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November 24, 2006

shane carey’s music mini-festo

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Shane Carey, a musi­cian from Ari­zona [his music pod­casts are here], sent me this:

A Music Mini-festo.
Ama­teur musi­cians: You no lon­ger need to “make it big.”
The Inter­net is slowly killing the myth that only rock stars make popu­lar music. The record industry still con­trols most of the fame and for­tune, but a record con­tract is no lon­ger neces­sary to reach lis­te­ners. If all you want is peo­ple to hear your music, get a web­site or put it on MyS­pace. Maybe you’ll get fame if 50 million peo­ple like it, and maybe you’ll have for­tune if they send some money your way. If not, at least you have sha­red your music. Nee­ding star­dom puts the power in someone else’s hands; being a musi­cian is yours, right now.
Pro­fes­sio­nal musi­cians: Kill your con­tracts.
To pick an exam­ple, Joe Satriani fans can­not just replace him with some other vir­tuoso gui­ta­rist relea­sed under a Crea­tive Com­mons license; only Joe will do. Your uni­que­ness means the fans can’t escape the music industry unless you do it first. Don’t sign; if you’ve sig­ned, don’t renew. If you can’t afford to quit without your fans’ sup­port, make sure they know it. If they won’t give you that sup­port, then you’re not the star that you thought you were, and the record industry owns you more than you know.
Music fans: Sup­port your musi­cians.
Enough about your right to hear the music, whether you can afford it or not: living in a world where peo­ple can afford to make that music is a pri­vi­lege to be ear­ned. Pro­fes­sio­nal musi­cians who stop recei­ving money will have to start spen­ding their days at jobs ins­tead of wri­ting music. A free down­load is not neces­sa­rily stea­ling, but if you don’t want to wait ten years for the next album to come out, throw them a few bucks to buy them the time.

Record industry pro­fes­sio­nals: Change or die.
An industry might exist in which peo­ple like you make money from the honest prac­tice of making it easy for musi­cians to get their music to lis­te­ners, but yours is not currently such an industry, or honest prac­tice. Without you, the musi­cian can author, record, and dis­tri­bute; without the musi­cian, you have no pro­duct. Stop alie­na­ting your mar­ket by suing them for telling you that the value you add is no lon­ger worth the asking price: inc­rease your value, lower the price, or get out of the busi­ness and leave the pro­du­cers and con­su­mers to work it out amongst themselves.

I espe­cially like the line, “Nee­ding star­dom puts the power in someone else’s hands; being a musi­cian is yours, right now.” Thanks, Shane!
[gaping­void mani­festo sub­mis­sion gui­de­li­nes are here.][Mani­festo archive is here.]

3 Responses to “shane carey’s music mini-festo”

1. silverfoot says:

   November 24, 2006 at 9:05 PM

   this is brilliant…
2. sLIVER says:

   December 1, 2006 at 8:13 AM

   Point 3 is correct — but the rest is just wrong.
3. Ty Cohen says:

   March 2, 2007 at 5:57 AM

   The Inter­net is slowly killing the myth that only rock stars make popu­lar music. The record industry still con­trols most of the fame and for­tune, but a record con­tract is no lon­ger neces­sary to reach lis­te­ners. If all you want is peo­ple to hear your music,click on this link The Inter­net is slowly killing the myth that only rock stars make popu­lar music. The record industry still con­trols most of the fame and for­tune, but a record con­tract is no lon­ger neces­sary to reach lis­te­ners. If all you want is peo­ple to hear your music,click on this link <a href=“http://www.order-yours-now.com
   which is very inte­res­ting article
   Music Contracts