iremembertapes. are previewed in Hampshire Chronicle in advance of their home town gig, a prelude to their 3rd headline UK tour, which, in turn, will see the release of their amazing debut album Human Architecture not only in the UK but in multiple European territories as well. 
Click above for the whole story. Listen to the album here:
At every music biz conference there are seminars about new business models. If I hear the word “monetise” one more time…
One such seminar at Midem was opened by some American lady who wasted no time to lambast the old model where “artists had no control over their destiny and labels controlled everything” blah blah blah.
I struggled to stay with it because I really don’t see the point in discussing what was, especially with people ill-informed about what it was, and who clearly have no plausible alternative as to what it should be.
For the record, in my artist career I was never told by a label, major or indie, to do this or that. They sent the money to our bank account and we made the record. That was a pretty good deal, any way you look at it.
Anyways, I bumped into a very old acquaintance, from back in the day when I was a young upstart badgering a booking agent to book us some gigs. This agent had moved on and had a great gig as the head of music licensing at Google.
He asked me what I thought of the DIY model, if it can ever be done. I said, probably not, just because of the sheer workload involved, but it’s a great way for an artist to get started.
As we’re all cogs in wheels surrounded by other wheels, links in a long and complicated chain, wheels rotating in sync along with other wheels, it’s fucking obvious that no one wheel can do it all on its own, let alone get it all its way. You have to do something that fits in with what the wheel next to you has to do, so that it can fit in with the next wheel. And so on.
This talk of the DIY model where the artist is in control…. as if any of us are in control of anything…. we’re here just to fart around, as Kurt Vonnegut used to say.
The new model? I’m happy to entertain the thought of losing the word “copyright”. But I’m extremely unhappy with any model that denies our right to make money from the fruits of our artistic and intellectual labour.
The right to make money. Let’s get that one sorted out and I’m happy to call the new model by whatever name you desire. You can call me Betty. But only at weekends.
We won’t solve it without legislation, either. Speaking of which, we had dinner with some lawyers who spoke about just what a mess our complicated copyright laws are in and how it complicates the way forward. They felt that a dialogue with emerging markets like China and Brazil is the key. They said that now is the time to go and tell them how it should be done. Mat asked them if they had considered that the Chinese and the Brazilians might not give a sh*t about what a bunch of pompous UK/US lawyers – present company excluded – have to say about the matter. It’s entirely possible that the other lot will do the talking and we in the west do the listening.
In a subsequent meeting a Chinese woman was pitching some new digital platform to me. She asked me not to bother her with a million questions on who owns what and what right is where, because in her market these things don’t exist. She was clearly exasperated by comments made by the previous people she’d been pitching to. She asked me to just accept that some money will be made and that both parties walk away with half of whatever it is.
Yup, that falls in the vicinity of the ballpark of my idea of the right to make money.
The right to make great music is another thing. We are lucky to have fantastic artists who do just that. The Manic Shine in an acoustic session at The Animal Farm performing their song Legs.
Suffering Silence’s remix of iremembertapes.’ new single All I Know is kicking our asses and we thought it might be nice to let her chat with Jaleh about her work:
1. How are you, what have you been up to lately?
I’m doing just finesome thank you. Mostly just been longboarding and writing new songs for my band.
2. How would you describe your style?
HYBRID!
3. What equipment and software do you use?
Logic Pro Studio 8, M-Audio Fast Track Pro, M-Audio Key Studio, Wesley Flying V Guitar, Tanglewood Bass, NJD Dynamic Mic, Beats by Dr. Dre Studio Headphones.
4. Your best achievement in the remixing field?
Being in the top 100 out of 2000+ entries in a Linkin Park remix contest.
5. How did you find remixing iremembertapes.? Any greetings you want to send to the band?
Remixing the iremembertapes track was a lot of fun! So thank you for the opportunity, and to the band, keep making great music!
Jack Trainer is in the news at Designer Magazine for a very good reason. He’s very good!
He speaks fast but not fast enough to get to the main point which he hits about 20 seconds from the end.
The very excellent The Manic Shine, one of our alumni, gets a nice write up in Alternative Vision.
See them at a gig soon…
| 22 Oct 2010 | 21:30 |
Barfly London London, London
| 30 Oct 2010 | 19:00 |
Urban Village Birmingham, Birmingham, UNITED KINGDOM
| 4 Nov 2010 | 22:30 |
Whistlebinkies Edinburgh
