Bowie Bonds
I have seen the future of
rock 'n' roll and it's called Prudential Insurance. In case you're one of those
old-fashioned rock fans who doesn't read the financial press, let me explain:
Several weeks back, $55 million worth of David Bowie was put on the market and
Prudential snapped it up in minutes.
You can
now buy bonds in David Bowie--if you can find them. Analysts at Moody's gave
them their much-coveted triple-A rating, based on a 7.9 percent annual return
against the projected earnings of "Space Oddity," "Jean Genie," and the rest of
the back catalog. Bowie is the first pop star to hold a bond offering, so you
can't buy bonds in, say, Gary U.S. Bonds, though that may be because he's only
had one hit in the last 15 years.
You'd think the David Bowie Class A Royalty-Backed Notes,
as they're officially known on Wall Street, would have caused a big splash in
an industry that prides itself on permanent novelty, but in all the hubbub over
his 50 th -birthday celebrations, Bowie forgot to mention it. When the
story did emerge, the rock press was mostly silent or flummoxed. Rolling
Stone gave it a paragraph. Pop fans know their idols are rich, and they
consider excess a respectable musical tradition. Few devotees of Michael
Jackson begrudge him his llamas, or even the young Scandinavian lad, winner of
a Norwegian Michael Jackson look-alike competition, who accompanies him on his
world travels.
But bonds?
That's not megastar hedonism, just boring squaresville suit stuff. It was left
to Bowie's business manager to argue that, au contraire , it was just
what you'd expect from the old Rebel Rebel. "The fact that David is the first
musician to do it is wonderful," said Bill Zysblat, bullishly, "because he is
always on the cutting edge." So that's what a cutting-edge rock 'n' roller is
in 1997: a guy with a triple-A rating on Wall Street. Zysblat's other clients,
Crosby, Stills, and Nash--that's a band, not a brokerage firm--are also
expected to go public.
Once upon a time, rock stars weren't rated by
Moody's. They were moody. They self-destructed, they choked to death on
their own vomit, they hoped to die before they got old. But those who failed
(to die, that is) grew increasingly concerned about the fine print. In the
'80s, Columbia was so anxious to sign Paul McCartney to a new album deal that
they offered $20 million. Chicken feed, he said; what else have you got? They
rummaged around for a bit, and then told McCartney they'd throw in the entire
song catalog of Frank Loesser, composer of, among others, Guys and Dolls
and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying . As you'll have
noticed, both shows have had successful '90s revivals on Broadway and their
scores have been continuous earners for McCartney. On the other hand, can you
name a Paul McCartney album from the last 15 years? So who do you think came
out on top of that deal? McCartney's no fool in this area: Among the other nest
eggs he owns are the score to Annie and, believe it or not, "Happy
Birthday to You." The latter was written in 1883 by two sisters, Mildred J.
Hill and Patty Smith Hill but, thanks to a legal judgment in the 1930s, is
still in copyright. Every time it's sung in public--for example, whenever a TV
station uses that clip of Marilyn Monroe serenading President
Kennedy--McCartney gets a check.
McCartney, of course, is now
Sir Paul--the first rock star to be knighted. Having spent decades trying to
maintain their pose as countercultural revolutionaries, the aristrockracy is
finally coming out of the closet. To his credit, though, even Mick Jagger feels
the trend toward rock respectability is going too far. Recently, he dropped in
on Elton John at his country house in Berkshire and was shocked by his old
friend's condition: "I've never seen so much porcelain," he complained,
wondering what happened to the glitterballs, strobe lights, amyl nitrate,
cocaine, and louche young men. "If I see another fucking piece of
porcelain ..."
Not so
long ago, Elton was routinely reviled in the tabloids as a corpulent,
drug-addled old poof (as the British say). Now, having conquered the demons of
booze, food, and drugs, he's the first rock star to be in danger of OD'ing on
gentility. A beloved national treasure, second only to the queen mother, he's
known to friends as "the Martha Stewart of rock 'n' roll" and offers such
fellow pop stars as Jon Bon Jovi his services as interior designer. Last year,
he was invited to jive with her majesty to "Rock Around the Clock," dancing
queen to queen.
Ah, yes: "Rock Around the Clock." "It was mid-'50s rock 'n'
roll," Rolling Stone 's Robert Palmer once wrote, "that blew away, in one
mighty, concentrated blast, the accumulated racial and social proprieties of
the centuries." Revolution is a crucial part of rock's self-image. Like the
Khmer Rouge, after their own "mighty, concentrated blast" in Cambodia, rock
even has its own Year Zero. Pick up Billboard 's Hot 100-chart reference
books--or almost any pop reference book--and they all start on July 9, 1955,
the dawn of "the rock era," when "Rock Around the Clock" got to No. 1. Never
mind that one of the writers of the song was born in the 19 th
century, or that Mitchell Parish, veteran lyricist (though born in the
20 th century, just) of "Sleigh Ride" and "Stardust," once described
it to me as "a good, conventional Tin Pan Alley song"--there go the social
proprieties of the centuries.
Some of those proprieties
have proved surprisingly resilient. And, since rock's into defining moments,
perhaps we can agree that, if July 9, 1955, is Year Zero, then the day David
Bowie became the Man Who Sold Himself--for a rock 'n' roller's only inventory
is his image and his songs--is Year Zero-Zero-Zero-Zero-Zero-Zero--the $55
million day rock 'n' roll finally gave up on revolution. Maybe we should
treasure all those bullet-riddled gangsta rappers, the only pop stars who don't
just talk the talk but walk the walk, even unto the grave. But how long can
they hold out? NASDAQ Shakur anyone?
