Marketers are slinging the blues at consumers

We know that with sales slumping the music business has been blue.

But now the music business has got “The Blues.”

Tied in, officially or otherwise, to this week’s “The Blues” series on PBS and to Congress’ declaration of 2003 as the Year of the Blues, a glut of CD and video releases is just in or coming soon to a music store or online shopping site near you.

Delta blues, Texas blues, Chicago blues, Memphis blues, acoustic blues, electric blues, Blind this, Muddy that....

It’s a lot to sort through, especially for anyone developing an interest in the music because of the series and related exposure. After the music industry was caught short by the surge of interest in rural folk and bluegrass spurred by the “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” phenomenon and by heightened interest in jazz driven by Ken Burns’ 2000 PBS documentary history, it seems every record company with any blues in its catalog is making sure it puts something on store shelves.

“It’s too much stuff,” says Violet Brown, who oversees blues stock for the Wherehouse retail chain. “And it’s a rehash. A lot of the packages are the same artists, same songs.”

There are 19 single-disc CDs alone being released under the official brand of the series -- soundtracks to each of the seven films, plus a dozen individual artist titles -- as well as a five-CD box set, a 21-track highlights release, a DVD set of the complete series and a book. But that’s just the start:

* EMI’s catalog imprint the Right Stuff has a new Blues Kingpins series with individual-artist collections showcasing B.B. King, Elmore James, Fats Domino, Ike Turner, John Lee Hooker and Lightnin’ Hopkins.

* The new Shout! Factory label also has a six-artist series, named “Heroes of the Blues,” with albums anthologizing Ma Rainey, Son House, Mississippi Fred McDowell, Skip James, the Rev. Gary Davis and Furry Lewis. The label claims these are the only albums to license tracks from various labels to cover these artists’ entire recording careers. The series has cover art taken from (or, in two cases, inspired by) cartoonist R. Crumb’s “Heroes of the Blues” playing cards. Shout! Factory also is behind “Deep Blues -- A Musical Pilgrimage to the Crossroads,” a documentary that’s been airing recently on PBS stations as a complement to the Scorsese program.

* Rounder Records has “Alan Lomax: Blues Songbook,” a two-CD set with recordings the pioneering musicologist made from the ‘30s through the ‘70s, including historic sessions with House, Jelly Roll Morton, Muddy Waters, Leadbelly and many others, a dozen of the tracks previously unreleased.

Rounder also has dipped into its catalog for “Box of the Blues,” a four-CD set covering 50 years of music right up to the present.

* “The American Folk Blues Festival” presents, on two DVDs, rare performance footage by Waters, Hooker, Howlin’ Wolf and others filmed between 1962 and 1966 at an annual event in England. There’s also a companion audio CD.

“You have everyone in the blues world’s dream: This marquee event that creates a marketing opportunity that’s never been before, and people have seen this coming since Scorsese announced he was doing this project,” says Howard Stovall, former executive director of the Memphis-based Blues Foundation.

The releases tied to the series, coming in a joint effort from Sony Music and Universal Music Entertainment, have the clear advantage.

“We’re focusing more on the Scorsese pieces as well as highlighting some seminal catalog that was out before by key artists old and new,” says Vince Szydlowski, senior director of product for the Virgin Entertainment Group.

“There’s some good stuff coming out, but there is quite a lot for customers to wade through. There is a fear that if we went too heavy on that stuff, it would detract from the impact of the Scorsese pieces. We’re trying to remain focused on that.”

While there may be hope of a repeat of the sales boosts from “O Brother” and Burns’ “Jazz,” many in the blues community are cautious with expectations.

“It’s obviously a good thing for us,” says David Hirshland, who, as executive vice president of the publisher Bug Music, represents the estates of Willie Dixon, Waters, Hooker and House. “It’s going to have prime placement in retail outlets, which this genre of music has never really been able to have. That in and of itself will mean increased sales.

“But frankly, for the young audience, the White Stripes do more to sell blues records than this ever will.”

Grammy tribute expected for Cash

The legacy of Johnny Cash, who died Sept. 12, will be a big presence at the Grammy Awards ceremony next February. But he won’t be a best album nominee, as some Grammy watchers had predicted.

It turns out that Cash’s “American IV: The Man Comes Around,” is not eligible for this year’s consideration. Though the album was released on CD last November, a limited-edition vinyl version was issued in September 2002, before the cutoff date for last year’s awards. In fact one song, “Give My Love to Rose,” won for best male country vocal performance.

A tribute segment to the Man in Black, however, is expected to be a prominent feature of the telecast, with major country and rock figures paying homage.

Meanwhile, there is no obvious album to pick up support that might otherwise have gone to Cash. Some could swing to Warren Zevon, who also died recently, shortly after the release of his album “The Wind,” written and recorded in the months after he learned he had terminal cancer.

There also is strong support for two acts with proven Grammy viability: Radiohead, whose “Hail to the Thief” is certain to get heavy album-of-the-year recognition from critics, and Steely Dan, whose “All Things Must Go” is considered by many to be a better album than the duo’s previous effort, “Two Against Nature,” which won Grammy album honors for 2000.