Trent Reznor Says "Steal My Music" 637
THX-1138 writes "A few months ago, Trent Reznor (frontman of the band Nine Inch Nails), was in Australia doing an interview when he commented on the outrageous prices of CDs there. Apparently now his label, Universal Media Group is angry at him for having said that. During a concert last night, he told fans, '...Has anyone seen the price come down? Okay, well, you know what that means — STEAL IT. Steal away. Steal and steal and steal some more and give it to all your friends and keep on stealin'. Because one way or another these mother****ers will get it through their head that they're ripping people off and that's not right.'"
Going indie (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Concert, not interview! (Score:4, Interesting)
My only question is did the concert tickets also get cheaper since his last visit?
Would he recommend people break into the stadium?
Re:Going indie (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:3, Interesting)
At least this way he can take the "It's actually my intellectual property" defense to the US Copyright Office if he gets thrown into court.
Trent quite isn't a conformist type (Score:5, Interesting)
And is not afraid to go against the labels' will, e.g. see the history behind an eastern egg [eeggs.com] on the "Broken" album:
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:5, Interesting)
It sounds similar to Matt Groening and FOX. They pissed him off by not letting him concentrate on Futurama and making him churn out more Simpsons so he used the Simpsons as a vehicle to insult FOX executives whenever he could. They had to put up with it as he was sticking by his contract and making them money.
It might just work... (Score:2, Interesting)
Regardless, music distribution companies simply add no value any more. When a company doesn't add any kind of value, they die. It happened with buggy whips, vacuum-tube manufacturers, and countless other industries. Right now, we can also see the slow death of Realtors because most, if not all, real estate information can be found easily for free. That's life. Adapt or die.
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:2, Interesting)
Actually, if he stopped accepting royalties, then the record companies will make an even larger profit and they wouldn't care. That would make it an empty gesture.
Feh! They real money is in the live shows. CD sales hardly enrich performers at all.
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:One out of one Trent Reznor agrees: (Score:3, Interesting)
How about...
The No Electronic Theft Act [usdoj.gov]?
Re:Trent, you say "Steal My Music", but, (Score:5, Interesting)
On February 12, 2007, a USB drive was found in a bathroom stall during a NIN concert in Lisbon. It contained a high-quality MP3 of the track "My Violent Heart," which quickly circulated throughout the Internet. Another USB drive containing the same track was purportedly found in Madrid.
On February 19, another USB drive was found in Barcelona, containing the track "Me, I'm Not" and an MP3 of static.
On February 25, a third USB drive was found in Manchester, containing the track "In This Twilight" and an image of the Hollywood sign apparently demolished.
Concerning the use of USB drives as a form of promotion, Reznor explains:
That's awesome, and makes my nerd heart warm.
Re:Off-topic, but.... (Score:3, Interesting)
* Disclaimer - I have not watched the interview, and am basing the above off the /. summary. Yes, it's a risky move, but I'm taking that chance. Sorry if I've completely missed the point as a result.
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:3, Interesting)
NiN is a Big Deal & could easily start their own label and do whatever they damn well please. So, by suggesting he renounce royalties, the GP is saying that Reznor shouldn't just say "Fuck the Man", he should actually stop taking money he's earned through the system he decries.
They have legal-fu, and they're not afraid to use it.
Does this even matter? (Score:4, Interesting)
Unfortunately, we are in the scenario where an artist that people will listen to (read: popular) got that way because of the RIAA and the industry they are in... they have likely signed a long-term contract. Once they are out of that contract, the general population won't really care about them (read: Pearl Jam, Prince) and they will kind of fade away. Personally, I like all of these acts I have named, but they aren't in the main spotlight anymore. This is a system that the RIAA has created, and unless someone can a) gain huge popularity without them and b) stay out of their clutches, it won't seem possible to break out of their system.
You know something is wrong when... (Score:3, Interesting)
Steal My Music Too, While You're At It (Score:5, Interesting)
If you play piano, there's sheet music available for two of my songs, with the rest coming sometime soon.
It's all completely legal to share, as it has a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 license. You can create derivative works such as remixes, and even sell my work or perform it in front of a paying crowd, but you must share alike - that is, give your derivative works the same license.
Why am I doing this? I am studying both piano and music theory with the aim of going back to school someday to major in musical composition. I want to compose symphonies.
I'll be in my fifties by the time I graduate - I can't afford to spend years building up a fan base. So when your local symphony orchestra plays my work, I want there to already be a loyal fan base in your city.
Thanks for your help!
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:1, Interesting)
We all make compromises trying to be effective in the world.
It is a rare person who can stand up and say "Yes, I made my compromises, and became a little more evil because of it, but good is still good, even when I'm not, and right is still right, even when I'm not strong enough to be."
I have drawn a great deal of strength from what you have produced.
Re:Promoter vs Artist (Score:2, Interesting)
I heard that Australians are paying around 30 US dollars for the latest album, whereas in the US it's somewhere around 15 dollars. How does that make sense? The label is raking his fans over the coals, because they're going to pay up anyway, but at the same time they're raising the price so high that people who are moderately interested in the band and the album are turned off because they aren't willing to shell out that kind of green on music... In that case, they'll probably download the music anyway.
To me, it all seems like a Frankenstein application of profit maximization.
yup, that's the future (Score:3, Interesting)
the internet based one, of course, needs no middleman. so your up and coming artist will put out his shingle, his website, be discovered by someone, and grow a fan base. perhaps he will be plugged on some music portal, online radio. people still need somewhere to go to sample new music. traditional radio i suppose won't really change at all, but may return to the era of the salty local dj who picks his own playlists, rather than song lists bought and sold by the music industry
but the money involved in this will all be advertising revenue, not money to or from artists. likewise, artists will only make money, if they ever become popular, via live gigs, or for hawking products: more advertising. artists won't make any money from albums. albums will become a historical artifact of the 20th century. and more importantly, music publishers won't make money from albums, because the music industry itself will simply fade away and die. artists will give their music away for free up front, to grow a fan base. does that sound strange? it's actually completely normal. they did this in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s: it was called radio. you heard songs, you bought the album. now you will hear songs from your traditional radio or online portal, and get it for free. but you will still go to concerts, and you will recognize your favorite artists when at&t hires them to do a commercial, or to play their song in the background of said commercial
and such a future is already ehre, in china, and most of the rest of the world outside the west. this is how most artists in the world live now, and how most have always lived since the dawn of time
just as you say, moving away from the corporate music industry is not some horrible act of trangressive freakish abnormality. it is actually a return to normalcy. it is the 20th century, in the west, with its corporate music industry, that is in fact the freakish aberration in time and place, not the other way around
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:3, Interesting)
You must, simply must, stop thinking of 'property' in a legal context the same way you think of the word "property" in discourse.
Re:Someone call the folks at "Intervention" (Score:3, Interesting)
IAAL. You are wrong.
There is absolutely no question that it would be a breach of an implied term of his contract to actively discourage people from buying CDs produced pursuant to the contract. The only way this would not be the case would be if the contract contained a clause expressly allowing him to say this type of thing with no penalty.
They could terminate the contract and sue him for (a) the lost sales on this album which result from his comments (which would be hard to prove) and (b) the loss of future earnings on the next album due to the termination of the contract arising from his breach. And they would probably win.
They won't do it, but only because of the bad PR.
That's not quite accurate. (Score:5, Interesting)
It's very easy to give stuff away - when selling it puts money in someone else's pile.
Artists for major record labels don't make any money selling CDs. You give your mechanical rights to the record company, they promote you, and you make your money on performances. That's the deal.
In the old world, this was a 'good' deal, as without the muscle of the record companies promoting you, your act was going to continue to play bars and night clubs instead of stadiums.
In the new world, there's the internet, and you can do quite well for yourself keeping your mechanical rights and performing less.
Re:Tickets to his show run $89 for two !! (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyway, Tool aren't bad. I've been a NIN fan for about 14 years now, and in 2000, I started boycotting RIAA CD releases. Trent's new album this year, "Year Zero", is the first CD I've bought in seven years. Why did I buy it? Had it been a traditional release, I would never have bought it most likely, despite being a huge fan of Trent's work. However, Trent's marketing, in particular leaking several tracks on USB drives and dumping them at various concert venues was enough to hook me (not to mention the multiple websites and the extremely elaborate back story for the whole album). Because of all that, I wound up buying the CD the week it was released.
Trent has already said that once his contract with Interscope is up (one more album) he's going to an online distribution model and not bothering with a label.
As for Trent's comments... I already knew his attitude toward the labels. On that video I'm more interested in the fact there seems to be not one for TWO security guys right in front of the person with the camera not doing anything about the dude with the camera.:)
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:3, Interesting)
I think it just as hard to give stuff away when you've made your pile,
If you can comfortably eat, sleep and slashdot (basic human rights I think!) then you've got your pile, and you're in just as good a position to be generous as anyone else... don't make excuses for others having more generosity than you -- accept the fact that you're a selfish greedy human, same as most others.
Me, I've got my pile, and you're not getting any of it! Good on Trent for giving his pile away to you undeserving thieves. I always stole his albums!
Re:Going indie (Score:5, Interesting)
I love, love, love CD Baby. I really, really do. They are what a label in the 21st century ought to be. The cut they take is perfectly fair, they give you all kinds of tips to help you sell your stuff, and really they just provide the store-front and a way to get your stuff into as many net-storefronts as possible, and they just keep doing more and more about this. I get 62.5 cents per iTunes purchase, several times more than any big-label band would get, regardless of how many I sell. I mean, working with them is SO SWEET. You can download your sales as a spreadsheet, something I do to make sure I'm paid up on my cover songs' licensing deals.
CD Baby is fuckin' rad, man. They should be the only label any musician should even consider.
It's hard enough to make money with music without some fucking label assraping you for every dime you "cost" them.
Re:Has he put his money where his mouth is? (Score:3, Interesting)
So for him having as much non concert audience as possible is more vital than sold CDs.
It probably really is the better deal to get as much audience as possible upfront so that his concerts are full.
Classical example for this is the Grateful Dead, while not having had a huge hit for decades, they constantly had full concerts and probably earned a lot more than many other bands.
Problem is getting that big probably still is impossible without the record industry and their propaganda machinery, but once you are in the contract you hare a slave of them for a period of time.
Re:Tickets to his show run $89 for two !! (Score:2, Interesting)
When living in Greece I was quite surprised by the way they handle this problem. Every singer, from the unknown to the most famous, is actually working. To make a living they produce CDs and then perform in front of people almost daily! Take note that the CDs are usually pirated, and even if they were not over a 10Milion potential customers there is not a great demand. So there are special venues where people can go with friends sit at a table and enjoy a dinner or drinks while listening to their favourite singer live (all included). This can get really expensive in case of the most famous singers but I never heard anyone complain about the costs of a live night compared to the costs of CDs.
Enrico
Re:legal in the first place (Score:2, Interesting)