THE FLOM FIRING:
ONE FOR THE BOOKS

As the music business remains preoccupied with Tuesday’s shakeup of Atlantic Records and the resulting media Flom-a-thon, many are saying that the method chosen by Lyor Cohen to break the news—having Jason fly to LAX from his Aspen vacation for his firing—ranks as one of the most tasteless, unnecessary and inhumane firings in music biz annals.

Wonderers wondering why the deed wasn't done privately in the confines of the WMG inner sanctum to preserve the dignity of both victim and executioner, or why Edgar Bronfman Jr. would allow this Cohen-administered figurative tar and feathering to take place right in the town square. The public—and seemingly vindictive—nature of the act lends further credence to those reports of bad blood between Cohen and Flom.

Historians point to the firing of Al Teller by his CBS boss Walter Yetnikoff the day after Teller was honored at a T.J. Martel dinner as a hit for the ages. Others recall the historic uprisings at WMG when Michael Fuchs made his move on Doug Morris, along with Bob Morgado's dismantling of the company’s legendary executive team, which is generally viewed as the most senseless Saturday night massacre in recent memory. Some rank the overthrow of Yetnikoff by Sony Music execs right up there as well. That axing was set off by Irving Azoff’s famous declaration in the press, “Ding dong, the witch is dead.”

In her rehash this morning, the N.Y. Daily News’ Phyllis Furman reminded us of a parallel between the Teller tale and the Flom firing, both of which were foreshadowed by dinners. In Flom’s case, the occasion was a roast of Bronfman, during which the sometime standup comic offered to his then-boss, “Roses are reddish, violets are bluish, our stock’s in the toilet, but at least we’re still Jewish.”