“Clark Gable” by The Postal Service paints a picture of old times… “I was waiting for a cross-town train in the London Underground when it struck me, that I’ve been waiting since birth to find a love that would look and sound like a movie. So I changed my plans, I rented a camera and a van, and then I called you. “I need you to pretend that we are in love again” and you agreed to…”
The “N,” “M,” “,” and “.” keys on my keyboard are now missing their letters from being worn away. The “O,” “P,” “A” and “S” keys are also heading that way. This keyboard will look pretty cool with absolutely no markings on the keys. It’s a good thing I can touch type. I still wouldn’t say no to a million dollar keyboard though.
Here’s my first Friday Five because the topic caught my eye and was something on my mind recently. Yes, Friday was several moons ago and I’m usually a punctual chap, but sue me for trying to be fashionable.
1. Who is your favorite singer/musician? Why? This is going to be impossible to name without me changing my mind again in the next minute. So this current minute my favourite musician/songwriter has got to be Ben Gibbard from The Postal Service and Death Cab for Cutie because he marries amazing lyrics with cool melodies. He writes stories that happen to be accompanied with music.
2. What one singer/musician can you not stand? Why? No one really, but I can’t say I admire those singers who act all diva-like and holier than thou. I’m naming no names of latinas with big insured bottoms, of course.
3. If your favorite singer wasn’t in the music business, do you think you would still like him/her as a person? A bit of a weird question, which could be rephrased as “Is your admiration for your favourite singer based on their looks?” or “If your favourite singer wasn’t famous, do you think you would still like him/her?” I can’t say I know any of the singers I admire so could I really judge them as a person on their personality and hence decide whether I’d like them or not? I do generally get along with musicians whether they be within the music business or not, so I’d like to say yes, probably. This question can only be answered accurately in its current form by stalkers.
4. Have you been to any concerts? If yes, who put on the best show? Been to a few. Maybe the best was The Get Up Kids where I had my first taste of crowd surfing. I can’t even remember the exact date, but it was in the year 2000. It was a fairly small venue. I was right at the front beside the mosh pit. Everyone sang along to all their songs. It doesn’t get much better than that.
5. What are your thoughts on downloading free music online vs. purchasing albums? Do you feel the RIAA is right in its pursuit to stop people from dowloading free music? I have always bought the albums and supported the artists I like. Although I realise that loss of sales and royalties leads to less cash being injected into record companies, which means less for musicians/songwriters and less money to invest in new talents, I believe we should just get with the times and realise downloadable music is a powerful force that gives artists a medium for exposure. From an artist’s point of view, I can safely say that a great majority of artists are just glad that their music is being heard. Music is first and foremost about connecting people. Making a little money in the process is just the extra reward. In short, I think free music is the best thing since sliced bread so of course I think the RIAA is the devil.
Record companies should realise that it can’t be stopped, so rather than spend time and resources on stopping it, they should concentrate on other ways they can sell the music (via subscription and pay-per-download systems). Sure, there’s loss of revenue and it’s technically stealing, but they’ll recoup their cash in other ways. I don’t believe it’s as big a loss as the record companies would like you to believe either. I think that for every one person that downloads songs from an album and doesn’t purchase the CD, there are a handful of other people that were able to download and hear songs from that CD for the first time and will then go on to buy the CD. I also believe that people who bought music before MP3 came about would continue to buy CDs. People who didn’t buy music before may continue to not buy music, but the availability of music may make these people more open to appreciating music and could lead to them going out to buy CDs they never otherwise would have heard. It introduces a sort of system of quality filtration too. People who download a new album and only like 1 or 2 songs may feel discouraged to buy the album. If these are songs that grow on you, then that person will eventually go out and buy the CD. If these are truly timelessly bad songs, then it cuts that artist off and gives them something to think about before recording crappy songs to fill the gaps in their album. Ultimately, at the end of the day it’s the love that pushes people to go out and support the artists as fans and that definitely hasn’t gone kaput from this world.
The music industry grows with the advent of new technologies. Recording standards improve. Media prices fall. Technology makes music more abundant in this world. Look at all the MP3 playing devices out there, especially those phones, cameras and watches that are able to play MP3s! How could the RIAA have a case? It’s because we live in litigious times. If there is copyright infringement that results in better exposure for recording artists, the recording studios won’t focus on that and the other benefits it has brought them. They won’t focus on how much better it is for business when they’re able to spend less money on advertising to make people come to gigs. After all, it’s the advertising that puts a real dent in the bank, not the mass production of CDs.
It’s safe to say I love the MP3 format. For one, it makes it easier for me to enjoy my music without shuffling CDs around in drive trays. But it’s not just MP3s, for there are several methods for encoding music nowadays. Everyone’s heard of the MP3 format and to a lesser extent the OGG format, but everyone can agree that MP3s currently wear the crown for the most accessible format. In the beginning, MP3 was just a media file. It was a means by which to compress music and create copies. Almost at the same time as its creation, it became a method of distributing music, freely. I could have cried tears of joy the first time I heard about Napster and how it rode like a cowboy on the saddle of MP3. Back in the early days, MP3 was a way to reach out and have your music become heard. Nowadays, MP3 is being remoulded by the record companies and is slowly becoming just another format for record companies to market their music. They’re already doing well with ringtones, which is another conveniently prosperous format to market music. I can’t remember the figures, but consumers are spending milions on ringtones each year. Do you hear anyone complaining about that?
In the beginning of the life of MP3s and the music-download culture, MP3s were a musical underground just like hip-hop used to be. It was a resource that existed and was accessible by anyone provided they knew about it. It was about the knowledge. And best of all, it was free. Several years later it’s in the mainstream and you’d be hard pressed to find anyone nowadays who didn’t know about downloading music and MP3s, with the obvious exception of people living in isolation, such as in rainforests and some towns in Scotland. Eventually, the record companies and their executives caught wind of this resource and decided to fight to take back what was theirs. They introduced a subscription system to download music “legally” and continue to make money in this way. All this is obvious to anyone, but the thing I only recently realised was the power involved. Records companies had become empowered by the MP3 format and had taken a huge part of it away from the people. It’s pointless trying to ban peer-to-peer sharing because it will continue to happen one way or another even if it’s made illegal. You can take the power away from the people, but you can’t take away the knowledge and the love. I for one will continue to download music and purchase CDs as though one can’t exist without the other.
I read something pretty darn interesting in a scientific way in a newspaper the other day. Studies done in Prague have found that women cat owners become hosts to parasites transferred from their moggies, which in cases may alter their personalities, to turn them into man-eaters! I’d read about toxoplasma bugs in cat faeces and how it can lead to toxoplasmosis. You might have read warnings on cat litter bags advising individuals with immune deficiency and pregnant women to wash their hands after handling the cat litter. But this new study says that it affects women, making them feel sexier and more confident with themselves. It affects men too, but in the opposite way, making them into grumpy bastards. Grumpy because they will complain more, and bastards because they’ll become more aggressive and generally more belligerent. The study was carried out at Charles University by Professor Jaroslav Flegr as part of a worldwide study into toxoplasma. He stated that “[Infected women] were more easy-going, warm-hearted, had more friends and cared about how they looked. They were also less trustworthy and had more relationships” and that men were more prone to jealousy.
The statistics say there are around 9 million cats in the UK and up to half the human population carries the bug, which produces the toxoplasma cells continuously to make women progressively hornier and men progressively moodier. I guess it won’t be long till we see subtle advertisements in classified sections of the local rag such as “Single male seeks single female with good sense of humour. Must be a non-smoker and own many cats.” It’s funny because now that I think about it, it seems true. The people I can think of who own cats seem to fit into the sex kitten and alley cat descriptions for women and men respectively. Did I mention I’m more of a dog fan?
