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erica - 2004-02-25 11:37:14
I have a different perspective on the whole Grey Tuesday thing.
I get the impression it was kind of a living room project gone awry. And even pressed at 3,000 copies, the record probably wasn't going to make that much money for the kid anyway.
I think we should all mash up, crash up, and splash up to our heart's content . . . it's good for the culcha. But he shoudln't have tried to sell it . . . at least, not without without expecting this to happen.
Why won't EMI just try to buy him out and fold him into their catalog, instead of chasing him down like a dog? Makes them look bad. Plus, it gives more fuel to the Fight-the-Power people.
I'm not particularly enamored of the Grey Tuesday thing -- it has a Save Ferris kind of ring to it -- but the album is awesome. I heard half of it in a store and got obsessed. Had no idea it was illegal till I Googled.
Erica
(I choose to victimize traditional songs -- they can't fight back.)
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Paula - 2004-02-25 11:58:09
Erica:
Thanks for that!
I think we should all mash up, crash up, and splash up to our heart's content . . . it's good for the culcha
Hmmm...how so? Mind you, I'm not disagreeing, I'm just not exactly followin' yr thought.
I had a protracted argument the other day with someone about Bikram's copyrighting his yoga sequence, and I fell squarely on the opposite side of this issue. But ancient yoga postures belong to the world, and "Happiness is a Warm Gun" doesn't, as much as we think it should.
Also, the "fight the powa" aspect of this is what irks me a little, too. Just because a big corporation is protecting its interests doesn't make them evil, it just makes them...big.
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erica - 2004-02-25 13:31:33
Howdy.
Re mash up, splash up, etc:
Well, if it wasn't for mash up records like this one, hip hop might not have been born. Or at least, not quite in the same way. My experience in the trad world tells me that putting songs through the musical meat grinder is what keeps the songs around, and I'm all for it.
I see EMI's reaction as shortsighted. Won't this make more people dig the White Album? As for me, I'm more interested now in Jay-Z. And by the way, I haven't heard about him chasing down the DJ. Is he? He's probably like f*ck it, I'm outta here anyway, have fun.
The Bikram thing freaks me out.
--Paw Power
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Paula - 2004-02-25 13:46:10
EMI's reaction was shortsighted. Won't this make more people dig the White Album?
That's a good point.
But what if the artist in question weren't the Beatles but, say, Erica Smith? And masher-guy was selling 3,000 copies of his Erica mash-up, and you didn't see a penny of this money?
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erica - 2004-02-25 14:17:43
Ha! I'd be thrilled if anyone cared other than the proverbial rat and his proverbial ass. I'm resigned to never making money on this music endeavour. That's what makes the EMI thing even more frustrating to me. Not only are they making their cash off the Beatles catalog, they're sitting on it by forbidding sampling (learned this from the Times article). So even if the kid went through the proper channels . . . no dice. They deserve to get needled. Businesses come and go, music stays. --Paw Power!
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Jeff - 2004-02-26 13:23:08
A few comments (all of which, oddly, involve lawyers in some capacity): why shouldn't sampling be handled like doing a cover song? That is, anyone can do it, but notice (and compositional credit) must be given, royalties paid, etc. That rate shoulud be higher than w/merely covering a track - but it's not as if there's a shortage of lawyers in the music industry... Good sampling work is truly creative - as creative as 'sampling' various of the 88 keys of a piano to make music. (Lame sampling - think of "Ice Ice Baby"'s reliance on "Under Pressure"'s bass riff - is, well, lame.)
On the Wolf/Bloom thing: I hadn't read about it till now - but I'm curious why, initially, you thought, "Naomi, let it go"?
Finally, re "Devil's Avocadoes": "avocado" as a word is itself a pun. The original word (as it is in Spanish), "aguacate," was close enough to the Spanish for "lawyer" that it came to be spelled that way. "Aguacate" in its Nahuatl form "ahuacatl" means "testicle." So "Devil's Avocadoes" not only *does* mean "Devil's advocates" but also "Devil's balls." You meant all that, of course ;)
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Paula - 2004-02-26 15:17:51
Avocadoes: Uh, yeah...yeah sure I knew that. Me smart! And it also ties in with Avagadro's Number, in a clever way that I can't yet explain for fear of reprisal from the California Avacado Growers and Chemists Society.
I agree with you about sampling. (Whew)
Regarding Wolf/Bloom: I tend to think that if something happened 20 years ago, and it doesn't directly affect your life anymore, then it's best to just move on. But when I read her account of the incident, my heart went out to her. (And, for the record, to Bloom, who comes across pathetically in the anecdote.)
I believe that she is entitled to feel residually pissed off and also exasperated by Yale's indifference, and I think it's a good thing that she's coming forward with it. No one should be made to feel that they can't complain about people in authority. It ain't sporting.
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