Good Press, Bad Press and Kickin Ass!

So… I get this email from a producer friend of mine sayin “check this out” and it’s a link to a Free Press article about the lead singer of a Toronto band that is here in Winnipeg recording their new album and how she got the crap beat out of her after meeting some people at a local bar. The singer for the Toronto-based band The Joys was having  a nice drink with one of her bandmates and a couple people that they had started chatting with.  The end result was Sarah Smith being hit in the head, taken on a crazy high speed van ride through the our city (probably not the way she would have liked to tour our wonderful city) and then being dragged from the van and bet on again until she could break free and get help.

All I can say is WTF!!!!!

What kind of city do we live in that does this to people? How embarrassing as a Winnipegger to have this happen and especially to someone from another city!  Day after day I hear similar stories about violent events that take place in this city and I’m not saying that it is now more important that one of our own “crew” got beat up, but it
really hits home.  So I was thinking, hey, we could all form a gang, not sure what our handle would be, but I’m pretty sure we could kick some gangsta ass if we needed to. Just think, a gang of music industry people.  Mild mannered, artsy types, just always sittin’ around singin’ kumbya and smoking dope drinkin beer!  Then… POW!  We take out the trash!  I am looking to my industry friends to give suggestions as to what we can call ourselves.  Come on, pipe in now… lets get us a really good name and kick some butt out there and take care of our own!

Oh ya, in my last post (The New Age of Marketing...) I mentioned that bands should do what ever they can to promote themselves. So after I asked my producer friend if Sarah was ok, I couldn’t help myself and I then asked,  “…are they working the press and PR side of this?”  Now, some of you may think that’s not classy…even maybe downright rude.  I think there is no such thing as bad press. Take it, run with it, make it happen.

The story was National news by the way!