Reading today's digest, looks like this topic has pretty much blown by, but
as a digester, I reserve the right to flog the dead horse a little. <g>
Joe Gracey (and I) wrote:
>> What's got me about this discussion is the doublethink. I'm not
>> supposed to have this live music that I didn't "pay" the artist for--
>This was not my, at least, point. Whether a live tape is free or not is
>not the issue with me. All I ask is the courtesy of a veto over a bad
>show, or for that matter for any reason whatsoever, since I insist on my
>right as an artist to control what happens with my art. Pretty simple
concept.
Simple? Yes and no. If we're talking about some session you recorded and
never released, I'd agree--yes, simple, you should have the only say in
whether that music gets circulated beyond the confines of your studio. If
we're talking about that show you played in public last night, I'd say no, it's
not that simple.
Let's say you think last night's show wasn't one of your finer performances
and that you wouldn't want someone to hear it on tape. Did you give
everyone at the show their money back, or announce for the stage, "Oh jeez,
people, forget everything you heard up here tonight. Come back for free
tomorrow night and we'll try to give you a better show." (I know from talking
to musicians that there are nights that they may feel that way, but no one's
ever offered a refund at any show I attended. And yeah, I've heard a few that
to describe them as "off nights" would be very kind.)
So what makes that performance good enough for those people in the venue,
but not good enough for me to listen to at home? No one listening to a live
tape is expecting to hear hundred-take in-studio perfection. We couldn't go
to the show, you didn't come to us, but we'd like to hear you perform a show
anyway. You presented this music to those people at the club, so what's so
different about presenting it to me in my living room (via a tape deck)?
>While I don't have any passionate feeling about tapes floating
>around out there and consider them mostly harmless in practical terms, I
>do have an uneasiness about them insofar as they may violate my right to
>control how my art is exposed to the public.
But Joe, weren't you exposing your art to the public in that show that my
hypothetical buddy recorded? Last fall, Richard Thompson toured and
played a number of new songs that will presumably be coming up on this
spring's new album. He was very much against these shows being taped,
because he wanted the songs "to be new to everyone" when the album
appears. Okay, so playing those songs to maybe 10,000 people on the tour
is somehow going to keep the music "new," but having 200 or so fanatics
hear them via the tapes will not? Maybe I'm just a simpleton, but if
Thompson didn't want people to hear those songs until the album came out,
then what was he doing playing them in public performance?
>>It seems to me that it's pretty
>> easy for industry weasels <g> who enjoy lots of free music to cast
>> stones at a music exchange medium that they don't participate in.
>I don't really see how promo music relates to tape trading. Promos fall
>entirely within the confines of what I am talking about, the artist's
>right to control how his music is presented.
You must have more artistic control than many performers. I hear about
bands that have no say in what songs get released on promos or the full-
length releases, have the promos charged against royalties, and then have
industry-connected weasels sell them off to used CD stores or collectors. I
don't see a lot of difference between the industry weasel selling a promo CD
and the bootleg weasel selling a live CD-R, except that one's selling music
performed for public consumption via a recording studo, and the other's
selling something performed for public consumption via a club. They're both
weasels.
But I see another similarity between a promo CD and a live tape-- in a best
case scenario, both can increase the exposure of an artist and lead to
someone buying a commercial release or attending a show. Worst case,
the tape collector doesn't like the tape or the band and doesn't buy a CD. . .
but the promo CD gets sold to a used CD shop, who sells it to a customer
*in place* of a commercial release that the customer might otherwise have
purchased. Does the first case represent a loss to the musician? Only if
the tape collector would have purchased the CD if he hadn't heard the tape.
The second case surely does.
>> (And I'll join the musicians in their everyone-should-pay-for-every-
>> note-they-hear argument if they join me in my campaign, as a writer, to
>> close down every library, used book store store, copying machine,
>> scanner, and the like, so that every person who reads my work has to pay
>> for it. It's only fair.)
>I have often wrestled with this similarity. How is a used book store any
>different than a used CD store? It seems to me that to be entirely fair
>there should be some way of assessing a royalty at the point of sale of
>all books/CDs/art.
It would be nice. See, I think the biggest difference between authors and
musicians is that we've had several hundred years to get used to the idea of
our art being more or less in the public domain after the first "performance."
<g>
>One last thought. Even though tape trading may be harmless and not for
>profit, there is still something there that bugs me. All I have to sell is
>my music. If my music goes around endlessly for free, am I not being
>deprived of compensation for what I do? I am not angry or blustering about
>this, just slightly confused by it.
And the serious tape collector is confused too. Does the circulation of live
tapes take income away from the artist? If the people collecting tapes were
doing it so they would never have to buy a commercial release or go to
another show, I'd agree with you. But the person collecting those tapes is
more passionate about music than the average consumer, more likely to be
buying those commercial releases, more likely to be going to shows. I just
looked over my tape list, and of the 48 artists on it, there is only one for
whom I don't own a CD-- and I'll definitely buy Kelly Willis's first album and
the "Fading Fast" EP when I find them. Has my collecting tapes deprived
musicians of compensation? Considering how it's kept me interested in
music, buying CDs, and going to shows instead of morphing into just another
over-40 guy who buys a couple greatest hits CDs of 70's bands each year
and only goes to the free Doobie Brothers concert at the downtown festival,
I'd have to say no.
Larry
(And after years of not participating in discussions because of the digest
factor, and having posts ignored, it's an honor to be debated by Joe Gracey.
And I'm not being facetious.)
