Bill Strahm's Weblog

Wednesday August 25, 2004

The downfall of RIAA

So I was in the gym reading a buisinessweek mag while pedalling (see the plethora of cycling entries on why) - and an article came up that said that the music industry grew 7% - after a long downturn due to those EVIL filesharing people, and P2P piracy.

Well I have news for you RIAA - the reason that your sales have gone down is that your product sucks. Lets face it - how many bands are there that an adult will ALWAYS go out and buy the next album that comes out. I mean sure - kids will buy Britany, or Christina, or whoever the boy band of the day is, but we are adults - I want a new Rolling Stones, AeroSmith, Van Halen... Where are these bands (Nirvana, Pearl Jam, don't even get me started on Outkast) and why.

I have wondered if the way that the RIAA is operating has something to do with this. Instead of letting new bands nurture themselves and create themselves in the way that the band wants to, they are presured into putting too many albums out early in their carreers. I mean seriously - the first Beatles album basically sucked, so did U2 and many other bands... but they were able to train themselves to the point that they became excellent musicians and ruled for many years.What I am seeing is new bands are discovered and then put on an album a year contract until no one will buy what comes out (that infamous sophmore slump) - and then they are dropped. Can we let bands figure out their own schedule - giving us great music when they are ready.

Note that this isn't a problem in the independant scene nearly as much - and that is its benefit. If you haven't checked it out - look at CD Baby for a great site that supports independant artists... and if you like surf rock, make sure and check out Surf Guitar Villians - one of my prior managers
(2004-08-25 14:26:38.0) Permalink Comments [1]

Thursday July 29, 2004

What are we listening to today Well right now we have Sultans of Swing (Dire Straits) playing in the office.

I fought getting an MP3 player for years, finally broke down a couple of months ago and have no idea why I put it off. These things are great. I went and got myself a RIO Chiba, a nice Flash based MP3 player, and now have a good pair of Sony Earbuds to go along with it.

I have to ask, why does every music player out there come with the cheapest piece of crap headphones - Want to know why my player sounds so much better than yours, it is the headphones...

(2004-07-29 10:49:53.0) Permalink Comments [1]