CNN Money: Music's lost decade: Sales cut in half

[No_Pressure]

And you have a problem with this? Personally, I don't think musicians should ever be making the kind of money they used to make.

Yes I do have a problem with it. If the market wasn't being manipulated by illegal activity there would be a lot more opportunities for aspiring artists, and people who already made it big would continue to make what the market would naturally dictate that they make. What we have today is an unnatural market that is crippled by the most open and massive amount of theft seen in any industry in America.

Sure you don't give a **** because you see some greedy douchebag who struck it rich by doing something that most of us engage in for fun. Crying about it doesn't help you, looks like if you were good enough to do what they do you should have picked a different career line. Adrian Peterson makes more money in a year than most people will make in their lifetime running around on a field with an oblong piece of leather in his hand, yet you're here on a football message board. Stop worshipping these undeserving sports franchises since you're such an advocate of normal and fair wages.

You say that musician's can't "make it" now. Any musician worth their two cents knows how to use the internet to push their music without the assistance of the conglomerates. And they will still make their money touring. Instead of making 100 times the the national average salary they will make 20 times. Poor musicians.

Not really. It takes a lot to become big through the internet alone, and more often than not bands only make it when they are thrust into the public by a large financial backer like MTV or a videogame as I said. These bands are not always the bands that would be considered great or influential, they are often simply pop bands of today. If this kind of environment existed years ago, bands like metallica, led zeppelin, black sabbath, etc. would have likely never become anything other than a small road band. Maybe you think it's better that way, maybe you're one of those people that think as soon as a band becomes successful they're a bunch of **** suckers. Personally I think that if people had been able to steal Michael Jackson's music in the 80's he would have been popular but would he have been called the king of pop? The greatest selling artist of all time? Perhaps when artists start to make money from their record sales, that enables them to IMPROVE THEIR PRODUCT IN THE STUDIO. With a declining music industry the studio is going bye-bye.

You calling Metallica not greedy reminds me of their stance on Guitar Hero. They wouldn't even okay a cover of a single one of their songs in the game because it was a ****ization of their art. Now that the game is selling, they want a whole game devoted to their music.

A cover would be a ****ization, they were given the amount of money they wanted. I don't see how this is greedy. The other bands that Guitar Hero has featured have settled for less and likely were not offered deals with an entire game devoted to them. Lets not forget that they did authorize their songs for download in Rockband before any guitar hero game was made for them, on top of that why do you act like they have some sort of obligation to give their music to a videogame? If you want to talk about greedy bands there are a lot worse out there than metallica by far. At least I still bought concert tickets on the floor for 90 dollars. Try that with the Rolling stones, it's thousands, try it with a lot of other bands and it's hundreds. They have done a lot of charity and benefit work in the part few years as well but I suppose that isn't as interesting to you as picturing James Hetfield swimming in a vault of money.

People that aren't you find ways to make lots of money because of their talents. Get over it.

This Tailgate is obsessed with Metallica.

I'm going to start a thread on crooners like Sinatra and see how long it takes someone to mention Metallica.

Yes, because a thread dealing with Napster, music piracy, and the decline of the music industry has NOTHING AT ALL to do with metallica. It's just some crazy obsession.

[MassSkinsFan]

I've only read the first and last pages of this thread (limited time).

Hi my name is Darrell and I've been screwed by the music industry [hi Darrell].

I have been in numerous bands which generated a combined nine studio albums on CD, plus countless singles. Record sales were modest at best, but good enough to keep us "viable" for a time. I've toured the US and Europe. I've been on six different small alternative labels with international distribution. I've had the thrill of seeing my CDs in Tower Records, HMV, etc., hearing my music on radio stations while driving through other states and countries, hearing it as bumper music on TV, and the disappointment of reviewing statements from the record company showing that despite decent sales, my band still owes them for a variety of costs. I've lived the musician lifestyle and taken the good with the bad.

I'm here to tell you that the industry is a lamprey to the artists' shark, only in this case the lamprey kills one shark before moving on to the next. Only in a few instances does the shark survive, and even then it only very rarely is able to shed the lamprey.

I have no sympathy for the lamprey as its own stupidity is finally beginning to hurt it. I hope it dies.

Lest ye younger musicians become discouraged by my words, know that life goes on, and you keep playing. I survived the industry but at a cost. I now have a straight job and a life outside music. I'm still in two bands, and we still gig, though on a reduced schedule and only locally. It's still fun and it would kill me to not be able to play. Besides, interwebz-savvy musicians can find ways to go around the industry and market themselves directly to fans or potential fans. It can be done! Keep the faith.

/rant

[AsburySkinsFan]

Its not the cost of the music, its the crap music they are releasing.

[AsburySkinsFan]

I have been in numerous bands which generated a combined nine studio albums on CD, plus countless singles. Record sales were modest at best, but good enough to keep us "viable" for a time. I've toured the US and Europe. I've been on six different small alternative labels with international distribution. I've had the thrill of seeing my CDs in Tower Records, HMV, etc., hearing my music on radio stations while driving through other states and countries, hearing it as bumper music on TV, and the disappointment of reviewing statements from the record company showing that despite decent sales, my band still owes them for a variety of costs. I've lived the musician lifestyle and taken the good with the bad.

Oh come on you can't leave us hanging on this! Tell us! Don't be a tease!

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

Yes, because a thread dealing with Napster, music piracy, and the decline of the music industry has NOTHING AT ALL to do with metallica. It's just some crazy obsession.

Easy, killer. I'm kinda on your side on this one.

The Rock Band/Guitar Hero issue is an interesting one. Did everyone see that No Doubt is suing the makers of Rock Band, because you can have No Doubt sing all the other songs in the game including "Mr. Roboto" and "YMCA?"

There are other ways to distribute your music now - through tv shows (The Fray owe their career to "Gray's Anatomy"), video games, commercials, etc. But you lose an unprecedented amount of control over your music and image this way.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

Its not the cost of the music, its the crap music they are releasing.

Because 1999 was a golden year for music?

For the one millionth time, this has nothing to do with artistry and everything to do with the business model collapsing under two forces: new technology and massive massive massive theft.

I would guess that the amount of music being "exchanged" in 2009 was roughly the same as in 1999. But probably only half of it is being sold in a legal market setting.

If half of all Hondas or Fords in America were stolen and driven by their thieves all over suburbia, the federal government would declare a national emergency. The same thing has happened in the music business.

If Garth Brooks sold about 60,000,000 albums in the 90s depsite the fact that he kind of sucked. Sucking just the same amount today, he would be lucky to sell 4 million copies of "Ropin' the Wind" today instead of the 14 million he sold at the time.

I'm basing the 4 million number on the units that Taylor Swift sold of Fearless. She is arguably as big as Brooks was in 1994 and gets play on pop stations. And she has a huge teenage fan base. And she sold 5 million albums over the last 2.5 years.

[No_Pressure]

Easy' date=' killer. I'm kinda on your side on this one.

The Rock Band/Guitar Hero issue is an interesting one. Did everyone see that No Doubt is suing the makers of Rock Band, because you can have No Doubt sing all the other songs in the game including "Mr. Roboto" and "YMCA?"

There are other ways to distribute your music now - through tv shows (The Fray owe their career to "Gray's Anatomy"), video games, commercials, etc. But you lose an unprecedented amount of control over your music and image this way.[/quote']

I want my forum name changed to Killer. Now.

And yes, thats what I'm saying, in the 60's 70's and 80's you play small venues and make jack **** for a while and if you're good you build a following. When a small label or perhaps even a big one notices that you have a good fan base and a decent level of popularity, they approach you with a record deal. This investment is low risk, medium yield for them. They basically pay you jack ****, you get jack ****, and if the record flops, they don't lose much. If the record is a success you still get jack **** but the record company gets a decent profit. This tells them that you are a product worth investing in even more. Sometimes this is done by a small label and then for your next album you are passed off to a big label.

The album is promoted by your band at shows basically and fans buy it because they want your music for themselves to listen to when they aren't at your concert for various reasons.

After your popularity touring goes up the record company spends more on your next release. You may get a higher quality studio, you may get some advertisements, you may have an increased number of records produced. Whatever the deal is you finally make enough money to live off of, and if you are successful the record company makes a lot of money.

If you are at this stage you are ready to strike it big and we can all imagine what happens there.

In today's industry here is what happens:

A. Your band starts out with nothing playing shows for zero money. You become popular amongst fans and your small venues sell out. Small labels are dead and you aren't big enough to warrant a big label. You record your songs yourself or at a local pay to record studio. The songs are low recording quality and you have no professional means to distribute them. You put your songs on myspace or burn CD's to sell after your show. Your few fans buy the CD's copy them, and hand them out to their friends that like your band. You make half the sales you would have otherwise, but this thing happened with cassette tapes too so oh well.

You never get the money to play any larger venues because you literally have pretty much nothing. No small label is around to pick you up and you perpetually stay as a house band somewhere or decide to get a real job to pay the bills.

B. Your band is lucky enough to make the money for a larger venue or lucky enough to somehow be noticed by one of the sick and dying large labels. This label does a low risk investment in your band. You make nothing, but since the music released is pirated by your fans once again the studio makes half of the already modest sum they expected to make, and your band does not warrant a larger contract so you never make it big.

C. In spite of low sales you are that 1/5,000,000 bands that someone at Guitar Hero or Madden feels is an interesting "underground" band, so you get a deal to put your music in a videogame where people hear it, and sometimes buy it. Half of the time they still pirate it so you are effectively making half or less than half of the money you would have otherwise.

Hooray.

I don't see how people can say screw the musicians they were overpaid. Yes. They were overpaid for sure, just like a lot of Americans. If you can't get past your jealousy that someone you consider undeserving made lots of money you are a fairly petty person. How would you feel if you owned a bakery and made the greatest cake in town- I mean you were raking in the cash from people. One day a customer comes in with a replicator machine like they had in Star Trek, buys a slice of your cake, and proceeds to stand outside your bakery replicating the cake for anyone who walked by and felt like having a piece. Sure some loyal customers might come in and ask what the heck is going on and buy a slice of cake from you, but for every 1 of them theres 20 of the other kind who will take it for free because they can.

Is everybody going to stand around saying "**** that baker, he was making more money than me anyway"? Perhaps they will but that doesn't change the fact that it is wrong. People have intellectual property. They create things and don't intend to give them away for free, and they are robbed blind anyway. That isn't a good thing in spite of what we may think of the person.

Rant over.

[MassSkinsFan]

Oh come on you can't leave us hanging on this! Tell us! Don't be a tease!

Member of Maelstrom (Taang!), Allstonians (Moon Records/Fork in Hand), Steady Earnest (BiB Records/DVS Media/Beatville/Dojo), The Hammond Group (Stip Records) and lots of other bands you don't know.

Sub on tours or guest on recordings with Bim Skala Bim, Lord Tanamo, Laurel Aitken, Derrick Morgan, Tjovi Ginen, and other various bands.

It's kind of disappointing when your music career can be summed up so quickly.

[AsburySkinsFan]

Because 1999 was a golden year for music?

No that was 1989!!

:wavetowel:jump::peaceout:

relax it was a joke.

I agree with you, the industry has killed itself and is now turning on itself to feed, just like the performance tax on radio stations that being pushed by the industry.

[AsburySkinsFan]

Member of Maelstrom (Taang!), Allstonians (Moon Records/Fork in Hand), Steady Earnest (BiB Records/DVS Media/Beatville/Dojo), The Hammond Group (Stip Records) and lots of other bands you don't know.

Sub on tours or guest on recordings with Bim Skala Bim, Lord Tanamo, Laurel Aitken, Derrick Morgan, Tjovi Ginen, and other various bands.

It's kind of disappointing when your music career can be summed up so quickly.

I'll be checking on Amazon.com for any of these, maybe you can get a couple pennies in royalties.

[MassSkinsFan]

I'll be checking on Amazon.com for any of these, maybe you can get a couple pennies in royalties.

Thanks!!! I'm rich though - still getting my $43.26 quarterly royalty check from BMI! :laugh:

Luckily, I'm no dummy so my regular job is good and I'm financially stable after wasting my youth as a down-and-out no-count bum (who had tons of fun).

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

I want my forum name changed to Killer. Now.

And yes, thats what I'm saying, in the 60's 70's and 80's you play small venues and make jack **** for a while and if you're good you build a following. When a small label or perhaps even a big one notices that you have a good fan base and a decent level of popularity, they approach you with a record deal. This investment is low risk, medium yield for them. They basically pay you jack ****, you get jack ****, and if the record flops, they don't lose much. If the record is a success you still get jack **** but the record company gets a decent profit. This tells them that you are a product worth investing in even more. Sometimes this is done by a small label and then for your next album you are passed off to a big label.

I would say that there is an opportunity to make quite a bit of money at this stage in your career in the past. The record company usually "loans" you a sizable sum of money to record this initial album. This also pays for incidentals - like food, housing, and touring. If you are smart with this initial sum of cash (i.e. not blowing it on hookers and blow) AND you tour your ass off. You can pay back the record company and keep a tidy little profit.

The problems that a lot of bands ran into is that they thought that initial contract was their money. And that's how you end up being someone like TLC where you sell 20 millon albums and owe your label millions of dollars. Record companies knew that most of the artists they signed were 19 year old high school drop outs so they basically turned them into indentured servants for the first five years of their career. The Rolling Stones had $0 to their names when they recorded "Exile on Main Street." And Mick is freaking economist.

[Smoot4Prez]

Yes I do have a problem with it. If the market wasn't being manipulated by illegal activity there would be a lot more opportunities for aspiring artists, and people who already made it big would continue to make what the market would naturally dictate that they make. What we have today is an unnatural market that is crippled by the most open and massive amount of theft seen in any industry in America.

Sure you don't give a **** because you see some greedy douchebag who struck it rich by doing something that most of us engage in for fun. Crying about it doesn't help you, looks like if you were good enough to do what they do you should have picked a different career line. Adrian Peterson makes more money in a year than most people will make in their lifetime running around on a field with an oblong piece of leather in his hand, yet you're here on a football message board. Stop worshipping these undeserving sports franchises since you're such an advocate of normal and fair wages.

I'm crying about it? I don't care that they made that much money in the old music industry. I'm just perfectly okay with them making less money. If the sports industry was somehow altered so that players made 1/10 of what they make I would be fine with that too.

Not really. It takes a lot to become big through the internet alone, and more often than not bands only make it when they are thrust into the public by a large financial backer like MTV or a videogame as I said. These bands are not always the bands that would be considered great or influential, they are often simply pop bands of today. If this kind of environment existed years ago, bands like metallica, led zeppelin, black sabbath, etc. would have likely never become anything other than a small road band. Maybe you think it's better that way, maybe you're one of those people that think as soon as a band becomes successful they're a bunch of **** suckers. Personally I think that if people had been able to steal Michael Jackson's music in the 80's he would have been popular but would he have been called the king of pop? The greatest selling artist of all time? Perhaps when artists start to make money from their record sales, that enables them to IMPROVE THEIR PRODUCT IN THE STUDIO. With a declining music industry the studio is going bye-bye.

O NO! We wouldn't have someone called the King of Pop or the best selling musical artist of all time?! Nevermind. I change my mind. I couldn't live without knowing that Michael Jackson is called the King of Pop. (Who cares) His music still would have circulated, still would be great, and he still would be able to make a living off of it. A damn good one.

Music studios do not disappear with the death of the cd and record. Music still has to be recorded to be put on digital media. There are music studios all over the place that only handle amateur musicians. With the way technology is advancing you can even put together descent tracks in your own home with a little investment.

A cover would be a ****ization, they were given the amount of money they wanted. I don't see how this is greedy. The other bands that Guitar Hero has featured have settled for less and likely were not offered deals with an entire game devoted to them. Lets not forget that they did authorize their songs for download in Rockband before any guitar hero game was made for them, on top of that why do you act like they have some sort of obligation to give their music to a videogame? If you want to talk about greedy bands there are a lot worse out there than metallica by far. At least I still bought concert tickets on the floor for 90 dollars. Try that with the Rolling stones, it's thousands, try it with a lot of other bands and it's hundreds. They have done a lot of charity and benefit work in the part few years as well but I suppose that isn't as interesting to you as picturing James Hetfield swimming in a vault of money.

You misunderstand. When Guitar Hero 1 came out they wouldn't let the game use any of their songs. They wouldn't even let the game cover a song. This is before the genre was as popular as it is today. They didn't want their music ****ized in some gimmicky game. This is fine. They have no obligation to have their music in a game.

Fast forward three years. The genre is booming and making money. Now Metallica all of the sudden cares much less for the integrity of their art. Yeah, they authorized their songs to be downloaded, after the genre proved it could make them money.

Are they the greediest band? No, I never said that. They are just an easy example.

Which is it, you don't want your art in a game, or you don't care as long as it's making you bank?

People that aren't you find ways to make lots of money because of their talents. Get over it.

oooooo burn! No need to get vindictive, we're having a discussion on a discussion board. :pfft:

The advent of mass media production/storage allowed record companies to exists and make large profits. Before mass media, artists who loved music, made music, toured, and made a living. Now the mass media format is changing, and their ability to make fortunes from it is dwindling and they are upset. I'm sorry if I just don't feel bad for them. Don't make it sound like I hate rich people and want everyone to make the same amount of money because that's not what I am implying at all.

[matty dread]

Where does one find a CD for $20?

The only CD's I know that are that much are either deluxe editions (sometimes), new releases directly from the distributer and FYE stores.

As far as suing goes...I am pretty sure the people that were sued were not customers, they were people who infringed on copyright laws.

I meant back in the day right before Napster broke in the late 90's, CDs that were $12 a few years earlier were suddenly $17 - $20.

You don't think those people that were stealing music were at one time a customer? They were stealing as part of the backlash against the industry, CD prices were out of control, all of a sudden music was available for "free" and people took advantage of it.

[matty dread]

Here is me putting on my old fogey hat for a minute.

I used to like buying an album or a CD (or even a cassette) and then taking it home and playing it from end to end while carefully studying the album art and then reading all the liner notes.

The acknowledgements in any Public Enemy CD were like a syllabus for a Black History course.

Does anyone besides me remember holding up the cover of License to Ill" in a mirror to read what the plane numbers said?

I hear you but ultimately the convenience of being able to download an album in a few seconds in the comfort of your own home is what trumps having the physical product.

[MassSkinsFan]

I hear you but ultimately the convenience of being able to download an album in a few seconds in the comfort of your own home is what trumps having the physical product.

Part of the fun as an artist was the cover art and CD packaging. I was involved in that for at least 3 of the CDs my bands did, and really led the effort on one. We did all sorts of interesting things that were like Easter eggs in video games. No one really noticed, at least that I ever heard.

I know that some bands still make that stuff available with their downloads, but it's just not the same. Ah, the good old days.

[RammsteinSkins]

I hate downloading music, I love having a CD collection and extending it. I just bought the new Rob Zombie CD today :evilg:

[Ghost of]

Because 1999 was a golden year for music?

For the one millionth time' date=' this has nothing to do with artistry and everything to do with the business model collapsing under two forces: new technology and massive massive massive theft.

[/quote']

I'm going to mostly agree with LBK here. I do think there were significant changes within market base for given genres but I think that just involved shifts between genres, so hip hop going from Ice Cube's Predator to Soulja Boy may be emblematic of a larger deterioration of quality in radio/commercial hip hop but that music as a whole can still be good and be popular and that tastes change.

Hell, I love 80s music but do you really want someone to come out and sound just like Culture Club or even Prince? Probably not. Michael Jackson couldn't even sound like MJ anymore, if he wanted to. I don't think anyone that's out is on the level of Peter Gabriel on his So album or Prince on Purple Rain but most of the music at any given time had good, ephemeral stuff, classics and a large, large component of junk. Some of that junk is actually fun to listen to at times but it comes and goes.

I also concur with Corcaigh---I don't know if music is quite the thing in the lives of younger people these days as it used to be. He describes the record store experience and I recall this fondly, as well. There was also a sense of being informed about the culture at large through certain forms of music (particularly rap,) and cable/satellite TV had not yet become ubiquitous (let alone things like hulu and other services.)

There are so many outlets, and I see young kids on Youtube talking about artists from the 90s (arguably RnB has disappeared from commercial radio, there are no Boys II Mens or Tevin Campbells anymore really, so there HAS been a devolution) and I still find myself surprised at how many "classics" young people actually know and listen to. That would also seem to cut into the markets. Most of us are not (and rarely did) going to hunt down little known bands and rappers in the attempt to find some gem in the rough. So if what's in the mainstream or on the radio isn't working for us, we're more likely to fall back on cherished favorites.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

I'm going to mostly agree with LBK here. I do think there were significant changes within market base for given genres but I think that just involved shifts between genres, so hip hop going from Ice Cube's Predator to Soulja Boy may be emblematic of a larger deterioration of quality in radio/commercial hip hop but that music as a whole can still be good and be popular and that tastes change.

I was around for Ice Cube. There were a whole lot of rap purists who thought that he was a nightmare. "Kurtis Blow had a message too, but it was POSITIVE."

No matter the time period, people think everything was better at an earlier time.

There are so many outlets, and I see young kids on Youtube talking about artists from the 90s (arguably RnB has disappeared from commercial radio, there are no Boys II Mens or Tevin Campbells anymore really, so there HAS been a devolution) and I still find myself surprised at how many "classics" young people actually know and listen to. That would also seem to cut into the markets. Most of us are not (and rarely did) going to hunt down little known bands and rappers in the attempt to find some gem in the rough. So if what's in the mainstream or on the radio isn't working for us, we're more likely to fall back on cherished favorites

At the same time, you don't what always got people going crazy at my high school dances in 90 and 91? "That's What I Like About You." I don't know how or why that song became a staple for us but it did.

And I think Tevin Campbell sucked. Sucked hard. I pretty much hated anything that sounded like whatever New Jack Swing was supposed to be.

Really, I can't tell you how much I hated nearly every R&B singer in the early 90s.

And, yes, Ice Cube was huge, but who had the biggest radio hits? Heavy D and Sir-Mix-A-Lot.

And what the two most ubiquitous songs during my senior year of high school?

"Achy Breaky Heart" and "I'm Too Sexy."

Everybody likes to pretend that they were rocking out to the Pixies when they were 16. But most people are liars.

[Ghost of]

I was around for Ice Cube. There were a whole lot of rap purists who thought that he was a nightmare.

And I think Tevin Campbell sucked. Sucked hard. I pretty much hated anything that sounded like whatever New Jack Swing was supposed to be.

And' date=' yes, Ice Cube was huge, but who had the biggest radio hits? Heavy D and Sir-Mix-A-Lot.

[/quote']

Your hate for the early 90s RnB scene is, I'd say, something a touch more specific to you. In fairness, a lot of Tevin's music was not New Jack at all (though one of his biggest hits from Boyz In the Hood, "Just Ask Me To" was definitely NEw Jack---that was a great song, don't know what is wrong with you lol.) Other than some songs, I don't think you can argue that a lot of the RnB in the 90s was actually RnB. Who even makes that anymore? It's all RnHop. Or PopnB.

As for Ice Cube, he may have been a nightmare but I always thought it was because of his content, not the actual music. I mean, I was just listening to Yo Yo, of all things and I was taken aback at the richness of the production on that song. (needed new headphones to really hear it.) There's a difference between offense taken at content (and hey, Ice Cube had lots of racist music, let's not pretend otherwise) and the overall quality of the music.

I think you're making some unfounded assertions or overly broad generalizations. because some of the biggest hits were by Heavy D doesn't negate the fact that when I watched Rap City, I saw other stuff or talked even to white people at my high school, that we talked about music other than Heavy D.

[Captain Wiggles]

Hey no need to dis Right Said Fred.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

I think you're making some unfounded assertions or overly broad generalizations. because some of the biggest hits were by Heavy D doesn't negate the fact that when I watched Rap City, I saw other stuff or talked even to white people at my high school, that we talked about music other than Heavy D.

Ice Cube has huge in my high school; though - for reasons unclear to anyone - I think everyone I knew owned Eazy-E's first album. For a while, it really seemed to me like Eazy was going to be the guy from NWA with staying power. Who knew?

And - for me - rap production will never top Public Enemy's first four albums. Those still sound like the end of the world to me.

I'm not that connected to the current hip-hop scene, but I assume that there is someone out there making truly great rap music now. It can't ALL be Lil' Wayne, can it?

I just hate the argument of "Everything was better when I was 18, and it all sucks now." It makes you sound like a WWII vet watching The Beatles on Ed Sullivan. (Not you, the person saying it).

These are the facts. thousands of albums and songs are released every year. Of those, five or six are classics the minute you hear them (I knew the first minute I heard "Crazy in Love" that I would be listening to it when I was in my 70s), four or five grow into classics (did anyone really see Jeff Buckley's cover of "Hallelujah" becoming the modern version of "Imagine?"), 90 percent of the rest is mediocre, and the remaining 9 percent truly sucks.

[No_Pressure]

I'm crying about it? I don't care that they made that much money in the old music industry. I'm just perfectly okay with them making less money. If the sports industry was somehow altered so that players made 1/10 of what they make I would be fine with that too.

Its not just "altered" they are being robbed blind by blatant criminal activity. Piracy and theft are PIRACY AND THEFT. They are ILLEGAL. Why do you have a hard time understanding that? It isn't like the market for their music just happened to change naturally they're being robbed.

Music studios do not disappear with the death of the cd and record. Music still has to be recorded to be put on digital media. There are music studios all over the place that only handle amateur musicians. With the way technology is advancing you can even put together descent tracks in your own home with a little investment.

You're confusing music studios with record labels. A label provides a studio but they also provide a lot more than that. They provide vital advertisement and exposure to the public which costs them lots of money and allows access to or knowledge of a new band far outside of the venues they may currently play. They also have greater means of production than anyone in a small time band could ever afford, and they have a far greater ability to distribute that music to various stores. Sure there are studios around that you can go to, pay a fee to use the equipment, and lay down some tracks. Then you can take your CD and peddle it on the streets after your show. It isn't the same as having your CD in record stores across America.

You misunderstand. When Guitar Hero 1 came out they wouldn't let the game use any of their songs. They wouldn't even let the game cover a song. This is before the genre was as popular as it is today. They didn't want their music ****ized in some gimmicky game. This is fine. They have no obligation to have their music in a game.

Fast forward three years. The genre is booming and making money. Now Metallica all of the sudden cares much less for the integrity of their art. Yeah, they authorized their songs to be downloaded, after the genre proved it could make them money.

Their guitar hero game doesn't include covers does it? It's their original material which would mean it isn't a ****ization unless you consider that entire franchise to be a ****ization.

The advent of mass media production/storage allowed record companies to exists and make large profits. Before mass media, artists who loved music, made music, toured, and made a living. Now the mass media format is changing, and their ability to make fortunes from it is dwindling and they are upset. I'm sorry if I just don't feel bad for them. Don't make it sound like I hate rich people and want everyone to make the same amount of money because that's not what I am implying at all.

It isn't a format change. Again, there are legal ways to download music such as iTunes. Artists still make money off of this, it is legal, legit, and fair as long as the artist agrees to do it. The format change isn't whats killing the music industry, the fact that this format can be stolen more easily than anything out there is. There wouldn't be any problem if people weren't stealing something that they are supposed to pay for but they are, and therein lies the problem.

[DeaconBlue]

BS, the record labels are the real villians in all of this. They rape their clients of most of the profits and stifle any other music that they arent pushing. I was there in the hey day of Napster. That fact that people could suddenly freely thumb through and listen to music that they never would have paid the exhorbitent prices to buy at a record store (if you could find alot of it at all). Band with really good music got exposure that they never got before. For a few glorious moments in time you werent confined to the same crappy 11 songs in rotation on you local radio station. You weren't subject to having the backstreet boys or the spice girls shoved down your throat. Anywayz that all over now. Im never giving a record label another red dent of my money EVER. As far as Im concerned they cut their own throats and the "bands" they represent.