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David Bowie on Use Of MP3s
XBS writes
"David Bowie told a British newspaper Thh Guardian that he is for MP3s. Bowie said, it could change the entire idea of what music is -- and that isn't so bad. Bowie's record label may not approve of his public endorsement of the enemy, but he doesn't seem to care. As he writes, "You don't have to stay with a record company forever. I get bored of those interminable situations."
You can read more at
Salon- it's a little
ways down the page, but its worth quick read if you're into
Bowie or MP3s.
I'm not a David Bowie fan so my question is, does it even really matter to him?
Maybe the spread of his music through mp3 will breathe some new life into his actual cd sales.
I knew that you could.
I never thought it was possible!
Bowie /is/ music, so I'd say his opinion counts.
BOWIE even likes the PRODIGY so eat my shorts
he also goes to their gigs
:P~~~~~~~~~~~
i love his music and all, but i see him more as a capitalist than an artist. he isn't interested so much in making good music, as he is in making money. just look at how he'll make a good cd, then switch over to something poppy/trashy. so when he came out with his online service, as i saw it, it wasn't to help his fans, it was for some publicity and to line his pockets. i think this mp3 comment is very similar, for attention so he can make more money.
just my opinion, of course, just calling it as i see it.
Low, what an album.
Exactly what I meant by my post.
For an artist like David Bowie, who has a huge catelog of slow moving albums, mp3 is a good thing for him. People here a song on the radio maybe, get the mp3 for it, like it, get more by that artist, then eventually by the album. He wins. So do we, as a consumer.
And I love Space Oddity. And I did get it in mp3, and I will be buying, at the least, a greatest hit collection of his that includes that song.
Later Major Tom
featuring mass, mariah carey, maya, and
whitney houston on the squeezebox
Like he said, you can make new music from his music. But his music will remain. You just get more music.
Same as Open Source (tm) Linux. You can make your own version, even M$ could make their own version, but the old version would remain.
It's Open Music (tm).
He has his own ISP. I don't know much about it. I only know the address is bowienet.net.
Anyone know anything about it?
Besides isn't he worth something like 800 million dollars? So I don't think he will be hurting for money.
of course he is a good businessman. he never would have gotten as far as he did if he wasnt a good businessman. how many pure artists do you know of that are that popular and dont do if for the money at some level? i can think of any. all of the big stars out there are where they are today because they cared about the money.
damnit man, dont argue with me on this. they are more geeky and their music is much better. the posterchildren are good but unfortunatly they have to much of a frat boy music sound to be great.
David bowie was all into making money back in the 80s, and now that he has his stash of cash, he turns around and says "Oh sure, copy all you want", if he was now, where he was in the 80s, he'd be against them. I can't stand this guy. Hes the biggest sellout known to man kind.
Heh, well, perhaps i shouldn't be so harsh. But I still think he doesnt care, and hes just glad he walked off with the $$$
I'm not sure how much any of you know about David Bowie, but he's not exactly known for sticking with one type of music. It wouldn't be a stretch, or a surprise, for Bowie to do much of anything. More power to him.
"Maybe the spread of his music through mp3 will breathe some new life into his actual cd sales."
Hey Kiddies, news for you, David Bowie is extremely rich. At the height of his popularity, he did some smart things with his money, and so CD sales at this point for him are irrelevant.
You know, for many artists the purpose in life is to bring their message (be it poetry, sculpture, music or whatnot) out to the masses. They want to change people, enlighten society, move the people. Not so often are they in in for the money, after all how many artists strike it rich?
Even if an artist does well, financially speaking, it usually means that their managers get rich, not the artist. You see this in every court case, be it George Michael, Salt-n-Peppa or whoever. Commercially a success, they get hardly a penny.
So do the artist lose much on MP3? Or is it perhaps rather their managers? Difficult question, eh?
If you follow Bowie's career you will find that is
not very true. Watch the VH1 show `Legends' on David Bowie and you see.
Fuck Ajit Pai
Another person supporting MP3. It's unstoppable!
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100% pure freak
I think it sort of fits in with his selling stock with himself. Sure, it was just a way to make a lot of money fast, but it could actually end up as something good with mp3's. Imagine a world with no big distributors controlling content, pricing, etc. You could have artists sell stock in themselves and then sell mp3's of their music directly to the customers. And they could stick with the current method of putting albums together, or just sell individual songs as they release them. I'm not sure it would be any better in the long run, but it would be interesting to see it tried.
goodnoise.com looks like a great site - pay some money to the artist, get the mp3 (legally). Cuts out the record company from the mix.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Posted by antivert:
Goodnoise is a very good idea, and they have some wonderful music there. They need to lower their compression rate.. just listen to that Frank Black and the Catholics song they have.. it's littered with swirly mp3 garbage.
Yeah... I just downloaded a bunch of Orbital MP3s (admittedly not legal ones), and now I know what my next CD purchase will be. Orbital is cool.
(The reason I checked them out was the discussion of the music for Pi, which is unfortunately totally rented out at Hollywood Video...)
I had a $15 gift certificate for The Wall, unfortunately it expired before I could figure out what to buy...
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Have you not heard Earthling?
It's about half-techno.
--
As for frat boy sound -- it's certainly not the typical 4/4 simplistic drek that implies. If you don't like it, you should check out Salaryman, the Pkids' alter ego, for a totally different sound from the same people.
MoA is pretty damn geeky too. And also cool.
--
Sorry... Bowie sold stock in his future earnings about a year ago. So no matter what happends to music in the future, Bowie *made out* already.
He's the last person you should listen to, because to him it's all history. It doesn't matter if you like his music. He is now out of the loop.
Linux is only free if your time has no value. Windows is only free if you threaten to use Linux.
He sold his BACK CATALOG only as Bowie Bonds.
Some thoughts on Bowie from a fan since the mid 70s.
1) I thought I read that Bowie Bonds were for his back catalog only and not his new stuff. Which explains why "heroes" theme was sold for a commercial. Gotta please the stock owners - which I think is something like 10. I read in Smart Money that some big time investor bought most of the shares. He was a Bowie fan.
2) Bowie always wanted to make it "big". With the ziggy persona he did. As he drifted into the the thin white duke (white soul) he wanted greater artistic expression. He also started to team up with the likes of Eno/Iggy Pop/Sales Brothers/Adrian Belew. There came the "Berlin" period where he pushed the experimental into the pop world. This is Low. Heroes. Lodger. These are alternative and have come to grasp some of the modern developments in music in the manner of Eno and Fripp, Can and Kraftwerk. Oddly enough after a number of years pushing the limits he decided he wanted a "hit album". Only Bowie could say that and produce it at will. It was the "Lets Dance" album. With Nile Rogers he does it with great success. After that seems to be when most of the posters on this system seem to have discovered him. So Bowie has done a lot both in terms of huge market share/Pop and great creative and intellectual output.
3) Bowie has always embraced new and exciting things. People keep shrugging him off until five years later when they keep saying "Oh, he was right." The dude is uncanny. Thats why he makes the bucks.
4) I saw this show on TV and Bowie was listed as one of the top money makers from last year. I don't remember the number - something like 14. I could be wrong on that number so don't quote me. Its +-4. Not bad for a 50 year old guy.
5) I also read that Bowie was the richest "British" rock star. at 800-900 Million. More than Paul McCarney. (I thought Paul was a legend at investing and the like. He owns a lot of music catalogs. Kinda like what M.Jackson did to him. Which is why it burned him up I guess. Do unto others....) I think Paul was at 400 and then it quickly dropped below 100 for a few then you got to something like 10 with Phil Collins at like 20M.
I find it sad to see people discard the opinion just because its Bowie - someone in the business who's opinion has a bit of weight. Suits will listen to what he says.
All the best and Peace
Ron
PS: We need a music section on slashdot.
Most indy bands will mail you a cd for $6.99. Usually less. Wow! Be the first on your block to spend a week downloading an entire cd's worth of songs from some band you don't even know!
Their "build a website for us lazy bums" contest is pretty lame too. They invest $250 (1 rio and $50 credit) and get god know how many free man hours of web site development and FREE ADVERTISING. Build a sight for your local pet store and they'll pay you $1000!
Be sure to check out their grueling Tour Schedule! Yowch! Hope the van can last that long!
I'll definately download the free song to see what this band of jokers sounds like. **UPDATE** Hey! Wait! I just did (I love the way you can play an mp3 while it's still downloading) and it's...darn good. Damn. I was really hoping they'd suck. Nicely produced, but not over-done, and some fine guitar playing. Sheeeit! Refreshing suprise from the sequenced badboy over-sampled rap I was expecting.
Aw heck. Maybe I'm just old, bitter, and jealous that I didn't do this first.
Nah. They suck.
;)
**>>BELCH
Erm... TAFKAP (erm, Prince) earns that
label. I believe he's the first "big time"
artist to do so (for certain values of
big time...).
Depending on your definitions, there's also
Madonna.
I forget what 8 was for.
Okay, Bowie sold all his stock in his future earnings, right? Sounds like he doesn't care if he does well or not, just so long as he enjoys what he does. It looks to me like David Bowie's one of very few artists in the main arena who doesn't have a sword-of-damocles profit margin to watch out for.
...when I can go onto the net, and download the complete album from any mainstream artist for like 5 bucks, and all that money goes straight to the artist rather than me paying most of my money to the record label, distributors etc. I know that's what mp3.com and goodnoise are trying to do, but it'll take a while before this happens with mainstream bands.
David Bowie must be so rich by now, why doesn't he drop is label and be the first "big-time" artist to do this?
I thought he just sold the publishing rights to his old catalogue and technically, didn't he set it as a public (?) corporation where he was still CEO of the corp that held this catalogue? He'd still make money even if he sold all the stock. Then again, he should have just sold it all to Michael Jackson and bitched about it 10 years later when MJ won't give back what he paid millions for.
Can always depend on Bowie. Lord knows...the man knows how to change with the times. Started accustical, singing love songs and songs of exploration with the 60s...then into rock for the 70s and 80s...90s are here he's doing techno. To top it off...he is supporting MP3s. Who knows...we might no longer need CD Players...
Thats very nice to see artists support MP3.
But for god's sake, don't kill his music and turn it in to techno or trance or rap or any other junk.
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I'm going to live forever, or die in the attempt.
I'm gonna shoot an MP3 server into space and see how the RIAA get's me then. ;)