Slashdot Mirror

Why buy no CDs at all, instead of buying from independent labels like these that don't sue people for downloading their music? And if none of those record labels have music that suits your tastes (I'll admit I lean towards hipster garbage in music taste), check RIAA Radar before you buy.

Because a non-essential, impulse purchase is stifled by a "mother may I?" check?

For most people on slashdot, the RIAA is just a justification to make themselves feel better about downloading instead of buying.

No, the reason we don't buy CDs is because of network effects. Once we stopped buying and looking at the big label CDs we had much incentive to go to a music store to look at the other 1% or whatever (by volume).

For example, since CompUSA and Circuit City both went down the drain, I go to BestBuy and GameStop LESS often to look at stuff. Taking a trip for just one store isn't worth it to browse. This is why malls and shopping centers are good for business.

Personally, I think I've bought 5 CDs since Napster was shut down - 2 of those for the DVD with the videos, 2 japanese sountracks and a musical for my gf. I don't illegally download it, or buy it online now, I just don't bother with music. If I listened to music even a tenth as much as I used to, I would buy a Zune and a Zune pass and get it there.

Why buy no CDs at all, instead of buying from independent labels like these that don't sue people for downloading their music? And if none of those record labels have music that suits your tastes (I'll admit I lean towards hipster garbage in music taste), check RIAA Radar before you buy.

For most people on slashdot, the RIAA is just a justification to make themselves feel better about downloading instead of buying.

Not purchasing any CDs is stupid if you also avoid buying them from non-RIAA labels. That said, there are a number of labels I like that provide non-RIAA music.

Also: I'll probably be modded down now for suggesting that you should buy music instead of pirate it.

Other than my subscription to eMusic, I pretty much only buy music direct-from-the-artist. This usually includes getting a record (on vinyl) at shows, which hopefully includes mp3 downloads that labels like Merge and Sub Pop include with their LPs. I also bought the Radiohead record (at $5) online.

I see 2 benefits to this approach:

1. (I like to think) artists get more from the sale than they would if I bought it from a shop.
2. The labels that make up the RIAA get less (if any) money from the sale. (I usually only go to shows of bands on independent labels - "safe" on the RIAA Radar).

The largest sellers of music are Amazon, Walmart, and iTunes. iTunes and Amazon will take indie music, and sell it on an equal footing with everything else. And while I'm not familiar with Walmart, I doubt they're in the pocket of the record labels.

The RIAA doesn't have a monopoly on production. Any fool with a computer can do a professional-quality job. These people just can't consistently do it as well as the top names in production, it's quite naturally led to an economics of scarcity.

Really what posts like yours show just how effective the RIAA is, and why it continues to exist even though every artist knows it's a Faustian deal, and every artist knows their alternatives. People like you may gripe about the RIAA, but really you're not interested in the large majority of music being created today that isn't RIAA, you just want the well-advertised, well-produced product that RIAA labels pump out. Nothing wrong with that, but blaming the RIAA for your not being willing to check out the many easily-available alternatives is ass-backwards.

Other independant labels are doing this as well. http://www.subpop.com/

I think it's fantastic considering some of my favorite bands produce beautiful artwork that makes for cool record sleves. I often end up buying the album on cd only to buy the vynal for looks.

As of the last few months, I almost never buy CDs anymore---- I'm lucky enough to have a great record store (Amoeba) that sells lots of new vinyl, and now I only buy records that include a download of the album. Recent LP+MP3 purchases include:

Ted Leo: Living with the Living
Low: Drums and Guns
Coco Rosie: The Adventures of Ghosthorse & Stillborn (sorry, Flash, but pretty)
Of Montreal: Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?
Blonde Redhead: 23
M. Ward: Post-War


I totally cannot tell you how much better it feels to spend my $12.99 on an LP than a cheap, disposable CD that becomes garbage after I import it.

And the best part is I'm selling Amoeba all my CDs to pay for it all!

Sub Pop Records sells vinyl directly. They've released albums by Nirvana, Soundgarden, L7, The Jesus and Mary Chain, The Shins, The Postal Service, and more artists. When you buy a record from them that was released in 2007 or later, you get free downloads of all the songs. So you don't even need the USB port.

I read through that article and it just sounds like one pretentious blogger's disdain for Microsoft. Let's run through all the things that got this fast-tracked to Slashdot:

• Early mention of Steve Ballmer throwing a chair as a microcosm of Microsoft's supposed corporate culture
• Rampant grammer* and spelling errors overshadowed by a blind sense of faith in the Linux community. Example: "The Linux community will publish every vulnerability, regardless of it's criticality, but the chances that a hacker will even choose to expliot those vulnerabilities is very low, (unnecessary comma) since most of them are of low criticality and it would be stupid to do so, anyways." So people don't attack Linux because "it would be stupid to do so." Thank you.
• The actual "Executable Internet" isn't mentioned until the second-to-last paragraph: "The only reason a version of Windows that runs from the Internet would even exist would be because there is competition. Microsoft simply does not have enough fists to punch every opponent; resulting in a poorly designed operating platform and ignorant users who don't know the difference between WEP and WPA and those who are also accustomed to having Viagara advertisements greet them every time they boot their computers." Seems like this man is more upset that the hoi polloi use Linux than that Microsoft doesn't care about security.

This is pure Linux-user elitism, the sort of smug "Our Opponent Just Doesn't Get It; We Do; and We're Smarter Than You" attitude that loses political battles and makes the arguer only look like a pretentious fool in the eyes of the skeptic.

I dislike Microsoft as much as the next Slashdot user but this article is awful: it simply slams Microsoft as the Big Corporate Machine with quotes like "Microsoft does not publish all their security vulnerabilities because other executive stockholders, whom are also ignorant would become worried and eventually begin to question the platform's security." If I wanted to hear ramblings about the willfully ignorant I'd listen to a David Cross album.

• The Decemberists {VERY highly recommended)
• Bloc Party
• Iron & Wine
• The Postal Service
• Fruit Bats
• Andrew Bird
• Los Straitjackets
• Neko Case
• Astaire
• Damien Rice
• Harvey Danger (in case you missed the story on them here a couple days back about them releasing their latest CD as a completely free download... OGG format and all!)

• The Decemberists
• Bloc Party
• Iron & Wine
• The Postal Service
• Fruit Bats
• Andrew Bird
• Los Straitjackets
• Neko Case
• Astaire
• Damien Rice

You can buy a digidesign Mbox factory package for $550

So, for more than twice as much, you can get something different. You don't say. Sure, the Mbox is a good package, but $500 is still a lot of money, and ProTools LE is not even remotely as easy to use as GarageBand.

I mean, ProTools is the industry standard for digital audio recording and editing for a reason.

And that reason is inertia, more than anything else. ProTools is good, yeah, but that doesn't mean it's the best for everyone in all cases. There's a lot of different software on the market for a reason.

Then again, I suppose any "musician" who buys Garage Band isn't exactly looking to take their tracks to a real engineer or shop their creation around to record companies, and more than "graphic artists" who use MS Paint would take their creations to a printing press.

Why didn't you just say "I've never used GarageBand, so I don't get it."? Comparing it to MS Paint is absolutely rediculous. If you really want an analogy, I'd say it's more like Adobe Photoshop Elements. It's the home game of the pro app.

I've always seen GarageBand as the digital equivalent to the sub-$200 4-track tape recorder (a sub-$200 interface, like Apple's, will cement this analogy). There's a huge number of successful musicians out there that got started on a 4-track -- a lot of a lot of beautiful albums that were recorded on them (Iron & Wine's The Creek Drank The Cradle is a recent example), and a lot of happy users.

I'm also troubled by your implication that a musician that uses GarageBand is a "musician", somehow different than a person that uses ProTools. A talented musician will sound good on both. A skilled graphic artist could definitely make something worthwhile in MS Paint. They wouldn't, because MS Paint is crap, but the point is that it's the artist that creates the art, the tool is just a tool, good or bad.

... instead of the bugs which cause any analysis of Freenet itself to be inaccurate.

I think you meant 'unfair' instead of 'inaccurate'. And that still sounds weird. Imagine a benchmark test that came out, showing Intel's newest processor to suck due to a bug. Would you buy Intel saying "yeah, but if you ignore the bug, it rocks"?

BTW and OT but if you folks haven't seen the Postal Service's video for D.C. Sleeps alone tonight, check it out here (http://www.subpop.com/scripts/main/bands_page.php ?id=412) under Multimedia. Reminds you of when MTV used to matter.

If you are going to link to a Pitchfork Parody site, at least link to the best (and original) one, over at SubPop.

Instead of writing crappy music and trying to be superstars by selling their souls to the record company, maybe they could try writing honest music and making an honest living off it. It is possible.

Agreed.

I actually listen to many of the bands you gave as examples.

To add to your post, SubPop Records is putting out a lot of good stuff, as is SaddleCreek Records. If you're into tougher stuff, you could always check out Bridge Nine Records, but I doubt that many people on here would like those bands.

You can also find some pretty interesting music on college radio stations, and NPR plays a lot of really good folk music.

Now I feel like a character off of High Fidelity

An okay list.. Here's some dead fscking brilliant bands including recommended songs.

Cuff the Duke Ballad of a Lonely Construction Worker

Julie Doiron Gone Gone, The Longest Winter

Eric's Trip Anytime You Want, Behind the Garage, Frame, Follow, Girlfriend, My Chest is Empty, Spring, Viewmaster

The Flashing Lights A Day Like That, Friends You Learn to Hate, High School, Keep It To Yourself, Where do the Days Go?

Jale Not Happy, Over You

Joel Plaskett Come On Teacher, Mystery and Crime, True Patriot Love, Unconditional Love

The New Pornographers Letter From an Occupant, The Body Says No

The Salteens Let Go of Your Bad Days, Kelly Nicoll, Nice Day, The Best Thought

Sloan Autobiography, C'mon C'mon, Coax Me, G Turns To D, Gimmie That, I Hate My Generation, On The Horizon, People of the Sky, Take Good Care of the Poor Boy, The Good in Everyone, The Line You Amend, The Rest of My Life

Thrush Hermit At My Expense, Before You Leave, Darling Don't Worry, From the Back of the Film, Songs for the Gang, The Day We Hit The Coast

Weakerthans Leash, Watermark

Young and Sexy Ella, The City You Live in is Ugly

Zumpano Behind the Beehive, The Party Rages On

An okay list.. Here's some dead fscking brilliant bands including recommended songs.

Cuff the Duke Ballad of a Lonely Construction Worker

Julie Doiron Gone Gone, The Longest Winter

Eric's Trip Anytime You Want, Behind the Garage, Frame, Follow, Girlfriend, My Chest is Empty, Spring, Viewmaster

The Flashing Lights A Day Like That, Friends You Learn to Hate, High School, Keep It To Yourself, Where do the Days Go?

Jale Not Happy, Over You

Joel Plaskett Come On Teacher, Mystery and Crime, True Patriot Love, Unconditional Love

The New Pornographers Letter From an Occupant, The Body Says No

The Salteens Let Go of Your Bad Days, Kelly Nicoll, Nice Day, The Best Thought

Sloan Autobiography, C'mon C'mon, Coax Me, G Turns To D, Gimmie That, I Hate My Generation, On The Horizon, People of the Sky, Take Good Care of the Poor Boy, The Good in Everyone, The Line You Amend, The Rest of My Life

Thrush Hermit At My Expense, Before You Leave, Darling Don't Worry, From the Back of the Film, Songs for the Gang, The Day We Hit The Coast

Weakerthans Leash, Watermark

Young and Sexy Ella, The City You Live in is Ugly

Zumpano Behind the Beehive, The Party Rages On

An okay list.. Here's some dead fscking brilliant bands including recommended songs.

Cuff the Duke Ballad of a Lonely Construction Worker

Julie Doiron Gone Gone, The Longest Winter

Eric's Trip Anytime You Want, Behind the Garage, Frame, Follow, Girlfriend, My Chest is Empty, Spring, Viewmaster

The Flashing Lights A Day Like That, Friends You Learn to Hate, High School, Keep It To Yourself, Where do the Days Go?

Jale Not Happy, Over You

Joel Plaskett Come On Teacher, Mystery and Crime, True Patriot Love, Unconditional Love

The New Pornographers Letter From an Occupant, The Body Says No

The Salteens Let Go of Your Bad Days, Kelly Nicoll, Nice Day, The Best Thought

Sloan Autobiography, C'mon C'mon, Coax Me, G Turns To D, Gimmie That, I Hate My Generation, On The Horizon, People of the Sky, Take Good Care of the Poor Boy, The Good in Everyone, The Line You Amend, The Rest of My Life

Thrush Hermit At My Expense, Before You Leave, Darling Don't Worry, From the Back of the Film, Songs for the Gang, The Day We Hit The Coast

Weakerthans Leash, Watermark

Young and Sexy Ella, The City You Live in is Ugly

Zumpano Behind the Beehive, The Party Rages On

Perfect the hipster / neo-lounge scene of a few years ago, that I hear is now making a comeback. That's the perfect settings for some dry martinis (martinis are made with gin, btw) and some Combustible Edison.

It's a great album. Captures everything they were about in their prime. It's not the best recording I've heard, but it's more than OK and I'm guessing the've made their $600 back.

But other forms of music require a bit more than a four track and a couple of cheap guitars. Into techno/electronic music? Expect to spend more $$$ getting that to sound right. Jazz can probably be done cheaply. Point and record is how the best sounding recordings are generally done.

IMO, any band that spends millions on recording is trying to get something that just isn't there. If you can't capture the essence of what your band is for far less money, then I suggest that the recording process is being used to hide the band's shortcomings.

-S

A boycott wouldn't do much because almost no one would bother with it. Instead, try having a day or a week of protests - picketing outside theaters, chain record stores (Best Buy, Tower, Virgin, HMV, et al). That would be great because it's actually somewhat realistic and unlike simply not buying things, it sends a clear a direct message to the companies that people are pissed off at them, while it also educates consumers who don't know any better.

Of course you could always try buying indie music as well, though some have major label distributors, you can always find others.

Try reading the Subpop Demo Tape Policy. The problem isn't with the record labels; the problem is that your band sucks.

Well, it's probably easier to list the RIAA members, since there's so many of them. You can find a list right here.

But if you're looking for a great non-RIAA label, I'd check out Sub Pop Records, based out of Seattle. They're a widely-recognized non-RIAA label (they're very big on the college radio circuit) who was responsible for the popularity of Nirvana, Soundgarden, and Mudhoney. Their music is worth a listen if you love grunge rock, I'd recommend the Sub Pop 200 compilation for starters.

--

I remember being thoroughly excited when David Bowie released a single exclusively online through N2K Inc., aka owners of Music Boulevard that merged with CDnow in 1999. I thought, this is it, the prices of CD burners are going to come down and soon I'm going to be able to buy music off of the internet directly from the artists and say bye-bye to record company price monopolies that maintain exorbitant CD prices when CDs are actually cheaper to produce than cassette tapes. Yet, that day is still not here because the record companies are making sure it doesn't happen.

I stopped working as a contract Audio Producer for a big company once I discovered the horrifying draconian contracts they were having the artists whose work we recorded and used online sign - the artists had to completely give up all rights to their own work. I mean, all of them as in the company holds all exclusive rights.

Part of the justification for this was because the company didn't want to have to deal with figuring out the royalties of music being accessed online. What if the user doesn't have a sound card or doesn't have their speakers turned up? How do you determine how many people really listened to the music on that page? So the company just followed the lead of the record industry - when in doubt, leave the artist out. Foolishly, I even did some composition work for the company before fully realizing what I had given up. Random note: my manager at the company was incredibly conscientious about seeing that contract artists received proper payment and credit for their work and was constantly struggling to have the contracts changed.

My point, (do I have one?), is that the record companies are not going to give up their monopoly. Furthermore, artists know that record companies have the marketing muscle and radio station influence to get them known and their music heard. And the record companies require that they pay for that influence, dearly. The only real solution is for artists to not go through the major record companies at all and either use smaller labels, like Sub Pop and Peerless Music, or do it themselves.

- tokengeekgrrl
"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions

Not only did Tom Waits recently say that he'd commit to Epitaph (I believe the recent quote was that they are "a bunch of dedicated guys who actually care about the music that they're producing"), but Epitaph has been stretching its fingers past the "punk" scene: into blues and folk. So this doesn't just mean that punk will become readily accessable, but so will other genres.

MP3s for sale, well, I support, but I don't think they're the hottest idea. I've always been a big fan of music in general, and therefore a big "try before you buy" advocate. Sell the songs for 99 cents and you might have some buyers, but drop the bitrate or dub them to mono and put 'em out for free and you'll get a following. How many times have we heard Hip Song X on the radio, said, "Oh, I'll buy that album," then found out the album sucks, or the band is overproduced and can't play three chords live, or some other horrible situation? The way I see it is that MP3s are a nice way to reintroduce musicianship and integrity to the industry, things which have long gone unrecognized. They allow independant artists who are talented to get recognized and popular artists to have a chance to truly prove their worth. It's been said millions of times: set the water level and society will swim to meet it. Now we can hear Hip Song X on the radio and then go and find the rest of the album somewhere to determine whether or not its worth our $13.99 or greater. If it isn't, oh well. That band will have their moment and then fade away, perhaps faster than usual. However, if it truly is a great record that deserves notice, it will be noticed and bought and exhalted, despite what the big six and other critics think.

I'm just ranting, really, at this point, and we all know the virtues of MP3s. Epitaph is taking a step in the right direction. Now if Matador and Merge (Superchunk's label, with Neutral Milk Hotel, Rocket From The Crypt, Portastatic, Magenetic Fields, Ladybug Transistor, and Third Eye Foundation, amongst others) and Touch & Go (Jesus Lizard, Blonde Redhead) and SubPop (a whole buncha bands, even though the label tends to get sneered at) and, hell, Grand Royal (Beastie Boys' label, now with Lucious Jackson, Ben Lee, Butter 08, and some other fairly hip groups) would open up and do the same thing, we'd really be cooking with gas. Show the RIAA just what they're up against.