The Love/Hate News Report 11.24.11: Happy Turkey Consumption Day
Posted by John Downey on 11.24.2011
News and thoughts on Lil Wayne and T.I. handing out turkeys, Jessica Simpson's possible deal with Weight Watchers, musicians finding a new way to support Occupy Wall Street, Big Boi possibly working with Kate Bush, Universal Music Group suing Grooveshark, GZA speaking at Harvard and more!
Welcome to the only music news report that would give you a hug, the Love/Hate News Report! Seriously, though, this news report will get most of its views on Thanksgiving, so I thank you for taking a moment to visit this little piece of web space. Thankfully, this column won't conflict with any major holidays until next July. That's right—I have a calendar.
The early birds might actually be reading this while I'm running in a 5K race. For those wondering whether I'm blowing smoke or not, I'll be running the Feaster Five, the largest race in New England (I've been told that something close to 10,000 people will participate). It has its own Wikipedia page and everything, and those who see this late in the evening might be able to look up my results. Here's hoping I don't embarrass myself.
You know who doesn't embarrass himself? Please, let me know. Oh, and you should check out Nick Krenn's Major Bands, Minor Labels. He talks about everything in that column...okay, maybe not everything, but he covers a lot of ground. His other column, The Music 3R's, is a very good column despite having AIDS. Oh, wait, that's a play on Lil B putting out a song called "I Have AIDS", which...ah, screw it, Nick's reaction to that story matches my own.
This is the last week of NaNoWriMo. I can crank out a few hundred words in only five minutes—all I have to do is shut off my brain and write dialogue. Anyway...
Okay, here's how this works: I find eight news bites per week, and complain about them. Except when I like them, in which case I'll rave about them. That is relatively speaking, of course. I'm a bit of a scoundrel who remains negative about most matters, so to let you know when I'm not trying to drown you in sarcasm/hate, I have helpful little visual reminders letting you know when I think something is a good thing. For reasons concerning symmetry, I've put indicators around the parts where I'm ranting.
If you don't agree with me, that's what the comment section is for. Go ahead and air your grievances in a matter that you find to be most appropriate. If you troll hard enough, I might cry. I will never admit to tearing up, of course, but you'll know when it happens when you get that warm feeling in your heart.
Musicians Set Up Website Supporting Occupy Wall Street
Last week, I ragged on Jay-Z for selling OWS t-shirts. My issue wasn't with OWS, or that a businessman like Jay-Z is the kind of person that OWS has taken a stand against—it's that Jay-Z stood to make a profit off of a group that are raging against irresponsible capitalism. I won't guess whether or not Jay-Z really hopes that OWS succeeds, but his actions did more to hurt the cause than help it. (Disclosure: I'm not trying to voice support of OWS, nor do I condemn their actions. I know people involved in OWS who were actually arrested while trying to follow police orders to disperse, and I know good people who were heckled by members of OWS while walking to their jobs. Discussion of OWS can be found in the political section, not here.)
Fortunately, a group of musicians have come up with a way to support OWS without engaging in some sort of hypocrisy. Occupy Musicians is a new website consisting of a list of musicians who support OWS. Most of the names won't raise an eyebrow, but there are a few big names to be found in there, including Ian MacKaye, Jello Biafra, Lou Reed, and Saul Williams. If Jay-Z really supports this movement, he'd do well to add his name to that list.
Since I can't find a graceful way of leaving this story, you get THIS:
Universal Music Needs More Money
Earlier this month, the Universal Music Group became the biggest record label in the world when they bought out EMI. The move was met with acclaim from various speaking heads in the industry—Martin Mills, the founder of Beggars Group, said "It's hard to imagine this acquisition being approved, given Universal's existing dominance in an over-concentrated market," and Charles Cadas, the CEO of Merlin, said that it was "difficult to see this as anything other than a setback for the digital market" (you know, the format that is supposed to be the source of most digital sales in the next few years). It seemed to be only a matter of time before UMG did something drastic and ill-informed, and by jove, we got it in the form of their lawsuit against Grooveshark.
Now, I embed Grooveshark playlists in most of my columns, and I've spent quite a bit of time using the service. To be completely honest, the only advantage that Grooveshark has over a comparable service like Spotify is that I can actually embed a Grooveshark playlist into a column while listening to a Spotify playlist involves booting up a separate application. In all other respects, Spotify is the superior product—the music loads up faster, it is easier to find music, and sharing music is generally easier. If Spotify allows me to embed a widget tomorrow, I'll likely stop using Grooveshark immediately.
There's another advantage that Spotify has over Grooveshark: they aren't prone to litigation. Grooveshark's relationship with the music industry is strained to say the least, with most of their content coming from their users rather than the artists themselves. They have managed to stay active under DMCA, which basically protects Grooveshark from most lawsuits but not people who upload music to Grooveshark. Then UMG got the urge to sue them and looked without leaping.
Last week, UMG filed a lawsuit against Grooveshark claiming that its employees uploaded hundreds of thousands of copyrighted songs to their service, which is a no-no under DMCA. I'd question why Grooveshark employees aren't allowed to use their own service, but seeing as how the DMCA is a tricky thing to work with in the first place, I won't stress about it too much. UMG's claim, though, is a bold one, and you'd be forgiven for wondering how they came about this information in the first place. This is the part, by the way, where this case gets really stupid, so you might want to put on a hard hat or something.
UMG, in their complaint, cited an anonymous comment left in Digital Music News's article, "King Crimson Can't Get Their Music Off of Grooveshark…", from someone claiming to be a Grooveshark employee (left on October 17th, if you don't want to search too much). The person claimed that they were paid per song they uploaded. "That's nice," you may be thinking, "but where's the real evidence?" Actually, that's what this lawsuit is based off of and was cited in a UMG release to the press. UMG claims to also have e-mails that back up claims made in the comment, begging the question as to how they received such damning evidence in the first place.
But hey, this might not sound too bad to you. UMG's evidence of Grooveshark's wrongdoing looks damn meek, but maybe you think that Grooveshark should still be held accountable for the music that is on their service. This is where things become truly outrageous, but first, I want you to try and guess just how much money UMG wants per infringement. Keep in mind that a single song goes for $0.99 on iTunes, most of the same songs can be heard for free on Spotify, and that we don't live in an oppressive, dystopian society. Here's a video to pass the time while you ponder it. I'll wait.
I hope you enjoyed that brief intermission. Anyway, if you guessed that UMG hopes to get $150,000 per infringement, you are correct! You are also probably very sad, but hey, you're a winner in my book. Grooveshark's founders have already called bullshit on all of UMG's claims, and also called UMG out for informing the press about this lawsuit before informing the people they were planning on suing. Unless UMG can come up with some actual evidence, their lawsuit looks as frivolous as Mariah Yeater's claims concerning Justin Bieber. Here's hoping this gets sorted out quickly.
Big Boi Wants To Work With Kate Bush
It's hard to come up with ways in which Big Boi and Kate Bush are similar. Both make music, I suppose, and good music at that, but they operate in completely different genres and have completely different philosophies. That said, these two might work together soon if Big Boi has his way.
In a recent interview with Big Boi, Boi had the following to say about Kate Bush:
"I want her to co-produce something with me. We'd produce a song and write it from scratch. I'd rather get her in a room and not have a plan and just let it come organically – it's not like I've got a song and I'll just be like, 'I want you to sing this part right here.'"
Color me intrigued. It's not as though a female English singer teamed with a rapper could ever produce bad results!
Jessie J and B.o.B.'s "Price Tag" Is The Highest Selling Collaboration Of 2011
…I stand corrected. Jessie J is another hot chick who a major label decided to turn into a star. B.o.B. thinks his alias sounds good. Together, they made a song called "Price Tag". It's not a horrible song, but it's not the sort of thing that I would listen to more than once. Needless to say, the music video for "Price Tag" has over 160,000,000 views. Go figure.
Someone actually punched the numbers and figured out what songs that were made as part of a collaboration had the highest sales this year. "Price Tag" topped the list with 950,000 copies sold. I'd complain about how other songs on the same list should have sold better, but really, the rest of the list is even worse. I'll grant that "Price Tag" is better than "Party Rock Anthem", "I Need A Doctor", and "E.T.", but I think that goes to show just how low the bar is more than anything. Keep in mind that the song embedded below is a smash hit. If I hadn't told you that, would you have guessed?
Lil Wayne And T.I. Give Away Turkeys
I would criticize this if it wasn't so damn lovable, but here we are. Last Friday, Lil Wayne and some of his friends/crew handed out turkeys to needy people in New Orleans. Someone commented on the original story that it was generous of Wayne to give out copies of his latest album for free. I would post a rebuttal, but then I remembered that he was referring to Tha Carter IV, so I can't disagree with that statement. Still, it was a nice gesture.
On Tuesday, T.I. handed out 300 turkeys to needy folks. He may have taken a cue from Lil Wayne, but hey, he fed hungry people, and that's what counts. It's also kind of refreshing to report on T.I.'s behavior without talking about why he's going to jail again.
…it works on so many levels!
Jessica Simpson In Talks With Weight Watchers
In case you don't know, Jessica Simpson is pregnant, though her people decided to keep it a secret for quite some time. Before Simpson revealed that she is with child, Weight Watchers started discussing endorsement deals with Simpson. Ouch. It gets worse, though—sources say that after Simpson disclosed her pregnancy, Weight Watchers is now offering her $4 million to lose her pregnancy weight and show off the results in their ads. One wonders if anyone working for Weight Watchers has ever met a pregnant woman.
This deal assumes that Simpson is going to balloon up to some absurd weight. The fact is that it can be very hard to predict just how much a pregnancy will affect a woman's body—some women put on a lot of weight while others barely show at all. To be sure, Simpson has put on quite a bit of weight, but this still strikes me as being somewhat inconsiderate at best and exploitive at worst. "Hey, Jessica, can you agree to lose an indeterminate amount of weight a few months from now? We'll pay you a lot of money!"
Why does my mind go to this scene when thinking of this story?
(Late breaking news: another source is claiming that there is no Weight Watchers deal. Make of that what you will.)
GZA Provides Me With The Easiest Joke Ever
Here's the setup: GZA is scheduled to speak at Harvard next month. He will discuss his career, his lyrics, and his music. He is also scheduled to have similar visits with schools like MIT.
Oh, c'mon, you know exactly where this is going…
Sure, it's the most obvious gag in the world, but sometimes, you just have to go with it.
Deaths In Music This Week
Singer Andrea True passed away on November 7, though news of her death was not made public until this week. Her claim to fame was her 1976 hit "More, More, More", which has been covered and sampled too many times to list. She passed away in a Kingston, NY hospital, but the cause of death has not been released to the public. She was 68.
Songwriter Lee Pockriss passed away on November 14 at his home in Connecticut. His credits include "Catch a Falling Star" and "Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini". He was 87.
On behalf of 411mania, I extend my condolences to the friends and families of the deceased.
And with that, we come to this week's playlist. This week, I figured that I would share Doomtree's self-titled album to give you a point of comparison for their latest album. Enjoy.
If the widget doesn't work, click here. If the widget doesn't show up, then it REALLY didn't work.
Albums To Love
January: Kaputt, Destroyer
February: Higher Learning 2, Fashawn
March: All Eternals Deck, Mountain Goats
April: Return Of 4eva, Big K.R.I.T.
May: Own Your Ghost, 13 & God
June: Blacked Up, Shabazz Palaces
July: Punch Perm, Dream Jefferson
August: Watch The Throne, Jay-Z and Kanye West
September: Father, Son, Holy Ghost, Girls
October: Hurry Up, We're Dreaming, M83
Musicians Set Up Website Supporting Occupy Wall Street
Universal Music Needs More Money
