarden – we were going to put out the first record but they were already signed to A&M, so that was like, "No we want our first record – our first big album or our first album to go out on an Indie." And so it went on SST and then the second album – then they – it helped build their base to then go to A&M.

Interviewer: And what did Soundgarden side or if they're also in the same category, but of those artists you just mentioned and those particular records, what were they selling back then, was it – how do you dimensionalize what those –

John Raso: Well – so the number, so it's funny the thing that was – it's like, my thought would always be well Sonic Youth had to be the biggest band, but they were the biggest critics band. The – by far the big selling band was Black Flag and then the Meat Puppets, probably two/three times of what a Sonic Youth was doing. But Sonic Youth –

Interviewer: Were they selling over a hundred grand or were they closer to 20/50?

John Raso: Well that's the thing it's all relative now, it's like – but probably about a 150,000 copies of those new records. And then there were some more blockbusters like Double Nickels on the Dime and Zen Arcade, those were the big moneymakers for them. And what was cool is they sold everything out of their warehouse, it was – they had a bunch of Indie distributors who would sell to, but the big chains would literally be talking to the lead singer from Nig-Heist, who was our head of sales in the back room and it was – and I heard great stories about them having such a good time when both Zen Arcade and Double Nickels were out at the same time and they were literally putting the buyer from Wal-Mart on hold or whatever just for 20 minutes just to torture them.

But everyone's walking in and asking for this record, I need it and so it was – they were very punk rock about it. But so yeah, so those were – but now that would – I think that would be a number one album –

Interviewer: I was just going to say, when you said it's relative, back then and Indie band selling 100,000 sounds phenomenal now. But back then that was the era of a million was like – you had to sell a million to be able to put out your next record on a –

John Raso: Exactly we're not going to pay for your option; it's only gold.

Interviewer: Yeah, yeah, that's incredible. Is there a highlight of something you worked on at that time that you're like holy shit, man, I touched that record?

John Raso: Well I was – so it was the end of Sonic Youth's term with SST, so I was in limbo with them when they started working on Daydream Nation, but it was never going to be an SST record, but it was – So I was – I ended up going to some of the rehearsal shows that they were doing for that. So I never got to deal with the finished product, but that probably is the coolest record I got to work on or be involved with, I should say. But – and then also Dinosaur's Bug was – that was a great one too, those were two that actually came – most of the other great ones I worked on, were in existence when I got there. I love that Meat Puppets Huevos record, I love the Firehose If'n record, but they were done. And I actually got pretty friendly with the guys from Screaming Trees, so it was always good to see those guys do well. So…

Interviewer: At that point in your life, was that your dream gig; were you thinking I'm living the dream? Or how detached from it were you or how immersed in it were you?

John Raso: So, I wasn't very immersed in the hang, the business part was kind of like – I was still learning what the jobs were and the business. The only – my sister was a music writer – is a music writer and so I got spoiled knowing that backstage was when I was eight and nine and going to a Kiss show and going, "OK, I want to hang out here, this is exciting, everyone…" and it's like every – like the whole magic that is the show is like this is spectacular and everyone's having a good time and we all love this band and all of that almost famous stuff was really what brought me into it. And then I slowly learned the business, the thing I like to tell people is I think I've done every job in the music business at this point. I've done the publicist job, I've done radio promotion, I've – I worked at – I booked bands, I've – obviously music publishing now.

I've been a product manager at a major label, I've been in the marketing department, I've been – so it's been pretty cool; I really – I like to think part of the reason I've survived and been successful in this business is it's also consolidated. You know how it's moved from the labels used to drive everything, now it's very manager-centric. And the best part about what I do is publishing seems to be the last great mystery and it really is difficult. So that's where my expertise is and so I'm really – I know everyone's side of the business and I know this side very well, so I think I've a pretty good role. In that I could talk – I could get in the van and talk music publishing.

Interviewer: Tell me about your time at a major label, like I think we worked at major – opposite ends of eras. And I was leaving just as streaming was finally blowing up and they were coming out of the doldrums. You were there when they were getting really high in CD's, right, is that –

John Raso: Yeah.

Interviewer: So talk about that.

John Raso: Well so the way I ended up getting in a major was because, essentially, the explosion of Nirvana and the Indie scene going above ground. As it – right, that's been the traditional history of everything, the Indie's have the cool cutting edge music, it takes off, the majors gobble it up and burn it out. Then the next scene comes along and then, right and then there's – and all the Indies get bought up. And then, OK, the majors then have to shed all of that extra weight and then the Indies start up again. And it's year after year, right from punk rock and then with – so punk rock begat all of the DIY Indie labels, then you started getting little bubbling up with the Husker Du's and then the Pixies and then the big kablam with Nirvana in '91/'92. And so all of those people – all of the majors wanted Indie cred, right, so all of the people I used to work with or the –

CMJ also became this monster of a convention and South by Southwest became this big thing. And it was all essentially graduation to the real money and that was the – so every major label had their Indie group right. And I ended up at Atlantic Records, who – which at the time was being run by Danny Goldberg who was managing Nirvana actually simultaneously I guess. And – but – so that's how I got my foot in the door. Of course I ended up not really working any of that music, the closest I got to it, was I got to be the product manager for Amphetamine Reptile Records out of Minneapolis who's – their highest profile thing is – it generated Helmet, but they had a lot of cool bands that were just too strange for major label, but they were still coming out anyway, like the Cows and Halo of Flies and –

So, but I ended up working with Rush, I worked with – and out of it the big money that was happening at Atlantic, was Hootie and the Blowfish, Stone Temple Pilots they're a big cool band, doing air quotes. But I got to tell you, out of – quick side note here, at the time, right, it was like Stone Temple Pilots, they sound like Pearl Jam and I don't even like Pearl Jam very much and they – boy they sound like every other grunge band. But in retrospect, they have really good songs.

Interviewer: I'm a 100% there with you and I was about to say I'm embarrassed to say that, but it has to be said, you're exactly right. Would you rather be stuck in a room listening to an hour of Stone Temple Pilots or an hour of Pearl Jam? I can make my vote now.

John Raso: Yeah, yeah, that's the thing, it's – Zeppelin derivative, he has the Eddie Vedder on every now and then, right, it's like – but at the end of the day, those – the [Delito ? 00:46:19] Brothers there, those guys wrote great hookie songs, so anyway –

Interviewer: One thing I would also say in their favor is it's something – Soundgarden has this similar trait, which is at least every record doesn't sound exactly the same. Like or hate what they do or how they evolved, at least they change.

John Raso: Yeah, well the whole everything sounds the same, I think is a touch argument just because I think it all sounds the same unless you're deep in anything unless it's a real radical departure. Right? It's still – frequently it's, right, it's the same humans, so the voice simply sound the same, it's the same – you have your aesthetic, there's some – obviously people are radically different. But I always find that it's a double edged sword, in that, boy this record – I really like the last one, this one sucks because it's so different. But then it's like, oh I like this band because they made something different that I really like too. There's only so many radio heads in the world.

Interviewer: That's where I think – all right this is where we'll break the fourth wall for a second, this is where we have to be careful because I think we could start the – I have probably four artists I want to just bring up right now and shit talk with you. And I don't know if that's good for either of us here so –

John Raso: No, I don't even know whether even – even shit talking Pearl Jam, it's like I have a lot of people whose tastes I really respect and it's one of those. Pearl Jam, I don't know, it's – I think they also could be like a Grateful Dead of that generation too, there's people I know, total dead heads love that music, I love every single record in their collection and it's – I don't hate it, it just – the magic doesn't happen for me. I feel I've grown old enough now to just feel I'm missing out on that pleasure as opposed to what the fuck's your problem.

Interviewer: Yeah, I chalk it up to, I can't like everything; there's plenty of music out there and it's not all for me or I might not have gotten to it or… Are there any good bands that start with the letter P?

John Raso: The Pixies.

Interviewer: The Pixies.

John Raso: Yeah, P.J. Harvey. Yeah Pink Floyd.

Interviewer: Pink Floyd, OK. All right. Because I could think of a lot of bad ones.

John Raso: Sure, sure. I can't discriminate against letters.

Interviewer: No, that's fair, you're more open-minded than I am in that regard. So –

John Raso: I'm trying to think of my – P Funk, how about P Funk does that count?

Interviewer: Yup, yup. I would give you Pavement.

John Raso: Iggy Pop. I'm trying to think of the P's in my record collection –

Interviewer: In my record collection, I organize by first name, so Iggy's under I.

John Raso: I haven't gone there yet, but my apps make me, so I…

Interviewer: That's why I did it, I just wanted everything to be consistent.

John Raso: Yeah. But do you – OK, just going down that nerd route, do you put your Beatles solo records separately or do you put them as part of your Beatles collection?

Interviewer: No, everything's separate by artist.

John Raso: See I have my Stooges and Iggy Pop together, I have – I've gotten very close to alphabetizing by year. Not that I –

Interviewer: Yeah, I experimented with things like that when I was younger, the problem is honestly, the problem I have is whenever I come up with any kind of system like that, the less obvious it is, I just lose shit then. I'm like, where would George Harrison be? And it would never occur to me that he's under the Beatles.

John Raso: So psychologically I think the reason I put the Beatles solo records next to the Beatles is that justifies why I own them. You know what I mean?

Interviewer: Well you're the person that I learned from though, that to make the perfect Beatles albums, you take the Paul songs off of them.

John Raso: I've been warming up to that a little bit, it is true. But that was a CD lesson, where be like –

Interviewer: It was the White Album.

John Raso: Yeah, yeah. You take them, you drop them and yeah –

Interviewer: It's especially egregious with the White Album, I would say. I don't necessarily agree with that approach for a lot of the other records, but definitely the White Album, that's pretty good. All right, so let's revisit some of our previous discussions, which is who, at this point, is not in the Hall of Fame that should be?

John Raso: My first go-to is always Paul Revere & the Raiders on that one.

Interviewer: And what's the argument?

John Raso: Paul Revere & the Raiders were essentially – they did the first version of Louie Louie, they were two or three years – they were pre-Beatles but they were also post-Beatles. So they're the ones – they actually self promoted themselves; they – I want to say they're originally from Idaho. But they were considered a Northwest band, so they pulled up that whole scene too. And then they had a ton of great singles, they had – they also hosted their own TV show, Where the Action Is. And so – and there's about a half a dozen songs that I think are killer, like Kicks, Good Thing Goin', like there's – they did the original Steppin' Stone.

Interviewer: And why aren't they in?

John Raso: I just think it's just a rock critic thing, I think. It's one of those things, I think, there – it's kind of like the Baseball Hall of Fame, it's like sorry you can't be in the ballot anymore, your time is coming when – Did Deep Purple ever get in? I think –

Interviewer: Yeah I thought we were going to say Deep Purple, did they get in? I don't know – I – honestly once it got to the nineties bands started getting in, it became too much for me. I can't – there's no – I think we would argue about it in the last era where it was fun to argue about, now I don't want to argue about what –

John Raso: Yeah.

Interviewer: … belongs in the Hall of Fame or not, that's exhausting to me.

John Raso: And that's what I was going to say, I was like this conversation isn't fun anymore because it's exactly that. Because also it's not – I feel like, right, the powers that be always skip a generation. So it's like the people who are on the board are a little older than us, right, and so they saw the fifties and the sixties one way and the seventies was a little tired and they're not as interested in that. So then it becomes much more about the money in the seventies, right. So who are the younger people that are going to be on the board? Where does it go next? Are you and I going to get on the board? I think we're going to be passed over, I think it's actually going to go younger and it's going to be the people that are all about Pearl Jam and Green Day, like the nineties people, right. [Audio Gap 00:53:10 - 00:53:22]

Interviewer: You froze. I think the music industry heard you criticizing it, hello? [Audio Gap, 00:53:28 - 00:53:40]

John Raso: Yes, I hear you.

Interviewer: I turned off my video to try to help the bandwidth, but I was about to – I think the music industry heard you criticizing, about to criticize it. All right, so you were saying that –

John Raso: I wasn't going to beat on Pearl Jam again, I was just going to say that it's the people with the nineties point of view are going to be the people, right. And at the same time, I feel like that's when I was in the industry was – that was my record label days, was essentially the nineties. And so to a certain extent, I think that's the worst view to have of who to go in the Hall of Fame. It should always be fan-centric, right and I think that's where it's not like, oh we've got to get so and so, that was the best press junket we ever went on. But I don't know are, Big Star aren't in and they're beloved.

But I don't know – to me that's it, that's very much a critical choice and the people who know that record love them and it's important to them and they started a thousand bands but Jonathon Richman and the Modern Lovers, but The Velvet Underground got in because, I think, they got marketed well enough to get to a certain… So there's just too many factors I don't like to make this a valuable Hall of Fame for me personally.

Interviewer: Big Star's a tough one to justify leaving out given how rediscovered they became and it's hard to argue against them.

John Raso: Well the fact that no one knows who they are from really if you walk down the street, what, one in 50, I guess it depends on what neighborhood you are in Brooklyn I guess –

Interviewer: Exactly. Yeah, exactly. I think to your point about it being for the fans, I think then one of the most justified additions is Dave Clark. I think Dave Clark's an interesting one because again one in 50 people. Who the hell knows who Dave Clark is at this point? But Dave Clark belongs in the Hall of Fame.

John Raso: Is the Dave Clark Five not in?

Interviewer: They're in, I was there, I saw Tom Hanks [unintelligible 00:55:44] and it was a beautiful speech, yeah, yeah it was great.

John Raso: But once again I just think that would never – if they weren't in already they would never get in. You know, I think it just passes – that wave kind of passes, by the way, speaking of Tom Hanks, he did for his sixtieth birthday, he hosted a thing on Boss, I think it's called Boss Radio, it's an internet… And he deejayed and it was so freaking good, he goes so deep. I just – it was all surf mans, his big thing was – this was the – New Jersey's answer to the Beatles, this is Wisconsin's answer to this, so it was all stuff from '64, that I've never heard of before and I go pretty deep. And it was all; it sounded familiar but I was just so happy to hear what a deep fan he is and that I have this – I had a secret fantasy that he just dusted off his old 45's and pulled them out that he's been hanging around since Cleveland from 60 years ago.

But if nothing else he might've just picked it all up from research from that thing you do, but –

Interviewer: No his induction speech for Dave Clark Five was clear he was a nerd and it was clear how much that meant to him as a kid in his room with his radio. But that same night The Ventures got in, so speaking – that was a good class.

John Raso: That's a great class.

Interviewer: It's also when Madonna got in and instead of performing she had –

John Raso: Oh she had the Stooges –

Interviewer: Stooges, yeah that was still a peak moment. Seeing Iggy sing Ray of Light was like that was so great. All right, so let me ask another Hall of Fame question then we'll stop. It seems like the eighties was largely passed over, is there anybody from the eighties that should've made it?

John Raso: Well this comes to the whole thing it's like not – should Black Flag be in? Should Husker Du be on? Should Sonic Youth be in? These, right –

Interviewer: But should they not be in, should – how do you not have Sonic Youth in?

John Raso: Well that's the thing, is it because Sonic Youth was the band that then – right, there's essentially not Nirvana, there's no – right, they were the signing at DGC Geffen, that lured all the cool bands over there, right. That was – it's like oh they – it was, right, REM and Sonic Youth almost are exactly the same in every way in their importance to the industry, but REM sold a lot more records. Right? Because, right, they – my process is Black Flag went around and called every pizzeria and showed up and played every – there were no venues and they created venues and created this whole network of places to play; they would play everywhere. REM then went around and found out where Black Flag had played and they went out and played all of those venues, and at the same time, they were connected to IRS that had built that whole circuit that evolved into really modern booking, right.

And so then REM was the first to sign to a major and had some success and that paved the way for – it was OK for Husker Du because REM was actually putting all these bands as opening acts and then Sonic Youth became the stranger band that gets signed, but you could see the strategy there. But all of those bands, to me, those are all major dominos that there is no something for it. I think Black Flag gets short shifted because they were signed to MCA Records, they were going to put out something on what's called Unicorn Records and then just before it was about to come out the president of the company or someone heard it and called it an anti-parent record.

And there was no way a company – he was going to put this out and SST Records came out of the fact that Greg Ginn had SST Records or SST solid state transistors because he was a ham radio nerd and he had some patents and he started – and he sold ham radio things. I was like, "Well I guess I've got to start a record label for my thing, so it became SST Records too. So that was – these are people who really invented the business just out of the mother of necessity thing and so more-so than anybody, Black Flag really, except Black Flag has also a bad problem where there was a lot of violence in their shows and some of it was racist crap and not of their own generating it but it's just that bad Nazi skinhead thing. And it was anti-police and all, right, so I could see where that – but then the Sex Pistols shouldn't be in, then the –

Interviewer: Then the Rolling Stones shouldn't be in, because from what I heard there was a lot of violence at their shows for two or three years.

John Raso: That's true, that's true or Elvis Presley or Bill Haley and the Comets, there's pool cues there.

Interviewer: Am I missing something by having not stuck with REM throughout their entire catalog?

John Raso: They put out a lot of records; they're of a certain taste. When they first came out I was very excited about them, I was – I actually liked their last couple of records, the –

Interviewer: That's what I'm asking, yeah did I by not sticking with them through the nineties and into the early 2000's, am I shortchanging myself?

John Raso: It's funny I can't point to, oh this records great, I just enjoy listening to them, but I can't say I also pull them out that often either. But the last couple ones where they didn't care and had the big Warner deal and – they made some – it was interesting.

Interviewer: I admire that about them, that they – just that fact, it's almost like I don't need to hear the music. I love what they did with the money.

John Raso: And that's true, they're apparently a fantastic citizens of Athens, Georgia, they're good civil citizens and Michael Stipe in particular I think is – he gets involved in local politics and does good things with his money. Yeah.

Interviewer: Yeah, it's funny I don't listen to them regularly, but every year or so I go back and I just kind of go through mainly the stuff through, I guess through green. I'll listen to the eighties hits and the early singles and I'm reminded by how amazing that stuff is.

John Raso: Yeah, oh they were great, yeah. The first time I saw them they were the opening act for the English Beat at a chapel at Oberlin College in Ohio. And the Murmur came out the next Friday or something, so this was just before Murmur came out and I snagged the set list and I still have the set list framed in my office, so it was the first time they were playing those songs. A lot of songs that – yeah and the English Beat were pretty great too.

Interviewer: Yeah I bet, I bet. Have you seen any shows since COVID has evolved into something that only kills dumb people?

John Raso: I have – I actually haven't my first show – so the first show I ended up buying tickets to is, I'm going to go see Devo at Radio City Music Hall in September, but before that I'm now going to – as shows started setting up. There's a band I really like called Bodega from here in Brooklyn that are playing at Baby's All Right Club here and I think that's – I want to say it's the Second of September, it's like that Friday. So that'll probably be the first live show I go to. So also actually end of September also got Sturgill – I'm blanking out his name now because I'm on the radio. Sturgill Simpson, he's playing Webster Hall in June –

Interviewer: He's fine without our promotion.

John Raso: Exactly, but it was like he's – the whole interesting thing is that he's doing four nights. I'm always impressed and I learned a lot of this from you, is the fact that when people underplay it's like they're thinking about their careers, they're thinking about their fans, they underplay their markets and he's not doing it like it's Webster Hall and $5,000 tickets, it's still whatever $50 tickets. So that's going to –

Interviewer: He could play The Garden at this point, right?

John Raso: Probably a couple nights, yeah at $95 or a $120 or whatever it especially when people are so jonesing to go to shows right, all of the shows they didn't go to last year that they hang on to tickets for, because they want the show to happen. "Don't give me my money back, I want to stay at the show, I want to go."

Interviewer: Did you happen to hear the episode that I did with Gerald from Devo?

John Raso: No, no, I didn't, I didn't.

Interviewer: So it was last – it was in the spring when they were campaigning for the Hall of Fame and their case is strong, first of all – [crosstalk ? 01:04:40] was strong –

John Raso: Absolutely, absolutely.

Interviewer: But I was taken by how much it means to – they actually in a very heartfelt genuine way, they want to be in the Hall of Fame. I was surprised that it was important but they felt like there's a place for us there, we should be there and they're not.

John Raso: Yeah, yeah. They were on this ballot, they still haven't gotten – I've stopped paying – I see the ballot and then I'm not quite sure who actually gets entered on it. But I know they were on the final ballot, right?

Interviewer: They were on the ballot, yeah.

John Raso: But they didn't get in?

Interviewer: They didn't get in.

John Raso: With Kraftwerk too, right.

Interviewer: And you would think the two of them together makes total sense.

John Raso: Yeah, yeah, yeah, no I love the – Devo; they're – the more I know about their history, the more – it almost – it just makes them funnier, the fact that they're just make this goofball music but it was so subversive and it came out of such subversive roots. And it really – they were totally goofing on fucking with the man, it was genius and that's why I could see maybe that is their ultimate, like I'm going to get into the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame and I'm – and it started – the seed was [unintelligible 01:06:05], it's amazing. I don't know, yeah –

Interviewer: Yeah there another band, if you give them money they're going to do something fucking goofy with it, they're going make some kind of statement with it and they're going to bite the hand that feeds them. And that's probably, I hate to say it, but that's probably what's keeping them up, there's somebody with a long memory that says, "Why are you making fun of our high art form, rock n roll?"

John Raso: I shy away from the conspiracy that someone has that kind of power, but I could – this come back to though if we go back to Rolling Stone, Rolling Stone was definitely being taken the piss out of during that period. So even – they warmed up to the Clash but originally the first review of the Clash was, the Clash arrive in America and open with I'm So Bored with the U.S.A. and go back immediately. Right? It was like total dismissal of this – this is not –

Interviewer: Who are these people?

John Raso: Disco album.

Interviewer: All right.

John Raso: We are far away from the deep legalese beginning of this show.

Interviewer: No that's how it's supposed to be, that's how the best conversations on this podcast. Really the podcast is just about me talking to interesting people about things that me and very few other people care about, so it's amazing.

John Raso: Well you know we could do that for hours, so…

Interviewer: Yeah, well I'm going to consider this part one, but I actually have to go because I have to catch an airplane, I'm going to L.A.

John Raso: Oh, all right.

Interviewer: Yeah, this'll be my third COVID trip, I did not fly at all for a long time until June and – but now I'm slowly emerging. Have not been to a concert yet, I've been to a baseball game.

John Raso: Yeah, there've been a lot of games.

Interviewer: Yeah and so my first concert's the end of September; I'm going to Herbie Hancock, who I've never seen before, seems long overdue.

John Raso: Is he doing anything in particular; is he – is it career retrospective or is it going to be the Rockit Band or –

Interviewer: I don't know what the project is, I just saw that he was coming to Seattle and I thought, well I should go see Herbie he's the last of that generation of piano players left. Chick Corea's gone, Keith Jarrett is no longer able to play, McCoy died during COVID, so yeah Herbie's the one. But yeah let's consider it part one, man and maybe we should do the three-way with David Gorman.

John Raso: That'd be good.

Interviewer: And we'll just spend an hour talking shit.

John Raso: Torturing people, yeah. Yeah, no it's funny I think I told you, I was the first person to have COVID, I had it March 18th and as a result I had a crappy month, but after that I went to Napa in August or July actually last year. And then I went to – when my mom got vaccinated I went to Florida and I've been – so -

Interviewer: That's some hipster shit. Oh I had COVID back when nobody had COVID.

John Raso: Yeah I had COVID before it was cool, man. So as a result I've been having a –

Interviewer: Have you been flying or driving?

John Raso: Well I flew to L.A. I've flown to Florida a few times. I'm sure we've had this – so my brother is one of the owners of the Marlins so I've gotten deep back into baseball. And so I went – this year I went for opening day, there was no attendance last year. But then this year I've totally gotten my girlfriend Joanna deep into baseball now, so last night I went to the Yankee game where Cole came back and Ohtani was in town, so I had to figure how to see some of that and that was my fourth stadium of the year, I've been to Philly, I've been to Miami, I've been to Citi Field and the Yankee Field. And then I actually – and if you're in town you should join me, driving to – on September 15th going to Marlins Nationals and then for the day game. And the evening game is Orioles/Yankees and it's Roberto Clemente day, so two more stadiums.

Interviewer: That's nice. The Yankees were here playing the Mariners on my fiftieth birthday last month.

John Raso: Awesome, I hope you went.

Interviewer: I did go, yeah it was great. And so it sounds like I had the wrong Russo brother then on the pod –

John Raso: He's real tightlipped, he does – all his money is from – he's the lead machine industry research guy. He's the guy who tells – he gives all of the research for whether people invest in Cat or Cogi or – I'm trying to think of all the different… So he spends most of his time in South America and in China meeting with these companies, finding out what the money is. So he had his own research firm that then got bought by this big research firm and that was his back cash out and then he bought a baseball team. So he's not a prime; there's 16 partners and the big money is there's a real estate guy down there, Bruce Sherman but his right hand is Derek Jeter, so it's – I think Jeter's been bringing out all the baseball teams, so it's like I get to go to the game and I end up – the best moment I ever had is I'm in a room and I'm talking baseball with Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada and Tino Martinez and I'm just like holy shit.

Interviewer: Oh, that's awesome.

John Raso: And Don Mattingly is the manager. So yeah that was pretty, pretty awesome, so…

Interviewer: I had a moment out here you'll appreciate, I went to a Mariner's game two or three years ago, the Yankees were in town and a friend of mine works at the stadium, he's the head of operations at T-Mobile Park. And he brought us out onto the field during batting practice and I met Reggie.

John Raso: Nice –

Interviewer: Yeah Reggie was surrounded by girls, I said, "Hey champ how are you?" And he was like whatever, he was doing a little – he was dancing for the girls and everything –

John Raso: Did he have a fur coat on?

Interviewer: He did not have a fur – he had a virtual fur coat on, he was – and it was so funny. I was like I should just not even be in Reggie Jackson's shadow right now, it was amazing.

John Raso: That is a great one.

Interviewer: All right, yeah man, thank you.

John Raso: Sure, thank you, I don't think I stepped on anything that's going to come back and haunt me so…

Interviewer: Nah, it's all good. All right, man, I'll follow up soon.

John Raso: OK, great thanks have a great play, talk to you soon.

Interviewer: Bye.

John Raso: Bye.

[End of recorded material, 01:13:03]