Sandy Pearlman

Woodrow Wilson Fellow in the History of Ideas. New School Fellow in Sociology and Anthropology. Framer of many of the key terms of the current public discourse concerning "the Future of Music." Founding Vice President, for A&R and Media Development at EMusic.com (the first of the downloading companies, way back in 1998). Vice President for Media Development at Moodlogic (creator of omniscient trans-media navigators for the likes of Sony and Microsoft). Producer, creator, songwriter, manager and theorist for many of the most important bands and musical trends of the last 20 years. Described by the Billboard Producer's Directory as "the Hunter Thompson of rock, a gonzo producer of searing intellect and vast vision." Gonzo enough to be played by Christopher Walken in the infamous Saturday Night Live parody skit of the making of "The Reaper" (which Pearlman produced for Blue Oyster Cult). President and Owner of the seminal American alternative label, 415 Records. By profession a visionary authority on the convergence of the Film, Video and Music cultures, with, the new culture of technology engendered by the Web. One of the few able to speak with equal authority, both, to, and, for these cultures. Visiting Lecturer on these issues at such assorted cool places as Stanford, Princeton, McGill and various Universities of California (Berkeley, le plus cool Santa Cruz, etcÖ). Visiting ScholarÝ at McGill. Consultant on these issues to overweight multinational entertainment conglomerates, stressing out on declining market share and growing irrelevancy: Sandy Pearlman is one of the crucial prime movers in the ever tightening embrace of Music by Technology and Technology by Music.

One of the first of the teen age Rock Critic cabal (see "Almost Famous"), he paid his way through school in the early 70s with his writing, actually inventing the term "Heavy Metal", along the way, during his sojourn at Crawdaddy magazine. He went on to produce (in some cases literally create) an impressive crew of diverse and uniquely innovative artists with attitude, a discography encompassing: Blue Oyster Cult, the Dictators (the first "punk" record), the Clash, Pavlov's Dog (the first Goth record), Dream Syndicate (kings of the L.A. Paisley Underground scene), etc. For this work he has received ( at last count) 17 gold and platinum records and was hailed (or blamed) by the Village Voice for creating "the Triumph of the Will guitar sound". Currently he is completing work on the new 100 minute long magnum opus pending release for Space Team Electra.

He headed the seminal alternative label, 415 Records: Romeo Void, Translator, Wire Train, Red Rockers, Love Club, Manitoba's Wild Kingdom, etc. In this capacity he acted as executive producer for much of the 415 output. As songwriter he is best known for his association with the Blue Oyster Cult, with whom he virtually defined the whole Heavy Metal genre, writing about half of their catalog, culminating in their 1989 conceptual song-cycle, Imaginos: An album, which has, according to Google, launched 3 new religions and more than 4,500 obsessiveÝ "All About Imaginos" Web Sites. Ironically enough (for a founder of EMusic), MetallicaÝ recorded "Astronomy," one of Pearlman's Imaginos songs, for their notoriously ultra-Napsterized (therefore famously litigated), Garage Inc. His management clients have included a who's who of influential artists in their respective genres, including Romeo Void (one of the breakthrough New Wave bands), Black Sabbath, Aldo Nova, and again, The Dictators and Blue Oyster Cult.Ý To ensure consistent profitability for these touring artists and their promoters, he pioneered the "mega-tour" stadium format of the 1980s, wherein a package of enormous acts (for example Heart, Black Sabbath, Blue Oyster Cult, Cheap Trick, Metallica....) travel together, sharing promotional, production and travel costs, a format persisting today with Lollapalooza, Lillith and their spawn. These tours included the enormously successful Black & Blue (Featuring Black Sabbath and the Blue Oyster Cult). The classic rock film "Black and Blue", which Pearlman produced, was a by-product of these tours.

He just might be the only person on the planet, to have been on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, Mondo 2000 and the pulp English Music newspaper, New Musical Express. The National Public Radio special on Heavy Metal, The Karamazov Vista, was basically the Sandy Pearlman show.Ý In 1992Ý (when Nirvana ruled the Earth) KIRO TV (CBS Seattle) produced a program on his views regarding the Seattle rock scene.

Most recently Sandy Pearlman has been at the forefront of the developing ACS (Alternative Compensation Systems) project. HavingÝ beenÝ so instrumental inÝ overthrowing the Old Music Business Order,Ý he has become prominent in that group of academics, lawyers, economists, intellectual property rights theorists and think tank denizens now attackingÝ the problem of how is that artists, creators and rights holders are actually to be paid in the context ofÝ a radically de-monetized music business (and soon enough film business). In this regard his proposal for, and, numerical analysis of a "World Wide Information IndustriesÝ Micro Tax", first surfaced at the Future of Music Conference at Georgetown University, has been receiving considerable attention, includingÝ that of the New York Times. Stay tuned for hearings at a US Senate Sub Committee chamber nowhere near you sometime soon.