― ste burkey, Friday, 11 February 2005 22:46 (nineteen years ago) link
― keith m (keithmcl), Saturday, 12 February 2005 01:35 (nineteen years ago) link
― Half japanese, Saturday, 26 February 2005 15:35 (nineteen years ago) link
― peter smith (plsmith), Saturday, 26 February 2005 16:18 (nineteen years ago) link
The Bicycles are just ok as far as I'm concerned.
― Bimble... (Bimble...), Saturday, 26 February 2005 18:40 (nineteen years ago) link
― peter smith (plsmith), Saturday, 26 February 2005 21:41 (nineteen years ago) link
That "the artist's wishes" argument is just plain stupid. The same insanity that allowed Zappa to RUIN all of his early records by messing with the reissue tapes 'cause he thought he could make them "better" or something. If artists are deliberately withholding good music from the public, keeping it exclusively in the domain of collector scum and the trading elite (that means you), then they fucking deserve to be bootlegged and fileshared. Let's start with Organum... Anybody wanna make me a CDR of all those 1-sided singles?
"I think that bootlegs help keep the flame of music alive by keeping it out of not only the industry's conception of the artist, but also the artist's conception of the artist." -Lenny Kaye
And, obviously, at least one band member also wants the stuff released.
― Sleeve, Friday, 25 March 2005 05:34 (nineteen years ago) link
― Bimble... (Bimble...), Friday, 25 March 2005 05:40 (nineteen years ago) link
But I'm going to have to disagree with you and with Lenny Kaye on that one. There's other issues here and in most situations. If Patti Smith was working on remastering some never-before issued Radio Ethiopa outtakes and I got my hands on a crappy 3rd generation tape, it'd be cool for me to release it, to my profit?
It's one thing to defend filesharing, another thing alltogether to defend outright bootlegging. You write some music and see someone selling it for their profit, before you decided to put it out. Did you "fucking deserve" to be bootlegged?
And sorry if I sound like a record executive, but sometimes bootlegs making music easily accessible stop people from bothering to properly license it or make sure the artists actively get paid. It's happening a lot in dance music reissues these days, I think. While I sent out a lot of Desp Bikes CDs, I always figured it wasn't THAT many, and if someone put out a properly remastered version and promoted it well, that it would sell, but if someone put a Desp Bikes CD in the store and it sold a lot of copies, would the proper version stand as much a chance? What are the precedents of this? I never bought the legit Neu!, Cluster and Silver Apples CDs because I had owned the bootlegs for years.
And for the record, perhaps a lot of people like the Desperate Bicycles because they are obscure and hard to get a hold of. Personally, I love the music, and find myself singing their songs all the time.
― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Tuesday, 29 March 2005 20:13 (nineteen years ago) link
yeah, fuck zappa. what on earth made him think that he was allowed to work on his own material?
― lauren (laurenp), Wednesday, 30 March 2005 12:30 (eighteen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 30 March 2005 13:12 (eighteen years ago) link
― lauren (laurenp), Wednesday, 30 March 2005 13:39 (eighteen years ago) link
― David Allen (David Allen), Wednesday, 30 March 2005 14:46 (eighteen years ago) link
While I don't know the Zappa stuff I certainly wish I could get a DVD of the original Star Wars as it was released, but we're not talking about artists who add drum machines and synthesizers, just having the choice to package their music the way they want.
If Martin Philips went back to the original tapes of The Chills LP Brave Words and released a new version with all the tracks sounding clearer, like the few songs he remixed for a Chills greatest hits package, because he has always hated the way the original LP sounded. I'd have no choice but to tell people to buy copies of the original CD if they like the way it sounds, which I do. It doesn't give me the right to bootleg and start selling copies of the original record.
We can be all utopian and punk-rock about the free sharing of music, but copyright laws exist for good reasons. I recently had a brief discussion about this with someone when I asked if he was still planning on putting out this comp CD he'd wanted to put together. He said he decided not to, that it would all get reissued eventually anyway. I couldn't argue with that logic. But it later occured to me that if enough of the core market for that music ended up just getting it online or especially on a bootleg, that someone may decide it's not worth reissuing, so the artists won't get paid, and without a legitimate and promoted reissue, it may not find a bigger audience. This sounds hypothetical, but I know people at record labels who've made these decisions. "I'd like to reissue that properly, but it's been bootlegged so much that it's just not worth it" is something I've heard more then once, and felt a few times myself.
You take some Desperate Bicycles music, make a bootleg CD, sell 1,000 copies. Then, if wonder of wonders, one of them emails me and says "we've selected you as the label to reissue our catalog", I may have to say that we simply couldn't afford to. And that would suck. Chances are a bigger label would do it anyway and could afford it, but not in every case.
― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Wednesday, 30 March 2005 21:00 (eighteen years ago) link
― Sal, Friday, 1 April 2005 08:43 (eighteen years ago) link
regarding the Junior Boys...they did eventually get signed...because someone thought they'd sell records. And if that label person didn't think that, they might not even have the money to buy their damn drum machine, and I wonder, do they still have a day job? Music has been treated as a product for a hell of a long time, and while it is, artists deserve to quit their day jobs and get paid, even if buying the CD is the equivelent of hitting the tip jar. I download files, if I don't like them, I delete them, and if I do like them, and they're not David Bowie, I buy the CD.
but if we couldn't expect to make our money back, there'd be no Theoretical Girls CD. Not because anyone was holding it back, but because nobody would have bothered, nobody would have cared, hell, nobody would have known to check. The best music releases would all be charity. And while we think about money, and our end goal is to make millions putting out forgotten music, our main goal is to at least make our money back so we can do it again. And if we make even more money back, well we can then afford to put out better stuff, promote it to more people, better support the artists etc, such is capitalism.
regarding the zappa/lucas/apocalypse redux arguments, they really don't relate to what may or may not be happening with the Desperate Bicycles I don't think, or with my comment regarding Lenny Kaye/Patti Smith or The Chills. But even with that there's gray areas...regarding the basic assumption, and this has been discussed before, that any remastering is going to be better remastering, that's different then radically remixing something.
As far as your musical utopia, there's been many discussions in many places...what happens when the media no longer exists, there's no copy-protection and everyone had gigs of storage in their brains and their living rooms, will all artists only make money through live performance? I just don't feel like having that discussion and figure we'll cross that bridge when we get to it!
― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Friday, 1 April 2005 09:49 (eighteen years ago) link
― Sal, Friday, 1 April 2005 16:38 (eighteen years ago) link
― harveyw (harveyw), Monday, 11 April 2005 22:25 (eighteen years ago) link
― >>, Tuesday, 12 April 2005 00:03 (eighteen years ago) link
TV appearance? I'll be contacting you off-list!
― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Tuesday, 12 April 2005 05:05 (eighteen years ago) link
― regular roundups (Dave M), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 06:42 (eighteen years ago) link
― corey c (shock of daylight), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 08:35 (eighteen years ago) link
― bradlen, Thursday, 19 January 2006 00:28 (eighteen years ago) link
― Eugene S. Huckleberry, Monday, 19 March 2007 20:40 (seventeen years ago) link
― sleeve, Monday, 19 March 2007 21:11 (seventeen years ago) link
― Richard Wood Johnson, Thursday, 22 March 2007 14:23 (seventeen years ago) link
― pretzel walrus, Thursday, 22 March 2007 14:34 (seventeen years ago) link
― dan selzer, Thursday, 22 March 2007 15:00 (seventeen years ago) link
― dan selzer, Thursday, 22 March 2007 15:21 (seventeen years ago) link
― Mark G, Thursday, 22 March 2007 15:37 (seventeen years ago) link
― dan selzer, Thursday, 22 March 2007 15:38 (seventeen years ago) link
― Mark G, Thursday, 22 March 2007 15:43 (seventeen years ago) link
― Richard Wood Johnson, Friday, 23 March 2007 05:41 (seventeen years ago) link
― Dr.C, Friday, 23 March 2007 09:01 (seventeen years ago) link
― Colonel Poo, Friday, 23 March 2007 10:33 (seventeen years ago) link
― dan selzer, Friday, 23 March 2007 11:19 (seventeen years ago) link
― Colonel Poo, Friday, 23 March 2007 12:15 (seventeen years ago) link
― dan selzer, Friday, 23 March 2007 12:43 (seventeen years ago) link
― deedeedeextrovert, Friday, 23 March 2007 15:02 (seventeen years ago) link
― dan selzer, Friday, 23 March 2007 15:29 (seventeen years ago) link
― sleeve, Friday, 23 March 2007 15:38 (seventeen years ago) link
― Robert Laversuch, Tuesday, 3 April 2007 13:52 (sixteen years ago) link
― kasperbauer, Friday, 20 April 2007 16:34 (sixteen years ago) link
eww, this music is fucking shite. there's no reason to hear this bollocks except the fact that someone doesn't want you to hear it. brilliant marketing move, laddies.
i love this pretentious existential explanation for the band: "The Desperate Bicycles were formed for the specific purpose of recording and releasing a single on their own label."
Not to make good music, not to express anything relevant, but simply to release an album. Yes, this has encouraged me to go buy an excessively large Hummer and drive it around just because.
― res, Saturday, 21 June 2008 20:06 (fifteen years ago) link
i'd say "advice on arrest" definitely expresses something relevant, and far from existential or pretentious. try actually listening to them next time.
― r1o natsume, Saturday, 21 June 2008 20:24 (fifteen years ago) link
What's really cool about music is that sometimes some people like it, while other people don't. A little respect for other people's taste and opinions goes a long way. They wrote tons of great songs that mean a lot to a lot of people. It's fine if you don't like them, and I guess it's silly for me to argue on the internet about stuff like this.
It was a pretty big deal, a big conceptual leap back then, that you could just put out a record. They had that idea and decided to do it. It was an influential move, but unlike the bulk of their followers, the music was also fantastic and they continued to write songs, released a few more singles and an LP. Most of it is pretty good to completely awesome, in my opinion, if not yours.
And I like it just because.
― dan selzer, Saturday, 21 June 2008 20:46 (fifteen years ago) link
Is this the thread that is mentioned in the page at the top of the thread that doesn't work when you click on the link on that page?
Because if it is, he's right, it is interesting.
I remember buying the second single from my local record shop and cursing the fact that you must have either lived next to Rough Trade or been a friend of the band to get the first single. Certainly had no chance getting it out in the sticks. It's good to hear it again after all these years.
― Ned Trifle II, Saturday, 2 August 2008 09:25 (fifteen years ago) link
Dug this up for the first time in probably 4 years? Totally enjoying "Cars"
― "lol" as frivolity (Stevie D), Wednesday, 5 August 2009 16:28 (fourteen years ago) link
"Holidays" is easily one of my favorite songs of all time. Can't get enough of it.
― Trip Maker, Wednesday, 5 August 2009 16:38 (fourteen years ago) link
I'm at the "Grief Is Very Private" single and it's quite exceptional. I'm surprised at how fucking good this is.
― "lol" as frivolity (Stevie D), Wednesday, 5 August 2009 16:44 (fourteen years ago) link