Drag City

xp i don't have a problem w/ DC not being on streaming services but the weird thing to me is not deferring to the artist's preference here.

(assuming there are a number of other DC artists like hagerty that would otherwise be fine w/ streaming services)

I could be wrong here, but I thought Spotify was an "all in all out" sort of situation wrt labels. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

which would mean if a handful of (relative) cash cows rejected the idea of their music being available on Spotify, everyone else would have to follow suit

There have definitely been cases of big artists pulling just *their* catalog, but maybe they have their own dedicated publisher or something?

Like Taylor Swift isn't there but other Big Machine albums are

I'm pretty sure this is all about the bottom line w/The Drag City folks and making sure their artists get a fair shake, which I find admirable. But, the other side of the coin is that DC vinyl is rather expensive, usually $20.00 or more for a single LP. That's a tall order.

the main issue i have remains the same and has nothing to do with spotify -- if i buy the LP, i want to be able to listen elsewhere and a downloadable option costs extra which means i pay like $30 for an album

and i am happy to give money to my favorite artists i just feel like it's inhumane to their loyal longterm customers to squeeze that hard
i go to shows too
will probably just focus on buying vinyl at shows i guess

From Will Oldham's AMA on Reddit last year: (https://www.reddit.com/r/indieheads/comments/51n7bz/ask_me_anything_will_oldham/) on subject of Drag City policy:

giraffeking
Hey Will, do you agree with Drag City's philosophy of not allowing their music on streaming services? And with their stance, do you worry about not reaching an audience that would want to listen to an album first before buying it?

bonafide138 (Will Oldham)
I don't know. we don't eat a meal before deciding if we'll pay for it. we don't wear clothes before buying them. we don't see a movie before buying the ticket. streaming is pretty bogus, it feeds the entitlement mentality. there are more vital audiences that I worry about reaching, besides/in addition to those who are dependent on a computer/smartphone and a wireless signal to listen to music

firetruckfiretruck
I get your point and agree to an extent, but we most definitely do try on clothes before buying them. Changing rooms?

bonafide138
Drag City puts up a streaming song prior to the release of almost every Drag City record. This might parallel the experience of trying on an item of clothing in a 3x3 flourescent-lit box, with price tags and security devices still attached to the garment.

Dr_Pickle_Fingers
Drag City is my favourite label and has been so for about 15 years. Times have changed, though, and it is sadly less convenient for me to listen to my many Drag City albums. I have to pull out all my old cables and such.
My point is this: I would totally pay a monthly subscription to Drag City for a Drag City streaming/download service. You, Joanna Newsom, Bill Callahan, Silver Jews, Faun Fables, Baby Dee. Hell, it'd be a better library than Spotify.

bonafide138
this is good news.

blacktoast
Will I love your music and I've been a listener for many years, but your viewpoint on this is deeply out of touch. I found your music through peer-to-peer sharing, as I've found most of the artists that I listen to and enjoy. Most people that are excited about hearing new music today are doing so using an internet connection, and that's not an "entitlement mentality" that's just the media climate that we're in. To expect people to continue to buy CDs in lieu of finding music on the internet is naive.

FearStalksTheLand
Just so you know I was a huge fan, and I have bought a lot of your music. The times have changed and I don't carry a iPod I can put my music one anymore. I have not heard any music from you in 6 years or so. In my mind you fit in the entitled audience of Neil Young of people who think they can dictate people listen to music.

bonafide138
Where Neil Young has created a new form of file and would like listeners to buy new gear, I say please keep your record player, your tape player, your CD player. Don't spend money following corporate evolution unless you feel you have to. And you can find almost all of my music on YouTube. So I don't get your point.

xpost (coincidentally!)

Oldham's talked a lot in interviews about how the 200/300-person club is the ideal size for performing, and how he wouldn't want the norm to be larger than that. I'm assume there are other DC artists who similarly want that level of success/fame, versus a label that will take them to the next level. And similarly not just with music placement but with their lives in general. There's certainly a level then of "how do they afford to live?" but if that's taken out of the equation, ideally the artists are working at the level they want to be working at.

Been interesting to see Adult Swim take DC's ethos to television.

Oldham's talked a lot in interviews about how the 200/300-person club is the ideal size for performing

totally agree w this, personally.

I'm an old that doesn't stream but I do use Youtube if I need to.

Drag City will endure all these streaming services imho... Spotify lost a tremendous amount of money last year, purportedly one quarter of one billion dollars, lol.

i stream & pay for spotify premium but would never begrudge an artist or label who decides it's not for him

Drag City will endure all these streaming services imho

idk how they do it but this is v likely to be true

Don't spend money following corporate evolution unless you feel you have to

so simple yet so otm

yup

http://pitchfork.com/news/70724-Drag-City-announces-closure-job-losses

fuck you for that (but also lol)

ha

Rock, in contrast, is the most popular genre in general, with 29 percent of consumption, but accounts for only 20 percent of the streaming market.

Part of streaming’s increased success, Nielsen finds, is that it’s the preferred platform for hip-hop and R&B fans. The genres make up 22 percent of all audio consumption, but 28 percent of on-demand streams.

So hip-hop and rnb fans are tight-arses?

good insight dude

or just more concerned w convenience/cheaper/poorer - take yr pick

also possibly less interested in "albums" as discrete artifacts idk

or smart

i prefer boxedjoy's interpretation of radio wont play it

so they have to stream it

that makes sense too

the Dans know all

what

the guys who run DC

Issues of compensation and business model aside, how mindblowing a piece of software is Spotify? Instant access to every song in the worlds biggest record collection!

I could not have imagined something like this as a kid.

Remember when Napster came out, the thrill of music being available per request! Up until then I could only hear what came on the radio, what was on mtv, on sampler cds with music magazines, and of course what I could afford and what I could borrow from friends or at the library...

Remember vividly a day at the school library, I must have been 12 or 13, I was on the computer and some girls from a class above mine were doing group work. I was on iMesh and so I asked them: Hey, is there a song you'd like to hear? They were hesitant to answer, maybe cause they didn't see the point of the question, probably also because it amounted to a kind of flirting and they were my seniors and all. But anyway, after a short while one of the girls was like, "I think he'll be able to get the song on the computer" and they asked for Lady Marmalade (the Xtina, Lil Kim, Mya, Pink version).

I searched for it and 20 minutes later I'd downloaded it and was able to play it back through the sound blasters. Felt like magic. The girls were impressed, but I think I was even more impressed. Never forgot that day.

so not gonna happen

lol

Issues of compensation and business model aside
Issues of compensation and business model aside
Issues of compensation and business model aside
Issues of compensation and business model aside
Issues of compensation and business model aside
Issues of compensation and business model aside
Issues of compensation and business model aside

Napster wasn't great for musicians either - but for the listeners? Amazing

I think it's fine if musicians can make a living from single/album sales (if they can buy a private jet I think it's silly) but I'm not sure it's necessary for there to be great music? lots of people make music for fun, ambitious stuff too

You don't hear expensive string arrangements on a lot of records these days, production value on a lot of new releases is probably lower than in the 90s - but there's tons of great stuff, right?

anyway, did not mean to further derail this dc thread, there are separate threads for this

you're right, why do we need the modern equivalent of Pet Sounds, Rumours, or Houses Of The Holy Road when we have Car Seat Headrest

Houses of the Holy, that is

everything's better now

sorry to be snarky. This is a sensitive topic for me

lots of people make music for fun, ambitious stuff too

don't you think that these 'lots of people' often reflect a very specific demographic of people privileged enough to have the free time to do this without having to worry about working a full time job? And don't you suspect this imbalance might be silencing voices that would otherwise be making great music?

no, I don't think so - especially not in an American context where jazz, blues, r'n'b, hip hop were at least partially rooted in "under-privileged" demographics

you're right, why do we need the modern equivalent of Pet Sounds, Rumours, or Houses Of The Holy when we have Car Seat Headrest

lots of things "might be silencing voices that would otherwise be making great music" but I'm not sure economics of album sales is... prominent

come to think of it - how are voices silenced? makes me think abtthe metal scene in Iran suffering oppression, but that's a case of censorship - is censorship more silencing than material concerns? (if the two are separable)

Silenced or confronted with barriers to entry? Different and both relevant but not in the thread for Drag City, of all things

xp the part about your post that triggered me was the thing about 'expensive string arrangements,' because I happened to be lamenting this very thing just yesterday. I was in a friend's car and she was listening to Aja, and all I could think about was how a record like that, under current conditions, could never get made now. Aside from the mechanics and logistics (flying session players across an ocean, recording at multiple studios), there's the matter of the cameraderie that "evil major label money" afforded bands like this. My concerns are just as much aesthetic as they are political (but that too)

it's interesting you bring up jazz because I doubt the average millennial Spotify junkie could name five working jazz artists that aren't in some way connected to Flying Lotus. Even if they could, they're not exactly 'supporting' them just by merely knowing who they are, and that may be even worse. Without benefactors, this is a music that will more or less cease to exist in any commercial capacity (and before you say anything, I would argue that as long as Downbeat still somehow exists it still does, despite the odds, exist in something resembling a commercial capacity)

La Lechera otm, sorry for the major derail, lord knows there are already dozens of threads about this (one more excruciating than the next)

just to clarify:

in an American context where jazz, blues, r'n'b, hip hop were at least partially rooted in "under-privileged" demographics

and funded by millions and millions of dollars of major label money

Napster wasn't great for musicians either
Napster wasn't great for musicians either
Napster wasn't great for musicians either
Napster wasn't great for musicians either
Napster wasn't great for musicians either
Napster wasn't great for musicians either
Napster wasn't great for musicians either
Napster wasn't great for musicians either
Napster wasn't great for musicians either

Niels absolutely killin' it ITT

just to clarify:

in an American context where jazz, blues, r'n'b, hip hop were at least partially rooted in "under-privileged" demographics

and funded by millions and millions of dollars of major label money

The situation was complex, at least with blues and jazz, but, yeah, I was puzzling over how to respond to that one too.

so much to say about the issues Wimmels raises I hardly know where to start, and can't in fact settle on a place to start. big question, the relative virtues of the old label system and its deep recording/studio budgets.