Considerable Sounds: The Music Industry Is Dead - An Obituary »
Posted by: Radiofreeeuropa 4 months, 3 weeks ago81 CommentsReflectReport this Story
The music business is dead, passed on! It is no more! It has ceased to be! It's expired and gone to meet it's maker! It's a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If it weren't nailed to it's perch it 'd be pushing up the daisies! It's metabolic processes are now history! it's off the twig! It's kicked the bucket, shuffled off it's mortal coil,
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Radiofreeeuropa4 months, 3 weeks ago
As much about the failed economic policies of the past 30 years as about the Music industry itself. Is it dead? In a sense, yes. Will it be resurrected? That is the larger question, we are now in a period of flux. Perhaps something better will emerge. Trent Reznor seems to think so. As does Peter Gabriel and David Byrne. But only if Artists stand together and demand it.
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eddie1074 months, 2 weeks ago
_The old greats can still fill a stadium, while Kid Rock is playing the local high school next week.
_The corporate morons that ignore that fact should be thrown out into the street, or put back into grade school where they belong.
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Radiofreeeuropa4 months, 2 weeks ago
"I was a securities analyst 70 years ago in London, so I can say that no financial man will ever understand business because financial people think a company makes money. A company makes shoes, and no financial man understands that. They think money is real. Shoes are real. Money is an end result." -- Peter Drucker
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AntiNeoCon4 months, 3 weeks ago
I don't know about the industry being dead, but I do not enjoy today's music as much as the older music. Noise is not music to me....and I would enjoy hearing the singer but today it seems the singer and the band are at the same volume level making it harder for a lot of us to understand the lyrics.
Gimme the old crooners, at least you could hear what they were singing about. :)
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Radiofreeeuropa4 months, 3 weeks ago
FTA-What is a sound economic practice? One that is fair to all who participate in it. Henry Ford was called a "class traitor" for paying his factory workers a good wage and generally treating them well. But he understood what today's junk bond traders, profiteers, and self aggrandizing leeches do not. That to sell lot's of widgets, the buyers must have the capital to purchase them. If Ford's own employees didn't make enough money to buy his model Ts, how could he sell very many?
Roosevelt too, was called a class traitor. It has been said that J. P. Morgan's family kept newspapers with pictures of Roosevelt out of his sight, and in one Connecticut country club...mention of his name was forbidden as a health measure, to prevent strokes and seizures. In Kansas a man went down into his cyclone cellar and announced "he would not emerge until Roosevelt was out of office." (While he was there, his wife ran off with a traveling salesman.)
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Jaydee404 months, 3 weeks ago
All good comments and graphs but kinda all over the place, maybe you could have called it something else. I liked what Peter Gabriel Said about artists not being property of record companies. While some may blame the economy for loses in revenue in the music industry it's the fans that are at the top of the list for reasons for it's demise. We the people who listen to music refuse to pay 20 dollars to buy a disc that may have two or three good songs on it and download it for free instead. Copyrights have gone the way of the dodo and the industry failed to adjust for that. With to lose of revenue from record sales there is less money to go along and that leaves many labels scrambling, they need to be more selective with artists and try to time releases with other events to build up support and interest.
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gamahuche4 months, 3 weeks ago
Seems like a long time since the last Music Story..
That was the Plastic People, et.al., and they're playing here in Kutna Hora this weekend! We had a cpl of tickets on one side for you but guess it will have to be next time :)
in this story I learned more from the macro-picture than from the music model. I stoppped being an active consumer, except for live gigs, a long time ago. There's always someone interesting showing up and an invitation - a couple of weeks ago to the US Ambassador's Residence where a blind jazz-pianist friend from VT was scheduled to play a benefit for organisations offering assistance to physically challenged people. Due to cancelled flight connections and weather problems he arrived very late and only played a couple of numbers but his band was there and a local guitar-player, American long-term resident in Prague, played a sensational gig. The residence is a fabulous 30's mansion of immense elegance and apparently the most luxurious in the world [?!]
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gamahuche4 months, 3 weeks ago
Extraordinarily security was non-existent, unless there were concealed machine-gun emplacements somewhere and not even a proper guest list. "I'm with the band" wd have worked but then were very few times when it didn't, even when it was true. Plus a permanent freebie at Ronnie Scott's in London in exchange for special services. Pop in for a set any time and often that included after-hours jams in extraordinary locations with wild combinations of players and axes..
We get given lots of CD's these days, sell some "alchemical" ones too; Michael Maier's 50 C16th fugues, brilliant dark emanations, recorded as "Mirrorion" in a cave in Finland a few miles south of the Arctic Circle by some magic Goths called Arktau Eos.. [google-able! - so is M. Maier - so is our pianist friend, Michael Arnowitt]. Not so long ago Daevid Allen of Soft Machine, later Gong showed up - just one of many trips down memory lane! Sorry to be so off-topic!! Mainly here to say Hi to you!
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Radiofreeeuropa4 months, 3 weeks ago
I surely would love to be there! Alas, no free time just now. I will be with you in spirit and solidarity for certain though. I do agree the piece is more about the big economic picture and how the afflictions of economic practices over the last 50 years are somewhat in tandem to mistakes made by the music industry. I think most industry has abandoned the notion that their business is based on creating something "valued" by it's customers. Instead seeing higher profit margins as a sanctified right of some kind, oblivious to what the customer actually wants. None of this affects music itself, but rather the business of how it is delivered.
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Radiofreeeuropa4 months, 3 weeks ago
Ah, all wonderful reminiscences to be sure! Many of the artists you mentioned made my spirit soar so high I thought the earth itself would be transmigrated upon return! It still happens, though it seems a bit tougher with corporate sponsorships and such with the more established artists. Still nothing has the power of music to transform, does it?
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OnionHead4 months, 3 weeks ago
The internet, social networking, street teams and temerity killed the RIAA.
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earthlingerer4 months, 2 weeks ago
European MTV sucks just as bad as american MTV. And they play all the same crap shows.
I won't even watch it.
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stephen-johnson4 months, 3 weeks ago
The reason for the decline of the music industry is simple: because of rampant music piracy, record companies and distributors are unable to make a profit.
Over the past 25 years or so, the video market has gone from videocassettes to Blu-Ray DVDs, while the music industry is still stuck with 16-bit CDs. Sadly, piracy is picking up in the video arena as well. In the coming years, look for video innovation to stop as well.
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Jaydee404 months, 3 weeks ago
It was simply arrogance to think that when people had the technology to make good quality copies they would pay inflated prices for original product. If the US industry was stupid enough to think people would ever honor intellectual copyrights in the modern world I hope they lost their shirt. Copying music is not new or exclusive to the digital age, remember we all had those ghetto-blasters with the dual cassette recorders with high speed dubbing back in the eighties. Was never anything said about that, Everyone I knew had a pirated copy of "Foot Lose" and the collective works of both Kiss and Iron Maiden. With High speed you could copy a cassette faster than copying a disc today but it was not a issue. I think people must look deeper to see just why the traditional format is failing.
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rdy2rck4 months, 3 weeks ago
A lot of good comments but this brings up just one curiosity I've been thinking about.The rock and roll era particularly hard rock began in the early 70's and am really curious has the "fad" reached it's peaked and in decline.I hear new music and like a lot but ask "Is there anything new."Yeah there's rap and Hip-Hop but where are the Super stars that sell out arenas and stadiums except the old classics.
I just wonder if the rock era as we know it has gone the way as say the jitterbug era.
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mozzer4 months, 3 weeks ago
In the past, our channels of mass music consumption were limited and dictated by the record labels. In effect, more people listened to the same thing. The internet has expanded those channels and subsequently fragmented the listening audience.
Because of this fragmentation, I believe that the superstars who sell out arenas are much harder to come by.
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Radiofreeeuropa4 months, 3 weeks ago
That is certainly David Byrne's take. And Gabriel's too. That it must die for new life to grow out of it. In a sense, as I have pontificated many times in this forum, the mass corporate takeover of the many smaller labels began in 70's. "Hey there's money being made here, we can't let these musicians just make whatever music they want willy nilly! This must be managed and controlled!!!"
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mozzer4 months, 3 weeks ago
Thanks to the beauty of the internet and music blogs, I'm listening to more music than I ever had growing up. Some of the newer stuff can be quite enjoyable. :)
However, we all reach a point where we recognize the banality of the pop song. IMO, this is why we stop listening to contemporary music as we age.
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Jaydee404 months, 3 weeks ago
I find it goes through cycles where there isn't anything new worth listening to then a entire new sound is unleashed and all is well for a while, I have over 50 Gb of music downloaded but haven't even bothered in the last six months. It seems like all they do is repeat the same old beat, get some girls to prance around half dressed or make something that sounds like the same old Nickleback song. Even the Country sound seems to have hit a dry spell and don't even get me started on this Idol crap.
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earthlingerer4 months, 2 weeks ago
Yeah, you could NEVER find stuff in those styles, but new composers and equally or superiorly talented artists like that on the internet for free, or very little money.
Sorry, but I'm 2needy. I need new stuff to stretch my mind and open it up. New sounds, new thoughts. I don't want early dementia.
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rdy2rck4 months, 3 weeks ago
One thing is for sure though,. Music of some sort will always exist ever since the cave man learned to make music from to sticks and it seems to me in recent times each succesive generation will find new ways to express the youth and rebelliousness
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Radiofreeeuropa4 months, 3 weeks ago
Music isn't dead, and though nostalgia associated with older music is a factor, it isn't the reason most people listen.
There is plenty of great music being made today. The "clear channels" of the world have homogenized everything to the point where most people have simply lost interest. What made music important and relevant in the past was diversity, the independent radio stations that occasionally played something because they liked it, the small label that took a chance on an unknown artist. Now overly market researched and banal pablum is the norm. Perhaps the giants must die, in order to bring about that wonderful scenario where music makers and business are partners with emphasis on music, not business. Where the business is again conducted by entrepreneurs who actually love music. Perhaps...
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Jaydee404 months, 3 weeks ago
Say Radio did you ever post the second part of you censorship in music piece? I have been looking forward to it but haven't seen it yet?
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Jaydee404 months, 3 weeks ago
Rap only makes up one part of the music scene, have you heard any of the other stuff out there? My wife and three kids all swore they would never listen to country but they all put it on their players now along with other things, my youngest just downloaded a Frank Sinatra yesterday. A lot of the older bands are coming out with new stuff as well, David Wilcox included.
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earthlingerer4 months, 2 weeks ago
I'm seeing a pattern here... gridcords hasn't bought an album since hair metal died.
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MisterX4 months, 2 weeks ago
I know I haven't purchased any CD's in nearly 7 years. I gave up collecting once they began tainting CD's with malware and pushing lawsuits. The cost of the CD wasn't worth it. I don't even listen to music on the radio anymore. I flat out lost interest. I tune into talk radio now.
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joeblowe4 months, 3 weeks ago
"It's time to put the corpse of what we know as the record industry in the ground and let some other beautiful things start to grow out of it" - here, I think, is the IMPORTANT idea. Perhaps the music INDUSTRY is, for a fact, dead. Good riddance. I don't see how something as personal as music can be an INDUSTRY anyway. With the greedy suits and agents out of the way, maybe those musicians who have something worthwhile to say will actually have an EASIER time of it. If the internet and medialess distribution had been a reality back when -I- was in a band, who knows? My life could have turned out completely different.
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MisterX4 months, 2 weeks ago
Does it then follow that individuals, students, and fans will no longer be threatened by unconscionable legal actions for making efforts to listen to music that would have inspired them to go out and purchase CD's, concert tickets, and posters of hot music divas?
I read somewhere that the RIAA wants a $5/month surcharge tacked on to every internet connection to compensate them for unlimited downloads/uploads. It wouldn't be a half-bad idea, except that the artists are unlikely to see any of it, the taxes and surcharges attached to the $5 fee will inflate it, and the $5 fee will more than likely become $20 inside of 2 years.
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metalman234 months, 2 weeks ago
All good comments and graphs but kinda all over the place, maybe you could have http://bestgeforce.summerhost.info/ called it something else. I liked what Peter Gabriel Said about artists not being property of record companies. While some may blame the http://bestkitchen.summerhost.info/ economy for loses in revenue in the music industry it's the fans that are at the http://goodkitchen.summerhost.info/ top of the list for reasons for it's demise. We the people who listen to music refuse to pay 20 dollars to buy a disc that may have two or three good songs on it and download it for free instead. Copyrights http://nicekitchen.summerhost.info/ have gone the way of http://www12.asphost4free.com/chairs the dodo and the industry failed to adjust for that. With to lose of revenue from record sales there is less money to go along and that leaves many labels scrambling, they need to be more selective with artists and try to time releases with other events to build up support and interest.
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ML20074 months, 2 weeks ago
Great music will never die. Commercialization will come and go but the creative spirit of man will not die. As long as their is a basement to hide, instruments to be had, and a free spirit around, music will not die, it will just get more meaningful and precious. Will the music industry die? No. As long as there is a shuckster to make a buck, the music industry may change forms or shape, but the industry will be some kind of money making venture, and certainly, not like the industry currently existing. Greed, power, and infamy, unfortunately, corrupts. It is the same in Governments, and it is the same in any industry which strives to make money, especially when that money is the end object. Well written article, RFE, as usual. A plus!
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Radiofreeeuropa
Greetings fellow travelers! Thanks for stopping in. I'm a musician, educator, and writer. You can see my work at various locations on the net ...
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