Dan Kennedy

Rocking in the corporate world

Dan Kennedy thought he landed his rock ’n’ roll dream job as Atlantic Records’ Director of Creative Development. However, he quickly learned that the record business was led by eccentric weirdoes with strange personal quirks. The higher one had climbed on the food chain, the more clueless he or she was about rock itself. The book’s big climactic moment occurs when the new head of the company announces that they are no longer in the music business, but in the lifestyle business. Merchandising will be the source of future profits.

The thirtysomething-white-male-suburbanite-punk-wannabe author writes humorously about directing gangsta rapper Fat Joe, putting together an ad campaign that celebrates 25 years of love songs by Phil Collins, and promoting Jewel’s anti-corporate single with a tie-in to a commercial for a woman’s razor.

Most of the musicians themselves come off as normal people surrounded by nuts. Kennedy finds personal salvation at an Iggy Pop concert and reminds readers that it’s the music that matters.