Monday, July 7, 2014

Less Likes; More "Love"

 Less Likes: More “Love”

I will try to make this brief (a difficult task for a pedantic, long-winded fart like me). Since returning to active music making 4 years ago, I have amassed well-over 100,000 ‘fans’ between my various Cyberspace sites, critical acclaim in many, many reviews, international airplay and countless messages/comments from ‘fans’ telling me how much they enjoy listening to my music or watching my motion pictures. What they fail to mention is “FOR FREE.”
This is the scourge of the Internet. Just as ‘video killed the radio star’ in the 1980’s, Internet—with streaming, illegal downloads, and countless hacks/posers giving away their mindless dribble for free on soundcloud, etc.—has killed the recording artist. I get ‘streamed’ every day (should spell it ‘reamed’). Each time I make $00.00039. Yes, kids. Less than 1/100th of $1.00 (an American dollar). No—it does not ‘add up.’ Not for Indie artists. I am not PSY or lady gugu.
Nutshell: I am $40,000 in debt ONLY from musical endeavors in the last 4 years. I am lucky I have a ‘day job’ (university professor), but I live from ‘paycheck’ to ‘paycheck’ and every extra bit I earn, after paying for rent and food, goes into my musical endeavors. I am not singing the ‘white man’s blues,’ I know I am lucky to have a good job (that and 5 university degrees…so luck and effort go hand-in-hand), I am just pointing out (and here we finally get to the marrow), every time people—you-- listen to my work for free, be it on Youtube, Reverbnation, etc., they/you are ripping me off. No, despite what morons like 'Will I Ain’t' spew, music is not created by artists to sell ‘product’ (as in, for example,  crappy, over-priced headphones, etc.).  That idiot (Will I Isn’t) even said Miles Davis made music to sell trumpets! No shit. He said that, in an interview on the BBC that touted him as a techno-prophet genius (he heartily agreed) (read “profit.” Two words: ‘My Humps.’ Enough said). Easy for him to say—he’s already made millions from his insipid crap.
If each one of my thousands of ‘likes’ and ‘views’ paid for just one download at $.99 apiece—less than one American dollar-- I wouldn’t be in this financial mess and I could make even cooler videos. Not just me, but many other actual ‘artists’ (pardon my pretension/arrogance here)…again, not the plethora of bullshit ‘noise’ ‘ambient’ ‘experimental’ ‘drone’ ‘EDM’ ‘DJ” ‘soundscape’, ‘chip’etc. wankers (99% of the time euphemisms for clueless, delusional saps that know nothing of music, or how to make it), geezers who put together cool sounds readily available in free software, twiddle some knobs and add lots of reverb, effects or loops, and call themselves ‘artists’ and have their sycophantic pals fawn all over them—this even includes many ‘famous’ gits (some wear masks); you figure out who. If the shoe pinches, go barefoot.
"One always has to remember these days where the garbage pail is, because it's so easy to make sounds, and to put sounds together into something that appears to be music, but it's just as hard as it always was to make good music." - Robert Moog
Every day--literally, I am very pleased to get messages from all over the universe, complimenting my audio and video work. I am truly grateful for this, but, pardon my crassness—“money talks.” On youtube alone, in 4 years I have amassed about 65,000 views for my videos (again, I am not PSY, thank Zeus). However, I am $40,000 in debt. Something is wrong here.
Finally: If you ‘like’ my material—any of my ‘songs’ or videos—please download a track, or one of my albums (CDs, either digitally or purchase the physical disc. I spend a lot of time and money making cool CD covers and packages. You are missing out on the ‘album’experience’ …your loss; a cool art form).
As they say in the church, “Show me the Love (equals money).” While I really do appreciate your ‘likes’ and kind words, they do not pay my bills.
Cheers,
LN
These sites await your love offerings:
 
Streaming (Spotify, etc.) is like urine. Better than a catheter, i.e., free downloads, but not by much.
PS- If I’ve alienated anyone with this rant, that’s cool. I’m an alien, too. 

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