Jim Wrote:
"Okay Fred and Victor! I've looked at
www.cdnow.com and www.cdbaby.com where I've had success buying CDs made by
JMDLers Kate Bennett, David Lahm, and Bryan Thomas. Prey, tell. Where can
I purchase your discs?"
Jim-
If you had been paying attention and stopped by the Tower booth at
Jonifest 2000 New Orleans, you could have picked up a copy there. Great
record, great pianist, great guy! And he has arrived as well. His stuff is
being traded on Napster. Just for fun I typed several of our own songwriters
performers names (Lahm, Bennett, Thomas, Johnson) into the search engine on
Napster and Fred was the only one that came up. I guess that means he HAS
arrived for whatever that's worth.
Speaking of Napster, I have been following the news and stuff on this
medium. I don't like people putting someones commercially available stuff up
there for the world to download for free. I do like the live and "not
available commercially available stuff" that I have found on there and would
be willing to pay fees to the artist of these recordings. I just don't know
how they are going to work the logistics of something like this out. I do
believe that the fricking record companies will STILL come out with there
inflated share of the pie though. I also believe that Napster (in all it's
glory and shame) might cause the whole business to veer away from the
traditional record companies (as we know them today) which will afford the
artists the ability to make alot more money. I am as guilty as anyone for
trading live tapes and bootlegs (for no profit to anyone of course) and I
have purchased tons of music over the years. But most of the money I have
spent goes to the big record companies and never reaches the artists.
I listened to a TV program on the subject and heard the opinions of all
these kids who were interviewed on the topic. Most of them could give a shit
about the artist (financially speaking). They feel like they should continue
to be able to do this and don't care about the reasons it is wrong. When
asked if they would be willing to pay a fee (like $5 a month or something)
to be able to access these files alot of them said they could not afford $5
a month and they would find a way to pirate the songs anyway. Alot of these
kids have collections in the 1000's of songs that they have not paid a dime
for and of course they do the same with software and movies too. I will
never tire of getting the records from the bins and coming home and reading
all the info inside and enjoying the music for the first time and then
turning my friends on to it. Oh well i guess I'll always be a hippie.
In other news, I saw Carly Simon of CNN tonight talking about her
daughter who is following in mommy and daddys footsteps and writing songs
and singing and playing the guitar. If it indeed is passed down thru the
jeans/genes, then damn that girl is gonna be a monster! She was talking
about how Carly resisted showing her how to write songs, insisting that if
she was gonna be able to do it then she should just do it on her own. She
said she was glad that Carly did that so she could forge her own way. Pretty
cool!
Hope everyone is having a great weekend!
Paz
NP-Close to the Edge-Yes (the Masterworks Tour)
