Nashville's Unwritten Rules: Inside the Business of Country Music [Paperback]

Dan Daley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1999

As country musicians LeAnn Rimes, Garth Brooks and Dwight Yoakam sell millions of records and put their names on the top of the pop as well as the country charts, country music is no longer thought of as merely southern, rural or American. It's a system more feudal than modern. This is a guided tour of the inner sanctum of country music's holy city.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Producer, songwriter, and journalist Daley has written an insider's book that hits the nail on the head: country music is a big money maker, with Nashville as the focal point, but to succeed you must follow some "unwritten rules." Daley points out that in spite of dollar signs everywhere, Southern qualms about social propriety dictate that you don't talk about money, you just make it. To this end, successful songwriters, producers, music publishers, and musicians in Nashville have learned the rules he sets down here. Those wanting a country music career in Nashville would do well to read this insightful book; Daley claims that even outsiders can learn to play this game. A valuable study of the Nashville music business that nicely complements Jimmy Bowen and Jean Jerome's Rough Mix (LJ 5/1/97); recommended for public and academic libraries.?Kathleen Sparkman, Baylor Univ., Waco, Tex.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Kirkus Reviews

This study of the country-music industry takes a smart look at the business end of America's most popular musical genre. Music journalist Daley divides Nashville's music empire into four fiefdoms: producers (whom he dubs ``princes''), songwriters, publishers, and musicians. Among musicians, the author focuses not on star performers but on session musicians--the professionals who give the music its identifiable sound. With this rule in place, Daley adopts an anecdotal approach to the growth and development of Nashville, calling on his dozens of interviews with major figures to explain what makes the city the undisputed capital of country. Those interviewed range from relative old-timers like Owen Bradley (who, with Chet Atkins, helped to establish many of the unwritten rules of Daley's title) to the newest musicians to join the A-list of session players selected to cut records by producers. Daley painstakingly details such unwritten rules as ``Thou shalt live in Nashville,'' which refers to the industry's disapproval of anyone daring to commute between the main hive and the outlands. Indeed, if producers are the princes of Nashville, then the twin villains, observes Daley, are the swaggering provinces of New York and Los Angeles, whose expatriates are treated with no small amount of suspicion when they arrive on Nashville's Music Row, purportedly threatening the local industry's ``rigid, familial, and benignly feudal structure.'' Rigid as this parochial prejudice against outsiders and commuters may be, it has also, as Daley points out, helped to keep country music authentic and has led Nashville to spectacular success in sending its music all around the nation. A solid plumbing of the forces driving a dominant and uniquely American industry. (16 b&w photos, not seen) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Overlook TP (January 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0879518898
• ISBN-13: 978-0879518899
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,690,709 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Bitter Pill, December 2, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Nashville Music Machine: The Unwritten Rules of the Country Music Business (Hardcover)

I was upset. I was even angry. With the author? No, with the business. As a New Jersey songwriter, I am an outsider. More like an outsider looking to displace a Nashville "insider". We all want music to be our livelihoods. But there are only so many musical chairs. We all know this. So why do books that remind us of this fact disturb us so much? If you are absolutely determined to do all that is necessary to be a part of the country music scene, then this book is an easy read. For those circling like vultures, keeping their distances, but not willing to dive full force into the fray, this book will shoot you down. It is extremely well written, jam-packed with critical info, and is a one-stop country history lesson. I have a brand new appreciation for the Nashville machine. I hated what I read. But I believed what I read. Suggestion: 1. Buy the book, 2. Take a sedative, 3. Read the book, and 4. Well, you'll decide what's next.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Revealing and insightful insider's account., February 2, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Nashville Music Machine: The Unwritten Rules of the Country Music Business (Hardcover)

As a reality-check, this should be considered a must-read by any aspiring songwriter, musician or singer before embarking on the pitted road to Nashville. Through incredible insight, research and experience, Mr. Daley illuminates the good, the bad and the eccentricity of the business of country music. His engaging style captures the tone of the laid-back, but unique, methodologies of the movers and shakers of the Nashville Community.

2 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Average, July 9, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Raleigh, NC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Nashville Music Machine: The Unwritten Rules of the Country Music Business (Hardcover)

Daley's book still doesn't get to the insider track of what the Nashville music business is all about - mainly because he has not lived the experience - by trying to make it on music row. Rather, he uses the self-reports of others to guide his words.

For example, the quote ``Thou shalt live in Nashville,'' which refers to the industry's disapproval of anyone daring to commute between the main hive and the outlands.

However, he fails to explain why so many of the new artists signed to Nashville labels have never spent one minute in Nashville - compared to how it use to be. In short, he failed to mention that it is 'financial' backers paving the way for new artists, who have 'nothing' to do with the music business in Nashville.