“Tik Tok” Goes The Clock

         We all know that celebrities face many lawsuits all the time, but some situations are more serious then the public actually understands.  A few days ago it was announced that singer/performer Kesha is trying to get out of her contract with producer Dr. Luke because of alleged allegations of rape and abuse. People in the music industry are under a lot of pressure because they are held to the highest expectations possible. On the other hand, you’re only hearing one side of this story about Dr. Luke. You’re not hearing the other side of the story as to whether Kesha did anything to cause any problems in the first place. So the two sides went to court and Kesha was claiming that she was drugged and abused physically and mentally. Of course Dr. Luke is denying all claims (shocker). When you’re in a fight that involves personal issues and a lot of money these battles can get really ugly and can take a lot of evidence to prove what the actual truth is.

         Kesha is fighting to be released from her contract with Dr. Luke so she no longer has to put up with the alleged abuse.  I don’t see why this is an issue… if you are having personal problems then you should just both get out of the contract. Why would you want to work with somebody who treats you horribly physically and mentally? It would be really hard to work under those conditions. On the other hand, sometimes contracts are written so you can’t break the contract and if you try to it makes your situation much worse. In the end the judge ruled against Kesha and wouldn’t break the contract.  Kesha who has been fighting this issue for a while spoke out in August about her issues saying, “Dr. Luke has been tyrannical and abusive since our relationship began.” Kesha explained in the affidavit about going to a party with the producer when she was 18 and being given what he called a “sober pill.” “I had only had a few drinks but after I had taken this ‘sober pill’ I blacked out,” she said. “Then came Dr. Luke’s threats. I specifically remember him telling me that if I ever tried to get away from him for any reason that he would tie me up in litigation until my career was over.” No one should be treated this way regardless of how famous they are or not. Kesha ended up developing severe problems including suicidal thoughts and a major eating disorder. These are serious allegations and it is going to have to be looked at very seriously.

         There are always two sides to every case. Of course you’re going to have Dr. Luke defending his side now saying he didn’t do any of the alleged things that Kesha is accusing him of doing. We don’t know what to believe at this point in the case, but in December he made a strong statement saying, "All of the horrific allegations of abuse, threats and other purported misconduct by me against Kesha are completely untrue and deeply hurtful”. Also, his lawyers said, “he wants his name restored”. This is what you typically hear in a high profile case where the person accused comes out and takes a stand and wants their name cleared.

 Being in the music industry can be both a positive and negative experience. It can be great from the standpoint that you get all the positive media attention (your music becomes popular, your songs climb to the top of the charts, you sell lots of CD’s and you tour all over the world). The bad part is that your life becomes an open book to the public and the media can give you a bad reputation (if something happens and you get into a legal battle, your career and your life will become public to everybody).  Dr. Luke is now fighting back (with his lawyers from Sony Music) because with Kesha not recording, she is violating her agreement with the company. I know that business is business and everything doesn’t stop just for you, but when issues come up you need to fix them as quickly as possible so things can go back to “normal”.

         There is one famous celebrity who is coming to Kesha’s aid and that is Taylor Swift. Taylor Swift agreed to donate $250,000 to help Kesha with her legal fees. I think that this is really nice of Swift to help out a fellow artist get through tough times. Apparently Demi Lovato had a problem with Taylor Swift by throwing nasty comments at her but they might have been misunderstood. So I guess the “Swifties” got to Demi about her comments and she clarified she was trying to raise awareness for women’s rights. Demi said, “As most people know, I tend to get fired up about the things I believe in, and although my heart and intentions are always in the right place, unfortunately sometimes my passion gets the best of me and causes me to say things that I probably shouldn't say. And when doing so it takes away from the real reason I am speaking up in the first place. Our focus should be on the topic of victims of sexual and physical abuse being afraid to come forward with their stories. They're more likely to face retaliation and harassment than to see justice being served. Especially women. It baffles me that when it comes to serious issues like equality and abuse, too often women are not taken as seriously as men. All I want to see is women coming together and actually making a difference. A real change and shift in society. Everyone has their own way of giving support to others, and at the end of the day, helping victims is all that matters. Ultimately, the message I want people to hear is it's okay to come forward with your abuse and if you do decide to take action, you are not alone." I think Demi is coming from a positive place and I think she meant well but sometimes, “you can’t judge a book by its cover”. Haven’t we heard that cliché over and over again? In the long run, Taylor and Demi are there to support Kesha and there are so many others that are stepping up to help. That is great to see the positive part of the music industry (being there for each other), trying to help her get her back to where she should be.

When something bad happens just pick yourself back up and work harder to accomplish what you want to do. Kesha, you need to keep making music, or else people are going to forget who you are. The last time you made an album was 2012… 4 years ago… this seems like an eternity in the music industry. According to lawyers for Dr. Luke and Sony they said, “she doesn’t have to work with him personally, though he has the rights to produce at least six songs on each of her albums and could pursue damages if he doesn’t.” We are all rooting for you Kesha (to get back to normal and produce music again), you deserve to be happy.

         I give credit to EW.com’s Eric Renner Brown, Jennifer Peltz from the Associated Press and popsugar.com’s Caitlin Hacker for talking about the issues in this story. They really showed you that even high profiled people in the music industry can face serious issues and they have to fight hard to get back their reputation and stay strong.

Here are the links to the three stories if you want even more analysis from their full points of view:

http://www.ew.com/article/2016/02/19/kesha-denied-preliminary-injunction-dr-luke

https://www.yahoo.com/music/kesha-goes-court-nyc-over-clash-producer-dr-190425278.html

http://www.popsugar.com/celebrity/Demi-Lovato-Clarifies-Taylor-Swift-Comment-February-2016-40298058

         Check out my podcast, “Behind The Mic With Nick Morgasen” on I-Tunes and Youtube. There are some great interviews with: Adam Carolla, Jack Hanna, Cesar Millan, Jackie Mason, Neil Sedaka, Peter Noone and many more…   

    

50 Cent "Making it Rain"

Plenty of people face money problems everyday which affect the way they live. Sometimes people don’t realize how bad their situation really is!!! People do stupid things to the point where they make their situations a lot worse then they have to be. The biggest contributors to this problem are entertainers and athletes because they don’t know how to control their money and fame properly. You have to realize when you’re in a bad situation you need to stay out of the spotlight so you don’t bring more attention to yourself. Silence is more powerful then speaking your opinion.

            One guy that didn’t get the memo was 50 Cent. We all know that 50 has been facing bankruptcy issues for a while now, but I think it is about to bite him big time. For a guy that claims to have no money he loves to show off on social media that he has a lot of bills!!! Last time I checked, if you’re having money issues then maybe you should keep your escapades out of the news where people can blast you for it including the bankruptcy judge. Acting not so smartly, 50 posted some Instagram photos of himself with massive rolls of $100 dollar bills on his bed watching TV and him playing with money and ironically spelling out “BROKE” with the bills. This is a whole new level of stupidity for him and he isn’t going to win any sympathy from the judge in the case he is facing on money he owes to some important people. The Judge had a lot to say to 50 Cent’s attorney talking about the allegations saying, “I’m concerned about allegations of non-disclosure or a lack of transparency in the case." "There's a purpose of having a bankruptcy process be transparent, and part of that purpose is to inspire confidence in the process," the judge said, adding that bankruptcy court is where "an honest but unfortunate debtor can come into court and seek relief." Celebrities do stupid crap all the time and they don’t realize that the things they do harm their situation even more, making it impossible for them to solve their problems. Look at Kanye West, he is in 53 Million dollars of personal debt and asking for money from billionaire Mark Zuckerberg. He put out he was able to produce and release his new album which he keeps taking down from his website and music streaming services. When you owe money to banks, an electronic company and your former significant other, then maybe you shouldn’t be putting your personal business on social media. 50 cent also got caught posting pictures on Instagram of him doing a live performance that he probably made big bucks on. Also, 50 tweeted about his new house and he said, “My crib is almost finished in AFRICA. I'm gonna have the craziest House warming party ever”. This is definitely what he should NOT be doing right now… go figure!!!! 

            Celebrities feel they can do whatever they want and that they are invincible to the world when it comes to money and power. Also, they don’t think the laws apply to them when they do stupid crap. There are many celebrities who have gone bankrupt for stupid reasons. Burt Reynolds went nearly bankrupt because he massively overspent his money putting himself millions of dollars in debt. Toni Braxton filled for bankruptcy a few times after being 50 million dollars in debt AND STILL WENT OUT AND BOUGHT AN EXPENSIVE HOUSE!!! Even Pamela Anderson, who was too busy running slow motion on the beach, went bankrupt because she had so much work done on her body. I could keep going… but the stories of bankruptcy get even more disturbing then the ones I just listed. When you make deals with people YOU HAVE TO PAY THEM BACK!!!! When you earn money put it away and DON’T GO SPEND IT ALL AT ONCE!!! Also if you have filed for bankruptcy you can’t go on social media and MAKE IT RAIN WITH $100 BILLS!!!! In the long run it would just be smart to hold on to your money so when your career or 15 minutes of fame are over then you could live off the money. Wow, wouldn’t that be such a crime, saving your fortune that you earned from being famous so you don’t have to work anymore.

            I give credit to Jose Pagliery for exposing 50 cent and his money problems. He also showed how stupid celebrities really are when they are having legal problems and they can’t stay out of the spotlight for two seconds. One of the dangers of using social media. Pagliery showed that sometimes when you take to many risks it is eventually going to bite you in the ass. Also, I give credit to myfirstclasslife.com for exposing celebrities and their stupidity when it comes to their money and eventually losing it all. They actually show you how stupid you have to be to make the dumb ass decisions they make. In the long run, if these famous people didn’t have money problems, then the websites, blogs and tabloids wouldn’t have material to write about.

Here are the links to the full stories for Jose Pagliery and myfirstclasslife.com if you want to see more information on celebrity money issues:

http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/19/news/50-cent-bankruptcy-instagram/index.html

http://myfirstclasslife.com/20-celebrities-went-broke/?singlepage=1

Check out my podcast, “Behind The Mic with Nick Morgasen” on I-Tunes and Youtube as I’ve had the chance to interview many famous people including: Adam Carolla, Cesar Millan, Neil Sedaka, Jackie Mason, Jack Hanna, Peter Noone, Graham Russell and many others.

The Best Team Money Can Buy

The New York Yankees are the best team money can buy. Let me clarify that, I’m not saying they’re the best team lately… What I am saying is that they buy all their players instead of trying to make the team balanced. There are five players on the roster that have contracts that are 100 million dollars or more. Trust me the Yankees have plenty of money, but sometimes they complain about the worst problems and then they use their Yankee muscles to put a new policy in place.

Since the Yankees don’t make enough money on tickets they felt they had to screw a bunch of fans that can’t already afford tickets by making it impossible for them to buy tickets now. The Yankees announced on Wednesday that the fans could no longer print out their tickets from their house for the 2016 season. I understand what the Yankees are trying to do because they want to stop ticket fraud and stop people from being scammed out of their hard earned money. That argument is a good one, but there is another side of the argument everybody is missing. Could the Yankees be trying to remove the secondary market so people don’t go and buy premium tickets for a lot less on sites like StubHub and Ticketmaster? Yankees COO Lonn Trost was on WFAN Thursday echoing this sentiment giving his opinion on the issue by saying, “The problem below market at a certain point is that if you buy a ticket in a very premium location and pay a substantial amount of money. It's not that we don't want that fan to sell it, but that fan is sitting there having paid a substantial amount of money for a ticket and [another] fan picks it up for a buck-and-a-half and sits there, and it's frustrating to the purchaser of the full amount. And quite frankly, the fan may be someone who has never sat in a premium location. So that's a frustration to our existing fan base.” So let me get this straight… you’re trying to penalize the fans that manage to find a great deal over the fans that spent more money. If you really want to go to a big time event you need to figure how to get the best value for your buck. Are you going to spend five hundred dollars plus ridiculous fees the Yankees add on, or are you going to go to StubHub and buy tickets for two hundred dollars with practically no fees? It’s just the Yankees being the Yankees.

         One more important issue that the Yankees are forgetting about is getting the younger fans to the games. The average family of four can’t afford to go to a game anymore because of these tickets prices. Also, don’t forget that you can’t afford a bottle of water or food because everything is overpriced at Yankee Stadium. What is happening is that those families are staying home and watching the games on their HD TV’s in the comfort of their own home not fighting the elements. You’re alienating the fans and now they are going to go to fewer games because you are making it more difficult to purchase the tickets. I have one solution that could fix this issue… it is to LOWER THE PRICES!!!! If you made the tickets more affordable then people wouldn’t go to secondary markets. By the way, rather then come up with a solution lets just take it away and punish the fans. The Yankees like to make a statement when they make a decision and right now they are the only team deciding to go against Stubhub and Ticketmaster and make a scene.

         In the long run more people are watching baseball on their TV’s and if they are going to do stupid crap like this to piss off the fans then you might as well kiss the fans goodbye. If you have enough money to be the highest payroll in MLB and own your own network then you can afford to lower your ticket prices so fans can have a great experience. Fewer kids are able to go to games cause their parents can’t afford it and they have to say, “sorry kids we can’t afford to go let’s watch on TV instead”.

I give credit to Chris Cwik for writing this story about exposing the Yankees for being difficult and inconsiderate to fans. We need to get the message out that their other important things in life besides money. All the Yankees care about is money and not about the fans and this is why the Yankees are, “The Best Team Money Can Buy”.

Here is the link to Chris Cwik’s story:

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-league-stew/yankees-exec-gets-snobby-when-defending-new-ticket-policy-235122871.html

Check out my podcast, “Behind The Mic with Nick Morgasen” on I-Tunes and Youtube. There are some great interviews with: Adam Carolla, Tommy James, Cesar Millan, Jackie Mason and others!!!

        

        

"Ruff" being a Dog

 If you have a dog, you want to give it everything possible and treat them like a prince or princess. There are some people who think their dogs are so special that they treat them like humans. Usually when they go on a vacation or long trip they bring their dog to a sitter, daycare or dog hotel. When you go to these hotels they now have different pay levels for how you want your dogs to be cared for. My grandparents have a white Maltese that they would take to the dog hotel and my grandmother would come back and tell me that you could pay more for the dog to have a TV in their room and a bigger cage so they have more room. I understand we think of our dogs as family, but WHY DO THEY NEED TV’S IN THEIR ROOM!!!! They don’t even know what they are watching anyway. In my opinion dogs need to have enough space to run around, enough food to eat and to have their hygiene checked every day. 

This leads me to the story I came across. As I said before, when some families get dogs they treat them more like family then other people. So now there is this new pet home that they are calling, “Pet Suites” and basically it is a new way to spoil your dog as if they aren’t getting enough love from their owners already). When I read about these Suites I couldn’t believe what was in them, they have: a full-size washer which we all know dogs are going to use to clean up their bed and towels, a refrigerator for food and of course water because we all know dogs go shopping for their own food and water. To top it all off… a tiled washing station with faucets that are made for the dogs. Wow!!! This is a dog’s paradise with everything all set up and they don’t have to go anywhere with all the essentials being at the suite already. There was a study in the story done by American Pet Products that, “Americans are expected to spend a whopping $60 billion dollars on their pets each year”. When I saw this my mouth almost dropped to the floor. I agree that our dogs should be comfortable and that we should get them top quality products to make sure we keep up with their well-being but, WE DON’T NEED TO PUT THEM IN LUXURY HOTELS!!!!! The two biggest Dog Events just happened… the “Puppy Bowl” and the “Westminster Dog show”. These dog owners spend a lot of money on luxuries to keep their dogs in shape and well prepared… then I guess that’s all right. This just seems a little too excessive to me.

I love dogs and my Brother and his wife and my grandparents both have dogs that I love to be around and take care of, but we can’t always be there every second of every day treating them like royalty. The credit goes to Lisa Johnson Mandell who wrote a great story on this, but she also proved that sometimes we could spend money on things that we don’t absolutely have to. We do it because we want to spoil someone.

Here is the link if you would like to see the whole story by Lisa Johnson Mandell:

https://www.yahoo.com/makers/trendy-built-home-pet-suites-210517212.html

Don’t forget to check out my podcast, “Behind The Mic with Nick Morgasen” on I-Tunes and Youtube. With some great past interviews with Neil Sedaka, Tommy James, Cesar Millan, Adam Carolla and many others…Stay tuned for new interviews coming soon.

Lets Put Bill Simmons in “The Ringer”

            Bill Simmons is a guy who likes to stir up controversy to make stories interesting and sometimes doesn’t care what the consequences are. Knowing that he recently had a very public break up with ESPN he will take every shot he can at “The Mother Ship”. He was tweeted by @ParrishWalton on twitter and he said, “What are the lessons @BillSimmons learned from running Grantland from a business perspective?” Bill Simmons responded with a tweet back saying, “Don’t do it with ESPN”. ESPN has had a lot trouble running their affiliated websites including “The Undefeated” which eventually saw Jason Whitlock part ways with the company. Maybe they need to focus more on their TV content than worrying about what their digital content is looking like. You saw guys like: Jason Whitlock, Keith Olbermann and Colin Cowherd leave the company because the company is going downhill and they weren’t allowed to give their full opinions because of the TV rights deals and relationships ESPN has. You can now add Bill Simmons to the list of guys that left ESPN because the two sides couldn’t agree on letting their opinions be heard. In my opinion I think Bill Simmons did himself in by talking about Roger Goodell’s handling of the Ray Rice incident on, “The Dan Patrick Show”. Simmons said,  “I’ll go further than you. I think it’s pathetic. He has handled so many things so badly — Roger Goodell — that it’s reached a point now where you have something like this, where it took four months to release the report, and he knew everything that was in it. He knows the results before the report is released to the public, and yet doesn’t have the testicular fortitude to do anything until he gauges the public reaction.” I understand that ESPN has a major contract with the NFL for Monday Night Football but, as a reporter/journalist you have to be able to give your opinion and being censored just makes it sound dumb. It is dumb because you are saying what the company wants you to say… not what you think is going to happen

            Since the break up, Bill Simmons has signed a huge multiyear deal with HBO to produce content for all their platforms, as well as continuing his podcast which he did over at Grantland. I guarantee you he has way more freedom to do what he wants at HBO and his opinions won’t be as censored as they were over at ESPN. Now that his podcast has been up and running he is creating a new site for his digital content and hopefully this site won’t get run into the ground like Grantland did. His new site is called, “The Ringer” and it will be interesting to see how the site is run differently. Just be prepared to see a lot of stories on Tom Brady and deflated footballs since he seems to hold a bias towards Boston sports. I like sports reporters/journalists who get away from being censored and give their own opinions. You should be able to speak up regardless of what deals your company has. If you’re not going to be completely honest with your audience, then you might as well not speak to the audience at all. I give credit to Nate Scott for reporting on this story to show that sometimes you have to keep looking for the right opportunities until you find the one that allows you to speak your opinions and not be censored.

If you would like to read more in-depth on this story check out the link to his story:

http://ftw.usatoday.com/2016/02/bill-simmons-podcast-new-website-the-ringer

Check out my podcast, “Behind The Mic with Nick Morgasen” on I-Tunes and Youtube as I’ve interviewed many famous people including: Adam Carolla, Cesar Millan, Tommy James, Jackie Mason and others!!!!