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Memo: To Record Labels

Re: How not to get a good review for your artist

1. Send the disc out from a stealth address that doesn’t match up with any artist publicity contacts, in an envelope that contains no promotional material.

2. Put it in a yellow and black cardboard sleeve labeled “RESTRICTED RELEASE! WATERMARKED DISC!”

3. Imprint the disc itself with a bogus artist name (say, Alan Martin) and album title (say, Epiphanies) and include only a laser-printed tracklist as any hint of the music’s actual provenance.

4. Make sure it not only can’t be ripped but also can’t even be played on a PC or Mac; writers hardly ever listen to music at their desks, anyway.

5. Have the actual content of the disc be Alanis Morissette’s Flavors of Entanglement, a disc that precisely zero people have any interest in leaking, and only seven are interested in actually hearing. (Ironically, I was one of them.)

6. Make sure the album sucks as badly as this one, on which the ever-earnest Morissette outdoes even herself with song titles like “Citizens of the Planet” and “In Praise of the Vulnerable Man,” cringe-inducing lyrics, and music that sounds like sub-par Evanescence.

Standout Tracks: “Underneath,” “Giggling Again for No Reason” ERIC SCHUMACHER-RASMUSSEN