You Are A Part Of The New Renaissance Of Music: Don’t Screw It Up

This blog is about music. And what it means to me, you and everyone else in the world. I’m taking a moment to realize, absorb, appreciate – fully – what I am a part of. What we’re all a part of.

Music is the most powerful art form in existence. More memories, experiences, and emotions are tied to music than anything else. Music was here when man was debating the pros and cons of walking upright. Music accompanied every war and every coronation. Music was there when my son was born, for someone’s first kiss, someone else’s favorite movie, and it will be there at your funeral. Some of us are lucky enough to spend our lives creating it. All of us spend our lives listening to it. Music time-stamps our lives. It makes us more aware that we’re here and breathing. A great song makes us appreciate our loved ones more and helps us work up the proper amount of “pissed off” for our ex’s. A great melody is like a water fountain from heaven that we can tap into and drink from at will. The perfect rhythm brings up desires and thoughts that later make us blush.

And yet, all I read about music right now is that music is in trouble. Music is heading downhill. Music has no value. Music is going nowhere. The glory days are gone.

And that fucking pisses me off. Believe me. Nothing is further from the truth and we should all be down on our knees thanking God for the sheer luck of being alive to write, record and create during this time in history.

Music is better, more alive, more influential and more important that at any point in history. Music is everywhere. Music is the catalyst for everything that anyone cares about. Have you ever watched a movie with out music? A TV show? A 30 second commercial? They’re unbearable! Commercials are unbearable even with music. Music makes them tolerable. That’s how strong music is. A movie without music? No one would go see it. Of the few that exist without music, a couple are important to the development of movie making as an art and surprisingly relegated to the eerie, macabre, horror genre – but most aren’t any good. Anytime a filmmaker really wants to move an audience, make them feel something, he has to rely on music. TV is the same. Ever wonder why reality TV has wall-to-wall music? It’s the only way producers can convince you something dreadfully important is happening on screen. Without it, it would be like watching your neighbor cut his lawn. With scissors.

120,000,000 iPods sold so far. People are listening. Lots of people.

As of this month, iTunes is the biggest music retailer in the world. They have sold 4 billion songs. They carry, every day, 6 million songs. And it’s growing. If you’re counting by CDs, that’s 500,000 different CDs (at 12 songs a CD). A Virgin Megastore carries about 150,000 CDs – many of which are duplicates.

Check out this headline from a couple months back: “World’s Greatest Record Collection for sale on eBay.”

Paul Mawhinney collected 6 million songs stored on 3 million records and 300,000 CDs. Same number of songs as iTunes? Of course, Paul has rare, limited release, obscure recordings. Priceless. Historical. He most likely doesn’t have any of my records so you kind of have to really call it “Almost The World’s Greatest Record Collection.” But, more importantly, you can buy my music on iTunes. Or yours. Anybodys. Without verification from a company or a store or a collector that your music is the greatest in the world.

It took Paul 50 years to collect these songs. iTunes has been in business for 6. iTunes will eventually carry nearly every recorded piece of music – known to mankind! - in it’s library. Available for purchase. Amazing. When you tell your grand kids that you used to browse through the defunct local, mom & pop record store (Tower Records) and gander at your choice of 50,000 different CDs, they’ll stare at you in amazement. “How did you ever find anything you liked with such a limited selection, Grandpa?” It’s Chris Anderson’s Long Tale economic theory times a billion.

Don’t buy into the crap that mega record companies are losing money because the music business sucks. They’re losing money because they’re not taking advantage of opportunities to make more money. They made money one way and are extremely reluctant to look for new ways. They’re complaining because they’ve lost control. Feel sorry for them like you feel sorry for Bear Stearns & Co.

Ask them about their music licensing business. The side of the business that controls the copyrights, the issuing of licenses for use of their music other than sales of CDs & digital downloads. It’s fucking booming! They can’t set goals high enough each year. It’s a goldmine. And 100% profit. They paid for the product 25 years ago. Everybody and their hairless Chihuahua is licensing music for the internet, commercials, tv, movies, DVDs, infomercials. And this is because the record companies own all of the “good shit.” The recordings you and I were brought up on. The songs we hold near and dear to our hearts. And the memories tied to those songs help sell product. Advertisers know that. So they’re licensing the shit out of those songs. Target & The Beatles – a match made in Madison Avenue Heaven. I hear “Hello/Goodbye” and I suddenly have a burning desire to buy toilet paper and a very reasonable price.

But with the record business changing, the conglomerates are in a dangerous position. 25 years from now, they may well not own “the good shit.” I will. Or you. Or our kids. They know if they don’t make hits now, they’ll have nothing to license in 25 years. So they want to lock us into agreements. Keep control. Maintain the staus quo.

But they can’t. They’re losing the war. And they’re desperate. So they sue their customers. They whine and cry about how tough business is.

And that is why it is only going to get better. Better for you and me. Better for the listener. Better for music. Music is being put back into the hands of those who make it. Musicians today have an opportunity to write exactly what they want, record it and release it – directly to the listener – without the obstacles of lawyers, executives and marketers who have only one thing on their minds – control. Oh, and money. OK, 3 things, control, money and commercially friendly acts they can manipulate to reinforce the first two things. Go check out Seth Godin’s incredible speech to Columbia Record executives about the state of the music business. I’m sending you here to see it before it is gone forever. Seth took it off You Tube for some reason. It’s brilliant and will affect you.

http://www.softlord.com/cat/industry-info/seth-godin-speaks-the-truth-to-columbia-records/

Music should be in the control of those who make it and those who listen. And it will be. Very soon. And that means you and me. This new world will finally allow music to be democratic. You, the makers, and you, the listeners, will decide what you want. The time has come for us to be the leaders of what is heard and what is talked about.

The music that will come out over the next fifty years will be the most innovative, original and phenomenal music ever heard by mankind. Our time will be looked back on as the new renaissance of music. Composers, songwriters and musicians all over the world will be cut free from the dictatorial chains of mega conglomerates and allowed to roam free, creating, recording and pillaging. The latter preferably only when the first two aren’t going so well.

Instead of just one artist every now and then releasing exactly what they want, imagine a world where what you listen to is always exactly what the artist wants. What YOU want. The music will be more pure, less homogenized and ultimately vastly more satisfying and entertaining to the creator and the listener. And everyone will be able to have access to it. At an extremely reasonable price.

And here go the naysayers. “$1 per song – we just can’t go any lower! It’s the number we’ve all come to - after much deliberation!” Don’t get hung up on price. Price is an old concept from an old world. Remember, music pricing was arbitrary and continues to be so. The record companies’ pricing comes straight out of their asses. Competition has not bred lower pricing – unlike every other business in the world. Someone decided long ago that music will sell at such and such a price point. And there it has stayed. There are more important things happening in music than the price of a song. But for the hell of it – run the numbers.

Here’s the scenario: You sign with a major label, get your measly $1 a record royalty (for all songs on the record), and if you’re lucky and were one of the writers, you then get your ridiculously low, government approved, mechanical rate (further lowered by your inept attorney) of about 6 cents per song for a whopping total of under $2 a CD. Divide $2 by 12 songs. You’re making 17 cents a song. You’re kinda famous? 25 cents a song. You’re really famous? 40 cents a song. Trent Reznor made $750,000 selling collector sets of his new music. By himself. The way he wanted. Exactly the way he wanted.

How much is that worth? A lot more than $750,000 because he will do it again. And again.

Will there be only great music in this new world? Absolutely not. Actors will continue to strum and models will continue to warble. Terrible songs will still become popular and genius will still lie hidden and undiscovered. In fact, there will probably be more bad music than ever before. But more art makes a better world. Even bad art. Creativity keeps people aware of what’s important in life. It keeps people loving and experiencing. It keeps people sharing.

Everyone, from artist to listener, will have a closer, more intimate relationship with music. There has never been an opportunity like this in history. You’re a part of it. A big part. Be a believer. The best is yet to come.