Choosing A Headliner

Photo by Rob Simmons on Unsplash

How do you choose a headliner? 

If James Taylor and Jackson Browne go on tour together (which they’re doing) and it’s billed as a “co-headlined” show, is it really a co-headline?

Or if Sting and Peter Gabriel toured together (which they did), and that was billed a co-headlined show, is that really a co-headline, or is it really tilted towards one of those artists?

One way to gauge is to see who comes on first. Another is to count their number one hits. Another might be to look at the recency of their last hit. Of course, you could also assess the totality of each artist’s impact on the music scene and the extent and durability of their imprint on our collective psyche. 

Which isn’t easy to do. Nor are any of the above measures final in their judgement. You and I could dispute not only the validity of each measure, but also the actual value of each metric.  

Which is entirely the point. Questions such as who is better or where has more value been created, are, in many respects, subjective ones to answer, certainly at the margins. James Taylor and Jackson Browne are both influential figures on the American music scene, going back decades, but to say one is better than the other? 

I’d suggest that it’s a meaningless assessment.

Even when we’re not making judgements at the margins - say, if I asked you who is better: The Beatles or Van Halen? Seems like a no brainer, doesn’t it? And, yes, most folks would probably agree with The Beatles influence, possibly even David Lee Roth and Eddie Van Halen (RIP). 

But what about the universe of kids who grew up on Van Halen, who were influenced by the band and its music, and moved into the music scene (successfully) on the back of that? For that group of folks, Van Halen were everything and any ‘objective’ measure or metric fails to reflect their reality.

The point is that the context is key. Judgements of who is ‘better’ are defined by the universe that is impacted, what’s important to them at that time, in the context of their realities. My son will tell you Drake is the most consequential musician of all time. My daughter will tell you it’s Just Bieber. I’ll argue it’s someone like Bono or Springsteen, or yes, Lennon and McCartney. 

There are no rights or wrongs. There are only our judgments.

It’s helpful to remember that as we make judgements of our own - about others, or ourselves.