HuffPost Exclusive -- An interview with Kurt Cobain's Manager and Former President of Warner Bros. Records, Danny Goldberg

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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Comments

[TScheisskopf]

Danny used to work in the next office when I was with Ken Schaeffer. Great guy and works his tail off for his artists. You really cannot ask for more than that.

[faust2001]

I know Kurt Cobain was a genius because the media and the hipsters tell me so.

[tedpikul]

Wow, what an insightful glib comment! Thx!

[PatA]

When Kurt Cobain killed himself, I heard it on my pickup radio. I had to pull off of the road and cry for a very long time. I'm glad that he had the opportunity to work with someone as nice as Danny Goldberg seems to be.

[GerriG]

I am a "grammy voter" Warners should start to think terms of signing people like me to bring back the goods taste and morals we use to enjoy in "music"