General Motors quietly redirected its Fastlane Blog back to the mothership in December, signaling an end to the direct-to-C-suite “conversations” you could have with automotive executives.
The blog, which once hosted Maximum Bob’s musings on life, design and resign, was held up as a paragon for corporate communication in its day (it won a Webby) and provided fodder for this site.
We hardly knew ye.
It was prophetic. Lutz on $2 gas: “People will exercise their freedom to buy the vehicle they want, V8 engine and all.”
It was controversial. Lutz on buying an import: “Stan, I guess it depends whether you have your own personality or whether you are a lemming-like follower of current trends.”
It was bombastic. Lutz on scoreboard, bro: “We went from having, at least in North America, some mediocre products to having acclaimed products that are selling extremely well, especially on the passenger car side. In June, for example, in a slow market, our retail car sales were up 8 percent.”
It was retrospective. Lutz on leaving: “This business isn’t all that complicated. Do the best product you can do, and if it looks better and drives better than the other guy’s, you win.”
And now it’s gone.
http://i.blogs.es/1eafa4/bob_lutz_rollover_opel/original.jpg
How I will forever think of Maximum Bob Lutz.
Life in the fast lane
Surely make you lose your mind
Life in the fast lane, everything all the time
Life in the fast lane, uh huh
Blowin’ and burnin’, blinded by thirst
They didn’t see the stop sign,
took a turn for the worse
RIP Glenn Frey. Although Don Henley is the lead singer on that song, Frey does singing backing vocals and has writing credits.
Most people really don’t have any understanding as to how many famous singers/musicians hail from the metro Detroit area.
It’s not just Eminem, Madonna, and Motown greats.
The Seattle area and metro Detroit area have produced a disproportionately high number of major musicians; something in non-Flint water.
Anthony Kiedis
Bob Seger
White Stripes
The Verve Pipe
Bill Haley
Iggy Pop (James Newell Osterberg, Jr.)
D’arcy of the Smashing Pumpkins
Smokey Robinson
Marvin Gaye
Ted Nugent
Alice Cooper
Kid Rock
Del Shannon
Brownsville Station
Rare Earth
Ray Parker Jr.
Ready For the World
Tommy James and the Shondells
And yet, somehow Cleveland got the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame.
VoGo, two words:
Alan. Freed.
BTW payola was once a legal and accepted practice with its roots in Vaudeville. Song pluggers would pay performers to sing their songs in the hope of selling more sheet music.
Freed’s ‘crime against humanity’ was playing R&B records for a mixed audience. Congressmen believed no one would play Rock & Roll unless paid by the record companies to do so; thus began their witch hunt.
Sponge (Vinnie Dombrowski is the only original member these days) had some hits in the 90s too.
Chad Smith, the drummer from the RHCP wasn’t born here, but grew up in Bloomfield Hills, went to Lasher High School, and is often in the area.
Flea!
I actually thought that I had forgot about him and that he was born here!
p.s. – My non-Flint water comment above wasn’t a dig at Flint; just the opposite. Given recent, tragic events there regarding their toxic water issues due to massive negligence,
Very good list DW.
A few there I wasn’t aware of. And I thought Brownsville Station were from Cleveland.
Alice Cooper recorded “Eighteen” in Canada to take advantage of Canadian content laws and get Rosalie Trombley to add it on CKLW.
Del Shannon drove a rusted-out four-year-old ’57 Plymouth to NYC to record “Runaway”.
And I thought all the Chili Peppers were Californian.
Not that I read “Fastlane” that much…but they should’ve left it up. Even if the reasons for shutdown were legitimate, it just doesn’t look good.
Grand Rapids claims Anthony Kiedis…
then they move to SoCal and turn into arseholes.
Everything I see of Barra reflects the environment in which she developed her career. In retrospect, it wasn’t realistic for me to hope that someone of a different gender would think any differently.
Diversity in skin color and gender are fine, even valued, just so long as you think exactly like us.
Makes sense; sounds like it was mostly just Bob Lutz’s blog, and he’s not with GM anymore. Though I’m somewhat surprised he didn’t stick to Livejournal, a la GRRM.
Also, when the generation before the current Silverado first came out, they made it the background image of the blog.
…But it was backwards, so the bowtie was backwards. Their designers kept a prominent backwards Chevy logo on their award-winning website for weeks if not months.
Robert Maxumus does something similar now on R&T. I’m not going to link to it so this doesn’t look like a paid advertisement.
Blog cancelled because Mary Barra is two busy violating the principles of good corporate governance by being CEO, President and Chairman. That and planning a redecoration of the Ren Cen.
Bob Lutz is bombastic and easy to criticize, but at least the blog had a unique voice when he wrote it.
Since he stopped doing it, the “blog” was essentially a series of press releases with comments sections attached. It should have been discontinued years ago.