Music makes us roll in herds….
There is quite some irony that I’m in London this week during the EMI Records media firestorm. After all, Gang of Four and the much-touted Radiohead were both on EMI Records and are both now beyond contracts with the label. This week EMI’s new owner, Guy Hands, decided to let 2000 staff go, about a third of the companies management and marketing staff, and has raised a further £250 million to cover the cost of the lay-offs. That’s on top of the roughly £4 billion he spent buying EMI. In his statements to the press he said that he was boosting the label’s A&R departments (the people who get out there and sign new talent) to bolster the creativity of the company, yet in the same breath said that he was dropping most of the current new artists on the label as they have cost the company £25 million in unsold CDs a year. EMI acts Robbie Williams and The Verve (who are managed by the same manager as Gang of Four) both say they are withholding their albums from EMI as they are worried they won’t be promoted. Messy.
Somehow I’ve been tracked down by the media here in London town. The Moose apparently has a caché and is considered a pundit, an ‘authority’ on the state of music in an online world. Ahem. I did my best.
The first of 3 interviews was a face-to-face, on camera with Annalisa Piras a correspondent for an Italian television news programme. Annalisa is a former president of the UK’s Foreign Press Association so I was careful about not jumping the shark as they say; Annalisa knows her stuff, the shark remained unjumped (is that a word?) Problem – her news piece headline was ‘2008, The End of The CD’ no question mark, apparently no irony….what to do/say? I can’t play it safe, I have 120 seconds to appear smart!
I can only be honest with her; CDs will last a lot longer than most people (myself included) would like to admit, there are still a majority of folks out there who purchase CDs and digital sales are not covering the slide downward in music sales – I do agree with David Byrne though, the tipping point will be reached very soon and CD sales will slide more quickly as more people buy music as downloads. I had to quickly craft some sound bites, here they are – ‘People have access via the Internet to more music than ever and are buying more music, it’s just one song at a time unfortunately.’ ‘The music industry failed to give people what they wanted – easy and cheap access to single songs online, available for download without restrictive DRM.’ ‘Artists will continue to create, people will buy their music, the middleman has now been cut out.’ ‘Guy Hands says that he wants to have EMI Records be a more creative company. Considering that EMI’s roster is made up of 100% ‘creative people’ that’s an interesting statement.’ And so on. She got back to me, she was very happy. Job done.
Next up was an interview with Adam Smith, London correspondent for Time Magazine. Same story really but more focused on EMI than the broader slump in the music markets. I spent 20 minutes on the phone with Adam and applied the newly-patented Moose sound bite machine but to less effect. I got one line in this story which slightly distorted my opinions – “Here’s a business person trying to turn [EMI] into a more creative company,” says Dave Allen, bass player with British post-punk band Gang of Four, a former EMI charge. “In my mind, it’s smoke and mirrors.” If that’s what I actually said then that’s weak…..but you can’t do anything about the editor’s scissors – c’mon Dave, be smarter!
Anyway, tomorrow Billboard, I think I’ll jump the shark. I’m here in London because Gang of Four is kicking up a storm in the studio and that makes me happy – new music coming in the Spring. And Radiohead continue to stoke their fan base by playing a free show in London’s Brick Lane at the Rough Trade store. Two ex-EMI bands having fun……that’s what it’s all about….fun…
PS – My buddy, Roy Christopher has a discussion going on his blog that’s a great extension of this debate.
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I certainly believe CDs will be around for a lot longer than many pundits make out, because they beat MP3s for sound quality hands down.
Having spent the best part of a year letting my iPod do the talking – plugging it in to home stereo, car etc – I’ve gone back to buying CDs as I’m sick of the poor sound quality you get from digital. (I buy vinyl too but for special quality stuff that I would never consider buying in digital format anyway, so it’s kinda irrelevant to the argument here.) Digital is fine for the on-the-move experience, but for considered listening? I don’t think so.
Of course I’m part of a dwindling minority, and I fully expect this to be reflected in pricing structures soon. Will I accept a price hike? Of course, CDs are currently underpriced in my opinion. That’s another thing the EMIs of this world got wrong. They should have done more to drive perceptions of value in the CD rather than allowing them to become such a disposable format. If they sort this out then the CD could remain a viable format for a very long time indeed – ie. if it is positioned (and delivered) as a format for the true fan and music lover.
January 17th, 2008 at 6:26 am@Freddie,
You make some good points and I like that you understand that you are in the minority on the CD vs Mp3 sound quality issue. I don’t know about the UK but in the USA there has been many attempts by the labels to add value to the CD experience two recent examples being a Super Audio or SA-CD http://www.sa-cd.net/ and another format which I think was DVD with audio on one side and visuals on the other. Neither made any impact in the marketplace.
January 17th, 2008 at 7:10 amI refer also to the David Byrne/Thom Yorke interview http://www.pampelmoose.com/mspeaks/?p=1217 where Thom reminds us that the business side of the music industry differs from the artistic side when it comes to ’selling’ music. Bands sell emotion, labels sell plastic packages…..
What about Storage? So we have this digitized world that continues to grow exponentially. The Apples of the world realize this and are temporarily quelling our fear and capitalizing on the “where do I put my growing digitized library of information”, well, with huge storage drives, of course. One question I have is, “at what point does the centralization of digitized information begin”. Google is attempting to centralize our day to day communication applications such as email, word and financial applications, pictures….what’s next; I think it will be music. Why can’t we own CD quality songs in perpetuity, why can’t they be purchased once and accessed a million times without a fear of it breaking or being lost? As we create easier and more creative ways to listen to the music, the world’s music becomes more and more disorganized. Can the consumer handle their music, not only in an intangible form, but in one form (copy) for millions to access, at any time, for eternity?
January 17th, 2008 at 7:59 amGo Dave! I finally posted a bit about this on my site. The whole thing (i.e., how the decline of the CD is affecting everything) is getting more and more interesting.
January 17th, 2008 at 2:08 pm@Bryan V
There’s 2 things here – 1 would be ‘cloud computing’ and that’s where the MacBook Air comes in, nothing much would need to be stored on the computer, access to your data is via the internet. And 2 local large storage – again Mac comes through with the Time Capsule (terrible name!) http://www.apple.com/timecapsule/ it’s a 500gb or 1 terrabyte back up device that’s also a wireless device for your network so that anyone on the network can back up to it. I think external storage via Apple or Google would eventually raise privacy issues especially if third parties subpoena the companies for access to your data…
January 17th, 2008 at 8:56 pmCDs, Mp3s, SA, downloads, storage – secondary concerns at best to me. I remember in the early 1970’s jamming a matchbook between an 8-track cassette and the player just to get the tape rolling again. It never diminished my interest in the music.
Dave says Gang of Four are kicking up a storm. They sound like they’re having a great time. That’s what matters.
I can’t wait for spring.
January 17th, 2008 at 9:09 pmJump the Shark!!
January 18th, 2008 at 2:23 amRoy Christopher says what I’ve been saying for quite some time now–we are back to SINGLES thanks to mp3. My burning question–with all the MP3 blogs out there, could any artist make a viable living selling nothing BUT singles? Could we go back to the days of the Quarrymen here, albeit in a digital format?
Maybe the Quarrymen ain’t the best example, perhaps Elvis Costello and Stiff is more appropos. Dave, you were there, (for Elvis, I mean, not the Quarries) …any perspective?
A Gang of Four/Elvis Costello mashup–now THERE’S a challenge. “I Don’t Wanna Go To Anthrax”
January 18th, 2008 at 4:43 amA propos of singles, haven’t Ash announced that they won’t be making LPs any more, only singles? I think there’s mileage in that idea… anyone remember the Wedding Present’s venture in this field? It brings a bit of excitement back in the equation.
As for CDs, I was interested to note that Simon Fox of HMV said today ‘I think there’s life in the CD yet’ having reported bumper Xmas takings (only +2% rise in music sales, albeit against an industry average of -12%). I’m with you Dave (et al) on the excitement and immediacy of digital formats, not to mention the irreversible consumer and market logic behind them, I just don’t want to find myself having my hand forced yet again by an industry that doesn’t seem to listen to what people really want.
So i couldn’t agree more with Thom Yorke. I couldn’t give a toss about enhanced CDs with videos or supposedly higher quality sound (they’re pretty good already). Frankly it comes down to packaging, the care and attention that is put into them, the way they are marketed, ie. all the things that determine the level of emotional (and financial) investment you’re prepared to make as a music fan. At present they are indeed just so many chunks of plastic, whacked out onto supermarket shelves, dished out cut-price by Amazon, HMV, Fopp etc. There’s no love or thought in there. Getting the new CD by X or Y or Z just isn’t an exciting experience any more. (Was it ever, really and truly?)
Accept the proposition that CDs are ONLY for the real fan (who is prepared to pay more) and you come back to the kind of thing Radiohead have been doing – cheapo digital product for the masses, exlusive subscription-only high end limited edition deluxe whatever for the fans. Only of course they couldn’t resist filling in the middle part with a crappy CD just to cover all bases which has made their groundbreaking record launch seem like just so much postmodern marketing.
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March 5th, 2008 at 1:45 pm