More on copyright and covers and youtube

[Migs]

I was having trouble figuring out part of the guitar solo from Hotel California the other day and went to look up one of the instruction vids on YouTube that I rememberd looking at a while back.
I was really quite annoyed to see it had been taken down because of copyright breach.  I couldn't see how that would benefit anyone.

I happen to know the somoene high up in Warner/Chappell down here and had a bit of a bitch to him about it.  His response was interesting:

"[migs]we have a general agreement with YouTube, but each territory has the ability to pull down content if they desire.. the teaching clips may be something to do with the recent action in the US over tab sites.. I should shut up!"

It is a shame and quite bemusing.  I was at a Tommy Emmanuel concert a while back and may have accidentally taken my MBR in.  I had to be very careful as Tommy's manager makes staff watch for bootleggers like a hawk.  The irony is, he gets up on stage and tells stories about sellout crowds and booking extra gigs in all sorts of out of the way places where he had done no previous touring or marketing.  Then he does a big thankyou to YouTube for making his music so popular in places he had never thought of.   They (or their management/record companies) are very happy to use take the benefits of things like YouTube without paying for it.  Seems like a bit of a pot kettle black thing to me.

[Greeny]

The whole music and entertainment industry has its head up its arse. As you say, YouTube has the power to create a lot of money for them, so why not embrace it? They're all running scared that their long-running scam to rip us off with over-charging on record and CD sales is now pretty much dead in the water. So where's the money now? It's all in live gigs, merchandise and - to a lesser extent - digital downloads. And how do they advertise these gigs etc? YouTube, social media, press, and word of mouth. The point of the first two is that they're FREE.

The funny thing is that I think a lot of artists realise this. It's the record companies themselves that don't seem to get it. It's like the dinosaurs era all over again - the big lumbering creatures are going to die out, leaving the agile little mammals to inherit the earth.

I recall a story about one of the media giants (it might have been Time Warner) slapping all sorts of takedown notices and legal threats on YouTube, only for YouTube to point out that the company had posted some of that content THEMSELVES as free advertising trailers. They had posted so much clandestine content that they didn't even know which was theirs and which was from independant users.

I have to tell you that I am on a potent cocktail of pain-relief drugs, so am probably tripping a bit rightnow, lol. Drung-rant over.

[Ferryman]

I guess big record companies are trying to protect the decreasing revenue stream from existing acts as CD sales dry up - their sales from the big artists are the annuity they use to fund new acts. New acts can better leverage the new media, they have little to lose in the way of stuff that's already out there, it helps them build a fan base and create a buzz. This is what Enter Shikari did, well worth checking out btw. It reminds me of 76-78 when the independents and self-funded labels took over from the majors for a short while.

I would imagine printed music sales are already pretty low, and online tabs are destroying them. So I can understand publishers going after the tab sites. Those are a direct rip off of copyright. Instructional videos are probably the final nail in the coffin. I think the legal position would be that everyone posting an instructional video should at least have the artists permission and possibly pay them a royalty as they are performing their works in public. That's the current legal position as I understand it.

BTW, new media can be just as controlling as the old media. Check out Taxi - it appears to be all new media and artist friendly but it seems to be controlled by an unknown coterie of A&R folks. You can't even talk to them and try to buy them a drink like in the old days!

I have to tell you that I am on a potent cocktail of pain-relief drugs, so am probably tripping a bit rightnow

Care to share?

[Greeny]

I have to tell you that I am on a potent cocktail of pain-relief drugs, so am probably tripping a bit rightnow

Care to share?

I have a trapped nerve in my neck - more painful than I can describe. At least it wasn't meningitis which was a passing possibility. So I've been on the Diazepam plus Diclofenac and Co-dydramol. I couldn't feel much of the pain anymore, but I did fall asleep in the middle of a work meeting on Tuesday!

[henwrench]

So I've been on the Diazepam plus Diclofenac and Co-dydramol.

     You lucky bugger.

                                                     Dr. henwrench

[Greeny]

p.s. I've been on Taxi for a couple of months. I spent almost 2 years deciding whether to join. I'm finally giving it a go. To be fair, their criticism (when they give it) is constructive, but you are right about the totally faceless / arms-length nature of how it's run. My biggest issue with it is that it's so American-focused - by that, I mean that there's way too many opportunities for Country songs and R&B, and not a great deal else. It's pretty galling to pay to join AND pay for every song you submit, but if I don't do it I'll never know for sure.

[Greeny]

So I've been on the Diazepam plus Diclofenac and Co-dydramol.

     You lucky bugger.

                                                     Dr. henwrench

I think I may have actually smiled this week... !

[Ferryman]

I did a lot of trawling of the Taxi forums and looked at the listings, and it's clear that the analysis is applied really inconsistently and you have to really conform to the listings to have a shot at them. It can work but you've got to have the time to play their games and make them work for you. The trouble with Taxi is you have to fit the formula that the producer or label wants, it's not a case of wow there's something unique we must get that. The labels are back in command, making all the bedroom musos dance to their tune. Can you imagine the listing for a song that would be right for Henwrench? But I guess I'm just an old punk, don't want to conform musically to what The Man wants.

I'm a big Enter Shikari fan and they used new media really well, see:
http://thedigitalist.net/2009/08/enter-shikari-or-lessons-from-the-record-industry-8506/
and didn't just use it as a mechanism to get signed (although of course they now have a deal with a major).

Cheers,

Nigel

[Greeny]

I did a lot of trawling of the Taxi forums and looked at the listings, and it's clear that the analysis is applied really inconsistently and you have to really conform to the listings to have a shot at them. It can work but you've got to have the time to play their games and make them work for you. The trouble with Taxi is you have to fit the formula that the producer or label wants, it's not a case of wow there's something unique we must get that. The labels are back in command, making all the bedroom musos dance to their tune. Can you imagine the listing for a song that would be right for Henwrench? But I guess I'm just an old punk, don't want to conform musically to what The Man wants.

You've pretty much summed it up right there. In addition, they're not even looking for potential in rough demos or making judgements on the songwriting itself; they want fully-formed, radio-ready performances that fit the listing requirement EXACTLY. It seems pretty lazy, but maybe that's how it works these days.

Remarkably, the MBR has done me proud in terms of recording quality. I haven't had one complaint about the quality of my demos - only praise. So that's pretty amazing for something home-recorded on the tiny silver dream machine.

Yep... not sure what they'd make of henwrench considering that they think MY stuff is a bit too edgy!

I kind of hoped (forlornly) that someone would hear something in my songs that wasn't just about a single listing. No luck so far though. I may - as a test - just write some big inane, anodine blockbuster to see what happens, lol.

I hate the thought of conforming or writing to order, but if it meant I could do it for a living I would consider compromise a fair exchange. It's not f*cking fair though that originality isn't rewarded these days. Or even recognised in a lot of cases. There are people on here who should be world famous.

[Ferryman]

Remarkably, the MBR has done me proud in terms of recording quality. I haven't had one complaint about the quality of my demos - only praise. So that's pretty amazing for something home-recorded on the tiny silver dream machine.

Now that is high praise indeed - I;ve seen them slag off what I thought were pretty good sounding recordings, so well done you. I know we tend to be very kind here, but your stuff does sound really, really good from a production perspective.

You coudl write that commercial blockbuster, you definitely have the songwriting skills. Nothing wrong with that if it gets picked up and makes you a few bob. But it's clear that there are a lot of people on there that spend their lives trying to sound exactly like this artist or that artist and the Taxi folks play them like rubes.

Cheers,

Nigel