Slashdot Mirror
Recording Music Without the Recording Industry
hephaist0s writes "The 2008 RPM Challenge — to write and record an original album in February, just because you can — is about to begin. Hundreds of musicians from around the world have already signed up. Last year, more than 850 albums were recorded as part of the challenge, a testament to what can be done by independent musicians without a label, without the RIAA, and often without a professional studio. The efforts ranged from an album made entirely on a Nintendo Game Boy to a Speed Racer rock opera, produced by both experienced bands and novice musicians, often in continent-spanning online collaborations. Last year's challenge generated one of the largest free jukeboxes of original music available online, built to stream on-demand all 8500-plus original, artist-owned songs. Imagine if grassroots, independent systems like this foretold the future of recorded music and its distribution."
The CB App. What's your 20?
All of them are thieves and pirates, stealing money from the poor recording companies.
> "The 2008 RPM Challenge -- to write and record an original album in February, just because you can"
Nope. You don't have to write the material in the month of February, only record it in February.
"Slow down, Cowboy! It has been 3 years, 7 months and 26 days since you last successfully posted a comment."
Using characters is not stealing or copyrightable! Trademark! A rock opera based on Speed Racer is not infringing on IP.
The RIAA and producers aren't about making music - they make celebrities. They broker fame to those who are bound to them by contract, allowing the producers and industry to profit from the success of musicians. They control what songs radio stations can play, determine what music makes it into movies and onto television, and even what gets heard while you're riding the elevator. They wield the ability to present the masses with specific songs of their choosing.
TV shows like American Idol reveal the fact that a substantial number of people can sing really, really well. They can find hundreds of talented people easily, so you can imagine how many more are out there that either don't try out, are not within the age range they are seeking, or are simply not shown on TV. If you figure one out of every 3000 people can sing really well, then that's 100,000 really good singers in the USA alone. The job of the recording industry is to pick out a handful that fits whatever mold they are currently using, and will agree to whatever contract they put in front of them.
Of course it is possible to record music without the industry. However no-one will know about your music (unless you happen to rise about the noise of the internet, like Esmee Denters did on YouTube with her home-made webcam videos).
Dan East
Better known as 318230.
After being part of the founding of 2 nonprofits, and working many years in offering free and near-free services, I've come to the following general conclusion:
"Free does not work long term".
What I mean is complex, and it includes many different factors. First off, living and existing requires money: for food, shelter, power, and security. There's no avoiding it. Getting great people to devote (significant) time onto projects requires that they be paid. If not, the great people go elsewhere. For short times, and for specific initiatives, one can get remarkable, free contributions: but it doesn't last very long. There needs to be a financial element to any project or organization that will create value and last long term.
The second thing to realize is that for the long-term services and groups that we do see that are both great and free to you (eg Linux, apache, public parks, etc. etc.) - someone is paying, but it's just not you. There is typically just some kind of cost shifting going on. It is either the programmer who voluntarily spending their time, the foundation donors giving money to pay the staff, EFF staff fighting to keep legal protections available, or taxation programs paying for public services.
There are increasing awareness now among people that there are several other forms of value getting passed around online that are not cash: for example (1) people's time and attention, and (2) social capital/connections and relationships, and others. When you incorporate these factors as ones of own value, then it becomes clear that absolutely nothing is "free". Someone does work to make and organize things, and they need to be paid back, or they will (eventually) move their efforts elsewhere. That payment back does not necessarily need to be only in cash: it can be in attention, credit, or other items or actions they find valuable. That said, for most artists and content creators making great work, they do need cash in order to continue to spend their time making high quality content.
So, the problem with this idea of going head-to-head with the recording industry is that the biggest challenge(nowadays) facing an artist is not recording, not production, and not distribution, it's advertising. Let's face it - most of us "find" new music by hearing it on the radio or in some other media (e.g. a movie), at a bar, or from a friend. All of those *except* the friend are pretty much the product of marketing (directly in the form of advertising or indirectly in the form of contacts and influence).
I remember hearing (no idea how accurate, but it makes sense) that something like 10 CDs are released every day in the US (never mind how much is released only digitally). The obstacle facing the indie artist is not how to make the music and not how to get it to a fan (paying or otherwise) but how to get people to pay attention. This is the biggest thing that MySpace (personally, I hate it and it's probably not necessary to link to) and outfits like CDBaby http://www.cdbaby.com/ have done for musicians: given fans an easy way to peruse music and find new artists in an enjoyable fashion.
Hopefully, this will have a similar effect. However, any meaningful discussion about kicking the recording industry in it's posterior side ought to focus on how this makes it easy for new fans to connect with an artist (mostly), and not just how easy or free it makes getting said music to said fan.
Part of what sells albums is the promotion of the material through radio play. What is the current frequency of independent works played on the mainstream media? Pretty low if at all depending on where you live. (That's what all that "payola" scandal is about... the labels are paying the radio stations to play their tunes to promote their sales.)
And what will it take to make a shift away from the already controlled "top-40" format? Convincing the independent radio stations to play something other than top-40 for their genre. Are there any independent radio stations left? Aren't they all owned by Clear Channel now? Possibly not ALL but clearly, Clear Channel is now such a major power that they will be hard to resist when they put up a fight.
So the reality is we have a kind of locked-in system such that "big media" has locked out the little and independent guys.
It will be a difficult road to travel trying to over-throw the current locked-in system, but it's win-able. Using current media will not do the trick though. It has to be fought where the playing field is still rather level. The public Internet.
So how can it be done? Get with the wide variety of Asian hardware makers to create a flood of internet-ready media players free of any DRM. Set up a wide variety of "pod-cast" programming sites (Internet Independent Stations) sourcing from the wide variety of independent media contributed to those sites by the artists and/or owners of the material. Then daily, people can "tune" into their favorite station(s) of the day or of the week to download their new play lists and listen to fresh new quality stuff every day instead of listening to the radio.
Radio is convenient, but the quality is low and everyone knows it. This is why satellite radio is still growing in popularity -- better content control and much more variety... something you're not going to get from the current locked-in system that exists on terrestrial radio.
These internet-based pod-stations will get by any restrictions or resistance people might have about satellite radio as the devices they select will be their own and have use in ways other than internet pod-cast downloads.
This is a very workable strategy considering how eager these Asian manufacturers are to sell their stuff. We have a tremendous demand for such gear in the US as well if the iPod's popularity is any indicator. Further, as I witness the popularity of "internet radio" in offices across the U.S., a system that behaves similarly would be rather popular as far as I can tell.
There's a huge, untapped area of media just waiting for the consumer public if some enterprising folks were willing to put the risk out there to give it a try. There's a lot of willingness on the consumer end and a lot of willingness for independent operators and independent artists as well. We just need a little unified interest to make it happen.
You can't because, when you do your independent production, whether you say so or not, you are *part* of the industry, even redefining it.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
http://www.jamendo.com/
Label-free production isn't a new thing -- we're probably at least a decade into the era where anybody could pick up the basic tools to produce an acceptable quality album for less than $3000, and really, that would have even bought you enough time in some conventional studios to have them do it. I've heard some good albums produced circa mid-90s this way.
And internet distribution isn't really that new anymore. That's also been happening to some degree since the late 90s, and it obviously had gathered considerable momentum by 3-4 years ago. We're not at the end of that trend, but once wireless data service becomes ubiquitous, it's pretty safe to say the old distribution channels (record stores & FM radio) will be outmatched.
But there's still going to be a significant distribution challenge, and that's marketing. If anything, I think it's possible it will get harder. I kindof wish I'd gotten myself together and produced something high quality about 3 years ago, because I think someday, people are going to look at 2000-2005 as the easiest period for an indie artist to get attention, just like 1997-2001 was the easiest period to get a start as a high profile blogger. The wide net of participants increasingly means greater competition for attention.
Some people will be willing and able to pay for people to help them get it. Something like a label will exist for that purpose for a long time.
Tweet, tweet.
I guess the RIAA has to get mentioned in any Slashdot story about music, but I don't really see this is about 'sticking it to the RIAA'.
It seems to me it's more about just giving people a goal and a deadline - a cure for procrastination and all the other stuff that gets in the way of finishing things.
ccalam - acoustic versions of new songs.
Ehh... There's a couple points I'd like to touch on here.
One: Yes, the RIAA is full-blown evil, and its disappearance can only be a good thing, not only for those being unfairly persecuted by it (whom these days seem to be anyone who's even heard a song they don't own while riding a friend's car), but also (even if they don't realize it yet) for the record labels themselves. The sooner they try to adapt to the changing marketplace instead of trying to plug an iceberg tear with sellotape, the better for everyone involved.
Two: However, art is not interchangeable in the same way software can be. I can say "Microsoft isn't needed anymore" because there are alternatives that perform the same functions, and often better and cheaper (or even free), but I can't say "Artist X isn't needed anymore". Because art (music in this case) doesn't merely "perform" a "function". Not good music, anyway.
One of my favorite bands ever is Gyllene Tider, from Sweden. I can barely understand half the lyrics, but their melodies are pure gold. A friend, while listening to them, mentioned a couple bands who sound kinda like them. "Why would you listen to songs you can't understand? If it's bouncy pop you want, you can get it in English". I was dumbstruck by the idea, even though I routinely tell friends "Why would you use expensive software that's broken half the time? I can install Linux for you in half an hour".
Free Art isn't like Free Software in that every artistic expression is unique. That particular expression may suck, but it's unique in its suckitude. And if you like one particular form of art, or a particular artist, there's no "switching" the way there is for software. So initiatives like this, while cool as hell, are not a way to "replace" anything. I can't imagine making a point of listening to stuff solely because it agrees with me ideologically, the same way I wouldn't drop the Star Wars films in favor of stuff like the Revelations fan film.
Of course, I may have just misread your point and am rambling on needlessly, but I just thought I'd throw it out there.
Anybody know if there's a torrent (or for that matter any centralized way to download) of the 2007 collection? I'm finding it pretty likeable, but that jukebox is really NOT doing it for me...I'd much rather have them stored locally and use iTunes (or WMP or xmms, point being I want them on my drive).
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
You're asking me to spend time and money to produce an album, and then give it away? I'm all about the spread of the arts and aesthetics, but producing a good album takes A LOT of money, and time.
I do a lot of music composition and production, myself. I spent $2500 this year on a new mac pro, upgrades to the latest versions of Digital Performer, Native Instruments Kontakt, EWQLSO Gold. I bought a bearbones Digidesign interface for $400, own a $1500 synthesizer, and two $100 microphones, and I'm NOWHERE NEAR capable of producing a rock/pop album. For that, I'd need to spend another $1000 on a 8-channel audio interface, $400 in decent overhead mics for drums, and probably a few more SM57s. On top of that, a good set of mixing plugins for my DAW (like Waves), is a good $800. To build a recording studio capable of providing even the most MINIMAL of recording environments is upwards $8000, and that's with cutting a lot of corners.
No, while I have the potential to record and produce keys, guitars, and vocals, I'm taking drums to a studio, where I'm going to pay a couple $100 an hour.
And then you ask me to give it away? Fuck you. That's not "free", that's negative. Even to do music for the joy of it, money's gotta come from somewhere.
Multiplayer Gaming (defined): Sitting around, discussing single-player games with my friends, at the bar.
There is a chance that these musicians can end up making money from their recordings someday, a much GREATER chance than if they had tried their luck with the RIAA. Feeding all of the CEOs, lawyers, marketing, walmart, etc. is taking money out of the pockets of musicians themselves.
What MUSICIANS need is to be free of these commercial juggernauts so they can compete in the market without juggernaut approval.
Meanwhile the Debian community has announce their competing project, the 2008 DEB Challenge.
You are right that you can't a replace an artist.
But an artist can switch labels.
Do we need the RIAA? No.
Do artists need the RIAA? No.
So we can do fine without RIAA. The artist needs an audience and the audience needs an artist. Problem solved.
What power has law where only money rules.
As a wanna-be artist who's recorded an album or two myself, there is an anxious excitement about the possibilities of self-recording, self-distribution, and self-promotion. When the internet was first taking off I thought it was going to crack the lid off of independent art, and soon listeners would have a wider variety of better quality stuff and more creative people would be able to find their audience.
To some degree, this is all true. There's a lot of stuff out there, and most artists can find some fans. But in the end it hasn't practially changed much: being in an internet band is about as important as being in a high-school band. The difference is that the 100 people that love you can now be spread across the world instead of just the town.
I think that most listeners really don't want better stuff (even by their own standards): they'd rather listen to stuff that their friends listen to. It's fun to be into popular music, and that's what most people do. They seek out popular music so that they can feel like they're part of something. I don't intend this as a put-down: they just want to enjoy life and I'll admit it's usually more fun to be into an okay-by-me-but-super-popular song than a more-to-your-liking-but-generally-unknown song. Because you can talk about it and play it at parties and people love it. Social interactions matter to music.
Even people like myself, who are drawn to listen to less popular music -- there's just so much stuff I don't feel I need any more. I get all the media I can handle already. So overall as an artist I'm sort of accepting that the way the world functions doesn't financially support all the musical artists who want to be. It doesn't even support all the musical artists who could qualify as great. There's a lot of great artists out there, and only enough opportunity for a tiny fraction of them.
It's kind of a let down, but I'm getting used to it. In the end, you can always make stuff you like, and probably find a few fans. You just won't be able to quit your day job.
Cheers.
PS - this is not based on lack of acceptance of my own musical endeavors, which are admittedly (and intentionally) dumb shit, but rather based on observing other artists
...no advertising, no making profits from the musicians:
http://alonetone.com/
(disclaimer: i made this app!)
I don't see why anyone would need this RPM thing. I am not bashing it, only questioning it, so put the flame throwers down, NOW! I ask because my brother is a professional musician. He owns his OWN label so getting recordings done, CDs pressed, etc. it easy for him. Back when it was just him he was able to do the same thing with basic stuff. He sells his music and he also gives it away for free on a burned disc, not a pressed one, BUT STILL. Even in his label contracts it tells the artists that their music WILL BE pirated, ripped and made to MP3s and they are NOT allowed to go after anyone infringing, because the contract says the consumer is not, especially when labeled on the inside cover of every CD from his label says, "Music is free, so feel free to rip, burn and distrubute this CD. Other formats like MP3 are welcome too." Simply said, he has made his fortunes by giving away his musics.
"That's right...I said it."
is that there are too many good musicians. Right now I could go out to at least five different local bars which all have excellent musicians playing and I don't live in a big city. Sometimes when there's a decent amount of people over at my house there will be at least a half dozen talented musicians around. It's supply and demand. Music isn't worth what it once was because musical talent isn't rare, musical equipment isn't expensive, and because music is so prevalent and good no one wants to pay money for it. And let's face it, you get a better experience going to the bar and paying a $5 cover to watch an amazingly talented amateur than you do when you pay $50 to see a "rock star." Drinks are cheaper and the ride home is shorter, too. Good music is a commodity and is by no means profitable for record companies. Celebrity personalities are what the music industry deals with today. They need people who can sell t-shirts, posters, and appear in t.v. ads. They need people who can cameo in movies, people who have an interview presence. If you don't like the way the music industry is, then blame Kurt Cobain and Napster. Cobain proved that serious artists are more of a liability than an asset to the record companies. Ever since he blew his head off record companies have sought people who want to be famous first and an artist second. And really, who can blame them? It's just economics--if we had moral record companies then the industry would have gone bankrupt when Napster hit.
As a musician I'm not particularly happy about the state of the music industry but the only thing I can hope for is that the majority of guitarist in the U.S. keel over a die for no apparent reason. As long as there are guys playing at the bar who are better than me who can't become rock stars I'll have no great expectations. I'll have succeeded when I'm the bar star, when I get paid a couple hundred bucks to play a bar. As a musician, that hundred bucks for a night says more about my music than the millions a night I'd make if I played sold out arenas singing whiney music about my libido to teeny boppers. And really, there's nothing wrong with that. So I'll always have to have a day job, but in no way does that compromise my artistic integrity. Most rennaissance painters never became famous and the ones that did usually remained close to anonymous throughout their own lifetime. It's not like being famous validates the work; if any artist feels that way then their art has failed before even started. I guess it sucks that no one will pay me millions for playing music, but at the same time the whole rock star thing is a bit ridiculous. No one expects to get rich painting - artists who get paid make logos, storyboards, and marketing materials. That doesn't mean the canvas art "industry" is in a sorry state - it's just evolved past being special and is now commodity.
--- Do you believe in the day?
Actually, the RPM challenge is to record an album in the month of February. There is nothing to say that the album should be written during that month.
There IS a web site that encourages writing an album in a month - and it FAWM.org (February Album Writing Month). The RPM challenge took this as inspiration and set up in the same month with slightly different criteria and has been better publicised. For it's first two years, RPMchallenge.com paid tribute to FAWM.org but now seems to be big enough and arrogant enough to have stopped paying tribute to the place it got its ideas from.
This is all fine in the world of capitalism but it still seems pretty uncool to me.
It's a motivation thing. People are lazy, and this gives us an excuse to do something on a set schedule. I've been writing and recording music for quite some time now, and yet it is amazing how much music I have not written, mostly due to simple procrastination.
Sig goes here.
You're missing a very important part of what they do: they control access to retail channels. Brick & mortar stores (heh, that dates me) still account for the majority of album sales.
Want to get your CD in Wal-Mart, Target, or any other large meatspace retailer? You've got to play ball with the RIAA content cartel.
"It is our blasphemy which has made us great, and will sustain us, and which the gods secretly admire in us." - Zelazny
"Why would you listen to songs you can't understand? If it's bouncy pop you want, you can get it in English". I was dumbstruck by the idea, even though I routinely tell friends "Why would you use expensive software that's broken half the time? I can install Linux for you in half an hour".
Both statements ignore their own audience.
In your case you'd replace broken software with cheaper (free) broken software that includes certain rights/freedoms the other didn't have but which most users won't directly benefit from (I love my mother but I know she'll never recompile a thing in her life). You just don't care about the things that proprietary systems provide which Linux doesn't have. Others will.
In your friend's case all he wants out of his music is that it's "bouncy pop" but you care about subtle nuances that aren't the same in his alternative music. That's no different to the OS situation - it all depends on what you want out of the the object (music or software).
If you're smart you should be using this as an opportunity to re-assess what you've been telling people about software rather than claim music/art is somehow special. Software can be viewed as a form of art too if you want to push boundaries and definitions. One man's commodity is another man's sacred art.
Heck I've even listened to some blokes ramble on about women being a commodity and then wonder why their view of women is so warped and they can't find someone they're happy with. For a commodity to be a commodity the differences and subtleties have to be ignored. If you're not willing to do that - if the details matter to you - you're no longer talking about a commodity.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
That's cool, and I wish a lot more labels were like that. But your brother should realise a couple of things:
Music has no value but what will people are willing to pay for it to have the experience... if anything. Radiohead understands this. The 14th century troubadours understood this. Most people throughout human history have understood this. As long as ears and ideas are free, music will be free.
The Musico-Idolatry Complex is a perversion.
It's the artist's prerogative to go to great personal sacrifice, debt, and even bankruptcy to make a work of art. It's the artist's prerogative to do so knowing that no one wants to pay for it. It's the artist's understanding of what moves people that saves him or her from pretension and pays his or her bills.
What is happening to the Musico-Idolatry Complex is right. You can say "Fuck you" to people, but the fucking going on is you fucking yourself.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.