James Blunt Says No To Piracy, Yes To Lily Allen
Our posting of Lily Allen's anti-piracy views sparked quite a debate in the comments section. Now singer songwriter James Blunt is also coming to Allen's defense with his own call for British musicians to "galvanize over a serious crime".
"I want to put my hand up in support of Lily Allen. She’s asking British musicians to galvanize over a serious crime: the death of a great British industry — our music business.
The world over, people are stealing music in its millions in the form of illegal file-sharing. It’s easy to do, and has become accepted by many, but people need to know that it is destroying people’s livelihoods and suffocating emerging British artists." – James Blunt in the Times UK
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James Blunt still has a career? I really don’t find
it necessary to comment directly about what he said as I think
most of us are on the same page. However I do find it funny that
its the artists that are on major labels are the ones that are coming out
against file sharing. I truly loved his little “suffocating emerging British artists”
I hope he wasn’t referring to independent musicians with that comment.
Thanks for the passionate plea, Mr. Blunt. Hope it works better than “Save The Whales” “Save The Rainforest” “Don’t Club Baby Seals” “Stop Global Warming” and all the other passionate and irrelevant public pleas made every day.
The old music business is OVER! Labels, right societies and yes, even artists need to realize that your recordings are worth almost nothing in the eyes of consumers. Instead of pricing music in a manner similar to physical media, all of the above need to understand that. Your new album isn’t worth ten bucks, Mr. Blunt! Maybe it’s worth a dollar, or maybe I should get it for free when I buy a 6 pack of Coca-Cola. The music industry (which obviously includes artists) is encouraging piracy by not addressing the massive difference between their perceived value of music products, and consumers.
Truly, if a consumer can themselves make endless 1:1 copies of said product, and distribute it to all their friends, or even globally, without breaking a sweat, how do you ever expect to get the genie back in the bottle? No one believes that music products are worth anything, anymore. 99 cents? That’s for puritans and squares. The cocktail format? All that extra media should be included with a digital album in the first place, it’s not worth one extra penny. Active music consumers, the tastemakers who break bands, know how to get everything they want for free. And for decades, the labels themselves have been giving music away for free when they feel like it. They are often behind the “leaks” of many albums to file sharing services.
The only solution for the industry is to either embrace file sharing, at a reasonable , consumer friendly price point (no more than $9.99 per month for all you can eat), or to tell consumers “you pay + ten bucks a month on your ISP fees, and you’ll never get sued for file sharing.” Masses of consumers will sign up, there will be huge revenue, and immediately the music business will immediately have a relationship with consumers again.
But this won’t happen for a while, because the labels, the right societies, and yes, the artists all base their value of music on a CD. I’m a former major label guy, but in my opinion, people should share more, keep devolving the old paradigms, break it down until everything is in a million pieces on the floor. Only then will everyone be desperate enough to be smart enough to change.
The labels and major artists need to actually understand the industry and how online music works before they criticize it!
Artists need to really think about maximising revenues when their music is launched and not about always getting money over their entire lives from music.
They understand exactly how it works, they’re just not HAPPY about it, which is why they’re criticizing it. But they’ve been bitching and suing for over a decade and have accomplished nothing, except to keep legitimate companies trying to license music from being successful due to unreasonable, extortive requirements. Anyone who has been involved in a licensing negotiation with the majors would agree – you can spot a licensee veteran a mile away because they walk funny, and need to sit on special pillows.
James Blunt – Warner / Atlantic
Lily Allen – Parlophone
Two solo artists who need ‘the machine’ to survive. Funny how at the same time Billy Coogan from Smashing Pumpkins has just announced his plans to release a huge amount of new Pumpkins material over the coming years for free, while charging for 4 track EPs for serious fans.
It’s not about ‘saving’ the old record industry, it’s about understanding the new one. Both Lily and James could do well if their labels dropped them and they got some good management in to show them how to take control.
Julian Moore, you said it perfectly.
OK, while we’re on the subject – who exactly are the good managers, who “get” the new music economy? We all spend enough time talking about who’s doing it wrong, might at well give some love to people doing it right 🙂
Indeed Julian Moore…everything on this Earth is getting smaller …except the expectations of rich people…smaller and sustainable FTW.
I found a comment on a post on another blog that so succinctly elucidated my thoughts on this issue that I am just going to quote it here in it’s entirety.
This points to a major problem with artists complaining about file-sharing. Whether or not it’s morally or legally right to file share, when artists and record labels say file sharing is wrong and demand payment for every conceivable usage…they are defining the artist relationship with their fans as a commercial rather than emotional. Fans will have none of that. The connection fans have with music is always emotional and they will react negatively to anyone who suggests otherwise.
comment made by “Rjk” in response this article: http://www.musicthinktank.com/blog/experiment-everyone-must-have-a-cd-even-if-free.html
The article is fascinating too.