Metallica

It wasn't purely their fault, mind - the years following actually vindicated the piracy concerns most artists had. But at the time, I get why fans were frustrated. The data on piracy's impact on sales was very new and incomplete, and this incomplete data allowed for the narrative that sales declines were largely due to a $2 average increase in price per unit since the 90s as well as decreasing inventory (there was a paper circulating that posited this for years). Common sense obviously told us that obviously giving someone an easy way to pilfer product for free was going to impact sales, but the sales dropoff wasn't stark enough that people realized what horseshit the aforementioned narrative was.

The other problem is that people like Metallica and Dr. Dre weren't the best vectors for the message because they were successful millionaires who probably weren't seeing a drop in their royalty checks from the piracy, whereas struggling independent artists were, and their concerns weren't getting the same airtime. Add that to the RIAA's overzealous pursuit of lawsuits against people who obviously couldn't pay and it very quickly became Evil Big Business Against Grandma. Many Independent artists were also speaking critically of the RIAA and in support of things like Napster to get them exposure, they were the voices getting airtime, so it was also felt that "smaller bands are ok with Napster" too. Which I don't blame them for, as who could have anticipated how stark the decline of sales could be during the infancy of Napster, y'know....

I was always someone who paid for all of his music simply because I largely listen to bands who sell 10,000 copies or less of albums and I want the scene to thrive, but back then everybody was parroting "people make pennies on CDs, merchandising and concerts is where it's at!", and that *still* gets traction with some people. Which of course rang hollow when the people saying that weren't actually buying merchandise or going to shows but were indeed pirating music.

Really, though, the reason for the anger makes more sense if you view it outside of a pop context. The pop industry was a corporate-backed machine by this point, one ran by suits for suits. Metal grew up as a self-sustaining underground scene and in the early 80s, tape-trading was a part of that (among Metallica, among everybody), and now these pioneers of the underground seemed to be scoffing at those ideals, like they'd turned their backs on the roots of the genre. It didn't matter that the people Metallica were targeting weren't diehard fans who wore out "No Life Til Leather" but dudes who d/led "I Disappear" alongside Godsmack mp3s (I'm not sure I believe that bootlegs were their primary concern, though they were *a* concern). Metalheads viewed it as the final betrayal to the scene.

Part of me wonders if Metallica would have been more easily forgiven without the Napster stand, but obviously history has vindicated musicians' concerns about file-sharing, and RIAA's slowness to adapt to a new digital medium and the lack of legitimate ways to purchase digital recordings for many years (at affordable prices) really fucked over musicians. obv the wrong thread for this but the thing I lament the most is now that independent artists are the voices begging for their art to be supported, for people to purchase their music (when there actually are affordable, legitimate ways to do so digitally, and even to bypass greedy labels), and they're getting "fuck you, you get money from Spotify, and your music is too expensive" chiding from fans who are too cheap to pay 5.99 on Bandcamp.

Just FYI... http://livemetallica.com

I've bought a few off there. always good quality, tho wish they'd bring the price down. but the free shows are cool too.

I do like that I was able to get one featuring Hardwired songs live a few days after the show.

San Juan show I think

http://i.imgur.com/UqFTUv8.gif

Haha

http://www.nme.com/news/music/man-arrested-for-allegedly-urinating-on-a-family-at-metallica-concert-2122836

One lone man's protest against the gentrification of Metallica concerts.

I see his point, tried to get a ticket for one of their London gigs and it was £130.

"Daddio"

Hetfield's move around the 2:40 mark in this video is awesome

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdlQyNe_9tE

plus that sweet ass

Cliff's fingers are so long it always looks like he's using all of them at once.

Haha, Jaymz does that all throughout the Cliff 'Em All tape.

My favorite part of Cliff Em all is Kirk deciding to put the beer back

Cliff Burton dressing like he got kicked outta Wishbone Ash in the mid-80s was one of the coolest things

I really, really, really wonder how Cliff would've turned out. It's impossible to see him selling out, but I would've said the same thing about James had he died 31 years ago.

He probably would've joined Les Claypool's Frog Brigade or something.

i went to the same community college as cliff

no statue, sadly

was not there when cliff is there

i am younger than him

when cliff WAS there

not drunk, honest

Heineken huh

sadly no clip on youtube of james opining on jagermeister

here's a good article:
https://www.redbull.com/au-en/metallica-st-anger-15-years-on

hopefully someday an equally compelling defense will be made for Lulu

well that was a lot of words

listening to the album while reading it and it's not as bad as I remembered thinking it was but it's also not a stealth masterpiece

Dirty Window would sound pretty cool if you did a Diamond Head style cover of it and ignored the lyrics

I’ll happily defend Lulu, but St Anger no way.

I no longer hate St. Anger the way I did in 2003, and I get why they made it, but I don't want or need to listen to it. Lulu I'll never listen to again.

I think he makes a compelling argument (though personally I cannot listen to st anger in its entirety without going crazy) and I remember feeling something similar when listening to Lulu in one sitting (which I think I've done 4-5 times) that it's excrutiating but somehow it works, it makes sense, and with the Junior Dad ending it's ultimately v rewarding

this mtv performance is hilarious:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uz5Av9ShZyI

Off topic....episode of the 'Dead Rock Stars' podcast focusing on Cliff Burton: https://www.acast.com/deadrockstars/deadrockstars-cliffburton

Might not to be everyone's taste but I enjoyed it.

been meaning to read richard's piece but i've kinda already made up my mind about st. anger bc i listened to it so much when i was writing about lulu: it's interesting, and there are a few good songs/ideas buried in it, but it's not good

say what you will about lulu but it's a much more dynamic record

no doubt about that

Off to see them in Manchester next month, looking forward to some carefully managed traffic flow

pic.twitter.com/GP0DX2WZyn

— Subprime (@sbprme) May 30, 2019

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0irY0Osz9Q

shudder

https://magazine.uc.edu/content/dam/magazine/images/famous/famousTV/lucky.jpg

The crowd aren't even remotely into it either

They did something like that when they played here last -- picked out a few local bands from the early 90s and played a medley of their songs. A few people in the crowd might've recognized their names, but even I couldn't figure out what songs they were supposed to be playing when I watched the YouTube video.

Most of the audience – who were most definitely more fans of Metallica fans in 1990 than they were of the Little Rock punk scene – just kinda stood there and went Ohhh-kay?

man, scalping tickets for your own fucking band is so shitty

https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8521538/live-nation-resale-market-secretly-recorded-phone-calls-concert-tickets

Kirk Is so boring
Imagine what could have been

all of us
can now
be metallica

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urqO95exaIE