A cynic's guide to the mainstream music industry

It's all about making money with a fast hit, says musician who's worked both sides BRYAN POTVIN knows the music industry from inside and out. He prefers to be out.

It's not that it hasn't been good to him. He and his bandmates in the recently reconstituted Northern Pikes who head into the recording studio this fall enjoyed a successful run in the early 1990s signed to Virgin.

Then, when the Pikes took a six year pause, Potvin clinched a corporate gig in the A & R (artist and repertoire) department at Polygram owned Mercury Records. He brought street cred to the job of scouting and helping to develop talent.

"Someone who could walk the walk and talk the talk,'' he says.

Yet Potvin soon became jaded with the industry. The most profound thing that happened to me, on just a basic A & R level, the job itself, was the startling discovery . . . as to how narrow the parameters really are.

I heard tons of great music. I heard beautiful music that I loved but nothing that I'd dare walk into a promo or marketing meeting with and say, "What do you think?''

That's why Potvin wasn't devastated when he lost his job in 1998 after Universal Music absorbed Polygram in a merger. It didn't hurt that he pocketed a big wad of cash. "That was a good thing, because now I have a record to show for it.''

Potvin used his severance package to record Heartbreakthrough, his solo debut filled with tuneful pop and lyrics that capture his period of transition. "I kind of felt like, I've got to do this on my own. And so I did. I tried to make as world class a record as I could, make a record that sounded like a real album, and hopefully somebody would get involved, and they did.''

They is Universal, which is distributing the disc on Potvin's Klementine imprint. Senior A & R guy Allan Reid Potvin's former boss heard and liked the CD. For that, Potvin is grateful. "Not a lot of people get one shot, let alone two,'' he says sitting on a bench in a downtown concrete park.

During his four years at Mercury, the 37 year old singer/guitarist stopped making music. He felt "a real hole in my life", he says.

Did the business of music sap his creative zeal? It's hard to say. But Potvin began to feel reinvigorated after attending songwriting seminars.

Potvin isn't on a mission to tell all. But he is, when pressed, candid about his experiences. Dissing record companies is becoming fashionable of late, with the likes of Limp Bizkit's Fred Durst, rocker Courtney Love and The The's Matt Johnson lining up to take them on in public.

It's like "I want a hit, I want it now, I want a fresh young face we can slap on MuchMusic in the next two months," says Potvin of the music executive approach. "I find the whole world like that . . . trying to make as much money as fast as possible; it's bizarre".

Labels, at one time, nurtured baby bands employing a long term strategy of building careers over many albums. Few people, it seems, are now interested in artist development, Potvin says.

Where does that leave him and other more "mature'' artists? "Maybe they might not have that financial confidence in you, but if you walk in with all the components in place, a finished record, management, maybe a video, game plan, you've taken a lot of the load on yourself.

They may be more readily apt to get involved." None of the five major labels, Canadian "branch plants'' of multinationals, show any eagerness to sign domestic artists unless they've got a shot at success abroad, he says. "If they're going to dump that money into an act, they have to feel confident about taking it to other territories in the world."

One industry insider, who didn't want to be named, agreed. It's not something labels would want to admit, but absolutely, exposing an artist to other markets is key, especially in the quasi borderless world.

"Opportunities for a domestic (act) internationally is really what you're looking at, the feasibility of selling this act or this artist into other markets." The trouble with that, argues Potvin, is "it's an uphill battle. That's the impression I got when I was (in the United States). Walking into a boardroom meeting trying to pitch a Canadian act that's sold 15,000 or 20,000 records, they're like, "You know what, we've got 15 of these on our roster. What do we need yours for?"

For these reasons, Potvin believes the future of music resides with independent companies such as Vancouver based Nettwerk, run by Terry McBride and home to Lilith founder Sarah McLachlan. McBride also manages Toronto's Barenaked Ladies.

"No one seems afraid of rolling their sleeves up there and getting their hands dirty. That's why, to me, those companies are poised to take over." Potvin's tales echo themes in American author Bill Flanagan's new book, A&R.

The VH1 executive centres his fictional narrative on several record company executives said to be based on "real'' industry figures. A&R makes it clear that it's the bottom line not the music that matters most. The novel is on Potvin's list of books to read this summer. His view is "there seems to me to be too much music out there," leaving label reps swamped. "People are often hearing records that they're working for the first time on the radio."

That empathy doesn't extend to people in the business with crass instincts, the type to show up at a showcase trying to be a player, trying to land this act, because everyone else is being a player.

"Without naming names, I've seen people get interested in acts only because other people were interested, or because the Americans are starting to show up."

Potvin says he wasn't good at playing the game, something others in the industry confirm. "I could never shuck and jive the way those people do," he says. "Some people just know how to operate in that kind of environment."

What Potvin found most soul destroying was the cynicism, much of it stemming from the cutthroat environment. "We're all scrapping for the same adds (songs being added to radio playlists) and wall space at retail. And things can get nasty. I made a very conscious decision when I was at A & R that I would not take part in it."

He tried to become someone "the artist could trust."

He also made a decision "not to bring up negatives. No matter how horrible the tape was, there was always something good about it. I heard some A & R people, not at my old company, sit down with a young band: This is what's wrong with this song. Your bridge sucks here, and that chorus is weak, and the guitar sounds horrible, bad, bad, bad, everything's bad.' I'd want to . . . quit."