Blame Patrice Wilson, the founder of Ark Music Factory and also that rapper who inexplicably appears in the background of Rebecca Black’s now infamous music video for Friday, the song the internet loves to hate.
In a recent interview with the Los Angeles Times, Wilson, who has been previously described as being, “a kind of Suge Knight of the preteen schoolyard” and has been accused of using young girls like Rebecca for his own financial gain. The L.A. Times writer who interviewed Wilson had more sympathy, describing him as a ”sad-eyed babyface” and “well-mannered, well-traveled, and well-educated.”
Not well-educated enough, apparently, to help his protege avoid getting all the wrong sorts of attention for her work.
“‘Tomorrow is Saturday, and Sunday comes afterwards.’ I mean, everybody knows that, obviously, but I wanted the song to be simple and kind of sweet,” Wilson says in the interview. ”People talk so much about how silly or stupid the lyrics are, but pop songs, they’re meant to be catchy and to tell things in a simple kind of way. I feel bad that Rebecca has been getting so many people criticizing the song. Because it was me that wrote it.”
Wilson’s company, Ark Music Factory, charges kids $2,000 to $4,000 dollars for an original song, studio time, a photo shoot, image consulting, a music video and promotion. It’s a steal, when compared to what major labels spend on music videos, but if Friday is a good example of Wilson’s work, then we can’t help thinking the money might be better spent on guitar lessons for wannaba pop stars, and a pad of sheet music to write their own songs.
Not that Wilson hasn’t successfully gotten Rebecca a lot of attention, both good and bad. But in a world where fame is less and less connected to talent, is this really this kind of thing we want to encourage in kids?
