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We zero in specifically on the connection between Washington and the music industry regulation. And I'll point you no further than an op ed in the Washington Post the headline Congress, I have a plea for you. It was written by Gene Simmons. Yes, that Gene Simmons, who was on stage at the Kennedy Center last weekend the Kennedy Center Awards.
You saw him in the Oval Office with Donald Trump, and you also saw him testifying on Capitol Hill yesterday before the Judiciary Committee for something called the AMFA Act. This is about music fairness royalties. Listen to what he said.
How do we dare come in second to Russia, an alleged country led by a despot, when they do a better job of paying our king of rock and roll, And we're gonna stand by and not pay today's artists and future artists because let's face it, our children are tomorrow's stars. It got to change this now for our children and our children's children. And I know you will. The President will sign this once all you guys respectfully get your act together and put this across the board.
Let's do the right thing. God bless America.
He's talking about the American Music Fairness Acts, proposed legislation that may or may not get a floor vote, but of course, with the support of the President, that would go a long way. It's got the support of Gene Simmons, and he's with us right now in studio. You spent the week in Washington. Thanks for making us part of it.
Well, it's my pleasure and people are shocked. I'll try to encapsulate what all this is for. I know that's a big word, like gymnasium. Look, I don't care what kind of music you listen to, but the American music, let's just stop at that point. American music means we create, then invented the music of planet Earth. Rock and roll, blues, jazz, hip hop, country and Western all invented and created here. Our stars are the stars of planet Earth. You can go to Africa and hear you ain't nothing, but it
no matter where you go. Every Christmas, everywhere around the world, people listen to Bing Crosby I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas, written by Irving Berlin. The astonishing, stunning, and shameful fact is that no matter who you hear on AM and FM radio. They're getting zero pennies for the airplay. So let's play a game. Who's your favorite recording artists?
Kiss?
No, come on, somebody from the past.
There we go. Jimmy Hendrix.
Jimmy Hendrix. Jimmy Hendrix has never in his entire career or now ever gotten paid a single penny when his music is played on AM and FM radio. The stunning fact is that the Russians and some other countries actually do pay performing artists on radio land radio, AMFM, and Americans do not. And this has got to change and should change. Look, I make a living, and people of my age, and you know who've climbed the mountain, clawed
and scratched their way to the top. We're blessed by the American dream because it is alive and I'm living proof of it. So I make a living. But the new artists, every penny counts, and the fact that they can be played on radio and not even make one penny for their performance is criminals.
So I control a lot of people. We're on the radio right now.
You see that big radio mic in front of you there with such a good radio show, Gene. They put it on TV and I've been knocking around the radio business for a minut we hear about BMI and ASKCAP fees. Has this always been the case or was it simply an exchange? You play my music for exposure for publicity, and I sell tickets and I sell albums And that's now out of balance?
Is that what happens? Artists are not interested in negotiating how their careers are built understood radio needs?
Where did the recording car BMI fees go?
ASKAP? And BMI specifically relates to writers and publishers, which doesn't affect the masses. Whatso weten?
So is this radio's fault or your contract with the record company?
How come the middleman hasn't given you nothing to do.
With the record company because they make money when they sell records and writers and producers. This is the actual recording artist. You like Elvis, you like Sinatra? When you hear that song on the radio. The people we tuned in for actually never get paid.
Amazing.
Everybody else gets paid, the writers and the publishers and the advertising dollars. Radio last year made fourteen billion dollars. You know how much of that went to the Sinatra state or Tame and Paula or all the new bands.
I think I'm getting zero.
Okay, that's in contrast to satellite radio, digital platform talking about no I know, but I just want to square that you're suggesting the radio industry is behind the times.
Because all of these other platforms are not staying anything.
I'm stating fact that AMFM radio is well. I want to use language that doesn't get anybody legal and involved in the Patua of the street is criminal. You cannot The America is based on the premise that if you work hard, you should get paid. So everybody's getting paid when a radio station AMMFM broadcasts. The executives get paid, the advertisers pay money, the billboards on the street which use our name and likeness for free. If you use my name and likeness otherwise, I would take your firstborn
and your house. But radio is allowed to do that. They keep fourteen billion, and the new artists, by the way, who's trying hard to make it, is not going to make those precious pennies to help them survive. And that's as far as I'm concerned. My opinion is it's criminal.
Listeners you write in the op ed are more likely today to discover new music on Spotify, Apple, YouTube, TikTok. At the same time, more and more local stations have been bought up by big corporations like iHeart in Odyssey.
They still play the.
Music without paying the artists, often hits that listeners already know in order to generate ad revenue. As I mentioned worked in radio for a while, I've seen rampant consolidation in this business.
Has that mean it.
Worse well one way or the other, Whether it's consolide or a potential payers, the result is the same. A truck runs you over and the guy comes out and says, I'm sorry, I ran you over. I didn't mean to do it, or I don't like you I ran you over. What's the difference you've been run over? So the question is an interesting dialectic, another big word like nasum. The result is nothing's changed. The artists are not getting paid.
That I mean especially our children and our children's children are going to be the next generation superstars after they climb their way to the top and five Ford, what do they have forward to look? What do they have? You know? Looking forward? They're going to get zero pennies when their songs are played on AM and FM radio, and that's insane.
Do you have the president's support on this? Did you talk to him about it?
I spent some time with the President alone in the Oval Office, and we talked about family and I've known the president, proud to say before he became a politician. But what else we talked about is a private issue.
Okay, So that wasn't about legislation.
I guess I didn't say that's what you're leading the witness. You're hon it the semantics, but I'm not anti semantic.
I hope that you're not, because we wouldn't be able to.
Let you let it was a little clickbait there. What I talked, Yes, I specifically said what I spoke with the President about is not for anybody else's consumption. Okay, Well, there is such a thing as privacy.
I completely understand.
I only ask you because so many lawmakers come on the air and say, if we get a directive from the president, we can make this work. What did you hear in the committee from from members? Did you get a lot of votes on this?
I've heard a lot of support. I've met privately with Senator Marshall Blackman and mister Schiff. Both sides of the aisle seem let's just say, as soon as Congress gets their act together, the President will sign this. I am convinced of it. My personal opinion.
Well, our audience should know, and you're talking to the business community right now that you are no stranger to big business and some pretty shrewd moves. It was a Bloomberg report when you sold your publishing rights last year House Entertainment Retirement.
That it's not entirely accurate, so just here to correct it for the record. An entity called Pophouse, a futuristic company out of Sweden, came and bought Kiss the underlying rights, the makeup logos as well as the writing publishing for a respectable sum enough to buy Rhode Island. I give you a pregnant pause so that it sinks in. But the future looks even more gargantuan than the past. We are in the middle of the first motion picture to
be directed by McGee. There's an awful lot of stuff that I can't talk about because nobody wants to find out where they're going to get for Christmas.
In July.
There is an enormous commitment by Pophouse in the future of kiss and this is just the beginning. When you look at a caterpillar and you say, well, that's the end of its life. No, you're shortsighted. You don't understand that it's going into a kon, which is where we are now, and we're going to come out and defy gravity with beautiful wings and sort of the heavens.
Very poetic.
I am kind of a big deal.
I've heard that in a poet.
I was a fan actually of Bloomberg when he was a mayor, met the gentleman and he struck me as a powerful and attractive man.
Well, I can only agree with that, and I loved.
His algorithm that made him rich and fish. But that's another story.
Well, i'll tell you what. We've got the terminal right here. I'm sure there's a disclaimer I'm supposed to read somewhere. But with everything you just described, you just outline the future of the music business.
Why are you chasing down the old format?
Well, look, the old formats are if they worked and they were justified, should should and would continue. But tell me what your retort is, even though I know you're not retorted, how do you how do you validate our stars, the people fought their way to the top, never get a cent for radio airplay. How do you validate that
while radio is making fourteen billion dollars. Again, I'm not demonizing them as bears, noting we need each other, but somewhere between paying artists zero and fourteen billion dollars, there should be a Remember the name of the act is Fairness, American Music Fairness Act. You should let me talk more. I can increase your you know, more people will watch this instead of SpongeBob SquarePants.
Come on, believe that that's why you're here. Nobody gets this much time. That's Simmons. Okay, so you said a lot. Well, we consider the future of the music business. Do you worry about AI regulation? Do you worry about these FACO bands coming up? Speaking of algorithms, And by the way, Mike Bloomberg is not only the boss here but founder chairman Bloomberg LP.
That's right, AI is a worry for you or not?
AI is a concern if left unregulated. Anything beautiful horse that you just bring in if it runs wild, you've got to have some parameters that we control instead of AI. Right now, there's a Country and Western star that's got a number one record of sorts on some chart doesn't actually exist. What do you think, Well, well, let me
just go. The major problem here, potentially, hypothetically and otherwise is that if states have the right and this has to be settled right away, the government must get a federal law that encompasses all of AI to get some
sanity out of this. Because if you can do AI legally in Delaware, where you have all your companies so you don't pay so you pay less taxes because you're a very bright man besides being good looking, why should they want to do real music and real art in New York when they can just go to Delaware and do AI. No, you need a federal law that encompasses the entire country, and I would highly recommend, and I
would hope the entire planet really gets together. It's an issue for the un to get a world body to accept it, because it's going to happen to the same thing that happened to the unions in America. You charge too much here, so we'll do business in China. No, you want to address the AI issue worldwide so we can control what the rules are, the comings and the going, and what's the income stream, who owns the IP, who's
the owner of the trademark? At in for? And I'd like to announce that I'm running for.
If you were a kid, you bought a guitar, you wanted to get in the music business, what would you tell him turn and run?
Well, I would tell anyone to do as I did, which is to say to have a fallback position, because anything that you pour your heart and soul into has a pretty good chance. And that means likely ninety five percent or more you will fail. And in my case, I became a sixth grade teacher and an assistant to the editor of Vogue magazine Kate Lloyd, and the assistant to the Puerto Rican Interagency Council MAGD Lena Miranda for the Boorriqua community, where I did work for government research
and Demonstration Project ADAM FROMIDAM and Ausium. In other words, if your thing doesn't work out, what's the backdrop? Like, I know you took ballet lessons. If this doesn't work out, and you know, do your not keeping up with it?
Yeah, it's pretty cool for you to be here, and I appreciate it very much. It is the American Music Fairness Act, that's what he came here to talk about.
You don't need me to tell you, Gene Simmons