Another reason to hate the majors

I got linked to this article the other day which gave me another reason to hate the major labels. The basic upshot is that as Rock Band and Guitar Hero sell by the million, the labels are complaining they don’t see enough money from the sales. Diddums.

Apparently Aerosmith made more money from their Guitar Hero spin-off than they have from any of their albums.

The Wired article goes on to state: “The amount being paid to the music industry, even though [these] games are entirely dependent on the content we own and control, is far too small,” Warner Music Group CEO Edgar Bronfman told analysts last summer. The money Warner receives for the use of its songs is “paltry,” he said, and if the gamemakers don’t pony up more cash, “we will not license to those games.” In response, Rock Band publisher MTV Games is now boycotting Warner artists, according to a source close to the negotiations.

Firstly, good on MTV for sticking it to Warners. The sheer greed of the majors continues to astound me. Rather than embrace the technology, the men in suits continue to steer their ships as if it were 1982. Times have changed. No-one’s buying CDs anymore. It just doesn’t happen. I can’t remember the last time I bought a CD. I can remember the last time I bought a download though – new content for Rock Band 2, just today. The only way the “industry” will survive is if it adapts to the technology.

Look at Napster – the big guns sued it, it shut down. Kazaa sprung into life so they shut that down. Then The Pirate Bay came along and now they’re trying to shut that down. The RIAA has sued thousands – yet downloading is bigger than ever. I’m not saying piracy is right, what I’m saying is that going after downloaders isn’t going to stop it. It’s like trying to stop a virus after it’s already spread and mutated.

Kids nowadays don’t have brand loyalty like they used to. And they certainly don’t give a fuck about major labels. The fact that more and more bands are shunning them and going DIY – Radiohead etc – says it all. If they keep this up, they’ll keep merging and merging until there’s one super label left.

The Wired article is very well written and makes some excellent points. The labels ought to push for more such titles and integrate them into their promotional strategies. They might not maximize profit on the licensing, but who cares? With more entries to come in the play-along genre, and networked hardware to play them on, the games themselves could even become an online music retail channel to rival iTunes.

It also comes to a better conclusion than I could try and write. I agree with every word.

If the company wants a case study, it need look no further than Universal Music Group. Rather than cavil over licensing fees, Universal parent company Vivendi simply bought Guitar Hero’s publisher, Activision. Look, the labels know that recorded music is in irreversible decline. Warner has actually led the industry with a policy of signing bands to so-called 360 deals, in which artists give the label a cut of everything they sell, be it ringtones, merchandise, or concert tickets. On the strength of such foresight, Bronfman has styled himself as the man who will reinvent the music industry. But part of that reinvention must be an end to petty haggling over fees.

Going PvP against gamemakers isn’t going to solve the industry’s problems. At this point, Bronfman still seems intent on dragging his business kicking and screaming back to the 20th century.

BIG

No, not the Tom Hanks movie. Something BIG is in the planning stages here at PT. It’s the biggest thing we’ve ever been involved with so keep your fingers crossed and all will be revealed soon…

It’s been pretty good so far…

 I thought the last series was balls, but  season 7 has been fairly good so far.  True, it’s been 24-by-numbers but it’s  entertaining enough and better than  most of the dross on TV…

Oscar schmoscar

I’ve sat and watched the news today and endured re-runs of last night’s Oscar ceremony. Question begs – who cares?!

The Oscars are nothing but a pat on the back for the industry, by the industry. It doesn’t tend to recognize excellent films (I mean Titanic once swept the boards…) and instead rewards faceless celebs who give pathetic, wincing speeches. If Kate Winslet thinks she will convince anyone she’s a poor working class girl then she deserves her gong!

Ultimately I don’t care who wins, who has worn what and who went to what party. I just want to enjoy movies regardless of awards.

Shits and gig(gles)

I’m going to see The Killers next week. Shamefully it will be my first gig of 2009, a poor attempt from someone supposedly in touch with what’s going on. I first saw Brandon Flowers and co 2 years ago around the release of ’sam’s Town’ which is an exceptional album. They remain one of the best live bands I’ve ever seen. Perhaps on a par with New Found Glory. NFG are definitely the most fun band I’ve ever seen, I think I’ve seen them 5 or 6 times now and they’re always amazing.

Anyway, who’s the best live band you’ve ever seen and why? Maybe it’s a memory, maybe someone just blew you away. Inspire me to see more bands!

An update. It’s been a while.

Yeah I know, I haven’t blogged for a while. I’ve been busy. The day job’s keeping me tied up for longer than I’d like, and then a certain major label got their knickers in a twist as a new Green Day song leaked and, as some wally posted the third-party link on the PT forums, said label’s lawyers decided to threaten us and our webhosts with a whole manner of nasties if we didn’t take it down ASAP. Just something else I could do without.

Anyway, stuff has been going on behind the scenes. PunktasticTV is launching a monthly (maybe) TV show soon which will have a whole manner of exclusives. It’ll feature Lamb of God and Danger Radio and, I hope, people will find it fun. We always need bands to submit their own stuff so please, please get in touch if you want to be involved.

We’ve also just posted an interview with Less Than Jake and have mega interviews with New Found Glory and Sonic Boom Six to come soon. We’re trying to increase our output when it comes to that kind of thing as we know we’re a bit slack. Spud’s also on the case for the long-awaited re-design of the main page and forums. Hopefully that will come about sometime this year. And yes, I am aware I’ve said that before.

Finally, if you haven’t already, add me up on twitter I like to feel like people love me.

I prefer Wellard

Someone told me today that ex-Eastender Dean Gaffney is an avid PT reader, a fact seemingly backed up by his twitter where he casually references the site in a tweet. Anyone else know any celeb PT fans out there?

Turn that shit off

Just how awesome are the guitar riffs in Rage Against The Machine songs? I heard ‘Guerilla Radio’ for the first time in ages today and it still sounds as fresh as a daisy.

The Format

It was brought to my attention by a friend that The Format broke up a year ago as yesterday. As many PT-ers and friends will know, The Format are one of the few bands that both me and the missus love equally. We love them so much that the staircase in our house has a series of framed posters of the band. They go up the stairs and look awesome:

Anyway, enough of the Grand Designs. The Format, for me, just did something different to the tonne of bands that did that emo/rock thing. While ‘The First Single’ is a bloody great obvious, swift-kick-in-the-nuts pop song, the band were never usually that overt. Instead they dressed everything up and disguised bloody amazing pop songs in 60s influenced guitars or clever lyrics. Who else could write a song like ‘Tie The Rope’ which, on the face of it, is a lovely little pop song – yet scratch the surface and it’s either about the suffocation of a relationship or suicide?

Like a great many bands they didn’t get the credit they deserve and a year ago as yesterday – Valentines Day – the band called it a day. A sad loss to music, if you haven’t checked out ‘Dog Problems’ then you must listen to it. www.myspace.com/theformat is a good starting point.

I blog about Blink, the public abuse me more

The other day I blogged about Blink 182 getting back together. I’ve been called lots of rude names for suggesting it may not be the best thing since sliced bread after all. Anyway, some of the comments gave me an idea…re-naming Blink songs in honour of them getting back together. For instance:

Stay Together for the Quids
What’s My Wage Again?
All The Small Coins
Here’s Your Fiver
Reckless Spending (OK, that one’s crap)
And of course, Time To Break Up!

Anyone else have any humorous manipulated song titles to add to the list?