Category: 3 – SHELF it (All Categories are 1 – Read ASAP!, 2 – BUY it!, 3 – SHELF it, 4 – SOMEDAY it)
Comments: The is the story of Warner Brothers Music’s incredible thirty year run where they shaped the music industry via artists like Jimi Hendrix, Madonna, and Prince. I don’t know much about the music industry – certainly not much about the industry in the 70s and 80s. I also can’t remember how this book ended up in my collection. But I love scrappy origin stories – so maybe that explains it. This was an entertaining read.
Insights that resonated: One of my favorite anecdotes that gets to the heart of their success was that the ethos of the group was their insistence that their focus was to not make hits.
Instead, they were run top-down by an ethos of trying to make great music. Even when they failed commercially, the question the team was asked was – “Was it good?”
Combine this ethos with creative and edgy marketing and you have an incredible package.
As simple as this sounds, it is so hard to do consistently – especially when you’re under pressure to prove viability or to drive growth. And this is especially so when your original set of leaders aren’t in charge.
And that (leadership changes) is predictably what ended their epic run as well.
Marler's Observatory 