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A History Lesson
When asked how they had initially
succeeded to win double-platinum success with their first album, Leverty said
that he felt that the right single went on the radio and got picked up, but back
in those days, people were also spending a hundred thousand dollars to make a
video.
"With "Don't Treat Me
Bad," they spent probably twenty thousand dollars to make our first
"Don't Treat Me Bad" video and it went to number fourteen, and they
said gosh we need to make another video, because that video we made is cheap and
we need to put you guys with a big production video to compete with these other
guys that have songs that are at number fourteen or whatever.
So, they cut a deal with this
director to cut another version of "Don't Treat Me Bad" and "Love
of a Lifetime," at the same time really. We went out to LA and shot
"Don't Treat Me Bad" and then we woke up the next morning and shot
"Love of a Lifetime." So, I think the videos that were being played on
MTV at the time made sense for a record company to dump money into video
production. Whereas now, a band like Firehouse never gets played on MTV, and
never gets played on VH-1 even."
Leverty believes that the
industry is well aware that the audience is still there for this kind of music,
but also knows that "it's just a corporate thing." In other words, the
radio stations are trying to stay current and stay hip, and major record labels
aren't signing bands that are melodic rock bands. And without record label
support, there's really no incentive for radio or television to play this type
of music.
He added, "I think
that good music will always be a commodity. Good musicianship and all that
will always get an ear. I think that what is pop music now, what is pop
culture doesn't have a whole lot to do with good music. It's just attitude
like you say and just an image, very little of that has anything to do
with the music…"
Life
On The Road
"One of the things that's real frustrating, when you're out on the
road, a lot of these radio stations will...
Conclusion
Before concluding the interview, Leverty wanted to
extend a special thanks to the band's fans...
For more information about Firehouse visit their official site at www.firehousemusic.com,
and also check out Bill Leverty's personal site at www.leverty.com.
Live photos were taken by Kara
Uhrlen and are property of The Pure Rock Shop.
Go back to the introduction.
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