Bloodletting at EMI today

[Dan]

1800 jobs cut today and this little tidbit;

"We have streamlined the artist roster which I found fairly bloated," EMI Recorded Music Chairman/CEO Alain Levy commented. "For example, we had 49 artists in Finland and I don’t think there are 49 Finns that can sing," he quipped.

The press release also says they dropped between 350 and 400 artists Worldwide.

WOW!!

[Andy]

Were I a Finn I might find that offensive.

[Jeff H.]

That's ok. Alain Levy is a frog. How many of them can sing?

[Dave]

Jeff H.,

Please keep the racial slurs out of the retalitory comments as my wife is French Canadian and I don't really find it to be appropriate behavior.

If it is a case of something that is quoted in a thread from an outside source, so be it, we can accept that here. But It's not like Mr. Levy is ever going to read your statement here.

Thanks

[Jeff H.]

Dave,

My comment by no means was serious or did I mean to offend the lovely people of France or French speaking Canada. I responded to what I thought was an insensitive remark by Mr. Levy with one that was equally sarcastic. Again it wasn't meant to be taken seriously.

Bon soir,
Jeff H.;)

[Dave]

Jeff H.,

Perhaps if you had chosen another amphibian, but I do now understand where you were coming from.;)

[Jeff H.]

Dave,

One other thing, I happen to be of partial French Creole lineage.

JH:D

[njwiv]

I'm 1/8 French and thought it was very funny, as I understood it to be in jest. Reminds me of a fraternity brother from England whom some of us (the insensitive ones, to be sure) lovingly called "Limey".

[Andy]

Now I feel stupid, the "frog" reference went over my head.


Dave,

Ask your wife how she would pronounce russette.

[Dave]

Andy,

Same as us as she has no accent.

[Andy]

Oh, so how would you pronounce it? Could you provide a phonetic spelling?

[Dave]

I'll try. Russ-it.

[Grant]

Originally posted by Jeff H.
That's ok. Alain Levy is a frog. How many of them can sing?

I don't get it. Someone explain this to me. What is the slur? send me a private message. I don't know too much about French Canadians, although one of my in-laws are.

[Gary]

Well at the risk of being banned.... or flamed.....

I believe it all started during the 100 years war between England and France. Joan of Arc rallied the French and they finally threw the English out of Europe. Don't forget that Normandy was part of England for a long time. The English Kings came from Normandy. No love was lost during this time period between the two countries and since frog legs were a delicacy in France (the French being great chefs and pretty civilized by wearing perfume), they were scornfully referred to as Frogs. I have no idea what they scornfully referred to the English as.

As an interesting side note, to this day the French Horn is really English and the English Horn is really French. So there was some cultural stuff happening back then that has survived to this day!

Had to throw that in - this is a music place after all!

:D

[Paul Chang]

Gary,

Thanks for your enlightenment. The French definitely prefer being associated with tricolore to grenouille.

Although I'm not French, I still remember those delicious frog legs I really enjoyed as a youngster back in Taiwan. As I grew older, they seemed getting harder and harder to find probably due to the urbanization of farmland. My wife told me she and her high school classmates thought their biology teacher was a dork and suspected that he took the frogs after the dissection lab. Yummy.

We missed it so much that we once ordered a plate of frog legs at China Stix in Santa Clara. They turned out to be bullfrog legs and we didn't like it one bit. Time to get certified for teaching high school biology. ;)

[Claus]

I thought the name EMI was cut, and replaced with Capitol...

[Grant]

Originally posted by Claus
I thought the name EMI was cut, and replaced with Capitol...

I think only the EMI label was cut. I believe the name is still EMI but the main label is now Capitol/Virgin.

[sgb]

Originally posted by Paul Chang
Gary,

Thanks for your enlightenment. The French definitely prefer being associated with tricolore to grenouille.

Although I'm not French, I still remember those delicious frog legs I really enjoyed as a youngster back in Taiwan. As I grew older, they seemed getting harder and harder to find probably due to the urbanization of farmland. My wife told me she and her high school classmates thought their biology teacher was a dork and suspected that he took the frogs after the dissection lab. Yummy.

We missed it so much that we once ordered a plate of frog legs at China Stix in Santa Clara. They turned out to be bullfrog legs and we didn't like it one bit. Time to get certified for teaching high school biology. ;)

Paul,

Having lived in France as a teenager, I'm certainly aware that the French regard grenouille as an epithet not to be used in polite company, but they harbor no distaste for crapaud (a toad) or phoque (a sealskin), in these instances.

As for the delectable frog legs, these have begun to disappear from restaurant menus here in Lousiana as well. There was once a time when a broiled or fried seafood platter included these in the better restaurants.

[mikenyc]

"It's not like Mr. Levy is ever going to read your statement here. "

It's so evident with the size of the bloodletting, that these Big Music Companies, with all of their ways of marketing and distributing and fighting....ahem..."piracy"...are so out of touch with the music they are supposed to be marketing.

They are spinning the cut back to be about dead-wood artists and employees...but it's not about that at all...and they know it!

To me, it's about the overhead they created for themselves, internally, so much so, they can't really market music anymore.

Forty nine Finnish music artists shouldn't make the difference between a situation of "more prosperity" and bankrupcy for a music company...even EMI. They dumped solid artists like Mariah Carey that sold millions for them at one time...just to grandstand and look good to investors and Wall Street.

It's a shame they are getting away with this scam.

How it effects us...is that down the road they will justify charging a higher list price for audio and DVD software....and NO ONE will say anything about it...just ooooo and ahhhhh.

Such hypocrisy should be punishable by 10000000 lashes with an encripted CD !