So I'm in this dive bar called -- God, help me -- "The Tiki Bar," being forced to re-live the disaster that was my brief career in band management.

A band I used to manage called Dr. Awkward, is playing an amazing set to a crowd consisting of the two other bands playing that night, myself and my girlfriend, the bar staff, six guys in the back ignoring the show and playing pool, and the show's promoter (a woman with whom I had a near screaming fit with over a bad gig of hers that I had booked this same band into at an almost identical dive bar not three years ago).

Not even two dollar bottles of Sam Adams are warding off this case of Deja Vu.

The promoter keeps trying to place where she's seen me before, and I keep side-stepping the question, instead lavishing compliments on Dr. Awkward and the band following them, a group called Uncle Oscar that I hadn't meant to stay for, but they were so good I couldn't resist. (Besides, it was the first time I had ever seen a really good female bassist pogo in high heels, and you just can't walk-out on something like that.)

Uncle Oscar finishes their excellent set, and I break for the door, only stopping to sign their mailing list and to buy one of their $2 demo tapes. Once again, the aforementioned promoter stops me, tries to place where she's seen me before (a question which I gracefully side-step again) and encourages me to stay for the next band. "But the next band is gonna be SIGNED soon!" she says, as if mere mention of the music industry's holy grail would be enough to keep me out late when I've got to be up at 6 a.m. the next morning. I apologize and bolt out before the band's done setting up.

The next day, Rich, the bassist for Dr. Awkward, calls me up and tells me I didn't miss much. "They were basically No Doubt 2," he tells me. "Cute lead singer, but nothing really interesting." Gee. I love rock n' roll.

Truth is, I love Dr. Awkward, and I really want them to succeed. They're talented, original, and can play their dang instruments, which puts them one up on just about every other band on the Southern California circuit. I also wouldn't mind hearing this Uncle Oscar on the radio. They were good -- fun to listen to and seemed like nice folks. I didn't see the next band, but it doesn't take a whole lot to figure out why a record company is interested -- they looked good and they're reminiscent of an established, phenomenally popular act.

I don't think I'm going out on a limb by saying that 90% of what you hear on the radio is simply a watered down echo of something that was better and fresher the year before. Seems there's really only three types of new bands getting airplay on commercial radio (and let's disregard the often more anarchic college radio stations, or small, eccentric stations like Los Angeles' KCRW -- we're talking "mainstream alternative" here, like LA's KROQ or Boston's WBCN.) First off, you get bands which are basically rip-offs of something that was once original, like the onslaught of wannabe Nirvanas we were subjected to in the early to mid 90's. The logic on these bands is simple. Some music big-wig rationalized that, if BAND X was successful, then BAND Z which is JUST LIKE THEM will be at least moderately successful. Nobody up top is expecting them to last forever, just long enough to make a buck off 'em.

Then you've got the real rarities -- the ones who, by some miracle, are actually alright and, like 'em or not, they're doing their own thing. There've been more of these then I would normally admit to over the past few years -- Beck springs to mind, as do 311, Ben Folds Five, K's Choice and several others.

Lastly, there are the acts which are such bloody calculated media creations you can't even take them seriously for five minutes and aren't even worth complaining overly much about. Think Spice Girls and you're on the right track. We're not gonna go any further with these.

Most bands that get record contracts are of the first variety, but you can't really blame them for it. USUALLY, they're just poor schmucks who were playing gigs around their scene who either by accident or their own design, happened to be really similar to what was popular at the moment. The A & E guy shows up at a gig, hands 'em a business card and vaguely eludes to them making millions. Is it really "selling out" for these guys to sign the dotted line? When was the last time YOU had even the slightest shot at a cool million, pal? Publisher's Clearing House? Give me a break.

Nah, it's not taking the cash (or, more frequently, the PROMISE of cash) that's the problem. It's when you let the record company re-make you into something you're not that you're "selling out." Or worse, when you make YOURSELF into something. Unfortunately, it's hard to tell what's what unless you've witnessed the development of that band. In matters of artistic integrity, one SHOULD give the artist the benefit of the doubt, unless you're a die-hard cynic, like me, in which case you should feel free to unduly criticize all you want. The real question is, "did they sell-out, or did they just run out of steam?"

This gets pretty abstract without illustrations. Let's go to the charts, shall we?

Band: R.E.M.
Did they sell-out: No
Justifications: While I'll be the first to admit that R.E.M. was MUCH better when they were the darlings of college radio, I'm not gonna go dissing them just for being successful. Whatever complaints I've had about that "Bang and Blame" junk, at least they still seem to be doing their own thing. Besides, who in their right mind would have believed that an album as artsy as Automatic For the People would have been a commercial success.

Band: U2

Did they sell-out: Either that or they've gone insane. Justifications: Once upon a time, U2 was a “cause” band. You name the bleeding heart liberal cause and they had a song about it. They wore earthtones and sung about important stuff -- like the Irish "troubles" and Martin Luther King, Jr.'s, assassination. Now lead singer Bono wears leather pants and they sing techno-gibberish about Lemons. Oh Okay.
Mitigating Factors: Following the dismal commercial failure of their last tour and two last albums, Bono is now claiming that they've been "parodying" a band that's sold-out. Yeah. You go, Bono.

Band: Save Ferris
Did they sell-out: NO
Justifications: Sell-Out? They still haven't even figured out they're famous! Lead singer Monique seems to be waiting for Allen Funt to pop-out of the bushes and shout "SURPRISE! You're on Candid Camera!"

Band: Nine Inch Nails
Did they sell out: Not yet
Justification: I'm gonna give old Reznor the benefit of the doubt, here. His first couple works, Pretty Hate Machine, Broken, and The Downward Spiral are alright, but I think he's explored his themes about as far as they can go. (As a friend of mine says, there's nothing wrong with Trent Reznor that can't be fixed by plopping him on a beach on a sunny day with a Corona Extra in one hand, a big old spliff in the other, and some Bob Marley playing in the background...)

Band: No Doubt
Did they sell-out: ...well, maybe
Justification: OK, I'll try to be merciful on No Doubt. They're from my hometown and all, but yeah, Tragic Kingdom was a pretty pop-safe album compared to their earlier work. A lot of this can be attributed to Gwen Stefani having to learn song-writing on the fly when her brother Eric left the band. Let's give her one more album and see how she turns out, OK?
Mitigating Factors: Gwen still hasn't appeared on the cover of Cosmo, a la Mariah Carey.

Band: Oasis
Did they sell-out: Man, they were BORN to sell-out.
Justification: If Oasis isn't the most media driven concoction to be pre-packaged for an MTV audience, I don't know WHAT is. Even their egos seem artificial. And what woman in her right mind wants to be compared to an obscure George Harrison flick, anyway?
Very scary Mitigating Factors: They might really BE that arrogant... Very scary Mitigating Factor to the Mitigating Factor: A Liam Gallagher quote, "John Lennon thought he was Jesus Christ. I just think I'm John Lennon."

Musician: Madonna
Did she sell-out: No
Justification: I think Madonna's taken the music industry for more than they intended to take her for. I can respect that.

Musician: The-Artist-Formerly-Known-as-Prince
Did he sell-out: Yes and No
Justification: Well, the first few albums, good as they were, were VERY market driven. They pushed all the right buttons to springboard the then Prince to notoriety. The movies didn't hurt, either. Then he went insane. Now he's making some pretty cool -- completely uncommercial -- music, and I think the record industry's scared of him. I think I'm scared of him.
Mitigating Factors: "Batdance"

Band: The Offspring
Did they sell-out: Yes
Justification: Punk-in-a-can. Just edgy and different enough to get attention. Their best song to date is a cover of The Damned's "Smash it Up" that follows the original so closely as to be a clone.
Mitigating factors: didn't punk used to be anti-establishment? These are all little rich brats who met at USC -- one of the wealthiest schools in the country.

Band or Musician: Rush, David Bowie, Sting, Peter Gabriel
Did they sell-out: No
Justification: It's not everybody who can keep going for over 20 years and seem to be oblivious as to whether or not an album's selling. They just keep doing their thing and pushing their music in new directions. Love 'em or hate 'em, you've got to give all these guys credit, and I see nothing wrong with aging gracefully.

Band: The Rolling Stones
Did they sell-out: sadly, yes
Justification: Er, did anybody actually LISTEN to their last couple albums? Is it just me, or are they trying REALLY hard to pass themselves off as youngsters, mostly by playing songs which are junk compared to their stuff in the mid-seventies?
Mitigating Factors: Their song "Start Me Up," was sold to Microsoft, setting a record for the highest price ever payed for a commercial jingle.

The sad truth is that the music industry is just that, an INDUSTRY, with immense amounts of money being spent pushing artists in directions that they'd probably prefer not to go in. I still get freaked out every time I hear some indie artist that I used to love played on the radio, but as pleased as I am to see them make it, part of me always wishes they were still my little secret. Still, it IS possible to run the record-industry gauntlet respectfully, maintaining some level of artistic integrity. And to the bands that have achieved this, I offer my congratulations. As to the rest, well, I can understand the urge to not have to say "Would you like fries with that?" over a drive-thru intercom but the only difference between fast food and fast food music is the pay-scale. They both taste awful.

(P.S. I started off this article talking about two wonderful bands, Dr. Awkward and Uncle Oscar. You can contact them, respectively, at dr_awkward@hotmail.com and Uncleoscar@webtv.net. Their demos are each only a couple bucks, and trust me, they're well worth it. C'mon, take a gamble on a new band!)

VICTOR D. INFANTE, nimue@ziplink.net, graduated in 1993 from the British campus of New England College. He is a staff writer for Next...Magazine and has worked as a music critic for several newspapers and online sites, including CollegeBeat. He has published three books of poetry, and is the editor of the forthcoming "Roadside Distractions," an anthology of contemporary American poets on the subject of travel. He currently lives in Southern California. Check out his weekly column, Indie Outlook.