Danny Golberg has been in the music business since the 1960s, getting his start in an entry level position at Billboard Magazine. From there he moved into music journalism, but he didn't like to criticize the rock bands so he moved into public relations. He handled PR for Led Zeppelin and Kiss and managed Bonnie Raitt and Kurt Cobain. He was the president of three major record companies: Atlantic, Warner Bros., and Mercury. His memoir of life inside the rock and roll business, Bumping Into Geniuses, is just out from Gotham Books.
Huffpo: How did you start out in rock and roll? You make it seem kind of random.
Danny Goldberg: The first step was completely random. I just needed a job and wanted to get my own apartment. I didn't even know what Billboard was. I thought it was a magazine about highway signs. Today kids are very sophisticated about things like charts but in the 60's, when I got my first job, there was no real pop awareness of the business. So the first step was completely random and lucky. Once I realized there was a business I was quite taken with it. I was at Billboard a few months and a promo guy form Capitol gave everybody a copy of The White Album the day it came out. That was one hell of a perk. It dawned on me you could be part of it without being a musician. After that I did the best I could to climb whatever ladders were in front of me.
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