tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-839146967530098790.post3057166193145112519..comments2023-03-22T01:59:08.989-07:00Comments on ProgRockin': music and industry, a system failureBGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08024085550417622898noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-839146967530098790.post-13485071287476202822008-04-11T18:02:00.000-07:002008-04-11T18:02:00.000-07:00I think its taken me a long time to reply to Rays ...I think its taken me a long time to reply to Rays post cause all this blogging lately has just been depressing. Music isn't meant to be business. Its like mixing oil and water. And it seems to drive a turnover of genres in the mainstream faster and faster. The eras of classical music can be measured in decades and centuries. Jazz movements lasted a decade or more (often changed by one guy, Miles Davis). Rock has some overlap, but can be lined up with the 50s, 60s and 70s. Now a style hits the mainstream for a few years at most and burns out under the weight of a thousand copycats... I need to go think some happy thoughts...Sean Gillhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04076164080096427562noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-839146967530098790.post-40818335275412691692008-04-10T21:52:00.000-07:002008-04-10T21:52:00.000-07:00FIL....Right!Of course the album is called "Fallin...FIL....Right!<BR/><BR/>Of course the album is called "Falling into infinity" amd not "Looking into infinity" as I wrote :)BGhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08024085550417622898noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-839146967530098790.post-20255707569005725792008-04-10T12:27:00.000-07:002008-04-10T12:27:00.000-07:00actually, I quite like FiI. It was the 1st album t...actually, I quite like FiI. It was the 1st album that I heard most songs from DT (maybe that's why) before really knowing them.arcarneirohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04387229906834845048noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-839146967530098790.post-54013681261646025622008-04-10T11:07:00.000-07:002008-04-10T11:07:00.000-07:00All this label talk reminds me of when Dream Theat...All this label talk reminds me of when Dream Theater's label got the idea that it would be ineverybody's interest to make a more accessible album. For a reason I never really figured out they agreed and created "Looking into infinity".<BR/><BR/>That is probably the only DT album I don't take for a regular spin.<BR/><BR/>Why? Well the songs are too mainstream, too short and have a too comercial sound to them...I actually find it quite boring.<BR/><BR/>They (the label) should have let DT do what DT does best, and every one would have been happier.BGhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08024085550417622898noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-839146967530098790.post-19738751153109767302008-04-10T06:34:00.000-07:002008-04-10T06:34:00.000-07:00"The mission of those companies is not loving musi..."<I>The mission of those companies is not loving music. It it is increasing the shareholder value.</I>" I think this phrase resumes it all!!!<BR/>Like Dominici says on his 2nd album, it's the Greed, the Evil Seed!<BR/><BR/>You can see the same thing happening on other big companies of other areas. When a company is small, it treats his clients like friends or family, wanting to serve the best quality service/product it's able to offer. You can even make an analogy with a girlfriend/boyfriend. The company pays attention, wants to please. As soon as the company gets big and believes will not lose the client (a sort of marriage state), the company acts like "I'll attend you later", "I'll get back at you when I have the time...".<BR/>The important thing isn't to please the client any more, is to make money, no matter the cost (as long as isn't money)! They think that only because they are big, have a solid known brand, we'll buy their stuff forever.<BR/>Well, when you start to treat your customers as mere clients, not as a family/(girl-boy)friend, there's a limit to the bad treatment received. When you're a family/(girl-boy)friend, you let certain thing go by (like "you offended me, but it's ok. We'll come to an agreement, since we are family"). But when you're a client, you start to demand your rights as a consumer (like "you offended me! I pay for the service/product! I'll sue you! I know my rigths!").<BR/>What I'm trying to say in my fuzzy writings is that the companies should also take the responsibilities of the way they want to operate.<BR/><BR/>Enough of analogies and back to the music.<BR/>I saw something similar happens. When that Nu-Metal was a popular thing (dunno how it's right now), I saw a band being created by a record label to play that kind of music, just like the other bands where playing. I remember watching on the MTV the guy from the band telling how they formed the band, how a guy from a record label (don't remember the label's name nor the band's name) contacted him and the other members and told them how and what to play.<BR/>That also happens on the hip-hop/rap. The other day I payed attention, and most of the musics (at least all that I heard at that moment) sounded quite the same, with the same beat, ones faster than others, the same "keyboard clap sound"... most, even, singing about the same things.<BR/><BR/>Erik Norlander have a album that speaks about this. Music Machine tells the story of Jonny America, a teenager pop idol genetically created by a huge music megaconglomerate to take over the world. It tell how he rose and fell and who the huge music megaconglomerate plotted everything. Even if you don't like his music, the story is quite interesting.<BR/><BR/>This "same music artist, same thing all the time" may be interesting in the 1st couple of albums, but the clients get bored easly. If the record labels don't bring something extra, something to enrich the experience, they'll lose the client. Since the music is all the same, they have to find some other ways.<BR/>As a guy commented on an Ayreon community. We were speaking of the national release of the ITEC and how poor quality the booklet was (paper, printing) compared to the original euro version. He said "the music everyone have. I want the booklet in quality. I want a good packaging". Something like Mindflow did on his Mind Over Body album. They put the whole album for free download, but if you see the packaging, the care with the visual/graphical content, it's worthy the buy.<BR/><BR/>To be fair, that happens on the prog-rock/prog-metal scene (bunch of bands sounding the same), but the influence of the record labels isn't that strong. I can't say for sure that 100% of the labels doesn't influence the bands sounds, but I think the extend of the influence is very short, minimal. That's more a bands problem, but that's a subject for a whole new topic.<BR/><BR/>It's very interesting and satisfactory to see those new labels arising, like Inside Out, Unicorn Digital (a pretty young label who's getting big quite fast), Lion Music, ProgRock Records, Sensory/Laser's Edge, Musea, Metal Mind Productions, and sooo many others.<BR/>But, it's like prog-rock/prog-metal is a separated world. Since it's not THAT commercial music, they don't deal with those problems of "achieving a certain amount of money to please the share holders" and such. I have a feeling that it's more a thing of "fan to fan" business. How would it be if prog-rock/prog-metal was a mainstream thing?<BR/>In the end, I think it's a problem that both sides has it's share of the guilty.arcarneirohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04387229906834845048noreply@blogger.com