Everything you needed done was done for you.
Now you do it on your own
But you find you're all alone what can you do?
So opens The Weepies' Hideaway. The Weepies?
They are the folk duo Deb Talan and Steve Tannen. Hideaway is their latest album (released in April of last year) and it's been a best seller on the folk charts. Kat tipped you off Wednesday that it was available for $1.99 at Amazon -- download the entire album for $1.99. It's now back up to $8.99. Still a bargain for anyone who bothers to listen.
And that's one of the good things about Amazon, they provide some real bargains -- bargains that just pop up and, if you're not regularly visiting, you can miss them.
Not that Amazon's without its problems. We had complaints in e-mails this week. First up, Dusty Springfield. We're Dusty fans. We mention her twice in this edition, for example. And we were very bothered by an e-mail from a reader who paid for Dusty Springfield's Gold and downloaded it only to discover it jumps in the midst of every song. He can't figure out if it was his downloading or if it's the download itself. (His e-mail just arrived and we're downloading Gold as we speak. It's taking longer than any download we've done before so if we have an answer, we'll provide it. Otherwise, check back next week.) That is a problem. And you'd assume that customer service would deal with your issue and do so quickly.
You'd assume that.
But you'd be wrong.
Check out, for example, this Amazon description (written by Amazon, not by a customer, check the link) of Melanie:
No talent who came out of Woodstock and who continued actively performing more than a quarter century later remained as closely associated with the 1960s and "flower power" than Melanie. Born Melanie Safka in Astoria, Queens, in 1947, she made her first public appearance at age four on a radio show, later studying at the New York Academy of Fine Arts. After mounting a singing career while in college, she later sang in clubs in Greenwich Village, and was signed to a publishing contract in 1967. She recorded her first single, "Beautiful People," for Columbia Records that same year. Her relationship with the record company was short-lived, however, and after one more single she left the label.
A community member brought it to Amazon's attention January 10th, Elaine blogged about it January 12th. The description has not been fixed. Melanie's a "no talent"? They think that's appropriate or a way to move downloads? "Hey, spend money on this, it's by a no talent!" Amazon's customer service is and remains a joke.
And that wouldn't have happened with a male artist.
Stephanie only downloads female artists from Amazon. She wasn't aware of that until she noticed that every time she logged in, Amazon's recommendations to her would include MP3 tracks by female artists ("usually ones I had downloaded other MP3s by") but would include all male artists for the album recommendations. "I just started downloading last winter and I checked the albums stored on my computer and it's all women. My CD collection has more variety but that's all I've downloaded. It really ticks me off that these 'related' artists are all male, week after week. It would tick me off even if I had purchased both men and women but having just downloaded women, they should be recommending women to me."
MP3 tracks recommended are female and the MP3 albums recommended are male? Yeah, we lived through that before. "Singles artists" are women, the sexist narrative went, men are "album artists." Obviously the digital age is not free of sexism.
As if to prove that fact, Amazon decided to promote Motown last month as part of Black History Month and notice the banner they used.
When people think of Motown, most people think of Diana Ross. She was the Queen of Motown. She scored 19 number one hits (that counts "We Are The World") and eighteen were with Motown. 12 of those were as part of the Supremes. No other Motown artist landed 19 songs on top of the Hot 100 and no other did so with 18 songs released by Motown ("We Are The World" was not a Motown single). Motown's longest chart topper is the Diana Ross and Lionel Richie duet "Endless Love" which spent nine weeks at number one.
Berry Gordy bet the label on Diana in the sixties because she was talented and she was a workhorse (working herself to the point of exhaustion). She became one of the biggest superstar Motown produced, bigger than Stevie Wonder, bigger than Marvin Gaye, bigger than Smokey Robinson. Only Michael Jackson could be considered bigger.
But you don't see Diana in the banner, do you?
You don't see any woman. But you certainly don't see Diana. Queen of the label. The face of Motown for most people. Her group was the only American group to hold its own (and thrive) during the British Invasion.
How can you pretend to honor Black History Month and Motown and ignore Diana Ross? Just another case of a woman being stripped out of the place she earned in history. Diana broke down the barriers being a 'first' at many clubs that did not book African-Americans prior to her. But Amazon didn't want to recognize her. What's really hilarious is that most people staring at the Amazon banner won't be able to recognize any of the males except for the young Michael Jackson.
Amazon is not without its problems and we're sorry if we've ever written in such a way to indicate that it is. Most of our readers (and most TCI community members) prefer Amazon to iTunes which is why we utilize it. Equally true is that Amazon often has real bargains and is generally a little cheaper in cost than iTunes.
Real bargains like an album of 14 tracks for just $1.99.
That was Hideaway last week.
And if only for "Can't Go Back Now," it was worth it. But there are many other tracks to fall in love with on the download. The price is now $8.99 and it's still worth it. Check out the singing on the title track of, "Even the stars, sometimes fade to gray, even the stars, hideaway." When it works, Amazon hooks you up with an artist you're unfamiliar with. When it works, they hook you up with The Weepies, for example. When it doesn't? It's just more of the same sexism that's dominated the music industry for decades.
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Ty note: Malvin89 e-mailed to insist that Michael Jackson had to have more number one hits than Diana Ross. Nope. Not yet anyway. On the Hot 100 (or Top 100 as it was called at another time, the pop charts) Michael Jackson sang on 17 number one hits -- like Diana's credits, you need to count "We Are the World" in that number. Five of those number one hits were for Motown -- four Jackson 5 songs and "Ben" as a solo artist.