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Beat-by-bit

"Confusion will be my epitaph"

King Crimson

It smells … medicine.

This is the feeling I feel when I read reports about copyright and "legal battle" music.

Over the past twenty years, much more than an industry have been called home due to attack of technological innovations.

The most intelligent and successful was healed and made a profit on this transformation.

O. had just died, simply, calmly and without all this fuss about nothing. Will surely be very soon forgotten, however, some people keep memories good on them.

But the most terrible are those who are screaming like pigs slaughtered when they die, and his attack on foot, which is breaking all Remedies on the table. Drugs that could have served some improvements of their disease if they had paid attention to them.

But this time to make the bottles Broken complete the room that the heavy fragrance – And it smells like medicine.

You can judge by the behavior of the patient to take action in a clinic psychiatry. These actions of the patient is illogical, absurd and damn unhappy. Thus, on one hand, you want to approach and help him, even for simple conversation. But on the other hand, feels tedious and awareness. And because nuts This behavior ', you are completely discouraged from taking part in his destiny, even a little. And you are looking at this picture ugly, you know what? – I prefer to leave the room. Let's do the best years of the patient (which he certainly had enough) back to our memory.

I've been wondering for so long about the time that the recording industry has lost all its charm and attraction, all that he had in the old days? Good old days, when every record company had its own recognizable face – a bright personality, which was expressed not only in design the labels of vinyl, but whatever the label was doing.

What happened to the music industry on the road to Beat "was" bit "was?

There are many articles written on the subject, most meaningless, referring to the business model "and" market share "concepts and other abstractions.

They remind me a placebo – a dummy pill that you put on the table the patient. The patient looks at the pill and put it in your head that everything will be okay, everything goes as expected, everything is back to normal …

I would like to talk about another level of abstraction, not those directly related to the business itself, but directly related to his death – Charisma, illusions and Energy …

Charisma

What is the main difference between the record of the Beat "golden" era, ie the seventies of the century past, and his followers of today's "piece" was?

In fact, there are many differences but one draws attention.

Those days, record companies were led by some great people. Personalities!

Today, the major labels are headed by people from the small category of "no-body, and no name. "

Most of them have nothing to do with music whatsoever. They are either accountants or lawyers. Sometimes the heart, What is particularly awful.

That is, in classic words – "plankton office."

Even if it is a very well paid plankton and brilliant, is still the plankton, and it would be a great mistake to think that the quality of music just depends on the musicians themselves.

People like Richard Brenson (Virgin), Stig Anderson (Polar Music) Berry Gordy (Motown) and Daniel Miller (Mute) had enormous charisma alone. And it is not clear who had more than – Recording artists or labels leaders. Brenson charisma surely surpass all his musicians, and still hangs over his 200 companies, no matter what they were doing.

Only an idiot would confuse Motown vinyl with vinyl Virgin. Were carriers of a specific culture. They had style and unity.

Your product has survived both the record labels and artists themselves were recording. Today, 30-40 years later, their products still being sold, changing hands the several times and, most importantly, with the price rising.

Sold for real money, despite the fact that the music of these records are available in millions websites. Despite its free availability, people spend $ 30 for the same thing on vinyl.

This is not because the sound of vinyl records, somehow special.

The reason is his charisma, which is present not only in people but also in inanimate objects, in spite of what organized religion would you think.

But that's true on one condition: only if inanimate objects were created by people who had charisma. Only if the designer put his soul the product is possible.

Charisma creates added value. And in our times, where everything is becoming free, it simply creates value. Not added, but simply the value, which is amazing in itself.

Charisma is the key to the success of computers with the apple logo 'bit'.

The charisma sells vinyl records of The Beatles with "apple" incision. These two companies, Apple's a musical and a computer – are the most notable examples of charisma. Nobody needs to be convinced to buy your product. People fight for it, despite the millions of seemingly free of cost alternatives.

What I would like to know when you have all this mass production of becoming faceless piles of plastic that needs persuasion to be purchased?

This moment is really known. It is the moment for which all the bright and attractive labels were acquired by TNCs from depersonalization complete musical products.

The mere acquisition of one company by another has little meaning by itself. That does not happen when he brought some benefits real to justify the acquisition cost. Especially when a huge accounting firm acquires a little creative and effective team, hoping to buy your creativity and charisma. However, the only thing they can do that is to kill all the creativity and bringing ex-zero charisma, sinking in the mud puddle called "culture corporate. "

But one way or another acquisition costs to be recovered. And then, a new format in the form of questionable-sounding, but low-cost and convenient compact discs appeared.

Vinyl records, and also the result of pressing the plastic while still having great individuality. Let's start with the fact that the same record, released in different labels in different countries, it sounded quite different, and had a lot of other details. But greed and the desire to re-sell the purchased material recording labels in a genuine new form has led to mountains of plastic inanimate. That put the first nail in the coffin music industry.

Despite the euphoria over the huge initial sales of CDs, can only be compared with an injection of a final dose of a drug strong. You'll feel fine, but not for long, however.

However charisma of artists was also undergoing dramatic changes. The era of musicians, whose life could fill a book has been replaced by the era of musicians, if only I could write an article on.

And then, one could only write an advertorial paid because there was really nothing to write about the artist. And journalists and PR managers creative thinking "could help attract the public to know the artist, whose hard they had to sell.

We all know how it ended. music press reached zero almost everywhere in the world due to lack of absolute basis for its activity. Cheap scandals and attempts to "compensate" a brilliant personality does not work for the new generation, who feel everything is false. While the scandals Amy Winehouse look comical, for some B. Spears are just abject.

The charisma is charisma, because it attracts people. This attraction works for the benefit of possessing charisma and those who are near him all the time.

Even when things are universally free, charisma would make money to its owner – one way or another.

There's only one problem (problem) with charisma. It can not be manufactured. It exists or not. And those who preach pop psychology and say that will teach you to be charismatic by various methods NLP – well, they can all go to hell. As everyone knows, the only benefit of training in NLP is the salary NLP trainer.

A final difference of the recording industry to a new age, that although related to charisma, but deserves to be mentioned, is the feature.

What were the roles of historical record?

Here are five basic functions:

– Find an artist

– Record the artist

– Promote the artist

– Distribute the recordings

– Cheating artist

Until a certain time, all these tasks were performed very well, especially the last point, where higher levels the instruments have been achieved.

But with the advent of the Internet (it is even indecent to say now), the only task that the label can do better of what the artist has been left for him, and this is the last. Artists, however, can also be mistaken as well, especially in their expectations.

Otherwise, artists find themselves alone, the record at his own expense (thanks to technology, which made the process cheaper and the quality of the recording that seemed to be concerned at all). Distribution has become a marvel as promotion could take place in some way with the help of the network in all its manifestations.

At some point the situation seems idyllic.

Complete freedom of [removed] utility that needs to be discussed separately), unfiltered in the form of record labels and managers-R (these are strange people who believe their musical taste to be like the masses), the immediate distribution of the music world. This is just a kind of fairy tale that is coming to us!

Well, everything will be fine, except for one thing to mourn.

People do not buy this music.

And they do not buy it anyway. Neither the CD nor as music files. Neither expensive nor cheap. Neither of the label, nor the artist.

– No, thanks. I do not need it.

– But why?

No, please do not give me iTunes Music Store and examples of success as proof that Radiohead is still possible to sell music and you just need to find a business model.

I'm sick of these two examples, because only one publication not too lazy to write a story or two about Radiohead.

Apple does not make a profit from the iTunes Music Store, and was declared many times by the company. Frankly speaking the service is on the verge of a recovery, but also brings great benefit indirectly – Sellings through the iPod. The number of tracks sold via iTunes seemed very convincing on the presentations from Apple and even better when talking about Steve Jobs. But unfortunately they are not comparable to talking about numbers of downloads of music free of charge on the Internet. And this is by far the most successful shop in the world!

So if anyone has taken seriously the Radiohead experiment of letting the public choose their own price for tracks to download Radiohead's new album, I wish I had this vision childish innocence in the world. I think it would make my life easier.

In fact, the tactics of Radiohead is still bright, but a totally different way. For its history of leaks well done miss the Internet, the group simply f ** ked the world media, starting an advertising campaign an incredible range of the same arrogance and unbelievable. It is not surprising that after a while, both Radiohead and their record label that has had to receive, with excellent sales of real CDs and vinyl, accessories, and other pleasant.

The only lesson I draw from the experience is that when Radiohead the music is very good and the artists are brilliant people, your product will be sold for real money even.

This is good music. It's really not Whether there is any piracy or not. Especially if you put aside your illusions stupid …

Illusions

First and most strange delusion is that a release of each new album should lead to materialization of at least one huge mansion on a private island.

Even thought the range of Beatles' song – a pool (and even then it was a joke). But they may think that way. His music brings true happiness millions of people for over forty years and millions of copies are being sold today.

During these forty years, no artist could not even near his level of genius.

And who said one singer, whose album can be heard only once in fast-forward and deserves the same income? Does the service public that a budget of millions of dollars were invested in "this" and must be recovered?

Who invented this notion that music band or composer must have higher income?

World history does not confirm this state of affairs. If you delete these twenty or thirty years of industry boom record (which is a drop in the ocean), the rest of the time the creative people who had income is just enough to do the things they love doing, and not worry much money. At least without the need for distraction from creative activity and forced to earn money some other way.

Nobody ever promised a private island for this type of activity.

We will have a clear view of things.

It was just a moment, a moment between past and future. It was called the music industry. It was very brief. It was at the crossroads between the time when there was no physical media, and when there are no more physical media. What is terrible about that?

We still have a lot of relics from that time. Maybe that's enough for everyone?

Above all I like a phrase said to me by one of my friends who is an engineer. One of their job functions is to hear a lot of new artists for one reason or another.

I do not listen the music for free – he said.

defenders of copyright and all other lawyers, there is no need to start applauding. That does not mean he does not listen to music free of charge. He meant that he deliberately refuses to listen to modern music, unless it is paid for it.

Approach that is worthy of respect and understanding. After all, if you bought a rotten fish is to consider it damage your health. So why do not worry too with their mental health, or at least about spoiled mood?

And the problem we find here is created by the same advantages as mentioned earlier as a tale potential for fairies music industry.

These technologies, which are designed to provide unprecedented creative freedom previously, the absence barriers, free distribution – who worked in precisely the opposite sense.

The illusion of freedom of expression

That sounds tempting, is not it? Only if you leave out one fact that is proven today – 99% of people can not actually create anything of value.

The best way to prove this is the Internet itself, particularly the Web 2.0 reincarnation.

People, that content created in the past, the quality continues to create it. All the rest is filled with junk.

Have you noticed that people who are thought to be never really serious blog (if not their profession)? Talking is not their specialty, and have little interest in the opinions of others. Your job is to create something …

Good or bad, but people is another purpose to consume, not create, and it always has been.

Today, any person, is expressed, and this is not a problem per se. It is still useful, if nobody sees it.

The problem is that all this is not done for you and your friends, but played in the market as a product of real music.

Now try to find something you like in this market within a pile of rubbish music. At a minimum, you must be a lover of music really determined to to spend all your time filtering.

I have a question for the music industry.

Do you seriously think that I have to pay the same 18 dollars for all the noise and the Dark Side Of The Moon on a shelf near?

Or are you kidding?

What we have in the end?

Freedom of expression was good in theory but in practice led to situations in which even for those technologies that operates very well (and I'm among them, talking frankly) is practically impossible to find anything valuable on the Internet. The noise has exceeded all reasonable levels.

Illusion of censorship.

Previously, the censors were labels. While they were young and managed by creative personalities – they were good filters. They have done great things, saving us the audience, swimming in the sea of shit.

Yes, sometimes we make mistakes and do not always recognize talent, but in general, the labels left us at least some artists of great scale and great potential. If there were no such filters, we never hear about them.

Because these labels truly record were absorbed by groups of accountants, lawyers, through transnational media groups, filters it got worse and worse. Eventually, they became so bad that, in fact, would be better without them. But as we see, the problem is not in the filters, but its quality.

So here's what we got.

Musicians and industry have had everything you could possibly imagine. All the latest technologies are in their hands.

virtual studios – creating almost free.

Distribution system is simply free.

Marketing opportunities are huge on the Internet, taking into account a marketing approach creative.

almost everything is great except one thing. Most people do not want to buy the majority of new music. Bastards, they're not afraid of nor laws, or of permanent harassment. Musicians and industry has everything you ever wanted, but people do not buy most of their products.

Or rather, its new product.

Like the Beatles, Queen, Pink Floyd, ABBA, etc. are still sold in great quantities of copies. Mp3, CD, vinyl – whatever you want. The musicians are all pensioners, but records are still sold, without any special marketing efforts.

At this point, would be appropriate to accuse me of fear of novelty, but not necessary.

First, I do not give a damn.

Secondly, I know that when a new band that appears can be really loved, I love it.

Similar to how I fell in love with Air, Zero 7, or a reincarnation of the Future Sound Of London. I had your mp3 totally free, and then went and bought everything on CD and then on vinyl.

Crazy?

But this is an exception the rule. Unfortunately, there is very little to fall through the new songs.

Almost nothing …

Everyone knows a superb music site – Last.fm. This site is a great tool to understand what love most people. " As everyone knows, statistics on Last.fm brings what real people are really listen on their computers. It's much more honest than all the payment information to the graphics world. Even if not paid for, graphs that reflect the purchases, but not real love. You can buy the CD, without thinking too much, or under the influence of the media. But no one will force you to listen to it every day.

Thus, while there Last.Fm, I do not remember that The Beatles will lower the third. Forty years after their last song.

And the rest of the Top 20 are true artists and personalities shine.

And by the way, the elderly are not the only people visiting Last.fm.

"No is this a sign of creative impotence? Does anyone is able to compose new material for those who did before? Sure, I'm proud, happy, flattered and all that, but how can it happen that the great success that was achieved was achieved by the material that was made twenty years ago – and that in a cover version? Something is wrong. This should not occur. "

Benny Andersson (ABBA)

Energy

Then, there are still artists they were selling, and are still selling their music for real money.

They are not many, but who said there must be millions of them?

Maybe your sales numbers are smaller, but who said every person on the planet should buy the music?

This illusion is only produced heads of transnational marketing labels.

References to previous levels (especially in the seventies of last century), are just making me laugh.

In those days, people had no other home entertainment except music. VCRs did not exist, or computer games or game consoles. No gadgets at all! Books and vinyl records were the only entertainment in our homes. This is the first explanation. Today, the attention of customers spread across all new media and arts, while their disposable income remains virtually the same. Music receives less attention. The attitude of which became more simple … in general. Music has become nothing but a bottom.

When talking about energy, it is good to start with which was appointed by proverbs long ago:

"What we get cheaper, we value is not enough"

Value or not.

This applies music, in the sense that the process has become much cheaper and mechanics. Breeders now invest less of its own energy. However, listeners feel it through some special sense and perfectly understand it.

"Beat track"

There is a musical genre, such as Ambient. Many think that this is a whole new musical genre that arose not long ago. However, similar to how the Beatles laid the groundwork for the brit-pop with one of his songs, invented the hard rock of the seventies with a different song and all the psychedelic contemporary with the third, the background music in its contemporary form appeared on the early recordings of Pink Floyd along with the psychedelic genre.

In those days, creating music, it was extremely difficult and costly. Synth have begun to appear and felt out of the ark. There was no ready-to-use audio samples. To achieve the desired effect guitar echo, a musician needed down in an empty pool, we could not do it otherwise. So people just had to be resourceful in a variety of ways.

They manipulated the tape, cut it into pieces, pasted, or even created some devices made just for the sake of achieving an effect. The great producer and sound engineer Alan Parsons went to a store to record the clock chime. And it was honest.

Honesty – this is the word that best shows how the music was made at the time. Not There was coverage of the technology behind which one could hide, and is clearly seen in the music of the time.

And he is still valuable.

way 'Bit'

Today, any teenager can instantly download from the internet a lot of modern sounds, samples, loops, and other "content" then launch a virtual studio on your laptop and set up something with it.

Depending on whether the noise is carried forward or backward, the final product can be called … just what you want!

But it still makes no sense, whatever the variant is.

Teen Smart the future, of course, will blow his cheeks out and start talking nonsense about what the original concept of his work, the ideas he put into it, and the pain of activity creative.

Music critics, however, will operate the words like "cult" (oh, I'd kill for that word!), "Cultural layer" and provide analogies to similar artists whose names are a kind of mystery to everyone, but for the critics themselves.

Does not work yet.

Music that was easily assembled from Lego blocks have no value. Musicians should not have thought that normal listeners do not really care. Here, the problem is not about computers, but on toast.

The result, which was previously held by the tremendous creative effort and mental energy the creator, is now achieved only through a few mouse clicks randomly on random fields of a software tool. And at first glance, in both cases (for music) have the same set of sounds and noises. Some sound landscape.

But I see the problem … In the first case, it sounds like a masterpiece, even forty years after its creation, while the second variant looks like a dirt-cheap things that any idiot can do.

Maybe it's mental energy, which, as emotions, is transmitted through the result of creative activity as well?

I just made the most extreme example, but for those who may think it is easy see everything that the rest of the product in contemporary music.

In any case, this is the explanation for the lower global interest catastrophic when it comes to electronic music. Doing so not only did not become profitable, but it is not prestigious in all topics.

A case particular.

Each person I believe that occasionally asks himself a question of how it should handle personal consumption of music today, when the question of copyright is literally hangs in the air?

On the one hand, I am sure that, deep down, almost everyone understands that the work of good writers, composers and other creators of intellectual property must, to some extent be compensated in cash.

Otherwise, its production would almost stop what I think anyone whatever happens.

On the other hand, when we begin to apply this question to ourselves, we realize that very quickly that when we get not the slightest ability to pay for books, music and movies (and indeed, for everything else), they are happy to use it.

And no matter what the law says about this matter, because the influence of law on our activity on the Internet are overblown. Ready to bet – What the proponents of copyright and other controllers invented further the development of information technologies unless the influence of law would become. In fact, it approaches zero rapidly.

People do not will be able to fight against the majority, especially in the era of high technology.

It has been shown and proven a million times, but if someone does not I understand – it is absolutely your own problem.

The morality of the issue does not bother me much. I believe people will never be truly free guided by principles of public morality, which replaced the personal principles long ago.

Given the absolute subjectivity of such concepts as "Good" and "evil" the majority opinion in relation to these concepts would be less bother you too.

"Morality for the weak, but falls within the Fort. "I agree with that truth hit and only add that the strength of the new century are precisely those who obtain technologies. That is the great majority of young people and even intelligent, but not a group of managers who had an obvious problem with sending an e-mail yesterday.

Thus, different ways, just for me, I tried to set the way I'm going to consume music, while being in harmony with myself, what is important.

Previous like most people I used to practice digital hoarding. But one day I did not understand the absolute stupidity of that activity.

And besides I found it extremely inefficient in the expansion of my personal development prospects music, I care deeply.

I noticed that 99% of all new songs that I downloaded, I heard once. And after he was killed or junk on my computer, or deleted immediately. I wrote about the causes of this phenomenon in detail above, but now I want to deal with the consequences.

You do not need to think long to realize that consumed most of this music in radio mode, not in a home media center mode. This song was never my iPod. I kept downloading, deleting, downloading, deleting until I understood all the foolish process.

At this time all the songs in the world were divided into two classes for me – the music is good enough for me so I'll listen to it all my life and music that is as "nothing", which is only worth listening to a brief time.

Since then, I stopped downloading anything from internet.

All my favorite albums have been bought long ago on vinyl and CDs and, of course, were regulars on my iPod.

Moved to the radio listener almost completely.

For radio, I certainly do not mean that the mediocrity that is displayed on FM in Russia (and not only there). I am talking about actual radio, what the internet gives me in the form of thousands of stations around the world in terms of quality that is acceptable to the song once.

I soon discovered real practical benefits of this type of music.

Unlike its pre-history "colleagues" on FM radio stations in truth I always Tell me what they are playing at the moment. This leads to a large number of musical discoveries, I could only dream of before. Often we come across real masterpieces, I would never know by visiting several music sites, with millions of bands whose names do not tell me much.

And when I come across them, I have an opportunity to explore the creativity of the band and perhaps buy your CD. Or download …

But that depends on the genius of the album and its ability to be on a shelf next to 'Queen: A Night at the Opera' or 'Air: Moon Safari. "

Record industry now has a chance and just to sell something to me to show me something I can fall sharply. I love him so much that I would gladly buy it and put on my bookshelf. I think not have no other way anymore.

From now on, only super-rarities will be sold for cash. Masterpieces that are impossible to pass. E register industry will offer me this kind of music or not, continues to be its own problem.

But I do not rule out another scenario, in addition, I think that would be ideal.

For the recording industry makes almost time to generate income (which will happen for sure), everyone involved in music just for money will have left.

The few that remain will be the creation of music just because they have real spiritual needs fro.

And, as usual in such cases, all that is done with soul is so good that we will desire to buy it again.

It is never too much when it comes to real music …

Record industry in the state when he arrived, he likes his customers. He does not like artists too. The music industry loves only himself. And this is why the energy expended does not return to it anyway.

I began this article with a quote from King Crimson, and will end with the last line of the last song of the last LP of the Beatles.

This message has a strong meaning and is the quintessence of what the band meant to the world. It shows his true attitude of the people and creativity, and that is why the records of this band is and will always be sold.

If the industry music could apply these words to you just for a bit, then he has a chance.

- And in the end the love you take

is equal to the love that you do (The Beatles).

/ Translation of Russian /

About the Author

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