The future of recorded music is free music

[OzziePete]

Ozzie, thanks for the response,it was well written and your points are well received.

I want to point out that in the days before recordings when we had more opportunities to perform live, that people like me, and I hope you also, would have been a lot happier in life living the life of a working musician and having an outlet for our talents than I have working as an electrician.  I put up with my job which I am good at, however All I really want to do is play my guitar and if I could do that for a living, I would be a very happy person.

I often tell my wife that when I retire I will be the guy at the pier with my guitar case open for tips, playing the blues, and I will be living a dream.

I would disagree with you there. My ability is basically sub par for a working musician. Having worked with some serious professional musos in a short stint learning recording engineering reinforced that view. I do have some 'ear' for production, a bit of arranging, and a decent sense of rhythm, and most of my recording stuff starts out small and ends up a bloody "Phil Spector" extravaganza (minus the dead starlet). But alas, I can't do too much as my ears are damaged and I have to take care of them and make allowances for them.  

I benefit from the increase in technology for home. I can do my own home recordings and if I happen to capture something that is good enough (1:1M chance) to put out in the public I can do it without wasting countless hours in a studio. Most of my work ain't for human consumption. That doesn't diminish my love of music, or my passion for playing guitars. I just wish I had some decent talent to hang my hat on.......

Back On Topic, I am the sort of person who would benefit from the anarchy with the digital domain at the moment. IF I strike a song that sounds good (or at least I think it is good enough to release) I can get onto You Tube or get it to iTunes.......or load up a website and sell a CD of it. But there was no way I was gunna put up with the BS that the music 'industry' puts you through to get a contract for recording. I have seen people turned inside out by those pr**ks. And my own ability and lack of confidence in it ( I have seen the real deal up close, and I am wise enough to accept that my own is far short of what can pass, OK?) meant I'd always be overlooked for a contract in the old school....so now is the better time for people like me who might, just might, have a product worth listening to.

 

[Jusatele]

Ozzie,do you love it ?

if you could do it for a living, would it make you happy ?

 

[Jusatele]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bix_Beiderbecke

 

[OzziePete]

Ozzie,do you love it ?

if you could do it for a living, would it make you happy ?

Mate I love music, but am uncertain I could handle too much negativity about my playing or do good enough to earn some money from it. I derive alot of personal enjoyment playing a guitar, and that has now extended to assembling them, and recording music..... Happy? I'll never be happy. I was a 'grumpy old man' in my 30s! I need a fair amount of positive reinforcement around me, rejections and people telling me to 'piss off' bring me down no end. As I have said, I have seen professional musos up close and also been lucky to see other people in the public eye, spoken to them and see what they have to tolerate in their everyday life, and can be wise enough to step back and say to myself "Is that what I want if things get successful?" Philosophically I can't say fame or notoriety would be good for my long term health! In fact, I'd probably would have ended up like Syd.....so it's best I keep it at this level and hey, if something worthwhile passes my scrutiny I'll share it around.... :icon_thumright:

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VrFV5r8cs0[/youtube]

 

[OzziePete]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bix_Beiderbecke

Wow, the Hendrix of Jazz! Eerily concidental they both died at age 28...... :sad:

Seems like so few recordings of his work.......never heard about this guy before now. In the present era he would have been up on You Tube with vids of his performances if he didn't record much at all.  :icon_thumright:

These are the type of folks we will eventually lose knowledge of. Little recording history, no video footage.......hopefully the Congress Library has his recordings safely stored for the future.

 

[Jusatele]

here is a story for you

I started playing at 6,I studied classical music till 12 when discovered rock and roll, at 16 I started playing in bars doing C&W,  I played into my 30s opening for some big bands and doing the Roxy a few times, well I was about 38 and laid a saw across my tight thumb. Needless to say after they sewed it back on it is useless to me as I have no feeling in the last half of it and I gave away all my left handed guitars.A few years later I picked up a right handed guitar and started to fiddle with it. The owner of the music store who knew me gave it to me if I promised to take lessons. Now remember,I at one time could shred with the best. Now my fastest solos are melodic, I cannot hold a pick as my thumb has no feeling. I have however developed a style of playing a rythm that drives lead players nuts with the chords I play and the runs I do.
I could cry about how good I was , I could make excuses, but I do the best I can.

Please, live your love of music, For a few years when I was denying I would ever play again I hated myself. I actually at one time considered ending it all, my life has always been music. Do not make excuses, things happen, but we have a gift, and it is us who have disabilities duty to prove to those who have gifts that they need to use them, we need to do the best we can, so they can push the envelope. We are the blessed ones.

 

[OzziePete]

I could cry about how good I was , I could make excuses, but I do the best I can.

Please, live your love of music, For a few years when I was denying I would ever play again I hated myself. I actually at one time considered ending it all, my life has always been music. Do not make excuses, things happen, but we have a gift, and it is us who have disabilities duty to prove to those who have gifts that they need to use them, we need to do the best we can, so they can push the envelope. We are the blessed ones.

Thank you for the advice, Justa, really I thank you for that.

You are right, and there are times I have 'given up' and sold some guitars etc only to regret it later.

For a long time I was devoted to my mother's health (and the whole situation stopped me from being overly creative) and now that has passed I have spent a lot of time, energy and money, upgrading my home system to a level I can feel comfortable with. I do approach my music gear and even the process of playing, with a professional attitude, my theory being if you are going to do something that is so near and dear to you you may as well respect it with a professional approach.

I have some musical projects in mind, and it is simply a matter now of getting the guitars I have been renovating and assembling, into good shape and then booting the software for recording! I have some good outline ideas brewing and some good touches to bring out, and I am hoping like hell that this equipment will bring out the better player in me. The other day when I finally got the #1 Tele going and heard that Guild Humbucker for the first time in 20 years, well, I was happy as a pig in shitee....The projects excite me and get me thinking positively and outwardly which is a good thing. Being retorspective and semi Autobiographical in content and context, they will allow me to make statements of things past and move ON. The equipment I have gathered is of reasonable quality to do the products justice. I am pushing myself into a  'no excuses' situation so the product has to be attempted, lol. :sign13:

OT though, this sort of home sytem was not conceivable for the average punter like me even 10 years ago. It was simply not worth the cost or in some cases, like the Amp Sim software and Firewire soundcard, not avialable to the level you could work properly with. So, in a lot oways, I have an empathy with the rise of anarchy in the recording world. In a lot of ways, not having the recording medium tied to an exclusive enclave of recording companies, radio & TV stations, works to my advantage.

 

[bagman67]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bix_Beiderbecke

There are some public domain (copyright expired) recordings of Bix on archive.org :  http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Bix+Beiderbecke%22

Knock yourselves out, kids.

Bagman

 

[Jusatele]

thanks bagman

bix has alwaya influenced me as I feel he is one of those who could have taken music so far, and died so young.  I actually feel the best musicians are never recognized.

 

[stubhead]

Well as long as it's story time...

My dad was some kind of kickass cornetist from a young age and Bix Beiderbecke and Louis Armstrong were his musical heroes for obvious reasons of age & the times. When Hitler went goony my dad dropped out of high school and joined the army to fight Nazis, but his weapon was the cornet - he played 1st, 2nd or 3rd chair on cornet & trumpet in THE army band, the one that played for generals and presidents. Even before the war ended he had standing offers from the big bands for a job, both Dorsey brothers in particular. But, he took a long careful look at the future of it - especially all the deaths like Bix Beiderbecke, the drinking, stress and weirdness of touring, and he decided to "go straight", met my mom, got a "day job" and only played for pleasure, although he could still tear through a chart into his 70's. As it turned out it was a wise decision, as the big bands just crapped out immediately after the war for a variety of reasons. But he know himself well enough, there was drinking in the family and I suspect he saw a dismal future ahead that way. I find it odd and spooky that it's apparently a "fact" that about 4% to 7% of adult males are "alcoholics" - but look at jazz musicians from the 20's, 30's, 40's, 50's etc., rock guitarists from the 60's onward, blues musicians! Country singers.... One might well wonder what the hell? because it's more like 50% to 80% or something.

 

[Mr. Dude]

My dad believes once you buy an album you should have listening rights to it. He boght the Beatles white album on vinyl when it came out, then on cassette tape, then twice on cd. Now the Beatles owe him money.
I think I can agree considering I bought metallicas black album 3 times. Those suckers owe me money. Recorded music shouldnt be free considering it costs money to make, but you shouldnt have to keep paying.

 

[OzziePete]

I tend to think of music as a product.  If I buy a product and manage to get one free into the bargain then fine!

But thinking you only have to buy one of the product and if you want another, and that must be free..... I don't follow that logic? :icon_scratch:

If you went to a live show and decided later in the week to go back and see it again, maybe at another venue, would be expecting to get in for free?

Or if you had a copy of a recording and it was lost or stolen, would you expect to get another copy for free because you already paid for the first one?

 

[Jusatele]

Ozzie, I follow you, and I have to say that buying a copy of a song and buying the rights to that song are different things. But how about making copies, this is a thing that is argued with the music industry all the time. seems if I bought the song I have rights to copy it all I want for private use, so then should I not have the right to download it free from then on ? not given a free hard copy, but the download rights?

it is a sticky subject I agree with many ways to look at it.

 

[tfarny]

Ummm. I don't want to sound like an elitist, but consider who is on this forum, and consider who you know. The people here have both assembled their own guitars, and chosen a "hobby" or livelihood that requires long years of practice (AKA "work") to get good enough at to even consider getting paid for it. And the people who you know and hang with are probably fairly interesting and involved with music or some other creative concerns that require something other than passive absorbing.

Now consider - the "average" American adult spends a full five hours of each day watching TV, not even counting internet time (reading about what's on TV). Five hours might not sound so bad until it's recast as 80% of their available free time - these people don't have any hobbies, they have no interests, they can't fix a screen door, they can't even feed themselves - food comes from restaurants and fast-food windows, not from their own hands. They don't read, they can't write, a hobby to them means staring at pictures of hotrods, not building one.... when I was growing up most every dad had a workroom in the basement with tools, now "no one" needs tools except weirdo cranks who build their own guitars. I have had people flat-out laugh at me in disbelief when I told them I put together a guitar I was using, that's just not possible in their world.

And where do they get their tastes from, what do they listen to? What their TV teaches them to. It's almost like there's two parallel worlds going on, where a a talented mimic like Slash, with a patented "image", is one of the Greatest Guitarists in the World and Steve Morse couldn't even support a family until he joined a dinosaur band ("legends" on VH1). If you've ever had one of those conversations where you're naming off musicians and bands you like and being met with dumb, stupified bovine stares.... There are rare intersections, like, Brad Paisley actually is a great guitarist, but for everyone like me who's TV is DVD-only, it means there's someone else out there watching TEN hours a day.

In this context, Lady Gaga will ALWAYS whup up on anyone who's actually attempting to make it on talent and quality. We in the weird little underbelly may get to choose our favorites, and the TV machine then gets to pick through them to see which ones are suitable to offer up to the bovine masses, but there's never going to be anything resembling an equitable distribution of money for talent. This is acutely evident in the stranglehold that "classic rock" STILL has on the radio airwaves. There was a particular slice of time wherein just about any band could receive the anointment of greatness, and it's steamrolled thirty years of subsequent musical talent. Have you ever known any bands that were better than Golden Earring? And how did they do.... Have you ever noticed that every new hot hand is evaluated by how well they poke through a Hendrix cover? Have you ever noticed just how bad Big Brother and the Holding Company were, except for Joplin? Wouldn't YOU like to time-travel back to London, 1965....

There is still plenty of power in the old machine, and at some point most talented new bands are faced with the dilemma of trying to make it on their own, or hook up with the machine. I suspect that bands that did stick to their own guns, like Phish and Dream Theater, will always find themselves vengefully shut out of the big money hose that Hollywood can still point one way or another. And the Grammy Awards keep going to people no one except the masses have heard of or care about, those interchangeable squeaky little girls and coloratura-spewing R and B "singers."

It doesn't really matter, just keep in mind that you are a little weirdo, and that only led to actual rolling-in-it American "success" between 1965 and 1980 or so. If you really want to make a bang, produce a guitar instructional video, not on playing but on how to make the correct variety of guitar face contortions needed to make the big time.

(Whoo! Not that I CARE, or anything...) :hello2:

Stubhead, I have such a man crush on you....

 

[Mr. Dude]

I tend to think of music as a product.  If I buy a product and manage to get one free into the bargain then fine!

But thinking you only have to buy one of the product and if you want another, and that must be free..... I don't follow that logic? :icon_scratch:

If you went to a live show and decided later in the week to go back and see it again, maybe at another venue, would be expecting to get in for free?

Or if you had a copy of a recording and it was lost or stolen, would you expect to get another copy for free because you already paid for the first one?

The whole statement was ment to be taken with a grain of salt- to say metallica owes me money is just riddiculous, but its irritating when your first copy is ruined in a car accident and your second copy is stolen- now I keep them at home and carry burnt copies. As far as your live show analogy unless your watching 5 hours of tv and listen to interchangeable squeaky girls no one song is ever twice the same- even if just a different tempo the product is different, a recorded album is the same every time.

 

[Jusatele]

Stubb head, I just reread your rant posted earlier and I still find it an entrancing post.
You hit it on the head in several areas
why
well you named it, we are programmed to watch that TV and have no hobbies but those they want us to have
and we, those who work hard at learning a instrument are breaking out of the mold
but then, do they want us to? or should we learn the tried and trusted method of "faces","cliches" and "hendrix licks" they want us to so that they can pigeon hole us and control our careers ?
Face it if big money can not make money off of us then we are a threat. Indie labels take sales from the machine.

I can say something that a lot of guys will moan over, but then later in life will adopt....... In my young days I chased success and that meant trying to get signed, I played the current trend. Now days I play more of what would be called classic stuff if I am doing a gig. That is where most guys think I am stagnant, BUT, when we get together as a group of musicians and start to Jam, and I mean improvise, we now end up going off on Jazz studies that sound real bluesy or country. I at one time wondered why we chose that until it hit me, And here is what I figured out.

We still want to push the envelope,but we also want to hear the influences that are why we started. We want to enjoy, respect, and go past. What we do when we are going for it is pure Jazz, based in what we love. And that is why I will pull out a slide and do a solo when we are playing a 1940s standard such as Danny Boy. The music in our heads is alive.

Those guys watching TV 5 hours a night will be buying copulations of songs they heard while in high school and college telling their kids this was the best stuff ever and never buy a song writen past when they were 23 in their life. I watch friends going to reunion concerts all the time and shake my heads as they would not buy a current release by the band but will buy their greatest hits CD.

Live the music, keep playing, push the envelope. One day you will be sitting with some friends jamming to a thought in your head, half drunk and happy as a pig in mud when someone will tell you about so in so who committed suicide because he lost his job. At that point remember you are still chasing your dream, not stuck in a mundane world you hate.

 

[stubhead]

I'll try to be brief ( :help

CD's are dirt cheap to make. There was an incredible level of profit margin involved when the "Big Six" record labels took music that they already owned and converted it to CD's.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Record_companies
Starting in the mid-80's these companies began clocking profit margins of 800%, 900%, even 1200%! It was like printing money, or digging a hole in the ground and having oil shoot out. That level of profit attracted Wall Street investors, of course. Which is why Seagrams Group - also an owner of DuPont - picked up Universal Studios, MCA, PolyGram, and Deutsche Grammophon. There are other complicated business relationships, CBS/Viacom, Clear Channel Radio, it's sufficient to say that there's a small number of financial entities who buy and sell portions of each other's businesses at a dizzying rate - if you've ever read up on, or been a part of, an operation known as "money-laundering" that will sound familiar. Here's a quote:

Live Nation is a live-events company based in Beverly Hills, California, focused on concert promotions. Live Nation formed in 2005 as a spin-off from Clear Channel Communications, which then merged with Ticketmaster in 2010 to become Live Nation Entertainment.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Nation

The point is, there's a small number of people who wish to own the concert sales, CD sales, TV face time, radio air time, commercial tie-ins - and it's in their greatest self-interest that you don't waste any of your entertainment money on a CD, concert ticket, cable station or download that's not under their domain.

Did you know that CD sales have remained quite constant for the past 20 years? No, because whenever a lazy music journalist needs to fill column inches without working, he can always call up a big-company "industry expert" who will tell him that those goddam downloading thieves have ruined music sales. The executives who used to buy new Mercedes when the old one was dirty HATE anyone who's selling CD's at concerts, they HATE that they don't have their fingers in every one of your pockets - they got used to those profit margins of 1,200%, and even though the back catalog is all plumbed dry and NOBODY REALLY WANTS ANOTHER BEATLES BOXED SET, ASSWIPE - they still think that if they're NOT clocking 1,200% profit, somebody must be robbing them.

The Big Four's CD sales are way, way off, because bands have the nerve to sell them right to the consumer! Hannaugh is sure right about the internet, there are corporate-written bills coming up before Congress twice and three times every session to try to limit access and shape the internet to drive profits back towards... why, the people who wrote the bills, of course. "Net neutrality" is the catchphrase, and you'd better believe that Comcast, Verizon, CBS-Warner-BMG-you-name-it don't want you goddam hippies sniffing around and unearthing music that they don't own.

This might seem like a bo-ring read (making economics bo-ring is one of the tools they use to shaft you, of course) but if you don't know what's happening, one morning you'll wake up and find the only thing you're allowed to listen to is Tim McGraw* and Kid Rock* and you'll say "Duh? When'd that happen?":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality

Fundamentally, you need to understand that the corporations are waging war against anything that lessens their degree of control, because it's just good business practice - as long as no one notices. "Ooooh! You're Bo-ring!"

*(Just shoot me now and get it over with, OK?) :tard:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seagram
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CBS_Corporation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viacom_%281971-2005%29

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bain_Capital -

More than twenty five years after its inception, Bain Capital manages approximately $65 billion in assets, and has founded, acquired, or invested in hundreds of companies including AMC Entertainment, Aspen Education Group, Brookstone, Burger King, Burlington Coat Factory, Domino's Pizza, DoubleClick, D&M Holdings, Guitar Center, Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), Sealy, The Sports Authority, Toys R Us, Unisource, Warner Music Group and The Weather Channel.

And, they want their founder Mitt Romney to be Preznit! That ought to work out OK for them.....

Aw, shucks - I wasn't brief. :cool01:

 

[Jusatele]

As you reinforce what is wrong with the industry you also push out the reason that indie sales are so huge, and why those not willing to accept the corporate giants have gone into a new arena for sales.
however, the reason it works the way it does is not because of those who chose to be different, but because of those too lazy not too.
I refer to those who sit in front of a TV for entertainment 5 hours a day.

face it, if it were not for a huge buying public that is willing to be forced fed, Tim McGraw and Kid Rock would not exist.

 

[OzziePete]

Wow, thanx for the latest post here Stubhead, that filled ina lot of holes in the story.... :icon_thumright:

 

[hannaugh]

Live Nation and Ticketmaster can suck it.  There are a few venues around me that I can buy tickets from directly instead of giving an extra $12 to ticketmaster for doing absolutely nothing, and I am always happy when my favorite bands play there.  Unfortunately though, of the nice medium sized and larger venues in LA, almost none of them sell their own tickets anymore, and that is really sad.   

Some of them don't even sell tickets at the box office anymore, so you have to pay ticketmaster a "convenience fee" for not having to go to the theater to get the tickets, when the latter isn't even an option.  I can easily picture people who aren't in the know driving to the theater to get the tickets, realizing they can't buy them because the theater no longer even uses the box office, and then walking next door to the music or video store to buy ticketmaster tickets and having to pay their $12 "convenience fee" for the privilege of not having to drive to the theater to pick them up.  I bet it happens all the time.