A Barking Dog

Nine Inch Nails has withdrawn from the MTV Movie Awards. MTV? Didn’t they used to play music? I’d reckon many of the current staffers at MTV were barely out of diapers back when the network first debuted, right about the first time this grizzled old roadie started doing gigs.

The beef is with a backdrop on the NIN set featuring President Bush during the performance of “Hand That Feeds” which could be interpreted as being critical of the war in Iraq. MTV declined citing being “uncomfortable with their performance being built around a partisan political statement” as the reason for the withdrawal. Foo Fighters will replace them at the June 4th taping. Soooo, partisan political statements being used in rock music, huh? Like when has that ever happened before? How about for the entire history of the rock and pop music industry… Prior to that there were jazz tunes describing the long suffering of a minority class. Popular music has always had social and political implications or interpretations. Rock and roll has always been about a rebel spirit. Not some pussification of ideas designed to pander to the mainstream.

In a statement on the NIN site NIN frontman Trent Reznor states “We were set to perform “Hand that Feeds” with an unmolested, straight forward image of George W Bush as the backdrop. Apparently the image of our President is as offensive to MTV as it is to me.” That’s a quote from Trent, BTW, though you won’t find me disagreeing. I would think MTV should get more in touch with the actual viewers instead of the Viacom Board of Directors.

Motley Crue has filed suit against TV network NBC. The suit claims that NBC has damaged sales of the most recent record when network honcho Jeff Zucker banned the act after frontman Vince Neil shouted “Happy fucking New Year” during a live broadcast of the Tonight Show. To that I say, so what? Those decency rules are foolish and not uniformly inforced. The rules are as big a joke as the FCC is at this point. Anyone listening to the Crue is not likely to be shocked by that. The only shocking thing to me is that all of the original band members are still alive. Besides, if you don’t like it turn the channel.

The issue here isn’t the so called profanity after all the Vice President of The United States used the same sort of language on the floor of the Congress. But suing NBC because they refuse to allow the band on the network would be like Yo Yo Ma suing the band because he wasn’t allowed to perform on the current tour. Blaming NBC for slow sales, even though the recent greatest hits release and current tour is doing better than many thought (myself included) is foolish. Could it possibly be that the act is a bunch of middle-aged 40 something rockers that jumped the shark almost two decades ago? No, that couldn’t be it. It’s got to be not being able to get on Carson (Daly, not Johnny) or Conan (O’Brien, not Barbarian).

I like the band and by all accounts they still put on a pretty good show but in terms of publicity stunts, this is pretty weak.

I’ve never heard of clothes that tell you when it’s too loud. From Engadget, a shirt that measures ambient sound pressure level. No, really…

It’s called “The Noise Shirt”. Machine washable, it displays SPL using segmented into bars with data gathered from a mic. It will run for about three hours on a single charge, or about half the duration of a “String Cheese Incident” set. There is an induction loop around the neck of the shirt that charges the polymer-lithium battery while on a specially designed hanger. There is also another site with more info, though I couldn’t find a price.

Researchers from Tampere University of Technology in Finland have published a white paper (1.4MB PDF file) explaining the technology and the concept of a Body Area Network (I couldn’t make this shit up, kids…) and Personal Area Network.

I wonder what’s next? Pants that do transfer function or socks that do impulse response?

Hilary Rosen, once leader of the RIAA has posted to the newly opened Huffington Post something that is as ironic as it is puzzling. Rosen was at the helm of the RIAA when it started the campaign against filesharing. There was no online alternative at the time from the RIAA and in the early days they were dead set against ANY sort of online commerce of recorded music. Now she is preaching for Steve Jobs to open the iPod to other DRM formats. My how times change.

Either Ms Rosen doesn’t understand or fails to have a grasp of the technology but this statement I found particularly suspect…

“The problem is that the iPod only works with either songs that you buy from the on-line Apple iTunes store or songs that you rip from your own CD’s.”

BZZZTTT. Thanks for playing, Don Pardo has some lovely parting gifts for you. You can import other non DRM formats into iTunes for conversion to iPod, though it will only play a few native formats without conversion. The real issue Rosen has is that it won’t play other DRM formats and other DRM formats aren’t compatable with the iPod’s proprietary format. Other DRM formats only play on their respective players or codecs as well. That’s kind of how DRM works, babe. Bummer. Windows is by and large the platform of choice in personal computing while the iPod and iPod Shuffle have commanding leads in their respective hardware sectors. To boot, Windows Media Player 9 only plays the proprietary Microsoft DRM format, on a single platform no less (the latest DRM features work only on Windows, not on the Mac) and I don’t see Hilary getting her panties in a twist over that. It would be easy enough to burn CDs of the tracks you legally purchased online in these other formats and import them into iTunes but some of them don’t allow the burning of CDs. Some are subscription formats only. You are only allowed to listen to the music as long as you are paying for the subscription. People chose to be locked into the Windows Media of their own free will, just as the people that choose to use iTMS/Fair Play do. Just as those that took odds on Bellamy Road over the weekend, you other guys bet on the wrong horse. The iPod and iTMS are kicking your ass.

I have my issues with the iPod and iTunes. it ain’t perfect. Lately it’s the battery in my just out of extended warranty 3G 15GB model and the recent restrictions imposed on the latest iTunes versions. I’m willing to live with those with hacks unless something better comes out. And I’m always lookin’. It hasn’t and many in the music consuming public feel the same way. How else would a hundred buck limited feature flash player take a commanding lead in the market only a few months into the game?

Instead of whining about being left out make something better. if you do people will buy it. I just downloaded a couple of songs I heard on KJAQ, the new “Jack” station in Seattle. Bon Jovi’s Runaway and “You Give Love a Bad Name”. I also downloaded the latest from Mercan Dede last night from their site. You might hear Mercan Dede on KEXP, but not on Jack. All on the the iPod, no prob. A couple of clicks and bada bing, I got music. You see Hil’, those other stores use a platform that lock the users into Windows and WMP 9. No worse than Uncle Steve in Cupertino. Except his users experience is much better.

Sort of puts a fork in the ass of your openness argument, doesn’t it?

We may have to wait for the next Linkin Park release as the band released a statement saying they wanted out of their Warner deal and were considering selling direct on the Internet.

Says a statement released by The Firm, Linkin Park’s management company..

“The new owners of the Warner Music Group will be reaping a windfall of $1.4 billion from their $2.6 billion purchase a mere 18 months ago if their planned IPO moves forward. Linkin Park, their biggest act, will get nothing,” the statement reads. “Of the planned $750 million raised by an IPO, only about $7 million will be put toward the company’s own operations, with no money going to WMG artists.”

While they still have four albums to deliver under the current contract, Warner is said to wish to extend the deal with an additional five albums at US$3 mil an album. While that might sound like a great deal, consider “Hybrid Theory” did 14 million units worldwide and was the best selling record of 2001. For the sake of round numbers let’s say US$10 per each copy of “Hybrid Theory” is a gross of US$140 million. They did 10 million units worldwide of the 2003 release “Meteora” and a couple million of the Jay-Z remixes of “Collision Course”. Combined US only sales of the three releases are in the 20 million unit range.

In response Warner Music Group issued a statement which in part says…

“We value our relationship with Linkin Park, and we are proud of our work together since signing the band as a developing artist in 1999. While Linkin Park’s talent is without question, the band’s management is using fictitious numbers and making baseless charges and inflammatory threats in what is clearly a negotiating tactic,” the statement read.

“Warner Bros. Records has made significant investments in Linkin Park, and they have always been compensated generously for their outstanding worldwide success.”

Fictious numbers? Baseless charges? Inflamatory threats? Seems like WMG thinks those sorts of business tactics are for the sole use of the labels. Kind of like dishing it out, but not being able to take it. Mr. Pot, allow me to introduce Mr. Kettle…

The current business models have hit an iceburg. Lifeboats are going into the water as we speak. There are plenty of managers in LA, Nashville and NYC that are waiting to see how this shakes out.

This from Accordian Guy, (and others) Norway’s answer to Blueman Group, Einsturzende Neubauten and the Maytag repairman. It’s a trio called Hurra Torpedo doing justice to the Bonnie Tyler hit “Total Eclipse of the Heart”.

This must be the “Oslo Sound” I keep hearing so much about. No word on any US tour plans

From a Pollstar exclusive, the Warfield Theater in San Fransisco has just been sold. Clear Channel, in the form of BGP still has two years left on the lease. I’m usually there in one form or another at least once or twice a year. It is in a shitty part of town, the stage left mon beach is pretty crowded, the dressing rooms and catering facilities are are pretty sparse, but the SF crowds are awesome.

Likely inheritents of the lease are Another Planet Entertainment, sheparded by Greg Perloff and Sherry Wasserman, both alums of the real Bill Graham Presents who embody the true meaning of BGP. Greg and Sherry are the kind of people that should be in this business. On the other side, there’s AEG Live nee Concerts West that has a finger in several high profile venues around the world. Owned by Philip Anschutz, AEG produces the Celine Dion show in Vegas, the Coachella Festival, New Orleans Jazz Festival, the current Alanis Morrisette tour, the current Neil Diamond Tour and Paul McCartney. They also operate Staples Center in LA, Nokia Live in Dallas, several pro sports franchises as well as the first big promoter I worked with in the early 80s, Goldenvoice Concerts. Goldenvoice has come a long way since me and Gary Tovar were smoking joints in the production office of the Olympic Auditorium.

That begs the question. It the industry served by another conglomerate with interests other than concert promotion? Certainly, AEG IS NOT Clear Channel. AEG seems to know what they are doing, at least in my direct experience. In recent years some of the Concerts West tours have lost their ass. Will it be any different for AEG in a post Clear Channel industry? Are we trading one megacorp for another?

Only time will tell. An interesting time at that…