One Hundred and EEEiiiightyyyyy!!!!

Last of the Beatles Podcasts, a bumper edition concentrating on the end of the Beatles, their various followups in mashup and cover form, and John Lennon’s death.

I live near Abbey Road so I just popped out and took these pictures – the ones of the tourists recreating the famous picture (and blocking the traffic in the process) are priceless – including the one below!

Tim you went too far this time…about 2 hours 18 minutes to be exact (138 minutes – EEK! 103Mb)

• The Rutles
• 17 Plombs Pour Peter Les Tubes – Come Together
• The Exterminators – The Beetle-Bomb
• Easy Star All-Stars – With a Little Help from My Friends
• Roy Redmond – Good Day Sunshine
• Wax Audio – Blue Rigby
• Stereo MC’s – Tomorrow Never Knows
• John Peel,John Lennon, Kenny Everett, Malcolm MCdowell – Nostalgia
• Jimmi Jammes – Let A Girl Be
• George Harrison – Pirate Bob
• Keith Lynn & The S.P.M’s & Byron Lee & The Dragonaires – My Sweet Lord
• Go Home Productions – Just Be Good To Paul
• People Like Us – Let Them In
• Ringo Starr with Stevie Nicks – Lay Down Your Arms
• The RIAA Remixes DO or DIY – Lord Only Knows:
• Byron Lee & The Dragonaires – Live And Let Die
• Ferris Bueller’s Day Off – Isms
• Rainbo – John, You Went Too Far This Time
• Yoshida Brothers – Oh, My Love
• Elliott Smith – Jealous Guy
• John Lennon And Kenny Everett – Desert Island Discs
• The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band – Give Booze a Chance
• John Lennon & ATOM – John Lennon-Nobody Told Me (ATOM’s Yin & Yang Mix)
• Yoko Ono – Everyman Everywoman (Basement Jaxx Man 2 Man Mix)
• Mountain Con – Variations on Outkast, The White Strips and John Lennon
• Marianne Faithfull – Working Class Hero (live)
• Wax Audio – God
• The Beatles – John Lennon with Yoko Ono – Interview (Part 2) June 1969
• WFMU – New York, NY Radio / The Night John Lennon Died
• John Lennon with Yoko Ono – Imagine (instrumental)
• team9 vs lennon vs temptations vs morrison – imagine vs ball of confusion vs palestine woman
• rx – imagine…walk on the wild side
• The Kleptones – Imagine The End Of The World
• DJ Earlybird – John Lennon vs the Supremes ‘Baby, imagine Love!’
• Go Home Productions – Imagine The Game
• Lennon – Love (demo)
• John Lennon – Stand By Me (demo?)
• Easy Star All-Stars – A Day in the Life
• Nina Simone – Here Comes The Sun

You might like these previous posts:

• RC 155: Beatles #4 – A Hard Reg Dwight – March 16, 2008
• RC 154: Beatles #3 – Evolver – March 11, 2008
• RC 169: Beatles Butchers – August 11, 2008
• RC 152: Beatles #2 – EVIL – February 24, 2008
• Radio Clash 21: Coming of Age Edition inc DJNoNo exclusive and Beatles minimix – March 29, 2005

Kutiman takes all the acapellas, demos, gear tests, people showing off their skills which there are millions of in YouTube – and a bit like the Napster Nuggets aka Mic In Tracks of old, makes a new track from them:

An amazing mix, and apparently there is an album of these but it’s been nuked by the attention – hope it comes back soon, I really dig this video and would love to see it and the others in hi-res – but it seems quite a few of them have already made it on to YouTube.

Intro:

More like this 4:20 tune (check out the white rasta :

And proof you can go all dnb on our asses with stuff like this:

You might like these previous posts:

• Complete CONtrol; or how Glasvegas and Columbia need to get a clue – November 3, 2008
• Fleetwood Mix – Fleetwood Mac mashup LP – October 19, 2009
• Instant YouTube Mashups – September 1, 2009
• Interviewed in MIT’s Technology Review about mashups & Girl Talk – January 21, 2009
• CC mixter – legally mashup people’s tracks! – April 28, 2005

About a month ago I joined Twitter – people were quite surprised, 2 years ago I’d expressed my hatred of Twitter at Podcamp 06 (the audio is floating around somewhere) so me eventually joining Twitter was a surprise.

Why the turnaround? Well one of two things; I feel as part of my job I need to keep abreast of these technologies, and the other that I’d missed hearing about whole conferences because the podcasting community had pretty much decamped wholesale to Twitter, and thus most of the conversations don’t happen outside, or unless you are subscribed to 100s of shifting blogs. Unlike previous times, the only central point was…you guessed it – the ubiquitous Twitter.

So has my attitude changed? Yes and no.

Back in 2006 I decried the fact that Twitter and social media were sucking the life out of real life friendship – there wasn’t really a point to going to see mates to find out how they are when you can read it on a Facebook or Twitter update. I think the social effects of sites like Facebook since 2006 has partly proven me correct, people seem to be using technology to offset traditional contact with friends, and there seems to be a wider base of shallower friends, what I call acquaintances, but under an umbrella of frequent updates so connected as if they are close friends. It’s a sham; a bad reflection of a true friendship. Obviously it’s also a good, keeping people in touch who are the other side of the world and bringing people together, so it’s not all bad. But I find it ironic that through technology I’m more likely to see someone 100s or 1,000s of miles away, but then never see friends down the road in the flesh.

Crazy Half Life

Robert Scoble talked about half-life of a conversation recently; I think in James Gleick fashion it’s useful to try and measure the speed at which these conversations are moving, the stress vectors. It’s obvious that Twitter is a very different animal to Livejournal, despite not that different technology and only about 7 years difference in launchdate, but really in speed they are worlds apart.

Part of the attraction of Twitter is it’s Google-like simplicity, it does one thing, and does it well. Compared to blogging or email, the conversations seem fairly one-sided, like a blog (really most people there are talking about themselves, the amount of PR/marketing and new media evangelists is horrific); but without the depth you can maintain in a blog. The conversations are quicker – gone in 15 minutes or quicker, and very volatile – no not that people get angry but the posts disappear off-screen quickly, and are gone.

So like a more acceptable version of those kids on the bus txting continually, it’s blogging with hyper A.D.D. But this seems to be the way social media is moving – into the realm of fast immediate mobile-friendly short conversations, throwaway, shallow.

And with video – like 12seconds I can see it becoming wham-bam-thank-you-Mr because the time constraints of following 100 or 1,000+ people and the flood of audio and video media means the message has to survive the tl;dw or tl:dl (too long; didn’t watch or too long; didn’t listen) of mobile phones, iPods and online media. Will this affect the message? Of course it will. Or there will be two streams, one of the refuseniks producing niche longer programs, and a massive pool of really short shows with no content.

Living with Numbers

‘Social Gaming’ as I call it, attaining friends for sheer number volume and grooming/attracting/whoring yourself to get people to click that ‘Add friend’ or ‘Follow’ button is not new – Myspace and millions of teenagers have been playing that game for years. But the simplicity of the user interface coupled with the prominence of the Following / Follower stats (thank GODDESS they didn’t make the mistake of calling it “friend’ like Myspace and LJ, what a psychological drama minefield that has been) has led to an almost messianic obsession with collecting followers. It makes the obsessive ‘I wanna be your friend’ popularism from when you were in school seem somehow quaint. At least those teens weren’t pushing a ‘brand’ and a hidden business/marketing plan.

Also interesting is a new breed of people who seem to be trying to create a career being a Social Media Whore – consultants or new media professionals, it’s like the professional bloggers of yore (who interestingly have stormed this Social Media space in the same way traditional broadcasters invaded podcasting, using their ‘name’ status and existing readership and other channels to promote their Twitter/Friendfeed to trounce any ‘competition’) except with one difference – blending the prosaic and mundane with the insights and links of old, all in 140 characters, leading to a sort of silent film / talkie divide between those using all media – video, microblogs, maps, moblog photos, work AND play, and those just pinging their Twitter from their blog when they post.

But is it possible to eat off linklove? Can online respect alone pay the bills? Is it a new way of working (I know of people who have gotten work via Twitter and other social media), or just TwitFactor? Your 15 seconds are up, Mr McLuhan43553.

Top of the Class

Something that has always bothered me about social media – and new / rich media (interesting term there) as a whole is that it’s nerdy. white, usually male and most definitely middle class. I’m sure loads of people will now point to exceptions, but it bothers me that diversity isn’t there – when 2nd and some of the 3rd world can now have access to at least mobile networks there isn’t a desire or a knowledge to blog, vlog, podcast, communicate? Is this a purely leisure class pursuit? Is it because the barriers to entry are too high, these shiny toys are way too expensive, from computers to bandwidth to servers? I do feel personally there aren’t enough different voices, and a lot of existing voices ‘retweeting’ or reposting the same old.

Talking class, it’s interesting that sociologists are studying the online habits of teenagers of differing class strata and/or money / social groups. Danah Boyd is doing some interesting work in this area – Facebook vs Myspace was a contentious one from 2007, I can see similar tribal loyalties affecting who signs up for Bebo, LinkedIn, Twitter etc. I wonder if Twitter classes as mid-30s male IT geek in it’s demographic? Certainly to progress past the posts about software ‘mashups’ (grr) and Rails coding it needs to widen it’s appeal – the one sided nature of most conversations and marketing spiel as well will put people off – the ability to track conversations is hard, which as Mr Scoble would say at this point, is why Friendfeed wins in that regard.

Hierarchies in the Clouds

I find it interesting that there is already what is called a Twitterati. but no Facebookati or Bebo Mafia, and it’s already acquired a (jokingly?) negative connoitation. Every bunch of people online creates a clique, but not many have such a visible metric to affirm their status. So you get usually the same old names, with 1,000s of friends, beseiged by their success, so they talk to each other and themselves. Reciprocity failure, the gift that keeps on giving.

Rustle the Brand / Public good?

So the new model that people are building is one of branding yourself (I did say they were in marketing) – but corporate bloggers could tell you tales of drunkeness and cruelty and the problem of openness vs public image. Now multiply this to a whole life, where the personal, prosaic and professional are blended together, where people share drunken tagged photos and videos on YouTube and Facebook (better change your Privacy settings!) with a profile linked to your LinkedIn CV. Now you can develop nicknames and personas, but it does raise interesting issues on what employers expect to know and what employees share (or more interestingly get shared about them), and how those feeds interact and cross-relate. And how it could all go very, very wrong (see the whole Russell Brand debacle for a broadcast version of this).

Is there a public good in social media? Is the act of sharing seen as a public good, or is it just an act of vanity or self promotion? Will people share if it endangers their brand? Or just self-censor so the conversations and connections become banal?

Web 2.0 – Where’s My Money?

Free content isn’t free; someone has to spend time making it, someone has to spend money storing it; someone at YouTube or Twitter has to spend expensive nights awake trying to work out how to make money from it. People have made money from other people’s ‘free’ content though.

I’ll quote Bicyclemark and Richard Bluestein from a Citizen Reporter podcast:

“BicycleMark: But then again sometimes I look at conferences and I think ‘What have we done?’. I’ve seen some very expensive conferences taking place…but you look around and you go ‘Wow look all this money that’s been spent so these people can talk to each other’ and I guess make business deals.

Richard: You know what bothers me…It’s interesting though that the business people that schmoozed and squeezed the money out of VC’s – they are not having any sort of problems paying for their health insurance, they’re still flying first class, you know what I mean..That’s the case pretty much anywhere in Silicon Valley…the people that Twitter everything and talk about the trends and eat constantly…just constantly! They just fucking always have plenty of money…they’re relying, they’re sucking off people like us that produce content…If you have a business based on podcasting or video…or streaming, there wouldn’t be any website if there wasn’t people makiing stuff. Most of the time they aren’t paying anything for that content.”

What the quote displays is the widening digital and social divides is also reflected online – the differences between rich and poor, free creators and paid producers, those with VC money and those with not and different classes. The internet has been seen as the great Communicator, crossing boundaries of race, class and gender, yet people are getting rich reinforcing those differences. Rich media indeed.

And the book publishers (Mr O’Reilly invented the term to sell books remember) and people who created startups and got the sponsorships and VC funds (and even refuse offers from Facebook) are the ones who got rich off the podcast (failed) boom, or the recent online video goldrush. Only the fail whale of the economy will put a pinprick into this small bubble. Maybe Baron von Blubber should sue.

But the ethics of making money off someone else’s content – which might not be owned by them, well I think it’s dubious at best. Funny to hear people moan about 99% of the videos on YouTube not being ‘monetizable’ – what you want people to post videos for free that conveniently fit into your business model and sponsorship deals? Do you want gold-plated hundreds and thousands on that cake or are you gonna eat it as is? No I’m surprised the companies have been very lax in revenue sharing, apart from some laughable contracts – it’s the media that brings people in, support it. Or it dies…oops too late.

Summary

Maybe the economy will change all this – unemployed people become social media professionals, selling their network as much as their skills (why does that sound like some 21st century cyber Austen novel?) and have time to create amazing videos on YouTube. With no house, rent or need for food. And pigs tweet.

I think it’s more likely the freebie time other than kids at school or retired people is over; companies are going to have to attract people to create media for them, especially if it has to be short snappy and sweet. Yeah the conversational tweet/video microblogging will stay; but podcasting and online video are going to have a tougher time. When people are stressed about their rent, they aren’t going to make loads of Mentos videos…unless it’s of protests. Maybe like with the Obama campaign we’ll see a start of mass use of social media as a political tool, if so that does give me hope.

You might like these previous posts:

• Second Degree Life? – January 30, 2007
• Andrew Keen RSA lecture – September 5, 2007
• Monkeying around: The Myspace Musical Revolution – November 1, 2005
• Podcamp Report – September 3, 2007
• Lawrence Lessig gets DMCA’d for fair use by Warners – April 30, 2009

Whew what HASN’T happened since the last show? New US President -and he’s black. New back pains and colds for Tim – and he’s ill. Yes we can, and No to H8, but not during happy hour or eating your Credit Crunch cereal (you know the one that turns the milk red). A new hope, Episode III, ‘I have a good feeling about this’, but first where’s my money?

This is a dance we do down Johannesburg way (93Mb, 111mins)

Tracklist:

• Miriam Makeba – Pata Pata
• Fosforo – Cumbia De Obama
• San Francisco Mime Troupe – Because you’re Stupid
• Incredible Bongo Band – Bongo 73
• Nan Vasconcelos – Brasil (Luciano Re-Edit)
• Nina Simone – Sinnerman (Felix Remix)
• Fifth Dimension – Let The Sunshine (Solly Bmore Edit)
• Kanye West – Love Lockdown (Solly Remix)
• AC Slater – Poison
• ZZT – Lower State Of Consciousness (Justice remix)
• AC Slater – Jack Got Jacked (Jack Beats Remix)
• DJ Donna Summer – Hoovermore
• Faex – What Poetry
• Ground Shelter (fear)
• The Chambers Brothers – Funky
• Mercury Rev – Senses On Fire (Fujiya & Miyagi Remix)
• Chase & Status – Against All Odds (Ft Kano)
• Chase & Status – Take Me Away
• London Elektricity – This Dark Matter
• Chase & Status – Is It Worth It
• London Elektricity – Outnumbered
• Eric B. and Rakim – Don’t Sweat The Technique
• The Moog Synthesizer with The Camarata Contemporary Chamber Orchestra – Sports et Divertissements – Le Flirt
• Tom Wilson – Lesbian_Seagull
• Gnarls Barkley – Who’s Gonna Save My Soul (Demo Version)
• Rah Band – Is anybody there
• Fleetwood Mac – Silver Springs (Rough & Outtakes)

You might like these previous posts:

• RC 161: Odds n Sods 6 – Acoustic PoohStyx (part one) – April 24, 2008
• Ground Shelter (Hope & Fear) – two topical mashups – November 7, 2008
• RC 170: Oddz and Sods 11 – All Good Things – August 25, 2008
• RC 176: Winter of Discontent v2.0 (aka Oddz and Sods 13) – February 5, 2009
• RC 179: Is he a Yankee? Naw I’m a Londoner – UK Hip Hop with Ian Fondue – April 5, 2009

Let me tell you a story:

There’s an unsigned rock band in Scotland, they’ve got a buzz around them, mostly created around demos pushed around the internet with the band’s permission. They do an interview with a blogger, who posts some of the said demos with the band’s permission. The band becomes a hot ticket as part of all this attention, and signs with a major label. So everyone’s happy then? Band have got big deal, blogger and others who caught on early got the scoops, the fans got the demos and are likely to buy the LP to hear the final tracks and others. All butterflies, yellow brick roads, unicorns and fluffy kittens?

Nope.

What actually happened was over a week ago the blogger, Ed from 17seconds got a DMCA takedown via Google/Blogger from Columbia, for an interview done before Glasvegas, the band, signed with them. The kicker? Well the tracks weren’t even available anymore. And originally were there with the band’s permission (implicit or otherwise, they were posted free at their site I think); when they owned all the rights, anyway, as they were then unsigned.

What this reveals is the utter stupidity (and doing a Metallica-ness, damn need to work on those verbs) of Google, Columbia (aka Sony BMG), Glasvegas and the DMCA. Google for pulling stuff without question – like Prince does with NPG Productions on YouTube, using the DMCA like confetti even when he doesn’t own the rights – Columbia for obviously doing a standard ‘buy everything’ deal with Glasvegas, and then strangely infuriating the fans and bloggers who put the band in the charts by regarding their initial promotional support as reason for litigation, Glasvegas for doing what bands like the Clash did before them and sign with $$$s in their eyes not realising probably what complete CONtrol means and probably not caring about the people who got them there, and DMCA evil piece of litigation that made this whole sad sorry state of affairs possible (apparently right or wrong the offending piece has to be taken down for 10-14 days? Is that true? If so, that is really a chilling effect).

Now where does it leave us? There seems to be one of the periodic crackdowns atm – Teenage Kicks have been threatened also, although that was the Baitles who tbh are like Prince litigious as feck. And no-one wants defends the rights to post ‘illegal music’ do they?

What tends to be less said is that these are less than ‘illegitimate’ bloggers in most cases, they’ve got the go-ahead, the contacts etc – and still get hassle even after being told it’s OK. So the official route is no less difficult, but ‘legit’ or not the record labels and their pluggers and marketers depend on these blogs in part to promote their music – they court them, as they do with DJs and remixers with acapellas and instrumentals, they lure them with the latest tracks. It’s no suprise, there isn’t a darkened back door where these ‘demo’ or pre-release MP3s are leaking out like fleeing rats; the record labels GIVE THEM to the blogs. Or the bands, or the marketing departments, or managers, or agents.

So hence irony of turning around and biting the hand that feeds you.

What to do? Well what about this – goto the Glasvegas Myspace page. Befriend them. Post a message pointing to 17seconds or the Don’t be Evil post. Then unfriend them

Tell your friends not to buy Glasvegas’s album and/or download or give them a copy until Ed or someone hears back. In fact fuck it boycott all Sony BMG if you want (who due to a contact I used to have used to be quite cool about all this, regularly releasing tracks for remix and review, unlike another frequent offender EMI who I’m glad to see are going down the pan May they rot in hell. They caused my own Cease and Desist – ooh remember them? How quaint they seem now – but anyway it’s sad to see Sony BMG join that cabal of stupidity).

Because I’m sure, Glasvegas being a Glaswegian band might not like being asked whether they are men or whether they are mice. Or that they are just now Columbia’s prison bitches…and might see these messages and respond. Doubtful, but one can try.

You might like these previous posts:

• Google’s ‘blogocide’ deletes music blogs – February 11, 2010
• Monkeying around: The Myspace Musical Revolution – November 1, 2005
• Pay to Play – your digital rights? – January 21, 2006
• Blogging can kill you – October 2, 2008
• Greedy Apple – October 2, 2008

Last Thursday we did a special themed gig at the Parkade in Second Life around the music of the Pet Shop Boys. I DJ’d first for 2 hours, then Amanda Shinji aka Ms Cyberpink DJ’d for 2 hours – you can hear her mix here. My set included a real mixture of originals, covers, remixes, mashups, collaborations and even the odd spoof

In this mix I included To Speak is a Sin, one of my coming out songs, as it is as I correctly guessed before Mr Tennant’s coming out, about a gay bar – takes me back to those times!

C.L.I.C.K.I.N.G. we’re clicking (108Mb, 128mins)

Setlist

• Pet Shop Boys – We’re the Pet Shop Boys
• Pet Shop Boys – Love Comes Quickly (Automatic Drum Beat Mix)
• DJ Magnet – Love Comes Running Up That Hill Quickly
• Pet Shop Boys – You Know Where You Went Wrong
• Pet Shop Boys – Two Divided by Zero
• Xam – West End Jump
• Flight Of The Conchords.- Inner City Pressure
• Junobot – What Have I Done To Deserve This
• Pet Shop Boys – Paninaro ’95
• Electronic – Disappointed
• judgedreadfull – don’t drop the washing up
• Yoko Ono – Walking On Thin Ice (Pet Shop Boys Electro Mix)
• Pet Shop Boys – It’s A Sin (DreamTime Mix v2.0)
• Pet Shop Boys – Left To My Own Devices
• Pet Shop Boys – In Private (7″ mix)
• Pet Shop Boys – Sodom (Trentmoller remix)
• Pet Shop Boys – Psychological (alter ego remix)
• Pet Shop Boys – Yesterday, When I Was Mad
• 10000 Spoons – Polyminimal-C
• Pet Shop Boys – Shopping
• Carter USM – Rent (Pet Shop Boys)
• Pet Shop Boys – We All Feel Better In the Dark
• Pet Shop Boys – I Want A Dog
• KLF vs PSB – So Hard
• Pet Shop Boys – DJ Culture
• Pet Shop Boys – How I Learned To Hate Rock ‘n’ Roll
• Pet Shop Boys – Party Song
• Pet Shop Boys – A Red Letter Day
• Pet Shop Boys – Go West
• Pet Shop Boys – To Speak Is A Sin
• Pet Shop Boys – Tall Thin Men (Demo)

All of the tracks are my PSB faves – mostly B-sides and album tracks with some singles thrown in and mashups/remixes.

Of note are Go West – in there because of my memory in 2006 seeing the Pet Shop Boys at the Civic Auditorium in San Francisco and belting out the words along with all the men there doing the motions and raising the roof, an amazing moment.

And To Speak is a Sin – my coming out song, which ironically was Neil’s Coming out album, and it is about gay bars, the old sort like The Coleherne in London, which I really associate with that song…

The mashup by DJ Magnet – Love Comes Running Up That Hill Quickly has emotional resonance for me, and DJ Culture is about the first gulf war – all those satellite fantasies and wars we’ve (not) wom. And I think You Know Where You Went Wrong was the first bside of the first Pet Shop Boys 12″ I had. And I own Introspective on cassette somewhere and I Want A Dog along with the funny Always in my House are the favourite tracks from that, I like the same sort of irreverent approach to their own songs like Soft Cell did with Ecstatic dancing…

And the ending of Tall Thin Men was accidental – Amanda had problems with her feed so I did another song (forgetting to switch off the audio in SL at first, so at the start you’re hearing the song relayed sattelite-like through the server) and is an unused demo from Closer to Heaven. I love it because a) it refutes the gay stereotype of liking showtunes and b) rhyming Ute Lemper with temper. A showtunes song about hating showtunes? CLASS.

You might like these previous posts:

• Parkade Shop Bois (and Girls) – Finally PSB’s set – April 3, 2008
• Things I Never Posted But Didn’t Get Round To It – July 26, 2009
• Pop of the Tops – September 23, 2008
• Reshuffle > Edit > Recyle > Goto 10? – December 8, 2005
• Fleetwood Mix – Fleetwood Mac mashup LP – October 19, 2009

Also included is the great show by Don Letts they did on the Saturday, with his memories of Joe Strummer and an unreleased BAD demo that Joe wrote. Very good listening, but it’s sadly too large for the other server and is on my 20Gb daily limited archive account, so if the bandwidth gets blasted and it’s unavailable, come back the next day or so.

If anyone from BBC Radio reads this, apart from as Negativland said ‘please don’t sue us’ we want MORE STRUMMER LONDON CALLING SHOWS. It’d be great to hear a podcast or repeat of all the shows., 1998-2001. Pretty please.

If anyone can ID the songs and/or the original 2001 transmit dates of the shows, I’d be very grateful.

Joe Strummer London Calling Show 1 (2001/repeated 17/12/2007)
Joe Strummer London Calling Show 2 (2001/repeated 18/12/2007)
Joe Strummer London Calling Show 3 (2001/repeated 19/12/2007)
Joe Strummer London Calling Show 4 (2001/repeated 20/12/2007)

Don Letts Clash City Radio tribute to Joe Strummer (transmitted 22/12/2007)

(Those with podcatchers who can’t handle multiple enclosures will have to download all but the first one manually – I’m not doing a post for every show!)

You might like these previous posts:

• The groove machine from Bush House: Joe Strummer’s London Calling – August 7, 2009
• The Future is indeed unwritten… – June 22, 2007
• Radio Clash 75: This One’s For Joe – May 15, 2006
• Joe on the Radio – December 17, 2007
• Apologies if you get show 75 twice… – May 15, 2006

I remember Mozgate part 1 back in 1992 (?), and felt that the NME was being hypocritical and over harsh over Morrissey wearing a Union Jack (shock horror!) and writing contentious songs like National Front Disco which didn’t make their position clear (but conversely didn’t say ‘Hi I’m Moz and I’m a racist!’ either). He was basically hounded out of the country, a witch hunt. I’m no fan of the BNP, NF, C18 or any right-wing fascist people (I do follow the mantra that the only good fascist is a dead one), but there was a weird feeling that the people chasing after them weren’t exactly spotless or thinking either, doing a sort of Witchfinder General j’accuse almost Monty Pythonesque mobthink.

The recent rematch is less ambiguous, the comments are partly the kind that would make a Tory MP blanche; he is so wrong about immigration it’s not true, but this sense of unease at the NME’s response continues from before.

Why?

Well there is the physician heal thyself argument, until fairly recently NME either hasn’t had a very conspicuous track record in anti-racism since the 1980′s (or the last time they sparred with Moz, although that was a blip); the Love Music Hate Racism has a certain irony after Simon Reynolds revealed in his recent ‘Bring the Noise’ that IPC (owners of both the defunct Melody Maker and NME) ruled that black faces weren’t allowed on the cover – ‘bad for sales’ apparently according to their focus groups. So being against racism is OK, but not if it hurts sales? WTF? Even on the recently Love Music Hate Racism I noticed the few black stars were stuck at the back – coincidence?

Also doesn’t help is that their niching of music coverage to a very restricted demographic – under 23, guitars, indie-rock – means that apart from the few that were on that cover, it is a white mostly middle class boys club. Oh and one of the last times I read it this year they had a review of a new unsigned band called Fucked Up dolled up as dodgy looking NF skinheads. At no point in the review did they call them out on this, or explain. Nice.

The other thing is the bleating of liberal media about these things reminds me of the hypocrisy regarding drug use such as cocaine – IT’S BAD they bleat while showing lurid shots of Amy, Lindsay, Britney and Pete off their bonce but looking so chic with it. It’s a serious issue, and I’m sure some in the media feel passionate and committed 100% to equal rights, fighting racism and phobia – but I get the sense that they feel that way as long as they don’t have to employ those people. I meant how many people at the NME, for example those pictures of the writers they lovingly tout like they are the new pop stars or something, how many are other than white middle class males?

This is not to say that Moz was right in what he said – he was WRONG. Immigration is crucial to what makes London a world class city, and in particular it’s music scene so vibrant; a melting pot of styles, people, influences. Same can be said of other parts of the UK, Bristol, Birmingham, Liverpool, Sheffield, Manchester…even places like Bradford get the shout. So it’s sad he’s still banging on about this like it was 1992 or 93 and one of his favourite bands Gene were about to receive the same slightly-hypocritical treatment for a single cover (?) and wreck their careers too. Glad to hear he is no racist though, Love Music Hate Racism is well worth supporting, and I was glad to see NME take part over the last few years…a long way to go though.

If the NME who cried wolf wasn’t so slightly hypocritical in their shouts, I’d believe them as it is I suspect another (faked? overhyped?) drama and hollow claims to empty, trendy beliefs.

You might like these previous posts:

• RC 136: All The World’s A Siege – October 23, 2007
• New Orleans – why Kanye West is so right… – September 4, 2005
• Podcasts – it’s all gone Pete Tong! – January 15, 2006
• Legal mashups? Gowers review & Warners – December 6, 2006
• Gay Shame mix – June 19, 2007

I like particularly this line:

I would have gladly paid a large monthly fee for a legal service as good as Oink – but none existed, because the music industry could never set aside their own greed and corporate bullshit to make it happen.

This sums up the problem in a nutshell; the record industry and retailers screwed music lovers (and artists) for years with CDs, they created their own hell by being greedy and expecting people to ‘upgrade’ their collections periodically and pay again and again for the same product, even as costs dropped, made it harder to find new music by conglomeration of media channels owned usually by the same companies, and ignored and did everything to prevent digital distribution until it was inevitable that without legal digital alternatives, politicians would not take severe action against ‘pirates’.

And all that time everyone who loves music wanted something like what Rob suggests – I wasn’t a fan or user of Oink but would use Audiogalaxy as an example…iTunes et al have missed the point made by Rob and in Audiogalaxy – rare tunes or customer requested tunes were given priority; and like all P2P services is user driven not driven by fairly clueless marketing departments trying to restrict you to what they want.

If the industry had allowed and co-operated with a service like that; relinquished some of it’s paranoiac control to a service driven around what music people wanted (fancy that, catering to customers!) rather than ignoring that need and/or criminalising it, then there wouldn’t be a situation that they are stuck between the twin devils of ITunes or P2P. What shocks me is not so much that people want music for free – the Radiohead ‘In Rainbows’ album intentional delivery/leak, crappy bitrate aside is proof of that as a given that some people will see digital music as lesser or free – is that there are still albums and music that is deleted and unavailable in any format.

Given that the usual argument for capitalism is that every niche is supposedly filled; why is this still the case? Why are the archives of the record labels still closed? Why are the charging the same as CDs for much lower quality and less prodution overheads? Why can’t we get the album immediately from the artist without all the expensive marketing hot air to tell us how good it is when we already have these things called ears to tell us that fact?

Given these questions and the lack of co-operation and protectionism of the industry (don’t get me started on DRM) I can’t see how an industry beholden to not giving the consumer what it wants can survive? Constantly telling Peter to not look for the Wolf is only going to last so long…and politicians won’t always give in to their extensive lobbying when mass dissent is already happening.

You might like these previous posts:

• Mixwit goes the way of Muxtape: RIAA still stupid, News at 11 – December 18, 2008
• Why Radiohead weren’t revolutionary – October 15, 2008
• Digital Watermarking – a killer contract – September 9, 2007
• Music and Your Message (In the Hour of Chaos) – February 19, 2010
• Words of Advice for Young Podcasters – August 24, 2006

All the world’s a siege; and o’er this far flung isle something is rockin’ in the state of Dubstep. This above all, Billy Waggledagger gets the props, but otherwise it is all Greek to me.

2B or not 2B, that is the pencil: (73Mb, 97mins) http://media.libsyn.com/media/radioclash/rc_136.mp3

Players:

• Lethal Bizzle – Babylon’s Burning in the Ghetto (from Love Music Hate Racism CD1)
• High Contrast – In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida (from Tough Guys Don’t Dance)
• Skream – Chest Boxing (from Love Music Hate Racism CD2)
• Benga – Music Box
• New Age Steppers – Fade Away
• Flight of the Conchords – Inner City Pressure – see video
• Akala – Electro Livin’ (from Love Music Hate Racism CD2)
• Coil – Further Back & Faster
• Jean Jacques Perrey and Luke Vibert – Moog Acid (Jackson Mix – via AudioOut blog)
• Soft Cell – Monoculture (Playgroup edit)
• Dead Milkmen – Instant Club Hit
• Dan Le Sac Vs. Scroobius Pip – A Letter from God
• Get Cape, Wear Cape, Fly – Build You A Tower (demo – from Love Music Hate Racism CD1)
• High Contrast – Chances (from Tough Guys Don’t Dance)
• Psychic TV – Just Drifting
• Psychic TV – Always is Always
• Lemon Interrupt – Minneapolis Airwaves (from AudioOut)
• Coil – Lorca not Orca
• Jeff Sconce – carry on wayward continuity actor (from Thus Sang Zarahelium)
• Psychic TV – The Orchids
• DJ Earworm – Lemon Lucy
• Hot Butter – Mah Na Mah Na
• Miss Piggy – Stereau Workout (from WFMU)
• Ryuichi Sakamoto – Rain / I Want a Divorce

You might like these previous posts:

• RC 137: Mostly Hallowed Eve – October 29, 2007
• RC 138: Itchy and Scratchy – November 9, 2007
• RC 143: Punk Rock War Lord – December 17, 2007
• RC 153: Odds n’ Sods – Let’s Pretend – March 6, 2008
• RC 159: Parkade Shop Boys – the PSB mix – April 12, 2008