Category Archives: Copyright

A to Z of Making It, Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Copyright, Music, My Stories, Piracy, Stupidity

Metallica – A Lot Has Changed Since 2008.

Seduced by fame
A moth into the flame

I have been listening to “Moth Into Flame” on Spotify daily. I must say it’s one of the their best songs written since we entered the 2000’s. The structure of the song, the brilliant intro, the lyrics, the barking verses and the melodic chorus all stand out.

Infamy
All for publicity
Destruction going viral

It could be about anyone in the entertainment business. Hell, it could be about Metallica’s Napster lawsuit.

For “Hardwired… To Self Destruct”, I like the lyrical message and the story behind the title more than the song in itself.

“Fifteen years ago, when you put out a record, there was a particular way that you did everything. Now it’s just whatever works for you. We’re in the process of putting a new record out this fall, and we’re just doing whatever we feel is right. There’s no particular way that it should be.”
Lars Ulrich – METALLICA

The last time Metallica released an album was in 2008. First week sales of “Death Magnetic” in the U.S market topped half a million units. But back then, streaming didn’t exist in the U.S market. It also didn’t exist in the major European and Asian markets. Now streaming makes up a large portion of the record label revenue however the price points are still debated. The customer has the option to purchase an album digitally, purchase the album on vinyl or CD, subscribe to a paid streaming service, subscribe to Spotify’s free tier or illegally download the album for free. Depending on the country you are in, the price points range from $0 USD to $10 USD.

As the Forbes article states, there is no alternative price in between even though research has shown that a $4.99 USD monthly subscription fee would convert the 60 million free tier streaming users into paid users.

What is better for the recording industry, 30 million users paying $9.99 USD a month or 90 million users paying $4.99 USD a month?

Do the math.

30 million paying users at $9.99 = $299,700,000

90 million paying users at $4.99 = $449,100,000

Metallica are masters of their own destiny, masters of their own recordings. For them, they do not have the high risk unknown that other labels have. They do not spend close to 20% of their revenue on artist development. They can negotiate their own streaming rate with Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon and Google. But they still do it the old way, taking time out to write and record 10 plus songs for a release. They will still judge this album on amount sold, instead of the amount streamed.

The article at Forbes, states what the record labels of the future would look like in six bullet points and one of the points is an artist-run record label.

Metallica own their masters. With the help of their management team, they have set up their own label. This gives the band negotiating power and it allows them to monetise their masters for the best price possible. Spotify has Metallica on it and it was on Metallica’s terms. You don’t hear Metallica complaining about the lack of money given to them by streaming services. Actually Kirk “I need a wah wah pedal for leads” Hammett might complain.

“Back in the day when Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning approached the music industry with a little baby they had called Napster, and the music industry refused to entertain any kind of deal with them on any level. Instead they open-sourced it to the world, and that changed the face of music. And so the industry’s reluctance to go with technology back in the day is something that we’re all, unfortunately, suffering from to this very day. Thankfully, the industry has seen the error of their ways, and they are embracing digital and technology on an unprecedented level, and we’re going through an adjustment period. It’ll take time.”
Dan Draiman – DISTURBED 

Instead of working with Napster, the recording industry got Lars Ulrich on board and went to war against the consumers of music. But in 2016, the recording industry is at another crossroad. It needs to decide on a price point for streaming that converts the 60 million plus free users into paid users. But the record labels want an increase in the current $9.99 price point. As far as the labels are concerned, it needs to be more.

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Copyright, Music, My Stories, Stupidity, Treating Fans Like Shit

The Copyright Games

It is big dollars to an artist when they sell their copyrights to a business entity to administer. For example. Downtown Music Publishing will have paid Nikki Sixx some dollars to acquire his Motley Crue song catalogue.

Deals like these are meant to be a partnership between publisher and artist where both benefit. The Publisher forks out some cash as an incentive and then aims to recoup that investment by licensing the songs to commercials, movie/tv placements, gaming or some other outlet that requires music. The publisher keeps a portion of the income and then charges an administration fee on the rest.

But, these days, publishers and record labels have amassed a lot of copyrights and when they have business models based on holding these copyrights, you have a copyright system that benefits a corporation more than an artist. So that gives them power in negotiations.

And is YouTube really that bad to the recording industry. Read the Guardian article about how the existing power players believe YouTube is “anti-artist”.

So can someone tell me how these existing power players find  a hardware maker called Apple as “artist-friendly” and how those same people find a music service like Spotify and Pandora as “anti-artist”. Let’s not kid ourselves here. Most artists (old and majority of new) want the 1980’s pay structure, the signing bonus, the $20 CD, even though it cost the label, $1 to make. But these same people love free gmail, free Facebook, free something else. And yet they still scream to be paid like it’s the 80’s. As the Guardian article states;

“Although many have a conflicted relationship with YouTube, there is a generational conflict dividing the field. Those in the “old” music industry want to keep things the way they always were, nailing down copyright in every way possible. Yet around them a “new” business is emerging – prescient and whip-smart artists, managers, labels and media organisations – who see YouTube as a facilitator of a creative renaissance rather than a death sentence.”

Is the system perfect?

Of course not, however neither was the music eco-system when the record labels controlled it and due to lobbying the labels had a government granted monopoly on it. But would the artist prefer. Napster like piracy that offered $0 into the eco-system or a platform that offers millions. And when you combine this platform with other streaming platforms and other ways to monetise music, you get to see different income streams. Because the people have spoken and they don’t want overpriced CD’s.

“With all the major label contracts coming up for renegotiation it makes absolute sense [to attack it]. These are huge businesses run by intelligent people and as much as it’s a mud-slinging exercise at the moment, I am hopeful they will reach a middle ground where artists are being [properly] remunerated and YouTube continues to grow its platform and its offerings to artists. YouTube has given us and many independent artists an audience and an opportunity to build a brand. That’s allowed us to exercise a business that goes far beyond what’s on YouTube.”

And with all of these deals being made, the companies holding the copyrights want the Government to step in and change the royalty rates because the artist is getting screwed and not them. So, on one side you have Music publishers like ASCAP and BMI, along with their “stars” arguing that streaming has led to a reduction in songwriters’ income. Lucky the Justice Department of the US declined their request.

“And in a move that has caused widespread worry throughout the music publishing world — the side of the business that deals with the lucrative copyrights for songwriting — the government has also said that, according to its interpretation of the consent decrees, the music agencies must change a major aspect of how they license music. The agencies must now adopt a policy known as “100 percent licensing,” which means that any party who controls part of a composition can issue a license for the whole thing. In the case of major pop hits, which tend to have many songwriters, there can sometimes be a dozen or more parties involved.”

And now the business model based these publishers have based on a government granted monopoly by extending copyright laws is threatened by another government decision. But hey, “artist friendly” Apple is putting in their own request to increase the royalties because if that does happen, it will kill off all of Apple’s competitors like Spotify and Pandora. And then Apple will have a business model based on another government granted monopoly.

Seriously to see how fucked up copyright is, the fact that a politician needed to settle with Rude Music, the company owned by Frank Sullivan from Survivor for $25,000 because of “copyright infringement” is a joke. Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee used “Eye of the Tiger” during a rally. And this is somehow copyright infringement because Rude Music believes he should have asked for permission. The truth is, Frank Sullivan doesn’t agree with views of the politician and wants the populace vote.

And Queen has joined a long list of artists to send cease and desist letters to Donald Trump because even though his campaign does the right thing and pays a licensing fee to the publishers to use songs in their catalogue, if the artist disagrees with the views of the politicians they believe they have a power to stop it. All in the name of being liked.

To close out my rant, the Electronic Frontiers Foundation sums up my copyright argument in one nice paragraph.

And on it goes. Again and again, large content owners seem to think that the only way to fight unauthorized media consumption is to expand copyright. But more copyright won’t change users’ behavior. What it will do is chill innovation and free expression online. The way to bring in more paying customers isn’t to write new law; it’s to build a better product and get it to more customers at the right price.

 

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A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Music, My Stories

Albums

“Blizzard Of Ozz” is 39 minutes long. A year later, “Diary Of A Madman” comes out and it clocks in at 42 minutes.  Ozzy built his career on these albums. Two albums in two years.

“You Can’t Stop Rock’N’Roll” from Twisted Sister is 38 minutes long. A year later, “Stay Hungry” comes out as a tight, nine-song, 37-minute set. Like Ozzy, Twisted Sister built their career on the backs of these albums.

“Kill Em All” is 51 minutes long. “Ride The Lightning” is 47 minutes long. “Master of Puppets” is 54 minutes long. Three albums in the space of three years and Metallica’s career is defined and built. In comparison, “Death Magnetic” is 75 minutes long and we are approaching EIGHT years between releases with the opus scheduled for an October release.

“The Number Of The Beast” is 39 minutes long . “Piece Of Mind” is 45 minutes long and “Powerslave” is 51 minutes long. In the space of three years, Iron Maiden built a career on the backs of these three albums. In comparison, “Book Of Souls” is 92 minutes long and it was released six years after their previous album.

“Highway To Hell” is 41 minutes long. “Back In Black” is 42 minutes long. “For Those About To Rock” is 40 minutes long. Three defining albums in the space of three years and AC/DC went from an Australian band to global superstars. In comparison, “Black Ice” is 55 minutes long and “Rock Or Bust” is a return to a normal time length of 35 minutes long. Although the quality is just not there and their main riff meister is missing in action.

“Heaven And Hell” is 39 minutes long and a year later “Mob Rules” came in at 40 minutes in length. Two albums in two years and Black Sabbath’s career is resurrected as a commercial force. For Ronnie James Dio, it was 5 studio albums and six years, and when the 42 minute long “Holy Diver” dropped in 1983, the foundations to Dio’s solos career are set.

What are these figures trying to say?

You don’t need 60 to 90 minutes’ worth of new music to be released on one slab at one time every two to three years. People don’t have spare hours. They have spare minutes. You need 30 to 40 minutes of new music to be released more frequently. Based on the past, bands got traction by releasing new music every 12 months.

Labels want albums because it is easier to charge money RIGHT NOW when there is a bundle of songs involved. Artists want albums, because they grew up on them and they want to be like their heroes and make a statement.

However the album means nothing to the listener who has a digital music collection. While the label heads and the artist want to be paid right now, the fan/listener thinks differently. And the difference between now and the past, is that the listener can influence the outcome.

You buy a track or an album and you could play it once. Maybe you could play it a hundred times or a thousand times or a million times. The artist and their label will never know how many times you played the track. All they will know is the ONE sale and all the money they would have received is from the ONE sale. But if you stream a track a million times, the artist will know. But listens pay less than sales and listens pay when a track is streamed! And if it is streamed a lot it will pay.

So…

Focus on listens. Fans are made by listens. We can talk about albums, but most people are listening to songs. And if a track has longevity, then so does the career of the artist.

Like when I go to “Blizzard Of Ozz”, I listen to “Goodbye To Romance”, “Mr Crowley” and “Crazy Train” as a must.

When I go to “The Number Of The Beast”, I listen to “Children Of The Damned” and “Hallowed Be Thy Name” as a must.

Of course there are other tracks that I like depending on moods, but the ones mentioned are essentials for me.

Listens are everything and based on how copyright law is designed to last the life of the artist plus 70 years after death, the copyright holder will get paid on each and every listen, forever. And the focus should not be on making an album-length statement of 60 to 90 minutes. It should be about putting out a song that can be listened to, over and over again.

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Copyright, Derivative Works, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Stupidity

Writing A Riff Is A Combination Of What We Have Heard Before

Have a drink for creativity.

Even if we think our favourites are original, trust me, they are not. For an artist to create music, they need to hear music. And when you hear music, you write music in the style of what you have heard. You use chords and melodies from song you have heard. Nobody lives in a vacuum.

In the end it took eight unknown jurors to decide this.

The funny thing here is the Copyright Law that Corporations orchestrated via Government lobbying in the Seventies, is getting used by others to now sue those same corporations who hold the copyrights to songs. Page and Plant sold their rights to Warner for a lot of money.

But seriously, if Copyright is operating how it is meant to work, once the creator dies, all of their creations become part of the public domain. Instead, Randy California’s songs became part of a business model for a corporation. In this case, the Trustee’s of Randy’s Estate.

Remember when the lawyers for Randy California’s trustee Michael Skidmore, asked for a $1 settlement along with a writing credit for Spirit guitarist Randy California and any future profits would then be received by the Trustee’s of California’s estate. Yep, I really love how copyright is used as a pension fund for people who really are not eligible to gain from it.

And what about the creative accounting from both sides.

The Trustee’s for Randy California estimated that the song earned close to $60 million between 2011 to 2014, citing a music publishing deal that Jimmy Page and Robert Plant signed with Warner Music. However, the accountant used by the Jimmy Page and Robert Plant legal team, said that Jimmy Page earned $615,000 and Robert Plant earned  $532,000 for the song. There is a massive disconnect there.

Either way, that’s some serious dough and when you add the money that other songs in their catalogue would earn, it adds up to a lot of money.

But some one is not telling the truth and when it comes to the accounting of music, the truth is the last thing being told. There are so many skeletons and the only way to find out the truth is a federal investigation.

The part the troubles me the most is how Michael Skidmore is trying to present a picture that what Randy California created is so original and free from any influences. And that is just not true.What Randy created is a sum of his influences. It’s not original and in no way unique.

And neither is Jimmy Page’s assertion that what he creates is so original and free from any influences. All music is influenced by what came before it and by what we experience.

But of course, Skidmore and his legal team are not happy with the outcome and plan to appeal. What a dead set joke and copyright is a joke as it currently stands.

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Copyright, Derivative Works, Music, My Stories, Stupidity

Even More Abuses Of Copyright

Copyright, copyright, copyright.

What kind of world do we live in, where a law that is meant to give a creator a monopoly on their works and encourage creativity for a certain period of time is being used for everything else except creativity.

First up is Axl Rose. In the past he has used copyright (via the DMCA Takedown Notice Scheme) to shakedown websites over album leaks and now (via a shonky firm called Web Sheriff) is using copyright to take down unflattering pictures of himself.

Here we have a Government law, (the DMCA) used in the name of copyright as a censorship tool without any consequences for fake claims.

Next, is a company called Smart Circle who is going after a WordPress blogger that is critical of the company. It looks like Smart Circle didn’t like seeing pictures of their Executive Team with devil horns and fire put up on the blog. So of course, the company sent WordPress a takedown notice, however WordPress left them online. Freedom of speech and fair use comes into play here. As the Torrentfreak article states;

Not pleased with this decision, Smart Circle asked the court for a DMCA subpoena against the blog owner, which a clerk has now signed off on. This means that the company can compel WordPress.com to hand over the personal details of the blog owner.

Yep, it’s nice to see how copyright gets abused to take down the voices of others.

Next.

AMC, the creator of “The Walking Dead” TV show and HBO the creator of “Game Of Thrones” are ramping up their abuses of copyright to take down websites that are “predicting” what would happen or who would die in the TV shows. In both instances, AMC and HBO are accusing the people behind the websites/Facebook pages of violating copyright law.

“What the?” is the first thing that comes to mind. Here the DMCA is being used in the name of copyright to silence fans of the TV shows from talking about them.

For “The Walking Dead” forum users, if they post who they believe their Lucille victim is and if they are right, then AMC will sue them. Well anyone who has read the comic books or gone to Wikipedia to catch up on the comic book stories will see that Glen is the Lucille victim. If the TV show chooses to run with that storyline then it’s no big secret is it.

So how does writing about it, lead to a copyright claim. Remember, copyright was designed to encourage creativity. It wasn’t designed to be used in a ridiculous manner by taking down websites/forums/Facebook pages, predicting what will happen in a TV show.

Then we have the many cases happening about “plagiarism” or “copyright theft” or “influence”.

“Stairway To Heaven” is going to court, almost 50 years after the song was released. Was copyright created to serve the heirs of creators and be used as a pension fund by these people.

Ed Sheeran is going to court because two Californian songwriters claim that they were ripped off. In a nut shell, the songwriters wrote a song called “Amazing” which was used by an X Factor winner and retitled “Amazing 2”. The songwriters then claim that “Amazing 2” was copied by Ed Sheeran and called “Photograph”.

“The chorus sections of Amazing and the infringing Photograph share 39 identical notes — meaning the notes are identical in pitch, rhythmic duration, and placement in the measure.”

Is Copyright designed to sue anyone who has a hit song because your song failed?

Of course not.

But every artist pours their blood, sweat and tears into their songs so they must be entitled to a piece of the pie in some way.

Their songs are their children so they must be entitled to something if a song that sounds similar to their song makes a connection with audiences. The fact that the songs these artists created in the first place are based on other songs that came before doesn’t seem to make it into the conversation.

Which is sad.

Jimmy Page is testifying that the passage in “Stairway” is a thousand years old and generational. However in a courtroom, in front of people who have no idea how music works, Page’s comments don’t hold much weight. These people don’t understand that music is a sum of many influences that our brain mixes together and when we create music, our brain blends what we have heard and stored and what comes out is unique and original. Their might be some overlap here and there, but doesn’t equate to plagiarism.

And when the same jurors are asked to assess the two songs based on various legalities, Page’s comments don’t benefit his case at all.

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A to Z of Making It, Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Copyright, Derivative Works, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

The Whole Damn Thing Has Turned To Dust

Tremonti windowed the release of “Dust” and kept it from Spotify for 4 weeks. This windowing process denies Spotify Premium fans a chance to listen to it. It’s discriminatory . It didn’t make me go out and buy the CD to hear it. I was actually tempted to search for it on the pirate sites to download it, however it just proved too much effort. And to purchase an mp3 just doesn’t come into the equation for me. And then YouTube, the service that pays less had it up.

Anyway, it feels like yesterday that I was listening to “Cauterize”. It was my number 7 for 2015 releases. So here we are almost a year later with “Dust”.

“In the words of the immortal YODA, a solid listen, this album is. An outstanding song, there is not. Intention of Tremonti, was not the hit single.”

It’s how I started my review of “Cauterize” and it still rings true for “Dust”.

Mark Tremonti has shown the world that he was the brains and driving force behind Creed. He kept his career trajectory going with Alter Bridge. In the downtime, he also started his own solo band.

After Creed finished up, he went away and mastered the art of shred. Along with his brother they formed Fret12. It’s a record label, book publisher (you should check out the “The Sound And The Story” specials and the diverse guitarists involved) and an overall one stop shop for all things Tremonti and other projects. His PRS guitars are state of the art and brilliant to play. Trust me on that one as I have one. The PRS through the 5150 is the perfect sound for me.

And via Alter Bridge, Tremonti is filling the void left behind by Led Zeppelin. Myles Kennedy is one of the best vocalists of the modern era ala Robert Plant and Mark Tremonti is a prolific writer and innovator ala Jimmy Page. And the real good musicians always rebuild their careers after their initial success. Jimmy Page did it after “The Yardbirds” and Mark Tremonti continues to do it after “Creed”.

Evan as “Dust” hits the streets, Alter Bridge are recording their next album. The work ethic is high.

“My Last Mistake”
It’s a thrash-a-thon. Like “Cauterize” before it, it’s a speed metal song. The chorus is excellent.

Just like tragedy
Folks line up to see
We forget and the problem’s gone
It just ain’t right to move on

It’s a sick symptom of society where we fail to hold to account, the people responsible for the tragedy. The GFC perps went on college speaking tours and high-five jobs at the financial firms they organised laws to benefit. They escaped unscathed, while the middle class and lower class got their homes foreclosed. Every time there is a shooting there is outrage, however nothing is done after on gun reform.

For all of the laws passed to spy on citizens in the name of terror, not one terrorist act have they stopped. And after each terrorist attack, our privacy and liberties erode a little bit more. The people need to hold to account the people responsible. But we cannot devote the time because the people responsible have us hooked line and sinker. We can’t take time of work because the income means more to us than the cause.

“Once Dead”
It’s another thrash-a-thon speed metal song, with a blast beat groove and a wicked arena rock chorus. It’s a great mix. Garrett Whitlock cements himself as a powerhouse drummer on this one.

We sink like a stone
Once dead once belonged

Sinking like a stone means to fail completely and once dead to me; means, your time is up. So in other words, the lyrics can be paraphrased as;
We have failed in life
And now our time is up

“Tore My Heart Out”
It’s a derivative version of “Dust” but unique enough to be a stand alone. Tremonti thought of changing the title because he didn’t want another song title with “heart” in it. “Another Heart” is on “Cauterize”. And that outro riff is like a crazy train going off the rails.

Show your will and do your part
Or be blind right from the start

“Catching Fire”
There is an interview with Tremonti (I think at whatculture.com) where he states the riff that starts the bridge, he’s had since high school. I dig little insights like that. You just don’t know when the time will come for an idea to blossom into a song.

The whole world’s catching fire again

“Betray Me”
How could you betray me
Remember hope, remember faith, remember trust

Venomous lyrics and sweep picking makes an appearance. Remember Malmsteen. Actually, how many fans of Creed/Alter Bridge, would know of Malmsteen?

“Dust”
But the piece de-resistance like “Providence” from the previous album is “Dust”. In the original track listing, “Dust” was the closer, however it got moved up to track number 4.

It grooves from the opening notes and it’s a song to define a career. The syncopated call and response of the riff and vocals, immediately hook you in.

You can hear the years of practice, the honing of his chops and how he called Shred teachers from the 80’s in Troy Stetina and Michael Angelo Batio to brush up his technique. Even after he sold 30 million plus records with Creed, he still worked at improving.

Tremonti stated that “’Dust’ is about how it feels to watch a close friend lose confidence in you.” And that’s what great songwriting is. Evidence of humanity.

And the Pre-Chorus, is a riff, building up to a Chorus that rocks hard with emotion and groove.

The whole damn thing has turned to dust
The ashes you left to bury us

There are other tracks on the album like;

“Rising Storm”
The song was meant to be called “Lay To Waste” however when Tremonti recorded the song in Garageband, it was called “Rising Storm” and the song title just stuck around.

“Unable To See”
It’s a derivative version of “Waters Rising” from Alter Bridge. The intro is from “The Sound and the Story DVD” and another musical idea that was written 20 plus years ago. Tremonti also stated over at whatculture.com;

“Unable to See” has some of the oldest parts on the entire record. The chorus of that song comes from a pre-chorus of a song I’d written for the One Day Remains record, the first Alter Bridge record, so that’s many years old, so there’s definitely some history scattered throughout.

Still we love to see a smile
But we are wronged by the ones that would never

If you take the relationship perspective to the lyric, it would be that we are surrounded by people who see the glass half empty and if you take a world view perspective, it would be about the terrorists who are trying to turn all of our cities into a desolate wasteland like their home city.

“The Cage”
Is that some chicken-picking going on masquerading as tapping? And the lyrics are very strong, almost venomous.

Take your words, they’re worth nothing, let your evil show

It’s another way to say, that the beliefs of people who try to affect our freedoms and liberties mean nothing to us and whenever their evil shows, they just push us together, something even the best intentioned governments couldn’t do.

“Never Wrong”
It could have been on an Alter Bridge album.

Tremonti is a guitar hero, as good as any of the Eighties shredders. He had multi-platinum success with Creed, an act that was devoid of guitar solos and lumped in with the Nu-Metal, Alternative Rock scene. It brought out the haters, jealous that a person who could shred, didn’t shred. In the end, people live and breathe on the songs they write, not on the guitar solos they write and Tremonti has built a consistent legacy. The pinnacle of his career in my eyes would be when his second act, Alter Bridge played the Wembley Arena. And dont be surprised if Tremonti the band get there as well.

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A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Music, My Stories, Piracy

The Streaming Wars, iTunes Suspending Downloads Due To Decreased Sales While Bandcamp Sees An Increase in Sales

“It’s (streaming) not the enemy and the thing that frustrates me is the old guys, and I call ’em the old guards; now what a nasty position to be in to be thought of as a gatekeeper. Because you’re a rockstar, you’ve been around 20, 30 years — some of ’em 40 years — and you say, ‘Bah humbug to streaming!’ You say, ‘Bah humbug to rock. Rock is dead. There’s no hope for the future. Put your guitars down and go get a job in a bank.’ It’s, like, that’s not the message that young musicians and fans need to hear. They need to hear, ‘Streaming is your friend. The listening experience is more exciting. Pick up your guitars, there’s a career for you out there. The next Elton John’s out there. The next Metallica’s out there. The next Beatles is out there. The next Muse is out there — they’re out there.’ They’re young, they need to be pushed to be the best they can be; they don’t need to be told there’s no future. There’s money and there’s hope, and what money gives musicians is the opportunity to have stability. And with stability you can continue to create music and, when an artist is creating music, we get to do interviews and talk about it.”
Nikki Sixx 

Suddenly Google has become the baddie when it comes to piracy being. The tech giant is accused of the same crimes that Napster, Limewire, The Pirate Bay, MegaUpload, etc. were accused of previously.

It’s been ongoing for a while, especially around the takedown procedures. Suddenly musicians are now speaking up against the small payments from YouTube. Nikki Sixx and Deborah Harry spoke out against YouTube.

Manager Irving Azoff mentioned YouTube should allow musicians to opt out of the service, and if the musicians via their backers ask for their content to be removed it should be removed permanently and not allowed to be put back up without the consent of said musicians.

And if you have ten minutes, check out the latest rant against YouTube. It is a read of BenHur proportions.

And then there was a rumour of iTunes cancelling music downloads which was denied by Apple. However where there is a rumour, there is also some truth. The article states;

“Whether or not Apple wakes up one day and decides to tear down its iTunes music download store is not the most important thing.  Because they are already starting to get rid of it.  This phase-out is already happening and Apple is definitely assisting this process.  They are definitely not growing their download store and they are doing what it takes to make this die a natural death.”

The article talks about how Apple is blurring the lines between iTunes and Apple Music, by corrupting our iTunes downloads with the Apple Music product, even going as far as replacing your paid iTunes download with the a different version licensed for Apple Music. Apple believes by doing this process, the user would eventually give in and pay for an Apple Music Streaming subscription.

And the major record labels couldn’t care less. They will phase out CD’s and if mp3 downloads are phased out, the only mp3’s pirates can download are the web rips of YouTube songs. Which if you read the above, the labels are really pushing hard to tear down as well. All of this means the labels get back control of the distribution channel that Napster took away.

They have hedged their bets with every digital musical offering, taking decent percentage stakes in each of them, so when they get sold or go public, the labels stand to gain billions. Add to that the millions earned from licensing the songs that they hold copyrights for and you get to see how much money is going to the record labels and not the artists.

But hey, YouTube and Spotify is to blame.

Bandcamp has posted a counter argument to Apples “iTunes problem”.

  • Bandcamp grew by 35% last year.
  • Fans pay artists $4.3 million dollars every month using the site, and they buy about 25,000 records a day.
  • Nearly 6 million fans have bought music through Bandcamp.
  • Digital album sales on Bandcamp grew 14% in 2015 while dropping 3% industry-wide.
  • Track sales grew 11% while dropping 13% industry-wide.
  • Vinyl was up 40%.
  • Cassettes 49%…
  • Even CD sales grew 10% (down 11% industry-wide).

Bandcamp is not just a download store. When a user buys music on Bandcamp, they also get instant, unlimited streaming of that music via Bandcamp’s free apps as well as an optional, high-quality download.

In the past I have always mentioned that fans come in different ways and consume music in different ways and it looks like Bandcamp is positioned to capitalise on that.

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A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Derivative Works, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Piracy, Stupidity

Plagiarism

“There was really just one song ever written and that was by Adam and Eve. We just do variations”

Keith Richards as he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in New York in 1993.

That my friends is music in a nutshell. All forms of art is inspired by the past. And then corporations came looking to profit from art and they lobbied the governments of the time to start writing laws. These laws would get enhanced until it got to a stage where the laws only benefit the corporation that controls/holds the copyright of the artist.

The word plagiarism in music is a dirty word.

If you look at a dictionary like the MERRIAM-WEBSTER ONLINE DICTIONARY, plagiarise means;

  • to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one’s own – Isn’t this what Sharon Osbourne did in Ozzy’s name for “Bark At The Moon”. Bob Daisley and Jake E. Lee wrote the album and Sharon had Ozzy listed as the sole songwriter.
  • to use (another’s production) without crediting the source – Isn’t this what Metallica did with “Enter Sandman” and “Welcome Home”. Kingdom Come did it. Every British Rock Invasion did it with the Blues of the 30’s and 40’s.
  • to commit literary theft – Isn’t this is what Robert Plant did with some of his Led Zeppelin lyrics.
  • to present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source – Isn’t this is the whole history of music. There is a pretty good chance that latest album of your favourite artist was influenced in sound and feel by songs of the past.

In music, if you play the notes A, B, C right after each other, you are technically playing the first three notes of a musical scale. And there is a 100% chance that those same three notes will appear in someone else’s song or have already appeared in a song written in the past.

So should we credit the person that came up with the Aeolian scale thousands of years ago for those three notes?

But if I was writing an essay I am required to credit anything that is the same as something that came before.

But what about the millions of songs that have A, B, C in a lead break or in a vocal melody or in a riff?

See how silly it gets when you start to use a scholarly term like plagiarism in music. Based on it’s dictionary meaning, then plagiarism has been around in music since the dawn of time.

But plagiarism is relevant these days because our culture believes it owns everything. We believe our ideas and words and stories are so original, we worry that others will “steal” them from us in some way and make millions of dollars from them, while we make nothing.

The fact that other people in the world are thinking the same ideas or writing similar words or living a life similar to ours, doesn’t even come into the equation.

And while plagiarism does exist in academic/literature circles, it really doesn’t exist in music. Because music is a sum of what came before it. If certain songs sound too similar, then that is copyright infringement and it exists in music.

That is what Vanilla Ice did when he lifted the bass line from “Under Pressure” and called it “Ice, Ice Baby”.

But when I hear Five Finger Death Punch lift the vocal melody from “The Ultimate Sin” and re-use it for two lines in an eight line verse in “Lift Me Up”, I call that “influenced by music that came before to create something new.” In other words, it is a derivative work.

But with so much money in music, especially around hit songs, the lines of inspiration have been reclassified as theft/plagiarism. Copyright infringement is now all about censorship and piracy.

And what you have is a jury of non-music experts setting precedents that blur the lines even more. And you have heirs of artists suing to protect their pension incomes, when the songs their deceased parent or grandparent wrote, should be in the PUBLIC DOMAIN as Copyright intended them to be.

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Copyright, Music, My Stories, Piracy, Stupidity, Treating Fans Like Shit

Scott (Stealing) Ian

Piracy, Copyright Infringement, Plagiarism, Website Blocking, Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and on and on it goes.

Why would anyone create music?

The record labels via the RIAA have screamed black and blue that piracy is decimating the business. They fought tooth and nail against every digital service and start-up. Yet year after year, it was digital music that was making a fortune for them, because all digital monies are pure profit. There are no manufacturing costs (like vinyl and CD’s), there are no warehousing and distribution costs and there is no breakage.

Remember Napster. It showed the recording industry what the majority of customers want. Access to cherry pick the song they want and access to listen to whatever they want. 17 years later, you can say that what Napster started has almost become a reality. The only outlier is that people still want to download mp3’s for free.

Which brings me to Scott Ian!

Can someone please explain to him what stealing really means because he is making metal heads look stupid and uninformed?

Downloading a copy of an mp3 is not stealing because the mp3 is still up on the web for streaming, purchase or downloading. If anything, it is copyright infringement.

But the question that he fails to ask is why are fans of Anthrax downloading their music illegally?

Is it because;

  • They download music and have no intention to pay for anything, not even a concert ticket of the said artist?
  • They download music because they have no other way to get it?
  • They download music because they have no other way to get it and they will purchase the CD eventually and even a concert ticket
  • They download music because they don’t want to pay Apple to download it, but they want it on their phone, and have every intention to purchase a concert ticket when Anthrax hits their town?

I can go on and on with different types of viewpoints of fans.

The value of music was originally inflated, because we, the customers had to buy an album worth of songs for the three, maybe five good songs. The hard-core super fans will always purchase, however the rest will do what they want to do, when they want to do.

As a collector, I still pick up CD’s of bands when they are super cheap like $5, years after the album was released and after I’ve streamed the album to death. And they are still in the plastic wrapping which I am sure once I have joined the afterlife, my heirs will commit them to a second-hand store or just toss them. The value of music is different from person to person.

But how many artists can safely say they know who their hard-core fans are.

I bet you there are always fans who purchase deluxe bundles, every time the said artist releases an album.

Is that buyer information getting filtered back to the artist?

It’s these fans, Scott Ian should be caring about. Are they getting any bonus offer, a loyalty card, a discount to a concert or a simple personalised thank you that makes the fan feel special for supporting the artists with every release?

Imagine the fan getting a hand written letter sent to their address that thanks them for purchasing the last four super deluxe bundles of the said band, and here is a bonus mp3 album for you to download plus a special VIP pass for their upcoming concert.

Instead, the fans are made to feel like criminals, for streaming an album instead of buying,  for cherry picking a few songs instead of paying for all of them or for downloading the album illegally.

That’s not the way it’s done anymore.

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A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Music, My Stories, Piracy, Stupidity

Just Some Thoughts on Copyright, YouTube and Rock Music

Nikki Sixx and many others want Google to pay more for each YouTube stream so they could bring their payment rates up to the same standard of other streaming providers.

You notice how the people who are now speaking out against YouTube, are the ones who control the rights to their music. It’s because they know exactly what payments they are getting compared to other streaming services. The rest of the artists are clueless and at the whim of the record label creative accounting machine.

In case you were not aware, both Motley Crue and Metallica own their copyrights. Peter Mensch on behalf of Metallica spoke out about YouTube and called it the devil. Nikki Sixx is now calling out YouTube on payment rates.

Anthrax on the other hand are clueless. They kept their new album off Spotify for a few weeks, but it was all over YouTube via fan uploads. As a band, you cannot control what your fans do with your music and how they choose to share it but what you can control is how you release it. Anthrax can’t have the release cycle the way they want it to be (pre-Napster), much the same way any business that has customers, can’t run their business the way they did back in the past. Look at Apple as a perfect example of a business trying to operate like it did when Steve Jobs was alive, while Amazon, Facebook and Google have moved on and surpassed Apple as a leader.

Because the customers are king and they decide what is of value and what isn’t.

Imagine Prince’s post death stats if his music was actually available to be streamed on Spotify. In case you were not aware, every news outlet reported how his sales increased post death. It’s fantastic that his sales have gone through the roof again, as it will benefit his current management team/label. Not him.

And trust me when I say this, the people that will end up controlling Prince’s music will orchestrate a rich licensing deal for his music to be on streaming services. Because it’s all about the greed. Then the lawsuits would come against any artist who has a song that might feel and sound like a Prince song.

If people want to respect Copyright again, then all of Prince’s songs and his catalog of unreleased songs should be part of the Public Domain.

So which way do artists want.

Do they want strong Copyright enforcement forever and a day which leads to censorship and Corporate monopolies and billions of dollars in the hands of executives who created no art and fly in their own private jets, while the actual artists are paid pennies and fly economy?

Do they want the Tidal exclusives and making copyright infringement/piracy relevant again in the process?

Do they want their fans to purchase their music only, have big first week sales and to make copyright infringement/piracy relevant again in the process?

Do they want to make it as easy as possible for fans to access their music forever in any format the fan desires and as easily as possible?

Because in music there is a lot of value in recorded music, regardless if it’s streaming or mp3 purchases or actual vinyl/CD sales.

If you want to look at the value of recorded music and how you can make money when legal alternatives are better than the pirated alternatives, look no further than China. As a music market based on recorded sales, China, had no transactional recorded music business. Piracy was huge. However it is now bringing in some serious dollars. The difference here is that the record labels have built partnerships with the techies and ISP’s, instead of litigating them to death in the courts with stupid troll like suits and take down notices.

They tried a paid model in 2012, it failed. They tried again and again, until they got it exactly right for the CUSTOMER to buy in. Now digital music revenues in China brings in millions of dollars which were not there before at all. This is a good thing, but again, how much of it is going back to the actual artists.

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