R.I.P. Sean Bonniwell

[axel]

A friend of mine had emailed him not long ago. This is what he wrote in a mail to her just recently:

"The music business (and the business of the arts for
that matter) has been choking the life-blood of artists since who knows
when (the nature of the beast?). Hopefully, in the end, the plastic
hallway fades, and the works of the artist is the legacy that survives.

With Blessings by His grace to you & yours,
sb"

 

[axel]

With "plastic hallway" he seemed to refer to a statement by Hunter S.Thompson:

"The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and good men die like dogs."

Sean Bonniwells music will live on.
The plastic hallway will fade.
Period.

 

[beccabear67]

Yes, there are some definitely cold-blooded vampire types in the entertainment business, it's ignorant/uneducated creators who they depend on to stab each other in the back for their reaping of the divide and conquer. Artists do it to themselves like Pavlov's dogs so often still, and yet when they do come across a half-decent business person they are so used to being screwed they will stab the knife in when the chance comes even though it totally cuts their own nose off! Arthur Lee for example was so primed to not be screwed that he undermined Jac Holzman to ridiculous degrees sometimes. How was he to know Elektra who'd never put rock music out before really was different? Warner Bros. does seem to have been a plastic hallway for a lot of people though (Beau Brummels and Mojo Men were wasted there in my opinion despite some good things coming out in spite of the label).

 

[axel]

There are thousands of examples I guess. But one of the worst cases of music business vampirism is Emitt Rhodes. Poor boy. So much talent... squeezed out like fruit juice, the empty skin thrown in the gutter.

 

[Frantic]

My bud Alec Palao went to Sean's memorial and the other Music Machine guys where there also. It turns out that Alec inherited all of Sean's master tapes and memorabillia!!! Including some cool early demos. More too come