“Fear is making the record companies less arrogant. They’re more open to ideas. So, what’s important now is to find music that’s timeless.”

Ok, but that's not "some corporation" deciding, that's a bunch of different companies not participating, and presumably that's because it's still a new thing and labels haven't accepted the concept. If they accepted the concept, your argument would be moot.

they can't accept the concept because its too complicated legally to sort out all the rights, payments, etc. They'll all collapse (and "be bought out for pennies") before they figure it out.

in other words its the Gordian Knot - it can't be untangled, it must be cut altogether.

You might be right. But why does it have to be complicated? Why not just share revenue as a percentage of total downloads? If the new Justin Timberlake single is 5% of downloads for a given week, why not just pay out a proportional amount of subscription revenue? I know that could be more complicated than it sounds, but these labels use pretty elaborate revenue schemes as it is.

"You might be right. But why does it have to be complicated? Why not just share revenue as a percentage of total downloads?"

You are kidding, right? Have you ever read any contracts? Or any legal documents ever?

it will be amusing if jobs announces beatles on itunes today

Yeah, actually I have.

The record companies already have plenty of complex legal arrangements though.

If the record companies don't move to subscription, it will either be because they're too resistant to change (which they've shown themselves to be so far), or because they think it will be a net loss from the revenue they currently earn from recordings (which is going to keep declining anyway).

personally I feel a high degree of shadenfreude at the major labels' current predicament - with CDs they created an unnecessary and inferior technology and foisted it on the market at ridiculously overpriced rates and now the principles behind that very same technology (i.e., digital copies of music) are proving to be their undoing.

Meanwhile, the original "punk rock"/DIY dream of the music scene being diversified and democratized has been realized: an ever-increasing number of people/kids/music fiends/whathaveyou are freely creating and sharing content with an increasingly smaller and smaller degree of corporate mediation.

I do think the labels have really hurt themselves with the way they've continued to treat artists. That thing about revenue sharing from touring and merch is really offensive. What self-respecting artists would want to go to a label that even considered a deal like that? I mean you've got a whole generation of kids raised on the idea that the music business is evil; a lot of them have read the Donald Passman book, the Steve Albini essay, etc., not to mention growing up with bands like Fugazi that set a different example, watching labels like Matador rise to prominence, etc., and there's a similar (though not entirely parallel) story in hip-hop. In other words, talented artists no longer necessarily see the majors as the place to go, and this becomes a recruiting problem.

I think the labels still operate with an early 60s mindset - where you could find a good looking kid with a nice voice on the street and make him into a star, then milk everything you could out of him until he went dry.

These days labels want things both ways - they want an artist to walk in already developed and marketable, which takes lots of savvy on the artist's part, but then they want to fully take advantage of the artist, which assumes the artist lacks savvy.

Sorry, those last two statements came out garbled and sound like they contradict each other. What I meant to say is that labels still want the dumb street kid they can take advantage of, but they also want that dumb street kid to walk in as a fully-formed artist, and they can't have it both ways.

Of course the subscription model would entail a HUGE loss in revenue for the labels. That's why they don't do it, not legal complexity, since they certainly have the army of lawyers necessary to make these things work. How much would people pay for a music subscription? $20/month? $50? Do you think that's going to "save" the labels? Sure, they may be fucked anyway, but subscription is basically admitting defeat -- they'd all lose their jobs.

yep

Yeah, they're probably fucked regardless.

Another legal problem that the article didn't address is antitrust laws,both in the US and Europe. If the major labels get together on some sort of subscription thing, this could be a problem

I think Rubin's probably right about this - but I don't think the whole subscription model will prevent it: "The future technology companies will either wait for the record companies to smarten up, or they'll let them sink until they can buy them for 10 cents on the dollar and own the whole thing."

Iowa doesn't do oh-so-postmodern. You're thinking of Brown.

Iowa also produced Flannery O'Connor, Kurt Vonnegut, and a bunch of other people who I will check wikipedia for and then post

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iowa_Writers_Workshop#Notable_Alumni

That thing about revenue sharing from touring and merch is really offensive. What self-respecting artists would want to go to a label that even considered a deal like that?

yeah this is completely wtf. I guess the label could assume more responsibility, financial and otherwise, though (and I'm completely talking out of my ass here) e.g. providing a touring band with an employee to handle merch, running the website, pony up for t-shirts/ screen printing overhead etc. Not saying this is an ideal situation by any means, but at least try to make a 50/50 split more palatable...

Vonnegut was from Indiana.

yeah this is completely wtf. Its wrongheaded and offensive but I don't think its completely wtf - they see where the income is and then demand a piece of it, this is standard corporate label MO.

Whoops, he TAUGHT at Iowa Writers Workshop. (I know he was from Indiana, I was talking about writing programs)

word

(Ha, probably better not to sidetrack into MFA-talk, but I just meant Iowa's aesthetic is really crisp, precise, and conventional. Also, hardly anyone writes bloated, pretentious, postmodern novels anymore, in part because boys don't like to read.)

oh yeah. I'm not saying I don't believe record companies would be all over this, I'm saying you (the artist) would have to be pretty dumb to get on board with it. That is unless most of the financial/ manpower investment is assumed by your label.

xxxpost

Yeah, I think you might see some labels take on more of those roles in exchange for revenue sharing. If a label can get some other hand out of your pocket in exchange for digging its own in a little deeper, artists might agree to it. But knowing the majors they'll probably find a way to make sure the artist comes out worse off in the end.

hardly anyone writes bloated, pretentious, postmodern novels anymore,

David Foster Wallace to thread

His last novel came out more than ten years ago.

I didn't read it then either

Is it wrong to enjoy seeing the slow collapse of the major labels? It's like watching the Hindenburg go down.

You enjoyed watching the Hindenburg go down?

it's more fun than watching the slow collapse of the bloated, pretentious, postmodern novel

hahaha

i just hope the music columbia releases now is as good as that article makes it out to be...

I think someone got a jump on Rick's word-of-mouth department with that whole Marie Digby fiasco going down right now.

the hindenburg went down pretty quickly actually

that's odd, it looked like it was barely moving in all those photographs.

oh the humanity

Marie Digby...? what's the deal?

I guess that's really the most insulting thing about the article--the assumption that major labels are worth saving, that we should be upset if Rick can't keep Columbia from going under. Personally, I could give a fuck. Seems like the real winner is large indies who are agile enough to roll with filesharing and for whom 50,000 sold is a success.

While I don't think *the majors* as they currently exist are all that worth saving, I do think there's something to be said for capital. Maybe labels the size of Matador and Sub Pop have enough money these days that you don't really need something bigger. But fact is it's pretty hard to make a great album without an advance.

Our label (a small but established and reputable indie) is paying for four days of studio time for us to do a full-length. That's including mixing. The only way we can possibly get it done is to do all the main tracking live in 2 days or so, a day of overdubs and a day of mixing. And that means practicing the hell out of the songs, which we can only do two or three times a week with our rental space schedule. And it's stressful as hell and no matter how much practice we get there's no guarantee we'll get good takes.

Which I don't mean as a complaint - four days is better than nothing. Hell, there are probably Stax sessions that were done as quickly. But if you name 20 of your favorite albums, at least 19 of them took more than four days to make, unless you deliberately pick ultra-lo-fi stuff or pre-studio-wizardry records. The majors are the ones who can put up the money, and they used to make great records as a result.

Seems like the real winner is large indies who are agile enough to roll with filesharing and for whom 50,000 sold is a success.

Most indies will never have a 50,000-seller, and I'm not sure what "agile enough to roll with filesharing" means -- agile enough to not mind losing money?

I think Black Sabbath's first three records were done in 10 days, total. And they still sound awesome.

Again, not saying you can't make a good record in three or four days. But there are a lot of great records that couldn't have been made in three or four days.

Marie Digby...? what's the deal?

Here.

Ms. Digby's simple, homemade music videos of her performing popular songs have been viewed more than 2.3 million times on YouTube. Her acoustic-guitar rendition of the R&B hit "Umbrella" has been featured on MTV's program "The Hills" and is played regularly on radio stations in Los Angeles, Sacramento and Portland, Ore. Capping the frenzy, a press release last week from Walt Disney Co.'s Hollywood Records label declared: "Breakthrough YouTube Phenomenon Marié Digby Signs With Hollywood Records."

What the release failed to mention is that Hollywood Records signed Ms. Digby in 2005, 18 months before she became a YouTube phenomenon. Hollywood Records helped devise her Internet strategy, consulted with her on the type of songs she chose to post, and distributed a high-quality studio recording of "Umbrella" to iTunes and radio stations.

that is very interesting

I think Black Sabbath's first three records were done in 10 days, total.

if the first three black sabbath albums were released today everyone would say they sound like shit and that they need more dynamic range compression or something

"Marie Digby...? what's the deal?"

She was sonned in internet beef.

Most indies will never have a 50,000-seller, and I'm not sure what "agile enough to roll with filesharing" means -- agile enough to not mind losing money?

You mentioned two large indies yourself--Sub Pop and Matador. I know Matador has had 50k sellers, I bet Sub Pop has too. Hell, so has Touch and Go, although it took them a while.

As for filesharing, indies may have a better chance at devising things to download that people will actually buy--the New Pornographers "Executive Edition" is at least an interesting idea.