 |
|
|
 |
|
What's your reaction to this column? Share your thoughts on the MESSAGE BOARD
Also From Modern Humorist: Colin Powell's Pop Pals Dear Dick: A Letter From George W. Boredom in the Court Behind the Music Napsteropoly Macdonna's Wedding Box Set of the Year Rock 'n' Roll Factory Worker Phish Fan Resume |
|
Insidious Virus Tells All! by C. Bottomley The Grammys show may be pop's greatest night each year, but God, it sure can be boring. U2 bellowing "Walk On"? Christina and company shrieking "Lady Marmalade," Train grunting through "Drops of Jupiter"? Haven't we seen all this stuff somewhere before? Last Wednesday night, after having a smile raised by Bob Dylan's snarl during some antique blues and Outkast's attempt to go 'round the world in a song, my attention had drifted to my computer and in particular, downloading an MP3 of Ludacris rapping "You's a Ho." Then Michael Greene, president/CEO of the National Academy of the Recording Arts and Sciences, delivered his usual self-congratulatory pat on the back. Ironies of ironies, that Ludacris bass rumble drowned out one of the show's most passionate performances. Greene was indicting scalawags for using the modern world's heavily-marketed CD burners and ultra popular file-sharing software. Message? Music lovers were killing music. Greene had barely welcomed the room full of millionaires and radio contest winners before he stuck in the knife. "The most insidious virus in our midst is the illegal downloading of music on the Net," he proclaimed. "This illegal file-sharing and ripping of music files is pervasive, out of control and oh so criminal. Many of the nominees here tonight, especially the new, less-established artists, are in immediate danger of being marginalized out of our business. Ripping is stealing their livelihood one digital file at a time, leaving their musical dreams haplessly snared in this World Wide Web of theft and indifference." Greene then introduced "three college-age students" who, under the auspices of NARAS, had spent the last two days downloading nearly 6000 songs off file-sharing services like Morpheus and Gnutella - an object lesson at how easy the delivery system is to use. Greene named names in his stats spiel. "Students" and "computer users," who are often the very same people, downloaded 3.6 billion songs every month. One phrase conspicuously missing from the tirade was "music lovers," and while I fully expect to be clapped into irons for downloading the entirety of Accept's Staying a Life last June, I'd like to take the opportunity of addressing the court of opinion. Greene's outburst had more behind it than a mere 40 billion songs per year being enjoyed gratis. 2001 was a stretch of rocky road for the record industry - or rather a year in which the free market system didn't do for them what it was supposed to: generate a proper profit. On February 25, the Recording Industry Association of America reported that the dollar value of all music product shipped fell to $13.7 billion from $14.3 billion the previous year. Said industry also has a revolt on its hands. Don Henley and Sheryl Crow have enlisted other big-name pop people into the Recording Artists Coalition, a lobbying organization for musicians' rights - in other words, a union for rock stars. Scoff if you will, but there has been increasing dissent between artists and their labels. Over the last few years, the likes of Beck, Courtney Love, Backstreet Boys, and the Dixie Chicks have sued to get out of their contracts. Combine poor profits with antsy musicians muttering about turning free agents, releasing their music on the Net and keeping the cash from the middleman, and you've got T-R-O-U-B-L-E. And guess what? The music industry really has no one but itself to blame for the current crisis. Why do music lovers use Morpheus, Gnutella, and other sites to download music? Start with the culture of immediacy put in place by the general velocity of mass media. If we want something, we want it now. If I'm at work and need to hear Lee Marvin croaking "Wanderin' Star," why not see if someone else in the world has an MP3 they're willing to share? The option is going to a record store, getting a blank stare, and, after a quick check on the computer, learning that they don't stock the Paint Your Wagon soundtrack. So the MP3-swapping system works as both a clandestine music library and instant pleasure machine. Manna abounds. Friends of mine have experienced hardened nipples upon finding obscure and historic Bob Dylan live tracks. When I wanted to hear a preview of Oasis' new song "The Hindu Times," to the Net I went - and though I struggled to make out the tune from a badly bootlegged sound file, sated I was. An English pal has been buzzing about the new dance acts like So Solid Crew and the Streets, but you can't buy their music in the United States. Thanks to the Internet, however, they land on my doorstep. Even Greene's finger-pointing speech is there. You might say it's like visiting the Library of Congress every day, or even a secondhand bookstore - where, by the way, books are sold every day without authors or publishers ever seeing a penny. I'll hedge on the usual argument used by MP3 thieves, who claim they use the Internet to preview music they plan on buying. I tend not to buy CDs I can rip. Why? Because I'd be dropping hundreds a week I can't afford. I'm a music addict, but I have to wonder whether $20 is really a fair price to pay for something like Def Leppard's Pyromania. If that album was a book, it would now be available in a cheap reprint. Instead, it's still selling at premium prices. Why? Because record labels are all too aware that consumers can fiend for music like Snoop Dogg does for weed - and if you want something badly enough, you can rationalize parting with any amount of Washingtons, Jacksons and Benjamins. A single CD can cost the same as subscribing to 30 days of HBO, as much as two or more movie tickets, and according to the back of Reader's Digest, feeding an orphan for a full month. That's downright grotesque. Ever since CDs were introduced in the early Ô80s, the price of the new technology has been artificially inflated and steadily rising, whereas the more recent innovation of the DVD can retail for as low as $10. The CD invention also allowed the music industry to wrest control of the supply after the "home taping is killing music" scare of 1983. Like a wise dealer, they changed the way the drug was consumed and leaked it out to us in slow increments. Collectors who wanted to replace their scratchy vinyl couldn't just go out and buy new vinyl, like replacing an old jacket with a modern blazer. They had to go out and buy an entirely new suit. And if you want a stellar item such Neil Young's On The Beach, well, it just isn't available. The consumer has been made to pay twice for something cherished, and you can't blame them for thinking twice about coughing up again. Before Michael Greene demands to see my doctoral thesis and sends the police in to my local university to rip hard drives from the computers, allow me to unleash my inner curmudgeon. People just might be buying less music nowadays because much of it simply isn't very good. Mariah Carey's Glitter soundtrack was the most glaring incident of an artist being rejected for making crappy tracks, but how much longer are we going to put up with stale spins on either Pearl Jam (I won't even insult your intelligence by naming the culprits here) or even Lifehouse (whoops, couldn't resist)? I hope when Greene went backstage and loosened his collar a little bit, he not only let off some steam, but also spent some time watching his own show. Sure, there was U2 flogging a record that is now two years old. But one of the evening's big winners demonstrated a lot that's wrong with the industry. Say what you like, but for the O Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack, a collection of re-spun old time country music, to win the Album of the Year is as cataclysmic an event as if the same award was given to the Sex Pistols' Nevermind the Bollocks. In part the album was embraced because of broad audience demands to feel something real; evidently listeners believed they found that reality in ancient tunes composed by rural folks, initially recorded when an artist's primary impulse was filling a dancehall of like-minded souls and leaving with the proceeds in their back pocket. So when Green starts administering penicillin, I'll hope he'll think about maybe healing himself as well. Yes, downloading is theft, but in the same way that the Boston Tea Party might be considered vandalism. It's a crime being committed by people who are still passionate about the music in the face of an industry that has nothing but contempt for artists and consumers. And if love is a virus, is that really such a bad thing. |
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
