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Post by Russg on Mar 30, 2018 6:43:18 GMT
Anthrax Drummer Charlie Benante shared his take on what happened with the music industry and the world of music in general since the explosion of the internet, telling Metal Command (via Blabbermouth):
"What happened with the music business is the ground kind of fell out from beneath all of us, and everybody kind of scrambled to think of ways of compensating for what had just happened or what had taken place.
"And I think some bands who thought they were maybe smarter than other bands started to do things where, 'We'll give the music for free,' and, 'You tell us what you wanna pay for it,' and I thought that was really stupid to do.
"Maybe they thought that was a great thing at the time, but I felt it was just devaluing music and what we were doing. I mean, why... why would you do that? Does that mean that all these chefs from around the world are saying, 'Just come to my restaurant. If you like the food, just pay what you want or don't even pay at all. Don't worry about it. I'll survive.' I just thought that was a real ignorant thing to do."
Adding that "you really have to put a lot of blame on the tech industry," Charlie focused on Apple, saying:
"As much as everybody loves Apple, I also think Apple had a big hand in destroying music, and nobody really says that; everybody's still on the side of Apple. But I believe Apple was one of the big hands in this that helped destroy music.
"The record companies had a big hand in it, because they got greedy. The artists got greedy when they felt, 'Oh, I can get a three-album deal for $75 million,' but at the end of the day, if they're taking all that money, what happens to the lesser-known bands who are striving to become something? Where does that money come from? I mean, it was just such a mess, and it really dug a hole for itself. And now who is paying for it? Everybody."
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Post by Liberian Girl on Mar 30, 2018 6:57:49 GMT
"And I think some bands who thought they were maybe smarter than other bands started to do things where, 'We'll give the music for free,' and, 'You tell us what you wanna pay for it,' and I thought that was really stupid to do. "Maybe they thought that was a great thing at the time, but I felt it was just devaluing music and what we were doing. I mean, why... why would you do that? Does that mean that all these chefs from around the world are saying, 'Just come to my restaurant. If you like the food, just pay what you want or don't even pay at all. Don't worry about it. I'll survive.' I just thought that was a real ignorant thing to do." This is obviously a dig at artists like Prince or bands like Radiohead and U2, which isn't really fair. An artist or band should be free to distribute their music however they like. It belongs to them and no-one else and if they want to give it away for free, that is their choice.
As for the tech giants and their role to play in the decline of record sales etc, well, they certainly played their part. The issue is twofold: music as a product is now obsolete, and people are moving away from having "collections". It's the intersection of a less materialistic society, both out of choice, and necessity, and of an increasingly value being placed on convenience and accessibility.
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Post by jaywonder on Mar 30, 2018 7:15:31 GMT
Record labels as well as tech played a big role in the current state of the industry. By getting greedy, especially in the 90s and early 00s by charging large amounts for CDs (who else remembers stores like Sam Goody and Warehouse Music charging $25 for CDs?) as well as the US labels phasing out physical singles among other factors.
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Post by HIStoric on Mar 30, 2018 7:36:00 GMT
Adding that "you really have to put a lot of blame on the tech industry," Charlie focused on Apple, saying: "As much as everybody loves Apple, I also think Apple had a big hand in destroying music, and nobody really says that; everybody's still on the side of Apple. But I believe Apple was one of the big hands in this that helped destroy music What exactly did Apple do though? The iTunes Store was a fantastic service, for once music from all labels was available under one roof (before then, labels were strewn across different services). I know they had somewhat cheaper prices, but that is fair given it's much cheaper to distribute music online than it is physically. Apple have given out free music, but usually it was just a 'Single of the Week' (by an upcoming, lesser known artists). Never really a free album, aside from that U2 one a few years back. I'm not really sure what they did except bring the concept of purchasing music to the 21st century. |
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Post by HIStoric on Mar 30, 2018 7:38:42 GMT
Record labels as well as tech played a big role in the current state of the industry. By getting greedy, especially in the 90s and early 00s by charging large amounts for CDs (who else remembers stores like Sam Goody and Warehouse Music charging $25 for CDs?) as well as the US labels phasing out physical singles among other factors. I can't believe a standard, 1 CD album was that high, it's completely ridiculous. It's even worse when you adjust for inflation, which makes it $40USD now. For that price I'd expect a nice boxset with a lot of material (In 2012, my Bad 25 deluxe box was slightly more expensive than that. Had 3CDs +1DVD). |
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Post by Russg on Mar 30, 2018 10:44:19 GMT
Streaming services like Tidal and Spotify have a lot more to answer for in terms of the decline of the physical format than Apple, as far as I can see. For many, streaming has made the physical format null and void, and also the purchasing of individual songs/albums completely pointless.
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Post by mistermaxxx08 on Apr 2, 2018 3:27:21 GMT
jaywonder nailed it because 2 disc cd sets were 25 and more dollars. the trip out irony is that CD's are cheaper to make than cassettes are,
also the taken away of Bands and pushing the solo act. also the sampling, also the video era watered alot of things down.
technilogy was there and then now you can cut and make records in your bedroom and go back to bed.
i also think that the same ole same with the record producers and being stuck with the hot flavor of the moment
and that kept on creating cookie cutter material.
however having said all that the music industry ain't done i wish it was however its not because you don't still have Idol,the voice, etc..
the industry never adapted to technilogy where social media is concearned.
acts today don't need the business on the local side however for market and distribution is a whole different animal
and that pimping monopoly is real,
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Post by SmoothGangsta on Apr 11, 2018 18:09:29 GMT
I use tidal for the CD quality streaming and I still buy CDs. Although I can see why people wouldn't and can you blame them really?
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Post by Deleted on Apr 11, 2018 23:10:01 GMT
It is true, streaming has made music cheap. In New Zealand CD's were prohibitively expensive until the arrival of JB's Hifi, Streaming, Itunes and Big Box retailers like the Warehouse (Kiwi Walmart) being allowed to sell CDs other than corny dollar country stuff.
Between the 1980s and about 2003, CD's for new release artists were like $34.95 to $36.95, and mid price CDs (Catalogue albums from the 70s and early 80s put on disc from tape or vinyl masters) were $24.95 - $28.95 and very rarely bad stuff like soundalikes and crap like "20 Country Hits" and "Gino Marinello Orchestra play star TRek" you know cheap Petrol station stuff was $20 - $22. These all sold at small mall stores like HMV (Went bankrupt in 1995 here), Sounz (90s to early 00s) and Grooves (80s - 2000s) and there was also a thriving 2nd music business of several stores selling used CDs at around $10 - $20 each for mainline artists and as little as $2 for the Gino Marinello type stuff and it was sad overall. As a teen in the early 90s and a broke student in the later 90s, all I could afford was tapes. Before 1990 most people still brought records, but our local plants shut down in 1987 and we stopped importing vinyl from Australia in late 1990. The tape was king for the poor and CD for the yuppies.
Of course with the arrival of cheaper music through streaming and downloads which swept us around 2002/04, these Mom and Pop music stores went out of business (Soundz hung on until about 2008), a store that is selling CDs at like $35 each and $29 on special can not compete with a barn store that sells new releases at no more than $19 now and albums a year old can be sold out at $6 each. The change was amazing, when 2pac and Biggie died in the 1996/97 period, stores bought in as much stock of both artists and set up racks of CDs that were all at $30+ each and $20+ for cassettes (Which died off around 2000 here), by the time our Michael died, the Warehouse had a rack with all his single CD's at $6.95 each and HIStory at $9.95 each. There is no way anyone could have done that say if Michael had died in 1998 instead of 2009.
The arrival of the barns and Itunes made music more affordable and open but it also killed off the Retail music stores and the 2nd hand Mom and Pop trade, now only a few 2nd harnd stores exist here and most sell new music and books along with other junk to break even, as these places will still charge over $20 for a new release and sell all the expensive box sets and scarce imports (Anything to make a buck). Our main one real Groovy, used to almost be a hippy collective bargain bin in the 80s and 90s, but now sell everything at mark up prices, vinyl, tapes, records and a range of expensive audio equipmenta nd accessories, music books, games cups, T shirts all at premium prices. I mean when Pirnce died, all the vinyl I bought that cost usually around $7 - $12 for a 12 inch single and $10 - $19 for an album went up to $30 and $50 overnight. That is how greedy they are now. So yeah I blame Itunes fo that, as many older people like us value physical music too.
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