"Getting back to the point, a guy like Jerry, he deals with the business, and he doesn't see it as being evil or ugly, it's what you have to do, and I mean I know there's some really ugly parts to it and parts which drive me nuts, but not in the same way as music business"
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Rabin’s sentence is a minor masterclass in the musician’s art of damage control: he’s not defending “the business” so much as defending the psychological trick that lets you survive it. “A guy like Jerry” (almost certainly a manager/label-side operator) becomes a proxy for a type: the person who can metabolize commerce without turning it into a moral crisis. The phrasing is tellingly practical, almost resigned: “it’s what you have to do.” Not “want,” not “believe,” just “have to” - necessity as anesthetic.
The line also performs a careful balancing act between credibility and complicity. Rabin nods to the “really ugly parts” to prove he isn’t naive, then immediately narrows the blast radius: they drive him nuts, “but not in the same way as music business.” That last clause lands like a weary punchline. He’s drawing a distinction between generic business ugliness and the uniquely intimate ugliness of the music industry, where identity, taste, youth, and authenticity get commodified. In most industries, the product isn’t your soul; in music, it often feels like it is.
Contextually, it reads like an artist who’s spent enough time in corporate rooms to recognize the coping strategies: some people moralize, some people compartmentalize. Rabin’s subtext is less “Jerry is right” than “Jerry’s stance is functional,” and function, in a system designed to blur art into inventory, becomes its own kind of ethics.
The line also performs a careful balancing act between credibility and complicity. Rabin nods to the “really ugly parts” to prove he isn’t naive, then immediately narrows the blast radius: they drive him nuts, “but not in the same way as music business.” That last clause lands like a weary punchline. He’s drawing a distinction between generic business ugliness and the uniquely intimate ugliness of the music industry, where identity, taste, youth, and authenticity get commodified. In most industries, the product isn’t your soul; in music, it often feels like it is.
Contextually, it reads like an artist who’s spent enough time in corporate rooms to recognize the coping strategies: some people moralize, some people compartmentalize. Rabin’s subtext is less “Jerry is right” than “Jerry’s stance is functional,” and function, in a system designed to blur art into inventory, becomes its own kind of ethics.
Quote Details
| Topic | Business |
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