If home taping is killing music…

Posted on January 17th, 2008 by Andy

HOME TAPING IS KILLING MUSIC
originally uploaded by 4mediafactory

…how can Radiohead allow people to download their album without DRM for as little as they want…and within a couple of months have the same album top the SALES charts in the UK and the US.

People are happy to pay so don’t treat them like thieves…

Actually currently In Rainbows is #2 in both the US and the UK so this post would have had more impact if I’d have made it last week…

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Corporate Rock Sucks #21: Kristin Hersh breaks away

Posted on November 27th, 2007 by Andy

The very wonderful Kristin Hersh has just launched CASH Music - the Coallition of Artists & Stake Holders is an attempt to make music and a living outside of the conventional industry way of doing things. It’s a bold step that I sincerely hope is rewarded. Rather than selling her music she is giving it away (Creative Commons licensed), encouraging people to share and re-mix. To make money from this venture she is putting faith in the fact that people don’t have a problem paying for music and will happily do it even if they’re not forced or bullied to do so. Either by one off donation or by subscription we, as fans, can demonstrate that we appreciate that an artist needs money and if that artist shows faith and trust in us - we can return the favour…

We’re all stake holders here. We all stand to gain from a productive relationship. Maybe it will help to think of this relationship as a conversation. For instance, I start the conversation by writing and recording a song every month, like the one I’m posting here this month, “Slippershell”. You respond by listening & sharing “Slippershell” with others.

Take your pick of the Slippershell download options (flac, mp3)

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Corporate rock sucks #20 :file-sharing increases CD purchasing

Posted on November 6th, 2007 by Andy

Surprise! Being exposed to more music makes you more likely to buy more music…

However, our analysis of the Canadian P2P file-sharing subpopulation suggests that there is a strong positive relationship between P2P file-sharing and CD purchasing. That is, among Canadians actually engaged in it, P2P file-sharing increases CD purchasing.
Intellectual Property Policy Directorate - The Impact of Music Downloads and P2P File-Sharing: Summary of findings

And perhaps more astounding is the fact that people who like music buy more albums than people who don’t!

Regarding music taste, we find that people who declare that they have a ‘very strong interest’ or ’somewhat strong interest’ in music compared with people who declared that they had a ‘very low interest’ in music purchased significantly more CD albums.

The survey is refuted here, specifically relating to the first claim above - I suspect no one in their right mind would take a chance on refuting the second claim!

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Corporate sucks #19: Because it’s run by idiots…

Posted on October 3rd, 2007 by Andy

[Jennifer] Pariser [Sony BMG's head of litigation]…then made perhaps the most startling comment of the day. Saying that the record labels have spent “millions” on the lawsuits, she then said that “we’ve lost money on this program.”

RIAA anti-P2P campaign a real money pit, according to testimony (via BoingBoing)

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Corporate rock sucks #18: Radiohead try another way…

Posted on October 1st, 2007 by Andy

I have very vivid memories of standing in Beggars Banquet in Kingston and NOT BUYING the first Radiohead EP Drill because they were on a major label - and I was very suspicious of major labels even back then (1992) and doubly suspicious of a band with no (recording) history turning up on a major. It’s funny (to me anyway) that they are now doing their bit to bring down the vile music industry.

I eventually succumbed and do own an album or three but I admire them all the more now that they have finally ditched the label and have decided to release their new record In Rainbows on their own. They have also taken an "honesty box" route by offering the download version at whatever price the customer wants to pay.

It helps that they’re huge and can take a chance on this but I sincerely hope that this proves that you can live outside of the system. Whether it’s HUGE Radiohead or not so huge Kristin Hersh who recently announced that she no longer feels she wants to be a part of the system…

There is today a twisted kind of natural selection in the entertainment industry — a sort of "survival of the blandest" — the result, I imagine, of mind-fucking marketing techniques, bandwagon appeal, hype. To me this stuff is ugly, not beautiful. Given this, I can only assume that record labels are not for me.

…and then there are all the thousands of other acts who have no prospect of becoming the next Radiohead (or even the next Throwing Muses) but who can now use the Internet to find an audience without having to work within the system (because for them the system is broken)…

A big fat pat on the back to Radiohead…and another nail in the coffin of the music industry.

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Corporate rock sucks #17: Prince reclaims his “art”

Posted on September 14th, 2007 by Andy

When people like Prince get all arsey about protecting their copyrights and start clamping down on people sharing their “grainy mobile phone footage” I start to despair that these people will never learn. To try and claim that people sharing their experiences can in any way reduce the artistic value of a performance is laughable at best. Now just maybe Prince is in the position where he can show such disdain for his fans without losing too much, but it saddens me all the same. The Internet as it stands is a good thing, the anarchic, chaotic, viral nature of the beast can only be a plus for discovery and discussion, for sharing and communing and that must be the best way to reach an audience. But if the “stars”, the labels and their vile Internet ambulance-chasers can’t see this then I can only sit back and wait for them to fail miserably…which they surely will…

Prince’s actions are a brave and pioneering step to challenge the status quo and hand control over internet rights back to the artists.

Wanker.

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Corporate rock sucks #16: Rick Rubin and Columbia

Posted on September 2nd, 2007 by Andy

A big feature on Rick Rubin and Columbia in the New York Times is an insight not only into someone trying to pull the record industry out of it’s taildive but also into an industry that sees the way out of that taildive is to screw either (or both) the consumer who they plan to lease music to rather than allow them to own music and/or the artist who they intend to screw even more money out of and give them even less chance of getting out of the debt that the record industry puts anyone but the most successful artists into…

You would subscribe to music. You’d pay, say, $19.95 a month, and the music will come anywhere you’d like. In this new world, there will be a virtual library that will be accessible from your car, from your cellphone, from your computer, from your television.

Barnett has other ideas, which he is discussing with Rubin. For instance, asking Columbia artists to give the record company up to 50 percent of their touring, merchandising and online revenue.

The future of music requires a downsizing of the expectations of the artist. The (major) record labels exist because they offer the naive and the foolish (mostly) unachievable wealth and success. The fact is that if artists, rather than chase hopeless dreams, concentrated on making music and making a living making music then there would be a lot more successful artists.

While I accept Rubin’s statement that if “music [was] easily available at a price of five or six dollars a month, then nobody [would] steal it”, I don’t see how the “subscription model” that he (and other industry people) are peddling can be considered anything but telling the consumer “you can’t be trusted with our music”. If the industry continues to treat consumers as untrustworthy is it any wonder that consumers turn their back on the industry.

If the future of the industry is concentrating, as it seems to be, on nothing but the future of the industry and not considering the future of music and the needs of the consumer and the artist, then is it any wonder that it is struggling. When the current greedy industry finally dies things will surely be better.

Posted in Music, blogs and the internet, corporate rock sucks | 1 Comment »

Corporate rock sucks #15: Kristin Hersh and sustainability

Posted on August 30th, 2007 by Andy

Kristin Hersh has posted her Thoughts On Sustainability to her blog and it makes reassuring reading…the future of an industry where the labels don’t control the artist may be a little way off but seeing someone of the profile of Kristin seriously considering a business model that involves “relying on listeners, treating music as a cooperative” gives me hope that ultimately the listener (fan!) and the artist will find ways of doing business without the corporations sucking the life (and the money) out of music.

To that end, I think I need to engage in a grassroots kind of capitalism, choosing principles over profits, values over image, ideals over marketing. I have to create a permeable membrane between artist and listener — Im a craftsperson, after all. The church of the rock star that the music industry televangelists hawk has always been anathema to me anyway. This is about songs and sounds, nothing else.

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Corporate rock sucks #14: Is the Internet a good thing for music?

Posted on July 31st, 2007 by Andy

I find it really sad when musicians, particularly musicians who I respect, seem to misunderstand just how good things are for music at the moment. The stranglehold of the (major) labels is coming to an end and the Internet is making it easier for talent to find a market.

Aimee Mann gave these responses in a Guardian G2 interview last week…

G2: What’s the greatest threat to music?
Aimee Mann: Music downloads and CD burning. If music is free, then the only people who can afford to make it are narcissistic jackasses who will do anything for attention.

I think its insulting to assume that all those people who have been happy to buy records for years will suddenly stop paying for it because they can download it - those same people who carried on buying records when they could tape it off their mates or off the radio. We do understand that it costs to make music and if we’re not being cheated or treated like thieves then we’re happy to keep on paying for it. If anything I buy more music now than I have ever done - I still download stuff illegally sometimes but I will always pay for anything I think is worth paying for. The Internet is the best exposure an act can have and to blame illegal downloads as a threat to the music industry is ridiculous. And CD burning? Really? CDs will be a thing of the past - nothing I download (legally or illegally) ever makes it onto a CD - there’s just no point. People will be listening to the music they download in many ways but over the next few years but I’m sure they will be listening to less and less of it on CDs.

G2: Is the internet a good thing for music?
Aimee Mann: It’s good for information, but pages like MySpace turn everyone into a musician, almost all of them terrible. It’s as if people think there are bundles of money lying around, when actually becoming a musician is a drastic choice.

And then you suggest that we are unable to discern good from bad? Come on Aimee that’s just stupid! More people making music is a good thing - people who didn’t have the money and opportunity before have that chance now - it’s a good thing. I can’t bear to even start to think of all the talented musicians who we never hear of because they spend their lives doing shitty jobs because making it in the music industry was less about talent and more about luck and wealth.

Just because there’s so much crap on MySpace doesn’t mean that the good stuff will get lost. The Internet isn’t just a place to get music - it’s a place to discover music. Social networking sites make finding music easier than it was 15 years ago…we have recommendation engines and “friends” and podcasts and personal radio stations throwing music our way. The good music will make it and more and more good music will make it.

Maybe there is a problem that with more music and still the same amount of disposable income the money will spread a little thinner - but as a consumer of music that has to be a good thing - and when the record labels stop sucking money (and creativity) out of music then that disposable income will go a little further.

Is the Internet a good thing for music? Bloody right it is - don;t be afraid of it - use it…

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Corporate rock sucks #13: Last.fm and Sony

Posted on July 12th, 2007 by Andy

So last.fm have struck a deal with ugly major Sony (you know the same Sony who care so little for their customers that surreptitiously install damaging software onto their computers) - now I understand that last.fm is part of a major corporate media group and that jumping into bed with major labels was the inevitable next step but this quote from Thomas Hesse of Sony BMG was worrying…

The Last.fm streaming service will give our established artists a platform through which they can reach new audiences, and its unique recommendation system will provide our emerging artists with an important opportunity to build their fan base

So they plan to use last.fm’s recommendation system to promote their emerging acts…so the recommendation system isn’t (or won’t be) a genuine one but more a promotional/advertising platform for Sony? And at what cost? Independent labels? Artists not aligned with a record company? The customers who can no longer trust that the recommendations were made for valid reasons?

To be honest the CBS thing, and then the non-silence on the Day of Silence (although I’ll admit that this wasn’t quite a black and white issue), and now this have really saddened me. I like to think a community based site would care for its community - I’m finding it more and more difficult to believe that last.fm do.

Posted in corporate rock sucks, last.fm | 2 Comments »