2011.08.26 - The Street - Video interview with Tommy

Transcript:

Voiceover: One Man Mutiny is the title of Tommy Stinson's new solo CD. The Guns N' Roses and former Replacements bassist is releasing it on his own label due to a real uprising now rocking the music industry.

Tommy: Part of the reason why the industry is kind of falling apart is that they haven't figured out how to make the jump to the new new way of doing things. I mean, there's been this sort of thing happening throughout musical history, I mean, they went from 78' to, you know, LPs to, you know, CDs and then mp3's. There's transition that has to happen, if you're on the front of that curve you're probably gonna, you're gonna be all right. If you're waiting in the wings back there for someone to tell you how to do it and figure it out, you're going to lose it, you're gonna be gone.

Voiceover: In order to stick around, Stinson, who started in the music business at age 12, is releasing his latest effort on his own label Done To Death Music.

Gregg Greenberg: Now you've been on small labels and big labels, tell me what's it like to have your own label.

Tommy: Well, there's a lot of trial and error. I mean, we're trying to figure out what, you know, what makes sense, where should I - because I got to put my own money into it - and I knew that going in, I knew what I was gonna have to figure out. Like what makes sense? Should I get a publicist? Should I get someone to help with the marketing idea? Maybe I can get both? And, you know, we're trying to figure out where is a good place for me to invest in my own music to where it's going to mean something and be meaningful. A lot of times with record labels, big or small, they'll just cover cross the board way of doing things and they'll give you a publicist that's not very good, and you'll do this and they'll give you a marketing team that will try and do this, and none of it really has anything to do with you or your music necessarily, it's just: that's what we do.

GG: Well, what do you think about other revenue streams like video games or movie soundtracks? You've done a soundtrack.

Tommy: I scored a movie for Sony called Catch And Release which was a huge, huge boost for me. One, it was a blast to do, it was something I had wanted to do for a long time and I did with BT and we just had a really good time doing it. And I did very well on that and, you know, for me... and as you go along now it's like a lot of bands are doing that now and they're doing them for free because they want to just be in the movie, and their music, it's just another tool in a way.

GG: Well, speaking of tools it seems like a lot of bands would rather have a hit on YouTube and go viral than go into the top 10. What is social networking and Facebook mean to people's careers right now? Has it supplanted MTV?

Tommy: God I hope so. You know, I think that it probably is going to do roughly what that did for music in the 80s and I think it could do that for music now. Obviously it's showing its... I mean, turning stars out of, you know, kids in their bedroom with a funny dance move. I mean, it's it's just making-

GG: Is that good or bad?

Tommy: I think it's good. I think it's... i think it's, you know, I think it's free and I think that people want to be entertained and I think, you know, if you can entertain them in that little square on your computer then they might go, "Well, you know what, these are playing a show down the street, maybe we should go check them out?" You might have something, you know, more interesting to do, you know.

Voiceover: As for Stinson's upcoming show schedule, he's playing dates in support of One Man Mutiny before rejoining Axl Rose in the Gunners for a fall South American tour. And as for the one show that children by the million are waiting for...

GG: If you remember Lorne Michaels went on Saturday Night Live and he held up a check for three thousand dollars to get the Beatles back together. He said, "If you come down you can take this check." What would it take for a Replacements reunion? What kind of a check would someone have to hold up?

Tommy: You know, they've been holding up pretty good ones already and, you know, we couldn't probably do it for the money, we'd have to do have fun first and foremost and I think that's just a daunting thing. I think that... One, I think Chris has gone his direction with art, and he's done very well with it and he's having a great run, and I think, you know, for Paul and I to just go do it alone we'd have to really sit down and just kind of go, "Let's go play some songs to these people that really wants to play, it'll make them happy, let's go try to have fun and see what it does," and be really light about it. But what ends up happening every time we talk about it, I think that it just becomes a little too precious and issue and like, you know, like we really want to, you know, tarnish it?

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