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Posted: 08.01.2002 Their A&R man said 'I don't hear a single'
Take that RIAA! I was just getting ready to blog this story and saw it mentioned here, too...
I've long been a fan of the group Wilco. I saw them in a small club setting when I lived in Mobile back in the summer of '95. The cool thing then was to get a Wilco gas station lighter from the tour. An excellent new article on CNN documents the making of their latest album: "Before the [Yankee Hotel Foxtrot] album's release, Wilco acted contrary to music business wisdom by making the album available to fans for free on its Web site. Ultimately, it seems those fans -- and more -- also bought the disc when it became available. 'It hurt when they [Reprise Records] said they didn't like our record,' [band leader Jeff] Tweedy said. 'But we went out on tour and nobody canceled our shows. Our tour was basically sold out. People came to the shows and sang all of the songs, and not one of them had to pay a penny for it. That felt good, actually.'" Many of you will recall a similar fight Weezer faced with their record company over the release of Maladroit this spring. Ultimately, Rivers Cuomo won the right to put tracks from Maladroit -- and any past, present or future release -- on the weezer.com site for download. Has this hurt the band? Obviously not. I'm sorry, but record companies and the RIAA have a long way to go to prove to me that they are fighting fair and in the artists' best interests. These are two very big instances where they were dead-wrong and were going against their bands' own wishes. (Read the full article at CNN.com.)  *blush* I don't know who Wilco is.Please don't punish me :( ¤ ¤ credit: Tammie | 08.01.02 at 04:44 AM | link- -this ¤ ¤ Don't feel bad at all. They've never really made it "big" -- just the alternative charts and such. ¤ ¤ credit: robyn | 08.01.02 at 04:56 AM | link--this ¤ ¤This is just so wrong on so many levels. I don't even know where to begin. Why should there be an issue with bands putting their own hard work on their own site? Isn't the record industry getting enough money? I don't even want to hear the crap about concerts costing money and all of that other shiot. That's what corporate sponsers are for! ¤ ¤ credit: statia | 08.01.02 at 08:29 AM | link--this ¤ ¤I'm so tired of RIAA trying to say they're doing this for the artists... no, they're doing it for their own pockets, and once everyone figures that out, the world will be a better place. ¤ ¤ credit: jesse | 08.01.02 at 08:47 AM | link--this ¤ ¤By fighting for artist rights, of course, they do mean their own wallets. The business of big business is big business - who cares if the little artists get in the way from time to time? :) ¤ ¤ credit: ste | 08.01.02 at 09:46 AM | link--this ¤ ¤Well the thing is that it doesn't matter one way or another, the recording company has the right to refuse to allow the band to post their music cause their contracts state that the recording company owns their music. Cute, isn't it. ¤ ¤ credit: Veshka | 08.01.02 at 11:13 AM | link--this ¤ ¤I don't get it. I thought that they hired people to get their songs played on the radio and create buzz about their albums. Back in the day, I taped songs I liked off the radio and made my own little mixed tapes, and it's the same for people downloading off the net. I still made my mom get the Wham Make It Big album and got my Tears For Fears on vinyl for my birthday. Whatever happened to making music for the sake of enjoying making music, rather than for the sake of lining some corporate exec's pockets? And as for bands who don't want their music traded online, well, way to burn your fans and not reach a new fan base, either. Wilco rules! -this ¤ ¤Well I finally found and burned all the tracks from Volume One of the Essential Weezer. And I'm diggin' it. But good grief? Do you know how many variations, demos, bootlegs and remixes there are of each of those songs? I'd like to never have found all the right versions. I hope you will make a Volume 2 tracklist, but I may have to beg for a mix CD - I don't think I have the patience to go through that all again. Which is not to say it isn't worth it, Weezer jams! ¤ ¤ credit: Promo | 08.01.02 at 02:51 PM | link--this ¤ ¤Not in Weezer's case, Veshka. That's why Rivers won their lawsuit. The music they produced on Maladroit was done independent of the label during creation and production. They offered it up to the label, the label said it sounded too much like Lynyrd Skynyrd and rejected it, and they put the tracks on the website for input and suggestions. Then Rivers mailed a demo out to radio stations who put it into heavy rotation -- and without any record company support whatsoever -- THEN a single showed up on the Billboard charts (first time in history an unreleased album had done so). At that point, the record company took notice and decided to release the album -- but from the court case, Rivers won the right to put up anything he'd produced independently on the website and set a very amazing precedent. ¤ ¤ credit: robyn | 08.01.02 at 03:13 PM | link--this ¤ ¤Robyn, as a long time fan of Wilco (and Uncle Tupelo dating before that) I think you need to read this article. And perhaps even direct your legions of fans toward the same thing. The more I learn about the recording industry the more I never feel guilty about downloading music: http://dir.salon.com/ent/feature/2001/03/14/payola/index.html Cheers, -this ¤ ¤Great article, Rick -- thanks! It's a topic I've went off about before, and unfortunately I'm sure I will again. ¤ ¤ credit: robyn | 08.01.02 at 11:44 PM | link--this ¤ ¤
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