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Which is pretty much exactly what you would want if you were selling the band's music. And it has worked: Eden's Crush's first single, Get Over Yourself, debuted at No. 1 two weeks ago, nearly doubling sales of the No. 2 single, according to SoundScan. (A CD is due May 1.) Not that there hasn't been friction. Shaunda Johnston, who made the group of 10 finalists before being cut, charges that the singers were rushed into signing a stingy contract with little room for negotiation. While none of the parties talks contract specifics, Stone and Stanley counter that they offered "a fair-marketplace agreement for a new artist" and that they helped the finalists find legal representation. Asked if the deal was fair, Maile Misajon of Eden's Crush hesitates: "I would really hate to answer that question. I'd probably go in a direction I don't want to go." Certainly less than sweet deals aren't new (ask any '50s bluesman). But on a show that purports to open the backstage door, why no mention of the signing--certainly one of the most important aspects of a new band's life?
The first season of Making the Band also stinted on such green-eyeshade details (we learn little about O-Town's record deal), but the second season promises a closer focus on business issues--in particular, the guys' decision not to sign a management deal with Pearlman (who had famous contract disputes with Backstreet Boys and 'N Sync).
From the start of Bands on the Run (Sundays, 10 p.m. E.T.), however, money isn't simply the name of the game; it is the game. Four unsigned bands pile into vans and go from city to city playing club dates. At the end, $50,000, a video on VH1, a shot at a record deal and $100,000 in equipment go to the best band--that is, whichever one made the most scratch selling tickets and merchandise. It's good TV--the competition heightens the stress and personality clashes on the road--and a depressing, if true, statement about musical priorities.
Executive producer Lauren Zelaznick says the development process involved some pained discussions about musical success. "Is [the show] about stunts that have nothing to do with music?" she asks. "No. Is it about their musical prowess, and you get a panel of judges, like a rock-'n'-roll Star Search? No, because that's also not the whole picture. It was, How do you represent success in the real world? Is it really cynical and awful to say it's by counting drink tickets sold at the door?"
These bands, as befits the older-skewing VH1, aren't teen pop (several have a circa 1995 alterna-rock sound). But that may not be a bad thing. Despite the success of O-Town and Eden's Crush, that slickly packaged style of music has lately dipped on the charts. Stone and Stanley predict Popstars will be on the air in 10 years, creating bands of different genres to suit each season. But it's hard to imagine, say, a Grungestars, should there be a resurgence in music reliant on at least the appearance of independence.