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They Might Be Giants Open Their Own Music Store
slothdog writes "They Might Be Giants have opened their own music store, featuring "highest quality" (256kbps LAME) un-DRM-encumbered mp3's. There are only two CDs currently available (at $0.99/song or $9.99/album), but presumably more will be added as time goes on. Looks like a great way to directly support the artists."
please do not trade them with your friends or post them on-line as this service is how we are making a living
I hope they don't honestly expect to make a living selling a handful of $0.99 cent tracks.
I hope they don't honestly think that people aren't going to trade them with their friends.
I hope they realize their terms of use is 404.
Disclaimer: I never really got into TMBG (read: I don't like them).
I hope more artists go down the same path.
I haven't purchased a TMBG album since FLOOD (a lifetime ago, I know), but was ready to purchase both the albums just to show support. The little help window mentioned specific browser versions needed on Windows and Mac, and I would have preferred to either see Linux mentioned in that window, or some explanation as to why specific versions were necessary to download. Not sure what would happen with Mozilla, so I figure I'll wait until someone posts here.
I also didn't like the '6 hour time window' in which to download my purchase... I'd like more time to resolve any issues that might come up doring download - in fact, I'd like them to create an account for me, and let me download them at any time - and possibly again in the future if for some reason I lose them.
I'm not keen on giving out my credit card number to every single band's website. I've enjoyed lots of music I bought via Bitpass and have found the process to be easy and fast. I've even got a few bucks left in my account earmarked for the next indie band I like.
If you're going to set up a store, please make Bitpass one of your payment options. Thanks.
less people will know that They Might Be Giants have their own stuff.
They would almost certainly be more profitaable in the long haul even if they get less from iTunes/Apple, but I guess having the two is a good idea too.
They seem to be on all the major online stores and have their own - good move.
What they should do is offer a discount of whatever they get from iTunes/Apple for those that have bought iTunes Music Store Songs.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
I realize that simplicity in pricing is their goal, but it seems odd that little between track oddities lasting 34 seconds are priced the same as a 'real' song.
TMBG put on the most entertaining concert I've ever attended. The skit with the puppet heads in the spotlight 15 feet over the stage was a scream. And lugging the glockenspiel all the way to Colorado for one note during one song was a nice touch.
My band has given away online tunes free for a couple of years now. At least you can play it through the site, you can probably figure out how to save them with a bit of geekery and craftiness, I am sure.
Despite giving away the music, we get at least a couple of CD sales through the internet every week!
Karma seems to be working in this case, because people often email in and say they heard the band on the radio, loved the music, did a web search, listened to a lot of the tunes, and wanted to own a copy for themselves or as a gift.
Not sure if this will work in 5 years if people don't buy CDs any more, but it's working for us at the moment.
Shameless plug - go to www.oninvisiblewings.com to see what I mean. If you listen to some tunes and decide to buy the album, then you will have proved the theory! A good intoduction the music is A Formidable Marinade.
Regards,
The Baron von Babyface
(with the face of a boy on the body of a middle-aged man)
baron@oninvisiblewings.com
Wasn't that The Safety Dance by Men Without Hats?
Slashdot is proof that Sturgeon's Law applies to mankind.
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why can't these music stores use a more superior format. they can then give more bang for your bitrate. they still stick with the old mp3.
First of all Mp3 is the format with the widest support -- period. You may not like this but it's reality. Secondly this is a small store run by the group, it's a bit unrealistic to expect them to support multiple formats. Thirdly we should be thankful they're releasing them in a format that doesn't have DRM restrictions. If they were using DRM restricted files I'm quite sure everyone would be complaining about that instead.there are portable vorbis players out there, we need more online stores now.
well, if they don't want to, nothing we can do about it.
Ogg's a nice format (for audio, I have had nothing but problems with it in video files) but it's support is still limited. You really can't expect a small store like this to support it. (Well you can expect it but realistically it's probably not going to happen). There's nothing wrong with promoting the format and hoping it's more widely adopted but until it is online music stores won't support it. It's a bit of a chicken or the egg problem.
Sadly this is more often than not the case. Recording contracts are generally "contractual work" and due to recent changes that were snuck into U.S. copyright law this definition is now binding. If the artists did this for a record label they'll never own it, and have to pay to sell their own music. Which would be such a horrible shame.
I don't know what sort of label TMBG played under, so this may not be the case. They may be free to sell their music whenever they want, and are just starting slowly. I sure hope so.
The Cheese Stands Alone.
Makes a lot of sense to get rid of DRM since people can already buy audio CDs anyway which are DRM free. And might as well sell it in a format currently most popular amongst consumers, mp3, although I wish they'd also sell it in AAC format (comparable audio quality takes up less space on my hard drive).
Regarding other artists that also give away free mp3s, I find a lot of artists on the Kill Rock Stars label give away free full length mp3s, especially Stereo Total (factsheet) and DeerHoof (factsheet, Puzzling Music Archive).
but I really wish someone would get up and offer unencoded raw music files. At 48,000kbps sampling rate. This lets me choose what lossy format I want to use, and I would seriously start buying entire albums like candy.
Slashdot is proof that Sturgeon's Law applies to mankind.
I just bought it for a few reasons:
1) I like TMBG.
2) It helps support the artist very effectively.
3) If enough people buy it, it will send a message to the RIAA that selling unencumbered MP3s is a better business than selling all these DRMed tunes.
By the way, no problems during the download process. Very easy, but not as seemless as iTMS. Still fun, and I was happy enough spending the $10.
You should also be aware seminal european electronic music label Warp Records does much the same thing with their catalog.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
Fortunately we have independent artists like TMBG who do own their own music.
Independent...as in...they don't have a label.
They're not just starting to release their music. They've been doing it for a while.
The RIAA doesn't represent the entire music buisness. Go check out cdbaby.com where other indie musicians are releasing their own work, without a contract.
You don't need a label to sing a song. (or be good at singing a song.)
And while we're on the subject of labels and contracts and stuff, let me just plug this now famous document in case you haven't read it: http://www.negativland.com/albini.html
For those that care, Leo Laporte of Techtv(now G4Techtv) created the dial-a-song system using a linux box and perl.
Also, Leo is bringing back the show Call For Help, but only for Techtv Canada.
Emusic used to have a TMBG "boutique" which also featured special free bonuses (no purchase necessary) every month.
They still have an extensive catalog of TMBG, where you can get Canstantinople, Birdhouse in your Soul and Particle Man (all of them on Severe Tire Damage but there's no more boutique, which may be part of the reason TMBG wanted to move on.
According to EncSpot, Emusic is not doing shabby encodes:
Birdhouse in your Soul.mp3
(bitrate graph defeated by LAMEness filter - now that's ironic...or is it apt?)
Type: mpeg 1 layer III
Bitrate: 203
Mode: joint stereo
Frequency: 44100 Hz
Frames: 7351
Length: 00:03:12
Av. Reservoir: 73
Emphasis: none
Scalefac: 29.8
Bad Last Frame: no
Encoder: Lame 3.92
Lame Header:
Quality: 78
Version String: Lame 3.92
Tag Revision: 0
VBR Method: vbr-old / vbr-rh
Lowpass Filter: 19000
Psycho-acoustic Model: nspsytune
Safe Joint Stereo: yes
nogap (continued): no
nogap (continuation): no
ATH Type: 4
ABR Bitrate: Unknown
Noise Shaping: 2
Stereo Mode: Joint Stereo
Unwise Settings Used: no
Input Frequency: 44.1kHz
--[ EncSpot Console 2.0 ]--[
http://www.guerillasoft.com ]--
It's not 256kbps, but my dsl is slow enough that I prefer Emusic's compact VBR downloads. The 3 minute song is 4.66 megabytes, about 50% larger than the 128kbps file they used to distribute.
Anyway, this new TMBG "boutique" is no more "direct from the artist" than Emusic was. The people behind this site are Back Office Music, the same guys who developed the Primus "Boutique." All they've done is change digital labels, really, though I think the "personal service" they're getting from BOM is better for them.
I survived the Dick Cheney Presidency 7 to 9 AM 7-21-07
but on a side note, they picked an unusual port (8543) to run their secure server. This means a small percentage of users won't be able to use their site.
Hell, I've heard demo-tapes from the 70's that sound better than actual albums. But the catch was, you could have a KILLER tape, but no way to distribute it.
/. when these topics come up. Usually, the focus is on copyright and the lock the major content providers have on copyright law through their bought and paid for congress-critters. The fix is definitely in.
So so so true. I've been saying this for several years on
But there is hope, because the copyright really belongs to the artist, as long as the artist doesn't sell it.
In the past, major content providers (news, music, movies) have had near monopolies because they controlled two things--
1. What got produced
2. What got distributed
Making good recordings was very expensive. You had to have special studios with special equipment for every step of the process.
Besides the costs of recording, there were the costs of actually producing the physical media. Vinyl LP's were pressed in factories where the initial setup was such that you had to press a LOT of copies to justify the setup costs.
And finally, you had to have a distribution channel to get the finished product out into record stores.
That's all gone now-- A guy in his mother's basement could do it all with a $1k computer. Studio, cd factory, worldwide advertising via his website, free samples, downloadable songs, fan club, book tour dates, the works. One single modest computer can do it all.
I could record a song this morning at this desk, mix it, and distribute it free worldwide by this afternoon. In 1990 that would have been incomprehensible science fiction.
Send lawyers, guns, and money. Dad, get me out of this.