Monday 26 July 2004

Yes, Delete Entry Telstar lays bla

Telstar Records have finally gone bust. Personally, I thought this happened months ago, but all the papers (The Times, Sun, etc.) are reporting it as if it happened today.

Funnily enough, in events that mirror the demise of Factory, it seems the label's fate has been sealed by disasterous attempts to get Posh Spice's career off the ground, with much spent on studio time for failed recordings and horrendous costs on marketing and the like. This is similar to the worrying moneypit of the Happy Mondays that eventually led to Factory calling it a day, almost 12 years ago.

The funny thing about the whole Telstar debacle is where Chairman Neil Palmer is actually placing the blame. In an article in the Sun, after paragraphs outlining the fatally costly mistake that was the Posh Spice incident, it then goes on the state, "Chairman Neil Palmer blamed illegal internet downloading and lack of radio support for British artists."

Illegal downloads? Telstar never released any of the ill-fated Posh material, how can it be downloaded at all?

It beggars belief that the scapegoat of piracy is still being trotted out to cover a myriad of sins, mainly bad judgement at the top. Tony Wilson took his hits in stride and admitted that getting the Mondays to record in Barbados was a bad thing. He didn't have the scapegoat of music fans hungry for material to blame, and to his credit, I don't think he would have had he had the change.

Neil Palmer, you are a petty man.

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