I bookmarked that article to read later, but you know I have been reasonably happy with the subscription model. The only irritating bit is the constant negotiation going on behind the scenes that means that my Black Crowes are available one week and not the next. But other than that, as much of a music fan as I am, I seem to be perfectly content between XM & Napster.
'Heart Of Gold'
Buffista Music III: The Search for Bach
There's a lady plays her fav'rite records/On the jukebox ev'ry day/All day long she plays the same old songs/And she believes the things that they say/She sings along with all the saddest songs/And she believes the stories are real/She lets the music dictate the way that she feels.
But then Rubin starts going on about the subscription model being the industry's salvation.
That's the point in the article where it lost its credibility for me.
I think that the industry wants subscriptions so badly, because it's the only business model that allows them to stay in business.
As Fake Steve Jobs put it:
Here's the back story. The music companies are in a dying business, and they know it. Sure, they act all cool because they hang around with rock stars. But beneath all the glamour these guys are actually operating two very low-tech businesses. One is a form of loan-sharking: they put up money to make records, then force recording artists to pay the money back with exorbitant interest. The other business is distribution. They’ve got big warehouses and they control the shipment of little plastic boxes that happen to have music in them.
The guys running the labels are pretty stupid -- most are just dirtbags who started out as band managers or promoters -- but now at long last they are kinda sorta finally vaguely getting clued in to the fact that both parts of their business model are fucked. Their loan-sharking business is being eliminated by low-cost digital recording technology that lets people make an album for very little money. And by letting us build the online music store they've taken themselves out of the distribution business. In the days of vinyl and then CDs, the labels managed to control the value chain by having loads of retailers in a highly fragmented market, and playing them off each other. In the digital world they've got us. And that's it.
Miranda July's playlist for the NY times
A sample:
4) Sycamore, Bill Callahan. Another one from Bill Callahan (aka Smog). This whole new album from him make me cry. I’ve spent so many years counting on him for dark songs and then suddenly - joy. Right. Things could just be ok. It is with this realization that I get a little tearful.
Miranda July's playlist for the NY times
Do I have room for another seekret girlfriend?
Do I have room for another seekret girlfriend?
Go and defend her on the NY Times blog! Some dill weed just called her pretentious.
Some dill weed just called her pretentious.
What an ass.
What an ass.
I snarked at him. I wonder if it'll be approved.
As a fan of her movie and her spoken-word performance art thing, I think it's ok for someone to consider Miranda July "pretentious," but only because it says far more about the person using the word than the artist receiving it. Presumably this person would also consider the following persons pretentious: Laurie Anderson, Joanna Newsom, Karen Finley, Lydia Lunch, Tamara Jenkins, Grace Paley, and so on. 'Cause women can't make art and like stuff without guys to influence them, right?
I wrote a response as well. Less snarky and more about why I liked her list.
My comment and Jon's have both passed through editorial review.
I am the "David" that does not agree with eric.