Which Artists Support Music Swapping?

jtauber asks: "With RIAA's new campaign to 'educate' people that unauthorized downloads of music are illegal and with the range of artists who are endorsing the campaign, I thought it would be interesting to ask the question: which well-known artists (if any) go against the RIAA and are _in favour_ of music swapping? Certainly many unsigned bands like my own encourage it, but what about those signed with major record labels?" We did a question along a similar veign not too long ago, except its focus was non-RIAA Record Labels. What artists are you aware of (popular or not) who have come out in favor of music-swapping?

Comments

They don't face the risk

[nelsonal]

Most of the artists who came out against it in the early days, like Metallica, did so because studio tracks were being leaked before they had even been decided upon. Because they don't face a lot of risk from any potetial lost sales, or gains from additional sales, the sales aspect is not a big concern at least from what I have seen. I think if pre release tracks were not shared, most artists would not care. The artists coming out against sharing are probably doing it to please their contract holders.

And me!

[Pembers]

You can find four (count 'em!) complete and unrestricted songs by yours truly here. They're in RealAudio, I'm afraid; at the time I didn't know any better. I'll get around to replacing them with MP3s or OGGs one of these years. I'm too old and cynical for a career as a musician now, so do whatever you like with them, as long as you don't sell them or represent them as someone else's work. Ta!

Re:There are lots, for live music

[stubear]

There's a difference between taping the live show and ripping the CD and passing it around. First, fans have only been given permission to tape the show, something that won't likely be a huge seller anyway for most bands and if a song or two does happen to make it onto a compilation album at some point, these bootlegs won't affect sales of the compilation that much.

Second, the bootlegged recordings might be nice to listen to but they don't compare to being at a well produced concert. Good quality MP3 rips on the other hand can encapsulate the exact same experience the original CD does. The next step in P2P music swapping is to scan the liner notes and offer PDFs of them. After that what's the point of buying the CD?

People who go to concerts, even to record the show and pass it around (is it really bootleg is the bands allow it to happen?) People who download hundreds of MP3s are leeches.

a lot

[Antipop]

I think just about every single indie band supports it, or at least doesn't mind. The more people these bands can get their music out to the more people who will come to their shows. I know that I will look up show listings for my area, download some MP3s of the bands I haven't heard before, and make my decision as to who gets my money for that weekend.

I know I've heard a few bands say that turnout for shows in smaller cities has actually been getting better, and a lot of kids will say it's because they checked them out via MP3.

Leftover Salmon

[Llama Keeper]

Leftover Salmon those crazy "Polyethnic Cajun Slamgrass" musicians allow live taping of their shows and have several shows "off the board" up in MP3 format on their website here.

I think the majority of bands of the "jam band" genre are cool about low key bootlegging and people trading their music.
The local jam band from my whereabouts Toadstool Jamboree is pretty cool about bootlegging as well. I got permission to throw my DAT on the board at a couple of their shows.

I think its mostly the uptight corporate bands that have such an issue with people MP3'ing. Most of the lowerkey / unsigned / indie bands don't really make much off of CD Sales and aren't in music to make a bundle, rather they love entertaining and would rather you buy a t-shirt and pay admission to their show. They also manage themselves typically so they aren't getting screwed by industry insiders.

Just my Opinion, but check out Toadstool and LOS... rocking music, plus you get to say slamgrass :)