Book review

“Die Bossin”: Hacking until it doesn’t work anymore

A special life path, subsumed into 20 lessons: Music PR consultant Marina Buzunashvilli aka "The Boss".

(Bild: Krone KREATIV/Penguin Verlag, Victoria Kaempfe)

In "Die Bossin" (Penguin Random House Verlag), 43-year-old Vienna-born music PR consultant Marina Buzunashvilli takes her readers on a 20-chapter lesson "from the hodd to the top of the music business". An interesting, instructive, but at times somewhat enervating read.

Marina Buzunashvilli has not had an easy life. The Azerbaijani-Georgian music enthusiast was born in Vienna and moved to Berlin-Kreuzberg with her family at an early age due to rampant racism. There she had to take on responsibility at a young age because the family situation would not allow it any other way. Her father left, her sister was caught up in the drug cartel and her mother came close to suicide several times. In these dysfunctional family circumstances, the now 43-year-old grew a thick shell early on, which at some point became so impenetrable that she could no longer stand herself in it. Due to her personal and private problems, Buzunashvilli is dependent on paying the family out of various borderline situations early on, and her work commitment is correspondingly high.

Beginning of the boss mentality
The passionate boy band fan (she likes to travel after the Backstreet Boys, but - by her own admission - always remains discreet and distant) had the desire to be a part of the glittering music industry early on and pursued this goal with ambition, meticulousness and enormous determination. Twenty years ago, she began her career as a PR consultant in the hip-hop scene and apparently made a name for herself as the toughest of the tough. Of course - anyone who has to deal with offensive and sometimes chauvinistic characters like Sido, Haftbefehl, Kool Savas and co. and is also female, has to grow a thick skin. In the male-dominated scene, however, the Berliner is increasingly asserting herself and gaining respect. In her early years in the hip-hop cosmos, she acquired the eponymous "boss mentality" - mixed with her difficult childhood.

In her autobiography, she teaches interested parties, but above all girls and young women, in 20 thoroughly argued lessons on how to gain respect as a petite woman through performance, authenticity and perseverance. Buzunashvilli is also open about the downsides of her professional success. As a result of her constant work and outwardly tough attitude, she misses the funeral of her beloved sister, drives her partner away for a while and sucks the lifeblood out of the minds and bodies of promising young talents in her industry. The deliberately presented "unfemininity", as the author herself calls her existence, has advantages and disadvantages in the entertainment industry. Chumming up to artists or pulling coke lines at after-show parties would be out of the question, but she would be available 24/7 on her cell phone and sometimes always one step ahead of the competition in her field.

Always working best
In various chapters, she traces her path from an agency to self-employment and back to industry leader Sony Music. She gives a detailed and self-critical account of lessons learned and mistakes made, often taking herself to task, but also propagating a fighter and careerist mentality, which - despite her terrible personal experiences - is exactly in line with the neoliberal and anti-employee trend, which is why entrepreneurs are only too happy to abolish trade unions and dissolve works councils. Although she distinguishes between self-employment (working indefinitely) and employment (a strict time corset), the quintessence of the modern myth of constant hustle is that it is best to work constantly if you want to make something of yourself.

In "The Boss", not only people from the music industry and interested fans gain insights into an industry that is often not easy to understand and hedonistic; the lessons written down by Buzunashvilli could, of course, also be applied to other sectors. Although one sympathizes with the author and is happy to see what professional maximum she has made of the immensely difficult situation in her life, the constant reminders to be the best and the strongest become enervating as the book progresses. A cry for love that has not yet been silenced is understandable given the burden of life, but the recipient cannot be burdened with the burden of absolution. In addition, errors in the content disrupt the flow of reading. For example, in a chapter in which the PR consultant and manager talks about how many euros she used to travel around Germany in 2001, even though the currency was demonstrably only introduced as cash in 2002.

To the personal point
"Die Bossin" admittedly contains much more than just "boss blah blah blah", but with a little less "I have to prove it to you all" mentality, the work would actually have been an interesting and very personal inventory. As it is, despite the entertaining and many interesting and informative chapters, there is still a slightly stale taste of self-congratulation, which shouldn't be there, because you respectfully honor her struggle and assertion over the 250 pages anyway. Incidentally, one should not be misled by the subtitle: "From the hood to the PERSONAL top of the music business" would have been more correct. With all due respect to Buzunashvilli's career, she is not (yet) the national or even global head of a major label ...