[Genteel Death]

What I dislike the most about downloading is the culture it created. Because paying for music is seen more and more like a gesture deserving contempt (hello Derek), you now have a trillion musicians constantly throwing their product at you, often with nothing more than a posterior- licking review that in 90% of cases is so aridly devoid of any critical objectivness, it makes you feel like really downloading the thing and let your ears do the judgement. I could name countless reviews that fooled me that way, being an enthusiast and all that. Doing the job of selling your own music and promoting it is stressful enough as it is; reducing a musician to acts of desperation worthy ofa fruit and veg merchant trying to sell the last few rotting oranges at closing time progressively cheapens the experience and demotivates any creative skill that once might have been there. And what sort of fan do you end up with? One that is so ''devoted'' to your craft, they expect the final product to appear on their hard drive free of charge. Until said ''fans'' get sick of it and move on to the ''tell the worldwide web how this record is shit'' phase. Which the artist won't have the time to follow, what with being too busy putting together their next 50 copy cdr release. And this without even mentioning that, as if by magic, self-contextualising your own music and working on its allure seems a vulgar attempt at self-promotion much more than yourself shoving product down people's throats. How odd.

[Dr. Eugene Felikson]

I'm surprised the music industry makes any money whatsoever aside from touring/live shows + merch.

[Adolfo]

spotify. discuss

[Decayed Rhapsody]

Originally Posted by Genteel Death

And this without even mentioning that, as if by magic, self-contextualising your own music and working on its allure seems a vulgar attempt at self-promotion much more than yourself shoving product down people's throats.

How so? What if someone wants to release their work for free? When you speak of allure, do you mean making oneself purposefully obscure? When does self-promotion of any kind turn into vulgarity?

[jonathan]

The Watcher: I disagree with this. If you go to shows, then you support the music industry in a more direct way financially than you would buying a record. Honestly, I don't see the music world changing all that much with the advent of downloading, only because art-rock fringe bands have always existed, and they always had to work day jobs and use their vacation time for touring. It's just the life and people dig it.

Decayed Rhapsody: Not sure what is vague about the notions I have put forth, but all I am saying is that it's possible to get paid playing shit you don't want to play. I'm not saying you're going to be loaded, but if you spend time practicing, and you're seeking monetary gain, you can get paid playing as long as you're playing what people want to hear. Really, nothing you said contradicted anything I said. I am in complete agreement. I just think it's important that if we're talking about paying musicians, that we frame this correctly, because it's totally possible to get paid playing music. By that same token, it's pretty much impossible to play music you wrote and are passionate about and get paid, just like it's always been.

[The Watcher]

Originally Posted by jonathan

I disagree with this. If you go to shows, then you support the music industry in a more direct way financially than you would buying a record.

Most bands get paid shit by venues too....... I guess if you're going and buying a t-shirt or whatever that helps them out directly but unless you live in a major city do you get to see all the bands you really like? Either way the bands are still working really hard to release an album and the what you're saying is "oh I can see them live so I have no issues stealing this"? I dunno man....... that's not exactly a valid justification in my mind..........

Originally Posted by jonathan

because art-rock fringe bands have always existed, and they always had to work day jobs and use their vacation time for touring. It's just the life and people dig it.

A) Just because it's always been that way doesn't mean the status quo is the way it should be. This isn't 1984 with Black Flag booking 6 month tours with a pay phone.

B) I don't think people actually do this scenario out of choice...... I've got two brothers who are aspiring or semi pro musicians, incredibly talented and both work in retail to pay their rent and do their main interest, music, on evenings and weekends because they aren't able to support themselves through music - and one of my brothers plays in a very successful band and 2 other moderately successful bands who gig all the time, have records out and actually tour frequently. None of this has even netted close to equating into a rent check at the end of the month. My other brother is more in Glice's situation and spends his time doing soundtrack work and other commercial stuff he has no interest in and still doesn't make that much money........ trust me they don't like doing this and neither do any of my other friends working shit jobs and relegating their band to a money losing hobby........ I mean shit, look at Aidan Baker - motherfucker makes so many awesome solo/Nadja records, records all the time, plays live constantly and still gets the royal shaft when it comes to getting paid, so much so that he moved to Berlin to pursue his career since any "hip" city in North America is so fucking cynical about music........

[The Watcher]

Originally Posted by Decayed Rhapsody

Was referring to jonathan's vague notion that playing in a live band is a "fantastic way" of making a living.

My apologies sir! I saw where "paying rent" came into play and I made a poor association.

[jonathan]

I guess all I'm saying is that even if you buy records, you're not really alleviating the situation. Really, Greg Ginn had to be in one of the most influential hardcore bands of all time, and then start one of the most influential independent record labels of all time to earn a decent living. These types of opportunities don't come around for everyone. Even if its not the way it should be, it's the way it is and it totally sucks. I'm not saying people do this day job/music thing out of choice, but they obviously dig their band and what their passionate to relegate it to a money losing hobby, right? If not, they wouldn't do it.

Really, if the situation is going to change, then major record labels need to disappear. They're the ones who have a monopoly on taste and culture and steal business away from people that actually care about what they're doing. If all the people that bought Lady Gaga's AND Miley Cirus's new CD put all of that money into the indie music scene, then I think we'd be having a very different discussion here. Obviously, that's not going to happen, but we ought to recognize who is hurting independent music, and it's definitely not the people who keep it alive.

[floatingslowly]

downloading brings me closer to the bands I love. thanks to peer-to-peer transfers, I can rest assured that just like me, 'bands' like uuuuu will ALWAYS have a day job (and that's what really helps the economy).

[The Watcher]

I got about halfway through the first one before I stopped reading...... you can justify it however you want with philosophical definitions of theft and ownership but if there's a band you really like and you can't be bothered to help them out by buying their record from them...... well that's just shitty...........

[Derek]

What I dislike the most about downloading is the culture it created. Because paying for music is seen more and more like a gesture deserving contempt (hello Derek)

I buy a lot of music.

[The Watcher]

Originally Posted by kinnikpasswordforgetter

i apologise if any of you got the impression that by posting that i was interested in reading your responses to it.

Well I don't believe that for a single second........

[The Watcher]

Originally Posted by kinnikpasswordforgetter

i don't like any bands, but if i did i would rob you and pay them with the plunder you fucking moron.

What an preposterous thing to say........

[jonathan]

Damn dude. Just... damn.

[Genteel Death]

Originally Posted by Decayed Rhapsody

How so? What if someone wants to release their work for free? When you speak of allure, do you mean making oneself purposefully obscure? When does self-promotion of any kind turn into vulgarity?

No, with working on your music's allure and self-contextualisation I mean attracting listeners to your work in a manner which employs more than just linking up to it on different websites. I'd like to see more musicians opening up a channel of communication between themselves and their audience, adding up to more than a mere breakdown of the styles they've been drawing from to create it or the instrumentation they've used. Only those who are clearly producing a body of work showing signs of lasting power should be able to afford that kind of elusiveness, I think. With accepting a culture that invites people to steal music and improvise themselves as critical apparatus for what they've stolen, you'll inevitably increment the chances of an objective music criticism suffering a blow at the hands of the defensive attitude scores of musicians will adopt when confronted on their motivations for creating it. I suppose what I was hinting at with my previous post is that a shit fan is more likely to make a shit critic, and so forth.

And, yes, there are musicians who don't need to do that because they still provide their audiences with what they expect from them, managing to succeed with high quality delivered. But let's face it, those are rare cases far from the norm. I am referring more to that dead zone which includes the so-called ''experimental'' community. Certainly not Odd Future, a collective more ambitious on their target audience than such and such drone/indie (whatever you want to call them) musician.

[Genteel Death]

Originally Posted by The Watcher

What an preposterous thing to say........

Trust me, you'd do better ignoring his posts. Unless you want to party.

[Genteel Death]

Originally Posted by Derek

I buy a lot of music.

So do I, if I quantify my record-buying habit myself.

[jonathan]

Honestly, Kinnik, the amount of self-loathing you must harbor is up on par with most Catholics.

[narlus]

Originally Posted by jonathan

I guess all I'm saying is that even if you buy records, you're not really alleviating the situation. Really, Greg Ginn had to be in one of the most influential hardcore bands of all time, and then start one of the most influential independent record labels of all time to earn a decent living.

didn't Ginn fuck over most of the bands he released records?

[keep poppin pimples]

Originally Posted by jonathan

My partner did give me a Bulgarian commie era pressing of the Beatles "Love Songs" two record compilation which I am quite excited to listen to here in a few months.

i have that same issue of it