Sorry to read is USA Today that Opry star Jim Ed Brown died of cancer yesterday. He was a big star in the 50s with his family group, The Browns, as solo artist in the 60s and then teamed with Helen Cornelius in the 70s for some hit country duets.
In the early 90s, I help product a couple TV shows that Jim Ed was starred on — and he was was a real good guy and hard worker. I was just entering my alt-country phase and tried to turn him on to Lyle Lovett and Dwight. He would very gracious, and then would put on demos of his daughter, who
. . . to continue with fewer typos I hope — new computer this week.
Jim Ed’s daughter had a killer voice and I thought she would be a big star.
Jim Ed was big Braves fan, and I watched the first game of the 1991 World Series with him and his crew at a Steak & Ale in Athens, GA I was the only Twins fans for miles.
Anyway, he was the first to have a hit record with “Pop-A-Top” which was later a big one for Alan Jackson. https://youtu.be/nOlZgr9vwgY
I’m siding with Ribot. Just because we haven’t yet figured out how to fairly compensate artists whose music is being streamed, doesn’t mean that we should stop trying.
I agree there has to be a way to make streaming work for everyone. Maybe I’m just a sucker, but I’ve been paying for Tidal HiFi streaming after dumping Beats (formerly MOG) and Rhapsody. I got rid of eMusic too, which was, and probably still is, an impossible site to navigate.
I am happy to pay to Tidal stream whatever, whenever, on any device I have.
Compared to what I paid for CDs back in the day? It’s peanuts. I think that Columbia House post hammers home even more how much people paid for stuff. Most of it was crap too — crappy cassettes, thin vinyl records that sometimes came from the record store warped, and horrible 8-tracks.
It’s probably generational, but I don’t think ad-free streaming should be totally free. Even Soundcloud is sticking ads in between their most popular tracks now.
I think Albini is primarily being realistic: the old model of copyright, particularly in the digital and global economy, is collapsing. He prefers to see the bright side of this, it will free artistic expression from the bonds of commodification and permit an ongoing open conversation in the arts. Ribot looks at this as an existential threat that will cut into his admittedly limited financial compensation. But to be honest, with the exception of Stravinsky, who was very much alive and intent on maintaining control of his early works when he pulled some sort of superficial re-annotation of the Rites of Spring, the extension of copyright terms has primarily been for the benefit of giant corporations monetizing “assets” that were long ago pilfered from their actual creators. The concept that copyright was to encourage expression by compensating the creator has become strictly another version of trickle down economics, a way for the big guys to maintain control (and especially income) by convincing the little guys that they too could one day become big guys under the existing system.
Albini also probably made far more money from producer fees than he ever saw from his royalties on “Songs About Fucking” and the rest of his catalogue.
By the way, our local provocateur Kenn Kweder, was ranting to me on a recent occasion that he had cancelled the copyrights on all of his songs, so he’s apparently one up on Albini.
The U.S. Constitution gives Congress the power to ” Congress has the power “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” This is the “copyright clause.” Current practice is very far from this. The primary goal is supposed to be promoting science and the arts, and the money is supposed to go to authors and inventors, not their corporate masters, who are working to eliminate the “for limited times” part of that clause.
Good morning, I’m writing from England with one of my periodic State of the Nation musical reports. Data gleaned from overheard car stereos suggests that this year’s music scene is comprised of two main elements: variations on Eastern music (Indian or Middleeastern) and pounding base. Granted, this brief study was conducted in the vicinity of London. I’m now up in Northern England where I haven’t heard much of anything at all except some young university lads discussing how to mix drum-and-bass with John Denver’s Country Roads…I kid you not, apparently that song was remixed and is very popular in the club scene.
Does anyone ever watch the TV show UnSung? It’s on TVOne, a cable network of African-American programming. It covers often forgotten artists who have some tragedy of one sort or another. I’ve seen episodes on Sheila E, The Delfonics, Ike Turner, and others. Their can be over-done and padded but usually worth the hour if you like the artist.
The other day they had a new episode on Otis Redding. Easily the best one I’ve seen basically because Redding was, well, the best. The live footage was amazing. Nothing I don’t think I haven’t seen before but not for awhile. I didn’t know much, though, about his life. He seemed pretty unusual in terms of how in control of the business side of music he was. And almost Brian Wilson like in terms of the creation of his music.
That must be it. Egads! The other music I hear in bars and restaurants is 80s and 90s English pop music. What Americans would call indie or British Invasion. There is never ending interest in regurgitating the stuff.
Today we drove through a tiny village in rural Durham county decorated with mannequins representing different Eurovision winners from years gone by. I was navigating so didn’t get to look at very much very closely, but did see Sweden’s 1974 foursome (Abba).
Do you think there’s any merit in Albini’s suggestion that there’s a need to rethink copyright law for music?
http://www.stereogum.com/1807599/read-marc-ribots-open-letter-to-steve-albini/wheres-the-beef/
I know he loves to stir things up, but I do think there’s some merit in what he has to say.
Sorry to read is USA Today that Opry star Jim Ed Brown died of cancer yesterday. He was a big star in the 50s with his family group, The Browns, as solo artist in the 60s and then teamed with Helen Cornelius in the 70s for some hit country duets.
In the early 90s, I help product a couple TV shows that Jim Ed was starred on — and he was was a real good guy and hard worker. I was just entering my alt-country phase and tried to turn him on to Lyle Lovett and Dwight. He would very gracious, and then would put on demos of his daughter, who
. . . to continue with fewer typos I hope — new computer this week.
Jim Ed’s daughter had a killer voice and I thought she would be a big star.
Jim Ed was big Braves fan, and I watched the first game of the 1991 World Series with him and his crew at a Steak & Ale in Athens, GA I was the only Twins fans for miles.
Anyway, he was the first to have a hit record with “Pop-A-Top” which was later a big one for Alan Jackson.
https://youtu.be/nOlZgr9vwgY
RIP Jim Ed
I’m siding with Ribot. Just because we haven’t yet figured out how to fairly compensate artists whose music is being streamed, doesn’t mean that we should stop trying.
I agree there has to be a way to make streaming work for everyone. Maybe I’m just a sucker, but I’ve been paying for Tidal HiFi streaming after dumping Beats (formerly MOG) and Rhapsody. I got rid of eMusic too, which was, and probably still is, an impossible site to navigate.
I am happy to pay to Tidal stream whatever, whenever, on any device I have.
Compared to what I paid for CDs back in the day? It’s peanuts. I think that Columbia House post hammers home even more how much people paid for stuff. Most of it was crap too — crappy cassettes, thin vinyl records that sometimes came from the record store warped, and horrible 8-tracks.
It’s probably generational, but I don’t think ad-free streaming should be totally free. Even Soundcloud is sticking ads in between their most popular tracks now.
I think Albini is primarily being realistic: the old model of copyright, particularly in the digital and global economy, is collapsing. He prefers to see the bright side of this, it will free artistic expression from the bonds of commodification and permit an ongoing open conversation in the arts. Ribot looks at this as an existential threat that will cut into his admittedly limited financial compensation. But to be honest, with the exception of Stravinsky, who was very much alive and intent on maintaining control of his early works when he pulled some sort of superficial re-annotation of the Rites of Spring, the extension of copyright terms has primarily been for the benefit of giant corporations monetizing “assets” that were long ago pilfered from their actual creators. The concept that copyright was to encourage expression by compensating the creator has become strictly another version of trickle down economics, a way for the big guys to maintain control (and especially income) by convincing the little guys that they too could one day become big guys under the existing system.
Albini also probably made far more money from producer fees than he ever saw from his royalties on “Songs About Fucking” and the rest of his catalogue.
By the way, our local provocateur Kenn Kweder, was ranting to me on a recent occasion that he had cancelled the copyrights on all of his songs, so he’s apparently one up on Albini.
The U.S. Constitution gives Congress the power to ” Congress has the power “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” This is the “copyright clause.” Current practice is very far from this. The primary goal is supposed to be promoting science and the arts, and the money is supposed to go to authors and inventors, not their corporate masters, who are working to eliminate the “for limited times” part of that clause.
What he said…more concisely!
Good morning, I’m writing from England with one of my periodic State of the Nation musical reports. Data gleaned from overheard car stereos suggests that this year’s music scene is comprised of two main elements: variations on Eastern music (Indian or Middleeastern) and pounding base. Granted, this brief study was conducted in the vicinity of London. I’m now up in Northern England where I haven’t heard much of anything at all except some young university lads discussing how to mix drum-and-bass with John Denver’s Country Roads…I kid you not, apparently that song was remixed and is very popular in the club scene.
I am explaining away the spelling errors to autocorrect, not random sampling of local potent potables.
Have fun — Is the Country Roads remix? More half a million plays on Soundcloud.
https://soundcloud.com/prettylights/country-roads-pretty-lights
Look for to more dispatches!
Does anyone ever watch the TV show UnSung? It’s on TVOne, a cable network of African-American programming. It covers often forgotten artists who have some tragedy of one sort or another. I’ve seen episodes on Sheila E, The Delfonics, Ike Turner, and others. Their can be over-done and padded but usually worth the hour if you like the artist.
The other day they had a new episode on Otis Redding. Easily the best one I’ve seen basically because Redding was, well, the best. The live footage was amazing. Nothing I don’t think I haven’t seen before but not for awhile. I didn’t know much, though, about his life. He seemed pretty unusual in terms of how in control of the business side of music he was. And almost Brian Wilson like in terms of the creation of his music.
It looks like you can stream the episode on their website – http://tvone.tv/category/shows/unsung/
That must be it. Egads! The other music I hear in bars and restaurants is 80s and 90s English pop music. What Americans would call indie or British Invasion. There is never ending interest in regurgitating the stuff.
Today we drove through a tiny village in rural Durham county decorated with mannequins representing different Eurovision winners from years gone by. I was navigating so didn’t get to look at very much very closely, but did see Sweden’s 1974 foursome (Abba).
BOX SETS THAT HAVE MOD’S NUMBER DEPT.:
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/early-television-richard-hell-songs-to-feature-on-new-box-set-20150624
I have considered getting this box set. For my birthday I just got The Best of The Best Show on WFMU!