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Elton John Says Internet is Destroying Music
Jared writes "Elton John says that the internet is destroying good music and "stopping people from going out and being with each other, creating stuff." He laments the way that the internet and the emerging industry of digital music has created a cold and impersonal world for artists to create new music in."
And Video killed the Radio star too, eh?
In other news Music has stated that Elton John is destroying it.
Sir Elton may be right, but fundamentally, the Internet is far more valuable than the transient phenomenon of pop music. Most of yesterday's tastes are outdated now, and as for what survives, it's enough to tide us over until the Internet and the creative classes evolve to a more beneficial relationship with each other.
There's so many bands I wouldn't have started listening to if I hadn't heard samples or web broadcasts of them on the net. It's certainly broadened my musical taste having digital distribution of music so easily available.
Seriously I'm seeing acts both prosper and thrive due to the internet. Even the more established groups like They Might Be Giants have done well thanks to the internet in reaching their fans. If anything there's probably a larger danger of background noise in the amount of chaff produced, but seeing various internet "memes" pop up from time to time I'm confident that the good stuff will always rise to the top.
Taking an even more commercial example, I wouldn't have heard much about pop-artists like Rogue Traders unless I'd seen an excerpt of Dr. Who from the UK which lead me to wiki the Aus act and find more info than a lone single - which is only reaching US market AFTER 2 YEARS - would provide. The single is available from iTunes - but I'll eagerly await the full album.
In the retro column, 80s artist Thomas Dolby released a live set recorded in front of a live audience in San Francisco onto iTunes a while back. He's got several businesses and projects going but it's nice to see him quickly produce and bring to market (thanks to the internet) some new material. This wouldn't have gotten the time of day by the traditional business model.
Good riddance I say.
BTW - check out SeeqPod. It's cooler than snail snot and the mobile client is SWEET. I've not only found hard to finds, and music out of circulation, but excellent mash-ups that would NEVER BE ALLOWED TO BE DISTRIBUTED BY THE CURRENT OUTDATED RIAA BUSINESS MODELS.
what is he talking about
just because he doesn't understand how to use the internet to meet people, doesn't mean he can make stupid statements like this
I have an entire network of friends who, using only their computers, instruments of choice, and the internet, make great music between each other
we're literally friends, and this is real music
if anything the internet is what will finally set music free
giving everyone an equal chance to put their stuff up
it may dilute it all a bit (an effect I hope for with a lot of genres)
but in the end we'll have more options as listeners
and musicians will have more options for making money
Next week on slashdot: sculptors suggest we rip out highways so that people can better appreciate sculptures and fountains.
Right Sir Elton, i'd love to be able to afford to see my bands live, but most of them are assholes like you and charge $150 a ticket, hence it's not possible to see more then a couple a year at best.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
today's Britney crowd
In my opinion, the new music world should be about choice The internet creates choice. And if that internet destroys the musicindustry(I'm talking about formatted music like britney's) GOOD: bring on all the new types of music!
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
In the same way a judge was once ridiculed for asking "Who are the Beatles", but it was necessary because again they were being talked about in a trial, but anybody subsequently reading the trial report would not get a clue what "Beatles" were. Because of the way the British legal system works, on case law and precedent, judges have to assume that a judgement may be brought up many years in the future - when, say, the word "website" will be long gone but the thing itself still exists.
Incidentally, in that case the question did show that the lawyers on both sides were themselves unclear what they were talking about - not unusual in these cases.
Pining for the fjords
You mean Bernie Taupin writes songs that are autobiographical, about people that are important to him. It's Taupin that wrote all those love song lyrics of the past...usually written to his girlfriend at the time. Elton put them all to extremely beautiful music.
I know, you did say "things important to his lyricist"...but I just wanted to make sure Bernie Taupin's name got out there.
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
If only there was a period in history when the internet didn't exist, so we could make a comparison to it.
- So who did?
- Yes!
(Sorry.)
The rebirth of music, created by real human beings to be shared with real human beings, music that only represented the minority of content readily available in the 20th century will again become the majority and the only people to miss the parasitic music publishers will be the parasitic publisher executives.
Elton is just isolated by wealth and mass media manufactured fame, and is lamenting his lost ability to share the creative process with the grass roots artists, as he approaches his end of times. The Internet will usher in a new era of live music in preference to dead recordings.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Sure. Mozart had an impact. Then he died when he was thirty five. We'll never know if he was really any good because we'll never know whether the stuff he would have produced when he was fifty or sixty would be just as good.
Elton John is saying something much more interesting than the usual "file sharing is killing the music industry" line, and it's silly to dismiss him because he hasn't moved with the times onto hip-hop or something like that.
What he's saying is that the music industry is in a creative crisis, and that the source of that crisis is a kind of breakdown in communication between artist and artist and artist and audience. This really is a different take on the problem. What makes it an interesting (not necessarily correct) viewpoint is that our tools for communication are better than ever. However the time-shifting convenience of those tools make the communication less immediate, less in the moment. It's like a chess grandmaster who stops playing tournaments and stays at home playing against a computer. He can spend every waking moment now playing chess, but he is no longer contributing to chess culture.
Personally, I'm not sure I buy this. Have artists stopped playing in clubs? Or giving concerts?
I think the biggest problem in music, at least in the US, is the end of independent ownership and management of radio stations. Radio is the most important tool for disseminating musical innovation, and once the distribution channels are centrally controlled, innovation is squashed by corporate gatekeeper. There is less room for individual advocacy, as local management and jobs disappear to be replaced by robot stations playing a predetermined format. Go any place in the country, turn on the radio, and you get just varying proportions of the following formats: Pop hits, oldies, country, sports talk, right wing talk, Christian radio. It's like every restaurant in the country had to be a McDonalds, Red Lobster, KFC, or Chili's.
In this context, the crushing of Internet radio is the worst thing imaginable, because it is crushing the last legitimate outlet for individuality in music distribution. File sharing may be a problem for the music industry, but unauthorized sharing is really the only outlet left for individual music advocacy.
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I'm tired of whiny (star) musicians being all like "Wah, the internets ate my moniez". If they really loved music, they'd make it even if they had to pay for it, like most of us who like to program/mess with computers and do it even if it costs us money (open source/new gadgets/etc). This just shows me that they're in it for the cash and have no regard for the music they make.
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I'd say it's more than just that. The biggest problem in music is the end of independent ownership and management of everything related to music on any kind of large scale. You name it, it's either owned or controlled by the RIAA mob, or it's basically irrelevant to the majority of the industry. Plenty of small-scale stuff happens, all the way down to people just talking to each other about it, but none of it reaches the necessary critical mass for any of the ideas generated to travel far beyond the (social) vicinity of the place where they started.
The root cause of all this is obvious: whenever anything significant starts to happen, people start thinking about how they can make money from it, and then they start thinking about how to maximise their profits from it, and then the RIAA mob makes them an offer.
The thing to keep in mind is, the internet is much more important than popular music. The music industry as it is today could suffer a horrible, painful death and we would still be better off than before the internet came around. Music was around long before "the industry", and it'll be around long after.
Sure. Mozart had an impact. Then he died when he was thirty five. We'll never know if he was really any good ...
Mozart created a body of music that has survived over 200 years after his death. And you still won't say whether he is any good?
DAMN your tough!!!
Download my free songs!
Funny, Elton... Backpage and Craigslist helped a buddy and me find a bass player, a drummer and a singer. We now have a band with our tunes on MySpace which gives us more exposure than we could ever have without the net. So, find new members, share your music, find the best deals on musical gear, tout your gigs, reach the world, download software to help recording... How is that killing music Sir Platform Heels and Funny Glasses?
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Elton has a bias against technology. He says so in the article. He doesn't use it. So how can he possibly know what its affect on music is? His reputation carries a big weight because of his past brilliance, but we have to be careful that we understand the limits of his insight.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
Sir Reginald is totally displacing here. The Internet is not the problem with modern music; on the contrary, it's the only thing keeping music alive. The large record companies are killing music by providing an endless supply of "marketable" pop claptrap. All of the musical innovation today comes from independent artists who have virtually no chance of ever getting a lucrative record contract. Guess where these indies distribute their music? Guess where they collaborate?
When it comes down to jamming, they still do it in basements and garages, like they've always done, but the sharing of ideas is possible like never before because of the "problem" that Elton is complaining about.
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It's interesting to hear this from the perspective of a very mainstream composer. Fascinating that he feels so disjunct from his listeners. Because for most independent and small artists, the Internet has brought them much CLOSER to their audiences. The increased communication, sense of community, and the niche culture of the Internet has been hailed as a boon by small artists. Suddenly the major label barriers to audience access have fallen down.
Perhaps what Elton is really describing is the disconnect of the artist who does not concertize. Smaller, independents described above make the majority of their income in live performances. Online communities and media all drive these artists' fans towards the concert hall. Elton is still operating in the paradigm where the album is the primary unit of communication with your audience. You do concerts and tours, but really only to promote a new album. Fans' reactions are taken on a per-album basis. There's no question that this model is getting less effective, and that can feel like a disconnect if you're stuck operating that way.
And BTW, Elton may be a real composer, but let's not compare him to Mozart. In his short life, Mozart revolutionized music. A poster here commented that he never got old enough for us to see if he was "really any good." As a classical musician, I can tell you that 600 compositions is MORE THAN ENOUGH to tell if a composer is "really any good". And Mozart was one of the greatest.
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