Dangermouse “Releases” New Album on Blank CD

DJ Dangermouse made a lot of noise (and a great album) when he released The Grey Album, an amazing mashup of Jay-Z’s Black Album and The Beatles White Album.

Of course, the big record lables, in this case EMI, considered Dangermouse’s work to be theft and tried to sue him and anyone trying to sell or otherwise distribute the album.  EMI failed in their battle but it left it’s mark on Dangermouse.

He has announced that, to avoid legal problems from EMI, he will not be releasing an album, but instead:

a limited edition, hand numbered 100+ page book which will now come with a blank, recordable CD-R. All copies will be clearly labeled: ‘For Legal Reasons, enclosed CD-R contains no music. Use it as you will.’

He goes on to wish everyone well in “finding” his music somewhere out there in the webosphere at which time they can burn that music onto the CD-R.

Awesome.

LINK

Merlin is a New Model for Label Success

Merlin is a very cool company that is succeeding with a new model for success as a “major label.”  Unlike traditional labels, Merlin actually represents a huge number of indie labels under a single banner (via ArsTech):

“Merlin isn’t a “real” label in the sense that it doesn’t do business the same way. The group negotiates licensing arrangements on behalf of its members so that small labels can get the benefits of a more sizable organization, but Merlin does not take any control of copyrights and does not do marketing or promotion.”

This is a great example of building a business model in response to current conditions.  Instead of desperately trying to hold onto the old model where making money was about selling albums, Merlin saw a need a provided a solution.

The Majors could learn a lesson from them…but they probably won’t.

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Can Curating Save the Labels?

Short answer: I don’t think so.

However, over on TechDirt there are some comments on Ian Rogers (former GM of Yahoo Music) open letter to EMI in which he talks of a new(ish) idea:

“affinity labels. Put together various mini-labels under which similar types of bands are associated. And, include on those labels a few of the “big name” EMI artists. Thus, for all the fans who are fans of some huge artist, by creating these affinity labels, it will help drive the fans of the big name artist to those other bands as well, knowing that they all have a similar sound or musical philosophy.”

I might be crazy but this sounds a lot like every indie label out there except with the idea of using big bands to attract fans to smaller bands.  Every indie label that’s any good is good because of its taste and fans of a label trust each new band the label releases will be worth listening to.

Applying this basic concept to the major labels – basically turning them into a bunch of mini-labels – is something the big film studios have tried to do over the past decade or two.  They formed little “indie” studios within their bigger frameworks to distribute smaller films.

Now, these same studios are discovering that smaller films simply make less money and they are shutting down their “indie” wings left and right (Warner Independent and PictureHouse are recent examples) to focus on big-budget blockbusters.

I don’t see how it will work any better for the labels.

The Music Industry is Waking Up. Too Late?

ArsTechnica has a good look at what’s happening the world of big music:

“Five hundred top members of the music business gathered today in New York to hear that “music 1.0 is dead.” Ted Cohen, a former EMI exec who used the phrase, opened the Digital Music Forum East by pleading with the industry to be wildly creative with new business models but not to “be desperate” during this transitional period. But what is music transitioning to? No one seemed quite sure, except to say that it won’t look much like the music business of the last several decades.”

The music industry has really been the canary in the coal mines as far as the internet economy is concerned.  It will be fascinating to see if they can save themselves before they’ve all choked to death.

Check out the whole ArsTechnica post for more on what was said at the conference and some good insight on what it all might mean.