4 Years Ago (2017)

Another Score Card post were I rechecked in with some of the artists I wrote about a few years before, just to see what is happening. Because three years in the music business is a long time.

Bands like Mutiny Within, Evans Blue, Corroded, Another Lost Year, Hell Or Highwater, Heartist, I Am Giant and Fates Warning all got mentioned.

I wrote about dictatorship in bands. My general viewpoint is that each band needs someone to steer the ship otherwise it all goes to hell.

Hetfield and Ulrich steer Metallica. Harris and Maiden. Sixx and Motley. Portnoy and Petrucci with Dream Theater and after Portnoy left, Petrucci took the reins. The Young brothers on AC/DC. And if their wasn’t someone steering the ship, I used Dokken as an example.

I wrote a post, called “Streamline”. It was basically asking the question of “Where do artists want their fans to go?”

Give people too much choice and they don’t buy at all. It’s one of the reason’s why a lot of people are still sitting on the fence when it comes to streaming. They’re not sure if it’s going to stick.

My musical journey started with vinyl and cassettes, then I had to upgrade my vinyl/cassette collection to CD’s, then I ripped all of my CD’s into MP3’s and now I’m doing streaming. I’m just one music consumer from millions.

Look at the band releases these days and how many different offerings they have. A normal Metallica release will have the following packages;

• CD – normal album
• Vinyl – normal album
• CD – Deluxe album
• Vinyl – Deluxe album
• iTunes – normal album
• iTunes – Deluxe album
• Streaming – normal album
• Streaming – Deluxe album

Why is there a need to have a normal album release and a deluxe album release these days?

Why is there a need to have bonus tracks added to certain geographical locations only?

Why can’t the album just be the album?

If the band wants to put out three discs, let them put out three discs and call it THE ALBUM…

8 Years Ago (2013)

I wrote a review of a Bullet For My Valentine gig in Sydney and I mentioned that if any band member leaves I won’t be interested as the band is a sum of their parts.

Well since 2013, their bass player left a few years after and then their drummer was told to not return to live duties when he took time out to sort out his personal life and to deal with becoming a father.

And slowly, I started to lose interest.

This one hurt to write as I was a huge fan of the band. But when One Less Reason went the fan funded route, they really needed to deliver to their fans the physical product they paid for. But they didn’t do it in a timely manner.

They basically fucked up the release and sending out of CDs. Some fans waited over 12 months for their CD to arrive, resorting to piracy to hear the album they fan funded. Questions to the band didn’t get answered and no one knew what the fuck was happening.

The band is still around today, I still listen to em but I’m sort of on the outer.