Pop Culture Archives - Sex, No Drugs & Rock'N'Roll

Forgettable Overproduced Grammys Music

February 13, 2017 by L.E. Kalikow Leave a Comment

How Music Got Here

When the new millennium began with record companies suing their own customers for peer-to-peer music downloading, the graffiti was on the wall. Like the industrial revolution before, the digital age wiped out the multi-billion dollar record business we once thought recession proof and timeless.

But the music didn’t die, it simply morphed into another dimension as the infrastructure built to filter, foster, package, market and sell it disappeared. Now music exists in an unfiltered internet ocean requiring navigational tools like Spotify and Pandora. And the vestiges of past record companies, co-opted into entertainment conglomerates, now create brands instead of artists, with commercials, soundtracks, and albums produced, not for the music, but to sell the brand.

The Evolution of ‘SEXY’: Revenge of The Nerds!

May 11, 2016 by L.E. Kalikow Leave a Comment

When I was a kid (in the dark ages before color TV) the ‘perfect couple’ was symbolized by the athletic captain of the football team chasing the virginal head cheerleader. Today apparently supplanted by the skinny debate team captain chasing the sexy high school slut, as “Revenge Of The Nerds” has become a reality.

The Hollywood Sexy Star Machine

The LGBT ‘Closet’ door wide open

March 25, 2016 by L.E. Kalikow Leave a Comment

With the mention of ‘Civil Rights’ most people immediately think in racial terms. But since the 60’s another civil rights movement has been taking place as well… LGBT.

A Little History

In Part 1 of “Sex, No Drugs & Rock’N’Roll (Memoirs Of A Music Junkie),” I remember the reaction in 1966, when I invited Allen Ginsberg to speak at Indiana University, “Allen walked into the room with electric hair sticking out, except where it clung to his ruffled red flannel shirt. Holding hands with an anemic male companion, Ginsberg swished to the podium and took center stage while most homosexuals were still in the closet. The entire spectacle caught the dumbfounded ladies of the I.U. Poetry Society with no established roles of etiquette. So they sat like a school of fish with round mouths sucking wind.”

Sex in America: What’s Wrong With This Picture?

March 4, 2016 by L.E. Kalikow 2 Comments

America’s sexual attitudes are f*cked up!

Apparently the word ‘intercourse’ is okay but ‘fuck’ is dirty? You can stab a woman in her chest on TV as long as you don’t show her nipple?!?

Who makes these rules?

Covert Art: Censorship

Above on the left is the cover art I submitted to publish my audiobook “Sex, No Drugs & Rock’N’Roll: Memoirs of A Music Junkie” to Amazon’s subsidiary Audible. It was rejected on the grounds it “contained nudity.” This, despite the fact that the cover had already been accepted in the paperback, album and eBook formats.

How Kesha’s Case is Similar to “Twelve Years A Slave”

February 21, 2016 by L.E. Kalikow Leave a Comment

In 1971 when I brought my first major recording contract home to my attorney father, in my book “Sex, No Drugs & Rock’N’Roll: Memoirs Of A Music Junkie,” I recounted, “As my father read the recording contract, he just kept shaking his head. To him it bordered on legalized slavery. We needed a consulting opinion.” So, we visited a major entertainment lawyer at the time who, “made the distinction between legal and practical in the high-stakes music business, with one-sided contracts that reflected the risk. On the other hand, once successful, everything was renegotiable.”

The Reasons I’m Disappointed in the HBO Show “Vinyl”

February 17, 2016 by L.E. Kalikow 4 Comments

Pilot Episode: Vinyl

Ever since the Scorsese/Jagger project was announced over a year ago, I’ve been waiting with Christmas anticipation for its opening. Having recently watched and re-watched the terrific CNN documentaries on both the 60’s and the 70’s, I now had a special interest in “Vinyl.” The Valentine’s Day pilot launch coincided directly with release of my own book living through the music business during those years in “Sex, No Drugs & Rock’N’Roll: Memoirs Of A Music Junkie.”