TomBomb.Com

The Times They Are A Mashing

Today's announcement that myspace.com will begin allowing members to buy music directly from their favorite bands has got me thinking.

In the pursuit of cool marketing, I have had the good fortune of hiring some pretty amazing musical acts.  People like Bob Dylan, Ray Charles, Bonnie Raitt, Tony Bennett--music hall of famers all, and young acts like Beck, Goo Goo Dolls and Sugar Ray also.  I know and love music and have been striving to pass this passion on to my kids.  My boy Sam and I have this year taken to making "mash-ups," re-mixing two or more songs to create a unique new work.  With hardware and software available today--Fruity Loops, Acid Pro, CuBase, ProTools--I've built a virtual recording studio in my home office.  We are having a good time mashing songs from acts like the Gorillaz, Hard Fi and Panic at the Disco.  The best part is combining old and new music to create a hip song with some heritage.  We blended The Clash's Rock the Casbah with Hard Fi's Cash Machine to create a totally fun new song we named Rock the Cash Machine[listen] (coming up with mashed up new titles is half the fun).  When we collaborate, we each try to bring something to the endeavor.  I have a vast iTunes collection--with CDs and vinyl as back up.  I also listen to the radio for new acts and trends. Sam has his iTunes and MP3s, but nothing from the material world and he doesn't listen to the radio.  Yet, he knows all the latest bands, knows when the latest albums "drop," knows which up and comers will be the next to blow up.  His black iPod is filled with cutting edge artists, yet his radar screen is totally online--coming from music sites and the passed on knowledge from his peers.  Now, with the announcement from myspace, he will further reduce the intermediaries in his life.  If he likes the sound of a new garage band or unwashed indie squad, he just needs to download and go.  No waiting for the okay from Rolling Stone magazine.  No waiting for American Bandstand.  No waiting for MTV--if they even showed videos any more, that is.  No, his is a private label, do-it-yourself generation.  He will be increasingly hard to influence, to persuade, to sell to.  And we're not just talking music here, either.   He and his younger sister Liz will learn, communicate and shop differently than we did, and that's fine, since the old ways sucked anyway (a world of limits and scarcity and producer tyranny).  The only question is, what collective experience will their generation have?  If they don't gather together anyplace, but rather "convene separately" via online communities, how will they identify with each other, share and even commiserate?  Will there be a "voice" of their generation, the way Dylan was or U2 is?  Will there be a soundtrack to their young lives?  A Brown-Eyed Girl to someday surface remember-when memories?  Geez, for that matter, how will future acts even be elected to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame when every artist is famous to someone?  Am I getting old or what? 

Tom Hayes Bio

Tom Hayes is one of Silicon Valley's best known marketing executives.  His new book on digital business and culture, Jump Point (McGraw-Hill), arrives in bookstores in January 2008. 

Tom has been called A Model Citizen for the 21^st Century by Fast Company magazine and marketing maverick by the Wall Street Journal.  As vice president of Applied Materials, he put the semiconductor industry giant on the global map.  In a 16 year career there he was responsible for growing the brand from modest beginnings into a mutli-billion dollar high tech powerhouse.

A pioneer at probing the intersection of technology and culture, Tom was the founding CEO and Chairman of Joint Venture: Silicon Valley, and launched the Charitech program to promote corporate citizenship among high tech companies.  A decade ago he created the Webstock ’96 live four-day mega-event with his friend, Melrose Place star Andrew Shue.  He made musical history the next year when he negotiated the only joint appearance ever of Bob Dylan with his son Jakob’s band The Wallflowers at the Applied Materials’ 30^th Anniversary party in San Jose. He invented the digital lifestyle event in the late 1990s with a series of events called Silicon Planet that paired new technology demos with live entertainers such as Beck and the B52s. Tom's 1994 book You Can Make A Difference in Silicon Valley is still used as a text on civic activism in schools and universities.

As a business writer and author, Tom is managed by Jim Levine at the Levine Greenberg Literary Agency.

Currently Tom is VP of Corporate Marketing at device software leader Enea, where he continues to color outside the lines.  His riffs and rants on marketing, technology, and culture can now be found at www.tombomb.com.