The truth is that music and art become a part of who we are. I can't stop seeing or hearing anymore than I can stop tasting the food I eat or breathing. And I wouldn't want to. Those experiences become part of my life.
That also means that people will always need music and art for their personal expression, not for money. It's amazing just how creative the average person can be and the amount of raw talent that exists in everyone for something. Of course there will always be those who are more creative or expressive than others and in a perfect world, those would be the ones that rise to the top.
So consider what happened to radio with the pay-for-play model. Major labels eventually edged out any music that wasn't theirs. The labels killed
radio. That's what happens when a market is controlled by a single organization
("90% of all legitimate music sold in the U.S."). The best didn't have much of a chance to be heard and now they have no chance at all.
Yet the internet has remained a wondrous place for leveling out that playing field. And that's what
scares traditional media. Just making their own music unavailable won't work without also having the controlling share of music available. So they need to eliminate the competition as well (including out of print or independent music) with take down requests.
Their approach is growing and threatens every independent band since copyright complaints don't have to prove ownership to demand an audio file is removed. The entire web site can be shut down without warning. Copyrights and permissions are tedious and complicated to prove, even if the clip was your dead grandmother singing in the shower. That's the point. You aren't supposed to listen to anything other than what they sell you or experience a
silent world. There's no choice.
I have no problem with Metallica, Brittney, Paris, Nickleback, or other RIAA label associated artists disappearing into thrift store obscurity in order to preserve my right to make personal choices about what I want to listen to. The labels spend millions on marketing research and they know their hit charts mean little to anyone that matters (i.e. anyone
buying).
The
RIAA is (still) just a trade association. Their sole mission has always been to promote the financial interests of their corporate membership and nothing more. There is no desire for morality, consciousness, public interest, musicianship, or foresight into the future beyond their mission -stockholders. And in furthering their goals, the RIAA has made Al Capone's fondest
dreams come true.
What I'm saying is that there's a whole lot more grey areas with copyright problems than what media would like us to
think about. So far, all I've heard has been a (scary) one way monologue. I resent being called a
criminal for making (rather boring) personal
choices about what I want to see and hear. I am no more a "terrorist" or "anarchist" or "felon" than
90% of average people and more honest than those making these policies. To think otherwise is so laughable that I've wondered about my rights to civil disobedience. I don't like thinking about my music that way.
I am not saying that music blogs or downloading are the answer. They are little more than a needed reaction to level out an extreme situation like patch until the people we elect stop drinking the kool-aid. I see little signs of that happening anytime soon. This is not going to go away.
My own experience was that I became excited about music again after I discovered mp3 blogs. Before that, I had stopped paying attention because much of what I heard was junk. Most of the music I was introduced to on blogs, I never would have been exposed to anywhere else. That changed my musical taste dramatically, and not towards the commercial mainstream stuff. There goes that
argument. I'm not interested in downloading their stuff, even when it's free.
Despite their whining about
downloading music all these years, nothing has changed. I still can't get what I want, bands still don't get paid a fair share, and it's obvious, labels aren't going to change as long as changing laws and congress are cheaper. It is not the customer's fault that bands only get $.05 from every track downloaded at ITunes (< $1.00 per album) and yet people pay
hundreds for mp3 players. CDBaby and independent labels are doing fine, so the
economic demand does exist. Yet, Radiohead's online release of "In Rainbow's" didn't qualify as "legitimate sales" to be counted by RIAA.
There's just one thing the labels are right about - something is very
wrong. Only it's not the customer.
Even kids are smart enough to see through their
guerilla-like
tactics that labels are pushing junk. Eventually kids will also figure out that mp3's are lossy, and headphones or computer speakers are limited when they want to listen to something they haven't heard in ten years. Figuring that out is a part of growing up or recovering after their first hard drive crash, whichever comes first. Yet the labels don't have enough respect for their own
product to figure that out?
The labels want disposable music. They aren't interested in old music when they have new junk to sell us.
There has never been a time when the average college kid could afford to own more than a few cd's (or albums) and those were usually from trades. Not anything the RIAA would count in their "legitimate sales" figures. Sampling is little more than using what they have to make what they want. Instead of using trends, the labels
answered by making that
illegal -except, of course, when buying their "authorized" versions.
Who are they
kidding? Music has been
scapegoated for making
broad, sweeping
changes in privacy and copyright
laws for
everything else. The communication and technological
advances made in areas with less restrictive
copyrights are what we can only dream of anymore.
Meanwhile, I realize it's only because of efforts like Lost-In-Tyme's (and others) that our history, culture and choices in music haven't been lost. And loosing the music would have been the real crime.
That's why it's impossible to have too many music blogs and I promise this will be my longest post.
So enjoy!
IMI
This is a classic rarity that has a rock/blues sound similar to what I would expect from Eric Clapton with Cream. It seems this was the only release made by The Sacred Mushroom. There are excellent reviews at Amazon. The album has been unavailable for decades, but while I was poking around for more information, I was happy to discover one of the original band members has remastered it. You can buy it here, http://goshornbrothersmusic.com/GBB.htm. This is from the original vinyl.
