Did you hear?? Vinyl is making a spectacular comeback that will save the music industry!!!

Puh-lease… or as Sergeant D would say, lettuce be cereal. While the projected numbers for 2011 in the above graphic look nice, vinyls still only account for 1.6% of all music sales. Sure, they’re pretty-looking, they sound good, and it’s great that they’re experiencing a growth in sales, but they still basically amount to souvenirs for most people, artifacts that lay mostly untouched on the shelf while the digital versions (pirated or not) get way more use. CDs are quickly inching towards the same fate.

Let’s just bring it to the cloud already and be done with this. Get your heads out your asses, labels!

-VN

MS contributor Corey Mitchell, ever the deal-hunter, emailed me yesterday about this free sampler that Metal Blade posted on Amazon featuring new music by great bands such as Between the Buried and Me, Primordial, In Solitude, Hate Eternal and more. I went through the whole process of downloading a new Amazon app (despite already having it), installing it, going back to the download page… only to be told the sampler wasn’t available in my territory. Zuh?

Then I realized I was on Amazon.co.uk, so I signed on to regular Amazon.com, searched for and successfully downloaded the sampler. It’s right here for those Americans who want it. But all Brits have to click the other link, above; Japanese folk can probably find it here, French people can presumably click here, Germans can download it here, and Chinese people… fucked if I know. Never mind if you’re Japanese, French, German or any other nationality but you speak English; no, no, no, Amazon will not allow you to download from the U.S. site! Never! Heresy! If you’re Metal Blade, this is a real concern since readers of MetalSucks come from all over the world.

And therein lies the problem; I bring this issue up not to pick on Metal Blade, of course (the same could be said of any release on any label), but to underscore the completely backwards state of our current digital distribution system.

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Black Market Activities, the label helmed by The Red Chord frontman Guy Kozowyk, has announced a new distribution and artist development deal with Good Fight Entertainment, bringing to an end their long-standing distribution arrangement with Metal Blade. With that announcement also comes an exciting calendar of new releases set to roll out this summer via BMA:

June 7 – Engineer – Crooked Voices
June 7 – Khann – Erode
June 21 – Fit For An Autopsy – The Process Of Human Extermination
June 21 – Ed Gein - Bad Luck
tba – Today Is The Day – Pain Is A Warning

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If you live in L.A. and you’re looking to break into the metal industry — or just have a passing interest in the business side of the metal/music world — you’re definitely not going to want to miss the Metal Meet-Up happening next Wednesday, May 11th. The event is taking place at the annual NARM convention and will be a great learning experience for anyone who attends. This year’s Metal Meet-Up panel will serve as a state of the address of the current state of  metal from a retail standpoint and will also focus on figuring out the best way to break a band. The panel includes this all-star cast of characters:

Moderator: Brian Slagel, President Metal Blade Records

Panelists:
Mike Gitter, A&R, Century Media Records
Jackie Kajzer, developer and host, Full Metal Jackie
Wayne Pighini, head of marketing, Vagrant Records
Bram Teitelman, editor, Metal Insider
Pat Egan, retail, Relapse Records

Visit Metal Insider for more details.

-VN

Nevermind stopping the rampant torrenting of music and movies, visiting .rar blogs or uploading copyrighted content to YouTube… guitar tabs are obviously a scourge on the world and need to be eliminated immediately! So sayeth the Music Publishers Association who have now made it impossible for those based outside the U.S. to shred along with their favorite song on a number of sites.

Yeah, this makes sense. Let’s stop kids from learning to play guitar and let’s actively discourage them from becoming active music consumers. Brilliant idea, guys. Typical of the short-sighted approach the industry is taking these days… never mind the future, let’s just worry about making money RIGHT NOW!

Admittedly, I know very little about the publishing industry and how it works. Why would an Internet user’s location matter for viewing a guitar tab online; do the artists get paid a small royalty when a U.S. citizen views their tab but not when a person based somewhere else does? Perhaps a savvy MS commenter can fill us all in.

-VN

Thanks: Patton

If Ash Avildsen is looking for some muscle in his corner for his ongoing anti-piracy battle, he should look no further than Dillinger Escape Plan frontman Greg Puciato, an artistic heavyweight with plenty of literal brawn to back it up. I can just see it… Avildsen and Puciato tag-teaming against a duo of bespectacled, basement-dwelling computer nerds… a fight for the ages! Dynamite moves! Steel chairs!

Tag-team member Puciato wrote a long blog entry on his own website over the weekend tackling the topic of music piracy, and his viewpoint, though nuanced and well-thought out, isn’t what you might expect from the ordinarily very liberal frontman. He makes a lot of really good points, and a few arguments that have glaring holes in them, but the entire blog entry is worth a read. Here’s the opening snippet:

I don’t see file sharing as an evil…it’s silly to say that it has any intrinsic properties of good and evil at all anyway. It’s just a new form of technology that evolved outside of what the record industry and intellectual property law structure was prepared for at the time. That having been said…I think it’s necessary to swim with the tide and not against it. I think it’s time to accept and acknowledge that the CD is a dead format. Maybe not dead in the way of the 8 track but dead in the way vinyl is. A CD now, should be thought of as a collector’s item, or a preferred way of listening if that is the individual’s preference, in which case he is already in the minority as most music is listened to via the MP3 format. A CD certainly sounds better than an MP3, just as a vinyl does, but it just lacks the infinitely superior convenience of the digital format.

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In a press release, The Recording Academy — a.k.a. “The Dicks Behind the Grammy Awards” — announced that they are streamlining their meaningless awards, reducing the number of categories in 2012 from 109 to 78. One of the casualties of this change is the Best Metal Performance Grammy, which will now be folded into the Best Hard Rock Performance category, which will heretofore be known as — you guessed it — the Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance.

This doesn’t really mean jack shit in the larger scheme of things, but it is just one more way in which The Recording Academy has disrespected metal. It also means it will now be even harder for the oh-so-few metal bands who did get recognized by the Academy to do so; said Academy is run by old white dudes who don’t know Metallica from Jethro Tull, and they consequently tend to gravitate towards higher-selling “name” acts. So if you think that, say, Lamb of God or Machine Head have any chance of competing with Alice in Chains and Them Crooked Vultures, well, you’re in for a sad surprise.

But, like I said, the good news is that these awards are about as relevant as Pretty Boy Floyd’s music, so this is not really that big a deal. Still, feel free to vent in our comments section.

-AR

Thanks: Matt Mommaerts

While both The Deciblog’s Shawn Macomber and myself both think that Chinese Democracy is pretty great, two music critics does not a hit album make. The record shit the bed when it came out in 2008, and Best Buy, who paid untold millions of dollars for the exclusive rights to sell physical copies of the album in the United States, were left holding the bag — I can’t find the exact figure right now, but I know they had to buy X million copies outright, and I know they weren’t allowed to return/sell back any copies they failed to get off their shelves. In other words, Axl Rose and Geffen Records ended up making out like bandits despite the album’s colossal commercial failure — they ended up not losing any money on the record’s fifteen year creation process, and they even got to claim that the album went platinum, because it did, technically, ship a million units. (For the record, as of this writing, it’s sold roughly 600,000 copies.) Meanwhile, if you’ve checked the shelves at your local Best Buy recently — and I have, for shits n’ giggles — there will literally be dozens and dozens of untouched Chinese Democracy CDs.

So what the crap is Best Buy gonna do with all those unsold units? Sell ‘em for $1.99, that’s what.

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Agalloch are currently criss-crossing the country, playing some cities for the first time ever (like New York, where we saw them slay on Tuesday night… more on that at a later date). They’re selling a tour-only 2xLP called whitedivisiongrey — a combo of 2008′s The White EP and 2004′s The Grey EP — for $30, limited to just 500 copies. Agalloch followers are completely fanatical about their merch, especially vinyl, so I’m quite honestly shocked that there are even any left at this stage of the tour. As usual, they’re already going on eBay for absolutely insane prices:

I mean… WOW, right?

Here’s the thing: tour-only vinyls by some metal band aren’t exactly Hannah Montana tickets. In other words, you’ve got to be a fan to even know they exist, and you’ve got to pay for a ticket to the show and attend that show to even have access. Street scalpers ain’t exactly in on this scheme. Which means the people selling these items online (not just this tour vinyl… this happens EVERY TIME Agalloch release ANYTHING) are big fans of the band who are looking to make a buck (or $150, as it were) on the backs of their heroes. What do we think of this??

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Sumerian Records co-founder Ash Avildsen published a ballsy video yesterday in which he presents some facts and his own opinions on the issue of music piracy. Since Ash instructs listeners at the very beginning to “take 3 minutes of your day to listen to this message with an open mind, and then decide for yourself how you feel about the subject at hand,” I figured I’d do just that.

So… first, watch the above video.

OK, ready? Now let’s dive in.

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Live on I-5, the new Soundgarden release of old live recordings, and My Life My Way, the new Agnostic Front album, are now both streaming on Facebook. I haven’t had a chance to listen to either one yet, although I’m sure they both provide their own unique pleasures.

Of course, you have to hit the “like” button and tell all your friends that the band is you-approved in order to hear the music. And I find this trend very interesting. I’m thrilled that bands are finally ditching MySpace, but I am curious if the “like” button really helps music to spread virally, or if it discourages casual fans or maybe even potential fans — a.k.a. “the most important market, since they’re not guaranteed to get the album/go to the concerts/buy the merch/etc. anyway” — from checking out the music.

I know there’s something wholly illogical about the concept of people not wanting to click the “like” button. It’s not like it takes a whole bunch of effort, or subscribes you to countless spam e-mails, or anything like that. But I do think it’s possible that there are people whose neuroses are such that they just don’t want that thing on their page that says “Johnny likes Lake Bukkake” or whatever, for any one of the following reasons:

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Dear record labels,

Please read this. All of it. Then kindly quit complaining about sagging revenues and scapegoating music piracy. You’re leaving money on the table.

Love,
Vince Neilstein

From AVC via The Guardian, written by Fred Wilson, a venture capitalist who spends upwards of $60 per month – and by his estimate around $2,000 annually – on music and music subscriptions:

I like to buy music. I buy it from emusic (where I pay $23/month for use it or lose it credits for music downloads), Amazon, and when in a pinch, iTunes. I also have two Rhapsody music subscriptions that cost an additional $20/month. My kids also regularly spend money on iTunes for music (often for tracks we already own somewhere else in the house). I suspect between all of this, our family spends well over $1000/year on mp3s, probably closer to $2000/year.

And yet, today I find myself pirating an album on the Internet. I thought I’d outline how this happened to showcase what a fucked up system we have for content sales on the web.

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If I were in a metal band on EMI or any of their affiliated labels I’d be running for the hills. Metal Insider is reporting that the label group — one of the remaining “Big Four” major labels — has been purchased by Citibank. Yes, a label has been purchased by a bank. Too fitting in the dire record industry times and dire financial times of 2011.

On the surface this transaction doesn’t seem like it would have much impact on metal, but any major move involving one of the biggest label groups in the world, regardless of genre, is going to have a “trickle-down effect” on all segments of the industry, to borrow a term from my good friend Ronald Reagan. Many metal labels we know and love are distributed by EMI — Century, Season of Mist, Earache, and Willowtip among them — although I don’t expect this deal to really have much impact on those businesses; if shit hits the fan with EMI, I’m sure those labels can find other distributors for as long as distributors remain necessary (which isn’t very long). Moreso I’d worry that the absence of a major source of investment in music on the whole would just result in… less music.

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In a lot of ways, Francis Ford Coppola is to cinema as Metallica are to metal. He directed four incredible movies (the first two Godfather films, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now), all of which still hold up as examples of the craft at its finest, and then he devolved into self-parody. (The Godfather: Part III is pretty much his version of “The Unforgiven IV,” and if you don’t remember Jack, consider yourself lucky.) He basically sired one of Hollywood’s royal families (His children, Sofia and Roman, are also film directors, and his nephew is Nicolas Cage, who changed his last name in an effort to achieve success based on his own merits), and these days, Coppola makes his money via his winery (I’ve had some of his wines, they’re actually quite good!), and then self-funds small, personal art films, like 2007′s Youth Without Youth and 2009′s Tetro. These movies generally open to middling reviews and are seen by an audience of about ten people, but it doesn’t really matter, because Coppola is doing what he wants and he seems happy.

Why am I rambling on about this dude? Because he recently gave an interview to The 99 Percent in which he basically advocates illegal downloading, and the concept of the artist as an unpaid worker:

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Spotify, the “in the cloud” all-you-can-eat streaming music service that’s wildly popular in Europe, has once again been thwarted in its attempt to break into the U.S. market. The issue, once again, is an inability to get the stubborn “Big Four” record label groups (other than Sony) to get their heads out of their collective asses and realize the power and reach of these services.

But with all the coverage Spotify continues to get in the mainstream media, how come no one is talking about MOG?? MOG’s service is competitive with Spotify’s. It offers unlimited streaming of an insanely wide variety of music (yes, plenty of metal, even the obscure stuff). No ownership of files on your hard drive is required; everything is streaming, and yes, the sound quality is good. The service also works on many mobile phone platforms and allows for a certain number of temporary downloads to those devices so you can listen even if you don’t have an Internet connection. MOG even one-ups Spotify by offering a variety of other features such as a recommendation engine similar to Pandora’s that allows users to create custom “radio stations” based on artists. Better yet, MOG is still offering a free 15-day trial of their service so you’ve got nothing to lose by trying it out. You’ll be happy you did — trust me, it’s that good. And get used to this, because it WILL be the way we all consume music in the not-too-distant future.

-VN

Full disclosure: MOG’s advertising arm sometimes purchases ads on MetalSucks. The ads are in no way related to this article.

Not that this should be surprising, but the numbers are in for the calendar year 2010 and album sales are still continuing their woeful decline.

Album sales peaked in the year 2000 when 942.5 million CDs flew off the shelves in a pre-digital marketplace. According to Metal Insider [via Billboard], album sales in 2010 — including all physical and digital formats — dropped to 326.2 million, a 12.8% drop from 2009 and a 65% drop from 2000. Sales of the CD format of albums fell by nearly 20% for the fourth year in a row. Wow!

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Earache Records continues to bewilder. While becoming a pioneering and leading label in the digital space over the past year+, the 25+ year-old label’s band roster continues to be firmly rooted in the past.

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From Classic Rock:

“Metallica still have the biggest selling album of the Soundscan era in America.

“Since 1991, when the Soundscan system was introduced to provide more accurate information on record sales, The Black Album has sold 15,620,000 copies.”

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Pizza pizza.

The best description of Domino’s pizza I’ve ever heard came from our friend Jason, who said, “It doesn’t taste like pizza, it tastes like an English muffin with tomato sauce.” And I’ve only eaten at a Little Caesar’s once that I can recall, but my impression of it was more or less the same as my impression of Domino’s (or Pizza Hut, for that matter). Maybe I’m spoiled because we have a lot of good pizza here in New York, but I’ve never been able to understand why anyone would prefer to have McPizza over any number of other Italian dining options.

But I gather (he said with his nose held high in the air) that these places are very popular within the white trash populace — a.k.a., Kid Rock’s bread n’ butter. So when I read the following on MediaPost.com (by way of Metal Insider), I thought, “Gee, that is a brilliant fucking idea.”

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Since the day we started this site I’ve been arguing that the sale and ownership of recorded music is on its way out and that all-encompassing streaming services “in the cloud” for a low monthly fee are the future of music listening. While the CD hasn’t become extinct as quickly as I’d thought it would, and though ownership of digital files is definitely here to stay for the time being, the real future is already here in the form of a few such streaming services that are available right now. The most talked about is Spotify, whose iTunes-like interface and vast catalogue has made it a huge hit in Europe, the only place it’s currently available. But there’s another service called MOG that’s available right now here in the U.S. that offers pretty much everything you’d want in a streaming service: a vast catalogue and a great interface for desktop and mobile listening, available for less than $10/month. And you can sign up for a free 15-day trial right now.

Most importantly, MOG’s got an incredible selection of metal; I just performed searches for a handful of metal bands on a variety of record labels (Century, Relapse, Earache, Willowtip, Prosthetic, Metal Blade) and found them all. You can either listen to single songs, full albums, or an artist-based “radio stations” that functions like Pandora by using sonic metrics and user analysis to suggests similar artists you may like. You can even adjust a slider between “Artist Only” on one end and “Similar Artists” on the other to vary how much new stuff you’d like to hear. You can also create custom playlists for yourself and others to enjoy.

The best part: this only costs $10/month!! Unlimited streaming metal on-demand for $10/month. What the fuck??? It’s kind of unbelievable.

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