Why you should NEVER Buy another Cd!!

[Wuntu Menny]

If you are a new artist, the best way to be heard is on tour or airplay. You make squat from touring and merchandise, you're lucky if you can pay for the gas to get to the next gig. You pay for the gas by selling copies of you CD at the show. You went into hock to cover the printing fees for your cool new tshirts, so your margins are zero on the resale.


Now you've got the tracks you never would have purchased, you share them with others that would have; now the starving artist is out another box of KD. Oh well, as artists we're supposed to gain inspiration from adversity aren't we? So keep up the good work!

T & J: I hear what you're saying and I agree in part. I also believe that you see my point. I download too...samples off the artist's websites to decide if I want to purchase the album.
Yeah, I'm up for a Guinness but I have a monster show to attend on Sat eve as well. I hope we can shoehorn some quality time in.

BoAddict: Ya gotta stop listenin to friends in the biz, man. Apparently they aren't the people on the other end of this stick and fail to see the big pitcher. The dudes in the middle don't give a damn, they still get paid no matter what. Yer take on the cashflow in the biz is seriously distorted too, man. Walk the proverbial mile before taking a stand like that.

If you didn't respect the artist enough to buy their work,
why steal it? That's like stealing food when you're not hungry...

WM

[Bryce Masuk]

Its not stealing from One point of view If people that NEVER would have bought your album Download your music Does it hurt you? No it Doesnt However If They would have bought your album it does. Its not like someone ripped off your car your out nothing and if your Stuff is good it will spread Like the plague And album sales will go up.

I will Not support These P.O.S. Mofo's At the top who want to sue Every 12 year old girl In the world The only thing they deserve Is a kick in the Damn head

[Aaron_S]

to take a line from Bryce our new Slogan..., "Hit a music Executive in the head with a hammer"

[Tim_Cranwill]

Ok, here's my rant... and it will be a good one....

I am a 25 year old singer/songwriter/musician who has a development deal with Warner Bros. in the US. Being a "rock star" has always been my dream... well not to be a "rock star" necessarily, but to make a living doing what I love; making music.

To the average “Joe”, downloading music is not a big deal. Heck, I've downloaded my share of music over the last few years. Copying your buddy's entire cd collection ain't too shabby either. Saves you a ton of cash and you get a whack load of cd's for next to nothing. That does sound like a great deal. But it's still stealing. Even if record companies are multi-billion dollar industries that charge too much for a cd, they still own that product. Just because Walmart makes a load of cash, is it cool to steal all of the Lord Of The Rings dolls that will fit in your pocket? Nope. Why? Because they own them and not you. Taking what's not yours IS stealing.

People have the attitude that hurting the record companies will somehow benefit them. How is that? Do you not enjoy music? Do you want all of the record companies to go broke so that we're stuck listening to $hitty local bands 24/7? And trust me, there are a lot more $hitty ones than good ones.

Sure the "biz" and it's higher ups make a lot of money. They make that money because they are capable of doing a very specialized job; recognizing and marketing talent. Not as easy as it sounds. Yes there are a bunch of "talentless" artists who get more than their share of fame and money but they DO earn that money. There IS a market for that music even if it's not your thing. There are also hundreds of talented artists who count on album sales to earn them their money. Even if they DO earn a lot of money… it’s THEIR money! Does someone tell you, “Earning $12/hour is more than you need to survive. I’m going to steal from the company you work for!”? I doubt it.

Most people don't know that it costs hundreds of thousands of dollars to make a record. Warner Bros’ budget to record 3 demos for me is $18'000 USD... for 3 songs!!! And they are JUST demos!!! To hire a good producer can cost almost a million dollars, Add to that studio time, musicians, mastering and etc. The list of expenses goes on and on and before you know it, a record costs over a million dollars to make and a lot more to market. That's money that has to be made back. That's what being a business is about.

Now, I’m not sure if this is public knowledge or not but two major record labels (there are only 5 major labels) are about to merge. Money making scheme? Not at all. They are merging because album sales are down... really down. Will this mean music will get back to its roots? Not even close. It will mean even further commercialization of music. More cookie cutter crap filling the airways because record companies will be forced to record and produce whatever is the trend at the time. Real artists will suffer and be cut out of the loop because they will be too much of a risk for the record labels to take.

So what do I think needs to be done? Not a clue. But vowing to “never buy a cd again” helps nobody…especially not the artist. One thing is true. Downloading music is a fact and it’s not going to go away anytime soon. Record companies will just have to find a way to regulate it. I would expect to see the price of CDRs go up. I would expect to see record companies trying new things to attract people to buy cd’s like lowering prices. I would expect the “Free sharing” of music as we know it to stop. I bet we’ll see a lot things change over the next little while. That’s what technology brings; change. But the fall of major labels would not be a good thing.

That’s my rant… for now. It may not be well thought out but I guess that’s ok because it was a rant. Now go out and support your favorite artists! Then go feed your herps!

[Colonel SB]

If I have the money I like to buy the album, get the cover art and all that shyte but I am guilty of burning a ferw CD's here and there.

[marisa]

Frankly I believe you two involved with music are correct, but I do not believe it's right to prosecute a 12 year old girl for doing something that MILLIONS of people do, will continue to do and are doing right this second. Its ludacris. No one likes record companies now, no one wants to pay 25 for a CD with one good song on it.

It's time for music to go back to the good old days, when real bands were made from OUTSTANDING live pre-formances that people PAID to get in to no problem and wanted to see again and again, wicked tunes and lots of airplay. Not a 25 dollar CD with crappy tunes on half.

Marisa

[unknownclown]

Personally I dont buy CDs I got sick of payin out the arse for them just to find out they suck then have them sprout legs and follow my friends out the door while my back was turned. To be honest I dont think Ive boughten a CD since "97". I dont listen to music much since Im concerned with what my daughter listens to and being 3 she'll repeat it. Ive tried to change the music I like for her benefit but hell it aint working. So buying or burning CDs realy dont affect me. I did recently download a movie just to see how long it would take with DSL but I had already boughten the movie.
As far as burning and downloading I realy dont get how it can hurt business. I mean people have been doing it for YEARS. Im 33 and I can remember when there werent any CDs or internet. What did we do? We copied off other peoples tapes or records and instead of the internet we would take it off of the radio. Maybe its not as massive as the internet, but then if anyone who was from that time looked back they would have to admit that most people did it alot! Personally I dont see a difference aside from now its more "high tech" and openly done.

Maybe if the recording studios and people invested in companies that produce CD burners or blank CDs or develop a site that charges some sort of membership fee heck I dont know.

[Lisa]

I stopped buying music a while ago, I don't download it anymore either as since Napster went down i've found the sharing programs to be riddled with spyware, adware and often viruses.

Now I only download the songs artists have on their websites or on sites that pay artists a fee for every download.

[OttawaChris]

I have a lot of trouble feeling any remorse for screwing someone who has been screwing me for years. Had the CDs been coming out at reasonable prices I would have still been buying them... but the fact of the matter is that they are grossly expensive (if its not a brand new CD you usually have to shell out 30 bucks for it)

The last CD I bought was St. Anger from Metallica... it was 17 bucks after taxes AND came with a DVD of all the songs too. This was, in my opinion, worth spending my hard earned money for and was a very reasonable price therefore I bought it.

No offense to you Wun... but starving bands aren't the ones being hit by music downloads. People have to know your band to search you out... a travelling bar band isnt going to be a hot download and most people aren't even going to bother ripping any of your songs to MP3 format unless they want to send a song to a friend to show you off... in that case you should be grateful for the publicity.

Universal music made what I think is a smart move... they are lowering the prices on their albums so that people come back to buying. Most people wont make a stink over paying 15 bucks for a full CD.

Also, making a comeback is the CD single. 3 or 4 bucks gets you the song you want (and in many cases the only good song on an album anyway)

I have other ideas for the music companies to make music more pallatable for us as well... but thats for me to take up with them

[BoAddict]

Wuntu Menny


my friend in the biz was a bass player in a band that toured across canada with bif naked and on another occasion toured across canada with wide mouth mason, they also opened for crash test dummy's who opened for alanis morrisette @ the corel center

i bought there cd but when doing a search for it i saw it on napster too

[Tim_Cranwill]

Chris, how is selling their products at market value "screwing you over"? If you think cd's are expansive, when's the last time you went shopping for a pair of jeans?!?!? There are products out there that are WAY more over priced than cd's...

Here's a challenge for all of you out there....

- Go find a talented local band... it will be tough to do.
- Pay for the recording, mixing and mastering of their cd.
- Pay for the manufacturing of that cd.
- Now go out and try to make a buck selling those cd's and putting on concerts.

If even ONE of you can make ANY money doing that, I will be VERY impressed.

It cost me and my band $11'000 to make our first cd (which pales in comparison to what "real" cd's cost to make). We got 1'000 copies made. Now, you tell me how much we would need to charge for our cd's to even break even. With labels, there are hundreds of people working on the project who all need a pay cheque.

Now, $30 is pretty steep for an album, but $80 is just plain stupid for a friggin' pair of jeans and I don't hear anybody slimming' Calvin Klein or J-Lo.

I guess I don't really know where I am going with this but maybe it's this; It's a big risk for a record company to put out an album. Sometimes it pays off like with the first album from "Hootie and the Blow Fish", then other times it doesn't... like with "Hootie's" second album.

Anyway, there are some things to think about... End of rant #2.

[marisa]

Yes but you can wear a pair of jeans for years, a CD nowadays has ONE good song on it.

You say you need the CD money, then why is it that the artist gets so little of it in reality?

Marisa

[Brock]

Just one thing before I start, Cranwill, market value is the value that people at the market are willing to pay for it. And according to this thread, they are few and far between, or completely non-existent alltogether.

Okay, first of all I want to say that I prefer punk music over all this rap crap and pop sh*t, I think music is reflective of the individual listenening to it. I also want to say that my buddies who go down to Vancouver and stop in a Punk specialty store spend at least 200$ per visit either on CD's or clothes. Why? Because punk isn't as controversial as the stars of the show, rap and pop, and most of them do what they do for the fans, they are happy earning an average annual salary that a janitor would make, as long as it's enough to live. There are no specialty punk stores near me. Result? I have had over 15,000 songs over the course of 5 years from filesharing, and I haven't spent a cent on a 'market value' CD in all of that time. Someone said that before filesharing was around, people taped things from their buddy's tapes/CDs on a stereo. This is true. I remember being 6 or 7 and taping a Dance Mix '9(something) on my neighbours stereo, and I did this quite often.
Let's face it, people are cheap, they have always been cheap, and always will be cheap (edit to say 'look for the best value'). Someone said that it takes a few hours of work to buy one CD, that's how I look at it too. People have to work for their money too, not just these pop icons like that damn guy Justin Timberlake, and when they associate themselves with a record company that is going to charge 35$ per CD, common sense should tell him 'Wow, I'm going to be in the gutter before you know it!'.
Pop=short for Popularity Contest. It's all a big show and they are trying to scam us. And let's be realistic, rap has no energy whatsoever and most of it gives off bad vibes through its lyrics, IMO it's just a fancy way of saying bad poetry.
The quality stuff is where people have REAL attitudes, REAL jobs, REAL music and REALISTIC values/views on their profession. Take Jack Black for example, now there is a charismatic guy who I would gladly pay 10-15$ on a CD on, he's just so damn cool. Britney Spears? Not happening. I went to a Goldfinger show (punk band) this summer and they were protesting the meat trade, they had videos at the back where you could watch calfs and cows being slaughtered while still alive, boiled alive, slit open alive, bled to death and mamed while still alive. Would you see that at a Britney Spears show? No, and that's why I respect punk, because they don't care if they offend people, they are individuals, not mass marketed copies of an idealistic Barbie.
We had an exchange student from Brazil last year, he didn't have filesharing and he had no knowledge of it after he got here. Before he knew what filesharing was, though, he spent about 700$ on CDs that he thought were so cool. And he ended up only liking only 10 songs on all of them. Filesharing allows you to benefit from the music without hurting the bulge in your back pocket. 700$ is a lot of money for something you can get for free, and I believe that is why most people fileshare, at least that's why I do, do you know how many reptiles you can buy with that money? Exactly, it can be better spent on something worth your while than something manufactured to be good, but is only a major let down when you realize how the songs are sh*tty. My sister spent 75$ on two CDs for her friend's birthday, I asked her why she would spend so much money on these CDs, she replied 'Because [artists] have 3 really good songs my friend likes.'

I could have bought 3 geckos with that money.


-Brock

I don't really buy music any more, I believe most artists and actors are not paid for their skill but for their advertising value. Some no talent someone that can draw in large crowds will be held above someone that has true skill and talent but doesn't draw large crowds. I don't care how many home runs you can hit, how loud you can sing, how fast you can carry a football, or how much special effects was in your last movie, no-one is worth multi-million paychecks. It's all about how much advertising value you have for the big boys.

[V.hb]

Just so you know.. On KaZaa you can also set yourself not to share any files........That is if you don't want to deal with any problems due to it..