Stevie did a Bat Mitzvah

[dissention]

Originally Posted by sparky

It is sickening to me because it is over the top, conspicuous consumption that is purely done for show. I don't think some 13 year old girl is a big Petty, Nicks, Henlel, Aerosmith fan. This looks to me like a big budget pissing contest, and it makes me kind of sick. It represents a part of culture that is embarrassing, self indulgent, and undignified. It is bad taste because it is completely out of scale.

This kind of party would actually be appropriate for Sheryl Crow's wedding. Ir Stevie's 60th birthday party. They both know a lot of the performers, it would make sense. I can only imagine the tens of thousands of dollars worth of food that is in the trash. It is the concept of doing ludicrous, extravagant things just because you can that I find distasteful. The scale of it all drives it into sickening territory for me.

And the performers ? Everyone's a whore folks. Some of us just can ask for more money than others. Everyone is a whore.

But who are you to judge?

You've actually managed to cut through numerous pages of bull**** with one bloody post. It's the whole idea of people with millions of dollars hiring out other millionaires for extravagant sums of money to perform for an audience of more millionaires that I find rather icky. Why? Because, as you said, it's just for show. It somehow gratifies them to show what a big fat dick they have in the form of a checkbook. It makes me sick to my stomach. Everything is about money; those who have it feel the need to show it off, and rich rock stars give into such bull**** because they're going to be rewarded with lots of money. Talk about tacky.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

It's also our right to be sickened by their extravagnace.

Yes, but in that right is hypocrisy of some form (maybe that is not the right word) because somewhere someone would be sickened by the way you spend money no matter how wisely you do it.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by dissention

But who are you to judge?

You've actually managed to cut through numerous pages of bull**** with one bloody post. It's the whole idea of people with millions of dollars hiring out other millionaires for extravagant sums of money to perform for an audience of more millionaires that I find rather icky. Why? Because, as you said, it's just for show. It somehow gratifies them to show what a big fat dick they have in the form of a checkbook. It makes me sick to my stomach. Everything is about money; those who have it feel the need to show it off, and rich rock stars give into such bull**** because they're going to be rewarded with lots of money. Talk about tacky.

But, his point was everyone does this. I do it everyday and so do you. I think that is the point. Though admittedly they do it on a far larger level than we do.

[Livia]

Where is Perez Hilton on this topic? I want DETAILS! I wanna know the set list, I need to know if Stevie and Tom did I Need to Know!

(Veruca Salt voice) DON'T CARE HOW, I WANT IT NOOOOOOOOOOOW!!!!!!

[David]

Originally Posted by danax6

As I already mentioned in the other thread regarding this subject, I didn't think Stevie would lend herself for stuff like this. I get benefits, tours, tv performances (where she surely gets paid a fukc of a lot of money also), but a 13 year old stranger's bar mitzvah? It doesn't even sound like anything fun or worthwhile.

Don't forget, too, that over the past six or eight years, Stevie played about a dozen private parties for large corporations. Fans kind of wondered about that, too, because it was the first they had ever heard of Stevie being hired by various corporations to perform privately (for employees).

Personally, I have no problem with it because I don't like Stevie in concert any more. so if she wants to play the Poultry Farmers' Convention in Lower Possomtrot, I say go for it!

[Serrart]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

It's also our right to be sickened by their extravagnace.

Extravagance is good, is creative, that's not extravagance: that's normality. The kind where some people sell themselves for a moment of popularity in reality shows ,and some others are willing to pay to see why Jane wouldn't betray Jim with Brad... or would. It's always a matter of spoiled children in a rich and bored Empire.

Romy

[dissention]

Originally Posted by David

Don't forget, too, that over the past six or eight years, Stevie played about a dozen private parties for large corporations. Fans kind of wondered about that, too, because it was the first they had ever heard of Stevie being hired by various corporations to perform privately (for employees).

Yes. Let us not forget the show she played for the National Association of Chain Drug Stores. Or was it the North American Clinical Dermatologic Society?

Personally, I have no problem with it because I don't like Stevie in concert any more. so if she wants to play the Poultry Farmers' Convention in Lower Possomtrot, I say go for it!

Hahaha.

[danax6]

Originally Posted by David

Don't forget, too, that over the past six or eight years, Stevie played about a dozen private parties for large corporations. Fans kind of wondered about that, too, because it was the first they had ever heard of Stevie being hired by various corporations to perform privately (for employees).

I know, it just seems strange to me. I think that if she didn't work another minute of her life anymore, starting right now, she would still have enough money until the day she dies. Why the extra pocket money? Sure, if it was something that I would enjoy doing, or as a 'favor', or for a good cause...but this?

[DashingDan]

Howard Stern's youngest daughter went.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by Serrart

Extravagance is good, is creative, that's not extravagance: that's normality. The kind where some people sell themselves for a moment of popularity in reality shows ,and some others are willing to pay to see why Jane wouldn't betray Jim with Brad... or would. It's always a matter of spoiled children in a rich and bored Empire.

Romy

I agree. In fact, almost all of the what is considered as the world's greatest art came and still comes from this type of spending. I readily agree it was on the backs of the poor for most of it (Great Pyramids, Louvre, etc. ) - which sucks.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by danax6

I know, it just seems strange to me. I think that if she didn't work another minute of her life anymore, starting right now, she would still have enough money until the day she dies. Why the extra pocket money? Sure, if it was something that I would enjoy doing, or as a 'favor', or for a good cause...but this?

Maybe she did it as a favor to Don, Joe, Tom, Jimmy Iovine, etc. Maybe she will donate all the money she got, if she got any. I mean if she went with Don or Tom as a favor, she got paid nothing or very little.

Interestingly, my mother and I were to be at the Waldorf Towers last week and weekend (which is when I think this was) - I would have never left the elevator and they probably would have moved us out of her suite

[Rickypt]

Originally Posted by Serrart

Do you know where and how your clothes and shoes are made? Does it smell too?
Romy

Yep I do, but I don't go around building a reputation as someone who only wears clothes that aren't made by exploited workers, yet suddenly turn around and sign a contract to be a Gap model.

My issue is with Tom Petty. Have a read at this interview with Tom Petty, who has been relentless about his views on greed. Note #2 and #8 in particular. It doesn't jive, it says something about his values, and it changes my esteem for him.

As for Stevie, I said I was embarrassed for her by playing this silly party and I would rather she put that energy into something special and intimate for her fans instead of for the fantasy of a guy who could simply afford it.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/_/id/5933643

[Jyqm]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

But is it that it was for so much money. A very rich older lady paid me $500 a few weeks ago to sing like five songs at her birthday party. I do not sing that well anymore and would have done it for free. But, she offered and I took it. I had a blast and made her happy. What is the harm in that? What if she paid me $5,000, $50,000, $500,0000 - and I took it.How is that a bad thing or a sell out. I would have performed the same for all of it.

I am just being curious not antagonistic.

I'm not as disgusted by the performers agreeing to do something like this as I am by the fact that this guy hired all of them, but for me, the problem I have with Stevie & pals is not the money but the fact that it's a private party for which they were hired. To me, that's something that cheapens the art (and the artist) a little bit.

You asked in another post how it's different from selling out a concert at Madison Square Garden. Well, in that case, Stevie announces that she's doing a show at Madison Square Garden at a certain time and place, and I go and pay to allow her to present her art to me on stage; it's her show, she's in control, and hopefully it's her ideal presentation of her art on that night. In the other case, if i hire Stevie for my party, it's not Stevie's show; it's me who tells her where and when and what I want her to do. At that point, she's just an employee and a puppet, and for me, that cheapens the art a little bit.

It's not a huge deal to me, but I do find it a little disappointing, and I do have more respect on this front for someone like Bruce Springsteen, who once he became famous declared, "I don't play no private parties no more."

Now of course, you go back a few centuries, and many of the classical masterpieces we know today were commissioned by aristocratic families for specific purposes, and the same is true of many wonderful paintings and portraits, but both cases are somewhat different animals, and I don't think I've got the strength to parse all that out tonight. Maybe in the morning...

[dissention]

Originally Posted by Rickypt

Yep I do, but I don't go around building a reputation as someone who only wears clothes that aren't made by exploited workers, yet suddenly turn around and sign a contract to be a Gap model.

My issue is with Tom Petty. Have a read at this interview with Tom Petty, who has been relentless about his views on greed. Note #2 and #8 in particular. It doesn't jive, it says something about his values, and it changes my esteem for him.

As for Stevie, I said I was embarrassed for her by playing this silly party and I would rather she put that energy into something special and intimate for her fans instead of for the fantasy of a guy who could simply afford it.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/_/id/5933643

"Money Becomes King" by Tom Petty

If you reach back in your memory
A little bell might ring
About a time that once existed
When money wasn't king
If you stretch your imagination
I'll tell you all a tale
About a time when everything
Wasn't up for sale

There was this cat named Johnny
Who loved to play and sing
When money wasn't king.

We'd all get so excited
When John would give a show
We'd raise the cash between us
And down the road we'd go
To hear him play that music
It spoke right to my soul
Every verse a diamond
And every chorus gold

The sound was my salvation
It was only everything
Before money became king.

Well I ain't sure how it happened
And I don't know exactly when
But everything got bigger
And the rules began to bend
And the TV taught the people
How to get their hair to shine
And how sweet life can be
If you keep a tight behind

And they raised the cost of living
And how could we have known
They'd double the price of tickets
To go see Johnny's show?

So we hocked all our possessions
And we sold a little dope
And went off to rock 'n' roll.

We arrived there early
In time to see rehearsal
And John came out and lip-synched
His new lite-beer commercial
And as the crowd arrived
As far as I could see
The faces were all different
There was no one there like me

They sat in golden circles
And waiters served them wine
And talked through all the music
And to John paid little mind
And way up in the nosebleeds
We watched upon the screen
They hung between the billboards
So cheaper seats could see

Johnny, rocked that golden circle
And all those VIPs
And that music that had freed us
Became a tired routine
And I saw his face in close-up
Tryin' to give it all he had
And sometimes his eyes betrayed him
You could see that he was sad

And I tried to rock on with him
But I slowly became bored
Could that man on stage with everything
Somehow need some more?

There was no use in pretending
No magic left to hear
All the music gave me
Was a craving for lite-beer
As I walked out of the arena
My ears began to ring
And money became king

[Rickypt]

Originally Posted by David

Personally, I have no problem with it because I don't like Stevie in concert any more. so if she wants to play the Poultry Farmers' Convention in Lower Possomtrot, I say go for it!

I think she already played that convention in '96, right before performing at that fair in Ohio.