Sheryl Underwood, Sara Gilbert, Sharon Osbourne and Aisha Tyler attend the 41st Annual Daytime Emmy Awards CBS after party at The Beverly Hilton Hotel on June 22, 2014 in Beverly Hills, California.
The 62-year-old wife of Ozzy Osbourne has been on the inside of the music industry her entire life. The daughter of Don Arden, a music manager and concert producer in the UK, she spent more of her childhood around rockers than anything else. As a teen, she went to work for her dad, starting out as a receptionist and moving up into promotions. When her father started managing Black Sabbath in 1976, she had no idea that three years later, he would be kicked out of the band and she would start the next chapter in her life - as his manager. Her business sense propelled his career and he has sold millions of albums over the years. Sharon was also the driving force behind Ozzfest and she was the one who negotiated the deal with MTV for The Osbournes, which garnered her two Emmy Award nominations as its producer in its three year run.
Needless to say, Sharon Osbourne isn't just a talk show host and talent judge with strong opinions. This is a lady who has seen every aspect of the music industry.
She started her explanation by saying, "Let's get it the way that it is. I think this has been deluded and people who are not in the music industry don't really understand what's going on." Osbourne goes on to explain that at the end of the day, it's marketing for Apple to sell phones and watches and music has little to do with the bottom line. While still insisting that the album is "mediocre," she did give the band some props overall. "The reason why they're giving this away for free is - U2's record sales have dropped. They are still the biggest rock band in the world, still one of the greatest rock bands in the world, but as far as writing new music, they are in that bracket that many people in their age group fall into - their music isn't relevant and doesn't sell like it used to."
Sharon's next issue with the giveaway centered on privacy. She felt like Apple invaded her private entertainment space by downloading the album straight to her device rather than just offering it to her and letting her decide if she wanted it or not. At the time of her tirade, there was no option to remove the album so like it or not, iPhone customers were stuck with it taking up space. For those thinking, "So just don't play it if you don't like it," she brought up shuffle and how anything (from Songs Of Innocence to President Obama's latest speech to the newest episode of The Talk) that you don't download yourself can disrupt your entertainment flow.
Her final problem centered on what such a large scale giveaway does to the music industry as a whole (especially during a time when illegal downloads and streaming is literally taking food off of the tables of musicians). She read from an article written by Paul Quirk, the Entertainment Retailers Association Chairman. "Giving away music like this is damaging to the value of music as privacy. And those who will suffer most are the artists of tomorrow. U2 have had their career but if one of the biggest rock bands in the world are prepared to give away their album for free, how can we really expect the public to spend dollars on an album by a new, coming artist?"
She then paraphrased another piece Quirk was quoted in, where he said, "Dumping an album in hundreds of millions of iTunes libraries whether people want it or not, reduces music to the level of a software update or a bug-fix or just plain spam."
She finished by speaking directly to U2 (in case they were watching). Sharon said, "Sorry guys. People - there's a whole new breed of artists coming up that need that money to survive to be able to continue to create. We're not all billionaires; we're not all in your world. So stop with your doing us a favor by giving it away for free. Keep it."
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