They’re popping up all over the place.
Musicians doing their own thing, that is. And among the latest is UK bass player Steve Lawson.
Actually, that’s not quite true. In fact, he’s been sharing his music online for quite a while
“Here you can listen to almost everything I’ve ever released,” he says on stevelawson.net. “And if you like it, hit the download buttons and pay what you want for it.”
“Enjoy!”
On stevelawson.net, he continues >>>
2010 is – rather tragically – shaping up to be the year when Rock Stars (and old-industry millionaires) complain about the state of music on behalf of ‘the little people’.
Here are three examples:
Peter Waterman, in an interview with The Times, said that Spotify was a terrible thing. It, he says
“devalue[s] our artists, they damage this country economically, culturally and morally”
Why’s that then, Pete?
“The big stars are a tiny percentage; the rest are broke, including a lot of well-known faces. Who is developing new talent? Without money, new acts are strangled before they mature. We all suffer.”
This, from the man who made a multi-million pound career of writing and producing ‘hits’ for soap stars – his company were ‘The Hit Factory’, FFS. It was he who, in the land before autotune, realised that multitracking someone with a then-really-crappy voice like Kylie would make it passable, enough to sell mediocre music off the back of a TV career anyway… (notice how good she got when she stopped working with SAW?). Yup, he’s been a bastion of the process to find new talent. A fine supporter of grass-roots music. No double standard there.
And to answer his question, ‘Who is developing new talent?‘ – the talented people are, you idiot! We don’t need ‘developing’, we can just get on with it, without you, and services like Spotify remove the gatekeepers and friction from people hearing us. It HELPS us. Stop speaking on our behalf.
Case-study #2, is DJ Shadow, who, in a rant on his website, suggests that the lack of perceived money in music has removed the incentive to create art (any of you who play music as amateurs, feel free to be MASSIVELY offended by this patronising bollocks now). As an example, he says
“how many young rap artists are grinding away these days in New York, trying to get a deal? Not too many, certainly compared to the ‘80s and ‘90s. There’s no allure, no pot at the end of the rainbow.”
Perhaps it’s because no-one needs to ‘grind away’ any more? You can make music at home, release it, find interesting places to play without the ‘grind’? What was the ‘grind’ for anyway? A record deal? Screw that. Gigs? Do them yourself. And has he actually looked at the relationship between the history of hip-hop and the political climate? It changes, it shifts. And post-bling, if rappers have become cash-obsessed, they’ve only themselves to blame. Long gone are the days when Hip-hop was ‘CNN for Black People’ as Chuck D called it, and it’s ain’t the fault of Bit Torrent.
Finally, Here’s Bono claiming that the world needs to learn from China about the joys of internet snooping, if Hollywood is to be saved the fate of Big Music. He says this, on the same day that it’s announced that Avatar is the ‘Fastest film to ever gross a billion dollars.’ Yup, Hollywood is REALLY hurting right now. Any INDUSTRY that grosses a billion dollars in 3 weeks is doing fine, let alone a SINGLE FILM.
And what does he say has happened in music?
“A decade’s worth of music file-sharing and swiping has made clear that the people it hurts are the creators..”
- Despite sales this year breaking records,
- Despite Lady Gaga SELLING 20 million downloads,
- Despite Lily Allen shifting 4 million albums in a career that started long after BitTorrent rounded the curve of its growth spurt,
- Despite U2s’ own planet-raping biggest-tour-of-all-time selling out around the globe.
So, dear Rock Stars – the problem here is not with the internet. It’s not with how it ‘hurts’ the little people. WE LOVE IT! It’s you. You and your expectations of wealth-beyond-measure are screwed. And I don’t care.
Here’s a headline for you – in the 3 weeks since I made ‘Behind Every Word’ available for free download, I’ve sold more CDs and downloads that in any one month since 6 months after it first came out.
This a four year old album. I’ve done no gigs in that time, I’ve taken out no ads, I’ve not given away a single bit of physical anything that cost me money. I’ve just talked about it, and invited people to listen to it. And guess what? They listened, and those who really liked it THEN PAID. And they paid more for the ‘free’ download they they do on iTunes.
I couldn’t possibly have done it without ‘free music’, without the internet, without sharing, without streaming. Nor could I have done it within the insanely restrictive copyright terms of a standard recording contract.
Headline number 2 – Indie Cellist is so successful, the mainstream industry don’t believe her when she tells them:
On Twitter yesterday I was chatting to Zoe Keating – awesome cellist, composer, looper, and massive indie success. So successful that ‘the industry’ don’t believe her when she says how successful she is! They only believe their own statistics – so only report her sales figures as measured by Soundscan. They don’t like that Zoe has done it all without them, so aren’t interested in developing newer more flexible ways of measuring success. But as I pointed out to Zoe, who has 1.3 MILLION twitter followers, she has a bigger audience than Billboard Magazine. So screw them and their outdated measurements, just do your music cos you love it, and bypass the nonsense of pre-millenial bullshit notions of success. (I also wonder just how influential people like Zoe can be in promoting other indie artists – using their platform as a discovery source… we’ll see, in time, I guess 
)
So, Rock Stars – stop it, let go. Your half a century in the sun is done. Pete, Bono, Joshua, you’ve got more than enough to live on for the rest of your lives. If you’re struggling, downsize. Maybe you’d get something out of reading the greatest blog post of 2009 about the music industry, by Danny Barnes.
Move over, and let those of us who value sustainability, artistic freedom and a conversational relationship with our audience over fame, celebrity and selling-millions-of-records-while-still-losing-money get on with what we do, using the tools that make it possible.
And if any of you three want a copy of Behind Every Word, please, download it for free, here – I promise I won’t spam the email address you have to give me in order to get the free version. Alternatively, pay what you can for it. If you’re strapped for cash, just drop in a tenner like you would for one of your much lamented CDs.
Excellent, Steve. Well said, mate.
January 14th, 2010 at 9:38 am
Indiana, can you try and let Steve down gently? Let him know that he’s mistaken, that this direct artist-to-fan-to-artist commerce is actually an illusion that can only occur in a parallel universe?
January 14th, 2010 at 12:27 pm
@Crosbie, he’s selling ‘copies’ you know because he is part of ‘this’ universe and he’s also giving copies away (just like the rest of us in this universe are). He’s not selling his ‘masters’ to his fans from what I have read here.
January 14th, 2010 at 12:30 pm
@Crosbie: he’s also practicing a bit of artist control because you need to give your email address in order to do the download. I’m glad artists are beginning to accept models that involve streaming services like spotify. This is very similar to our concept for artists at Kerchoonz. The artists can give their downloads away for free, but, we share the ad-revenue with the artists. When people stream their music, the artist also receives a cut from the ad revenue on their page. I’m not sure what you think I’m ‘missing’ here Crosbie?
January 14th, 2010 at 1:26 pm
Indiana, I didn’t say he was selling his recordings, but that option is available to him – in addition to the business he’s already doing without needing to sue his fans for file-sharing, or send the boys round to streaming sites to collect royalties.
How much money did he say he made by selling his fans’ eyeballs to advertisers? How much did he say he made from royalties charged to streaming sites?
Because you’ve not yet made the paradigm shift I’m not really surprised you still see this as sale of copies to fans, as something that wouldn’t occur without the threat of heavy copyright fines persuading a sufficiently large number of people to buy authorised copies.
If people still buy copies, well QED, copyright must still be working!
Do you not have the slightest glimmer of recognition that possibly Steve’s fans would still have bought copies from him WITHOUT copyright?
What follows from that, is that they are not so much purchasing copies that they could get elsewhere for free, as PATRONISING the artist by way of rewarding or encouraging their work.
January 14th, 2010 at 2:45 pm
The only people who have ’sued fans’ for file-sharing have been the majors (to my knowledge) and perhaps other ‘high profile’ artists.
If his music is on Spotify, he would be receiving a royalty. He does refer to it. Obviously he is selling ‘copies’. You keep saying that the market for ‘copies’ is dead. That’s not the case at all. I still sell copies and I’m fairly sure that Billy and tons of other artists still sell copies. Steve’s fans would still buy copies without copyright, but, if ‘Steve’, for example, doesn’t write his own songs and he uses someone elses work and ‘covers’ that song, the songwriter wouldn’t be paid. This is an income stream that is very important for composers and songwriters. In your universe, songwriters and composers would not be able to survive. There are tons of people who work as song writers and pitch their songs to performing artists. There are also a lot of performing artists who are extremely talented, but, cannot write songs. Are we to simply drop those artists or are we to simply drop those songwriters/composers in your universe? You seem to have the idea that songwriters shouldn’t receive a royalty and that they should simply sell their songs once to one artist? How could a songwriter make a living that way? A performing artist would not be able to afford to simply buy a song upfront from a songwriter. Composers/songwriters work mostly on spec and in exchange for royalties from sales, royalties from airplay, etc. I don’t have any problems at all with the way Steve is doing things. There are tons of people out there doing ‘tip jars’. That’s perfectly fine.
January 14th, 2010 at 4:56 pm
But, Indiana, you want to keep copyright’s power to sue people, even if you pretend to be wounded at the suggestion that you might ever resort to using it.
As Al Capone puts it “You can get much further with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone.”
Surrender your weapons. Deal with your fans in a trusting relationship, not as a mercenary publisher with copyright holstered in reserve.
January 14th, 2010 at 5:05 pm
Give it up Cros. .. they will NEVER get it.
I’d love to hear more proof of concept stories from real artists
like this one. I hope more like him find time away from making money doing what they love to come here and talk to all of us about it.
Fans WANT to support artists they love, and they do.
January 14th, 2010 at 5:49 pm
?? I want to sue people? Where do you get that idea?
January 14th, 2010 at 5:51 pm
@crosbie Instead of implying that artists want to sue people (and especially me, since I’ve never sued anyone in my life and have never suggested suing anyone ever), why not answer my post about what to do with songwriter’s and composers in your ‘universe’?
January 14th, 2010 at 5:59 pm
@dredd hang on a minute, in another thread, you said that you would hope that Crosbie’s theory wouldn’t alienate composer/songwriters or artists that rely on royalties when the question was asked about whether the ‘fans’ who would be sold ‘recordings’ would then be able to collect royalties from streaming sites. I agreed with your statement there. So, why now would we not be ‘getting it’? I’ve just said that I think what “Steve” has done is really good. He’s putting his songs on his site up for free and asking people to donate similar to a lot of ‘tip jar’ artists out there. In the meanwhile, he is also making his copies available for sale and likewise he’s engaging streaming sites. That’s what we all need to do to survive. He’s giving his music for free in exchange for your email address so that he can communicate with you and he’s asking for some cash in his tip jar. What’s not to ‘get’ or ‘understand’? I’m just saying that there are composers and songwriter’s out there who wouldn’t be able to make a living under his theory unless Crosbie explains how that would work.
January 14th, 2010 at 6:05 pm
Indiana, a slave owner doesn’t WANT to beat their slaves, but they want the power to do so, just in case it’s necessary.
A musician doesn’t WANT to sue the artist who flatters them by remixing them, but they need the power to sue them just in case they haven’t first paid for a license to do so.
If you can’t conceive of ever needing to sue anyone, why are you so desperate to retain the power to do so?
Incidentally, do you think Dreddsnik is right and that I’m wasting my time trying to enlighten you? Or do you think it’s possible that you might be convinced to neutralise copyright in your work, such that your fans are liberated and need no longer live in fear that you might sue them?
January 14th, 2010 at 7:13 pm
Trust me Crosbie, you’re wasting your time. And ours.
January 14th, 2010 at 7:48 pm
Billy, a lot of us don’t think he is wasting our time. Sorry.
January 14th, 2010 at 7:48 pm
That depends on the point of view.
If one comes here to talk about alternative ways of getting your art, whatever it is, to the fans without the middle man, your time is well spent.
If one here to use a very badly thought out law as a baseball bat type of negotiating tool, then one might be wasting time.
January 15th, 2010 at 7:22 pm
@Crosbie
I think you’re taking a lot out of context. The first comment post in this thread shows that you have some misconceptions about my beliefs. My fans have no fear that I might sue them. So, not sure where you’re coming from.
Musician’s don’t sue people who remix because they didn’t ‘pay a license’ anyway. That doesn’t happen. What happens is someone uses their work and simply doesn’t bother to fill in the forms and the ‘musician’ (writer/composer) doesn’t receive his revenue stream (royalty) which his livelihood often depends upon. That’s how the system works. Nobody asks artists to pay licenses ‘up front’ in order for people to ‘cover’ or ‘remix’ their work. The rule is simply that when you release, you declare the use so that those people’s works that you are using receive their share. This part of the system isn’t ‘unfair’ and it allows tons of people to work and expand upon other people’s work. It’s only ‘if’ someone’s interpretation would show the work in a negative light (e.g. for example a parody or something that endorsed the use of class A drugs for children, etc.) that an composer or artist would refute that use.
Personally, I believe that copyright should be reformed. I believe that the length of copyright should be reduced and ‘use it or lose it’ should be enforced. I believe that if anyone is to own copyright on works, it should be the creator. If the creator decides to enter into an agreement and ‘lease’ the copyright to a third party, I believe the length of time for use should be limited and reversion back to the creator be a period of something like a decade (but, only if the copyright is being used actively.)
January 16th, 2010 at 5:33 pm
It’s a bit odd to see bits from a blog post taken massively out of context and used as fuel for a weird fight… No idea what the history is between you two. Don’t particularly care to find out…
For a bit of context on where I’m coming from, I’d suggest going and reading a few other posts on my site, where this was first posted, that hopefully put it in context… For the record, I’m not anti-infrastructure. I’m against the idea that the old infrastructure is a given, now that most of it is at best unnecessary and at worst actively damaging to the vital relationship between artist and audience. Build the team you need as the need arises, don’t spend what you haven’t got, and don’t make the music you were born to make, not that some marketing dickhead tells you is going to sell…
anyway, here’s a handful of posts that might help:
• Indepependent Music Manifesto• Transformative Vs Incremental Change• Spotify: Are They The Bad Guys?• If Spotify Is The New Radio, The Artists Are Winning.
There are lots more, should you be interested, but those four probably frame this particular article well.
Steve
January 16th, 2010 at 7:23 pm
@ Steve:
Thanks for the links. As for the weird fight, you need to go back to the beginning to put that into context as well.
Cheers!
Jon
January 19th, 2010 at 12:18 pm
Well said. It’s refreshing to hear this from a successful artist such as yourself.