So, if you watch EPIC FU, you know that we regularly feature music artists in the "Sh!t We Like" portion of the show. We love highlighting indie and up and coming musicians and exposing them to a wider audience.
Recently, we featured Peter Fox, who is a kick-ass German musician. He has his own web site and a MySpace page from which he streams some of his songs. Now, we reaaally love his most recent single Alles Neu, but the problem is that YOU CAN'T BUY IT ANYWHERE ONLINE. His record label Downbeat/Warner doesn't get it. What is the point of releasing a new music video on the web if you don't make the song readily available for everyone to buy?!?
This is especially true when it comes to international musicians. For example, iTunes makes it impossible to buy an album from an international artist. Wanna buy the latest single from a hot new DJ from the UK or Japan? You better hope the album is available in the US version of the store. It's a way to keep the borders up and to keep us all from expanding and developing our cross-cultural experience. It also keeps musicians who are repped by labels from potentially making more money from fans who want to support their work.
And you know what ends up happening? Limewire.
Ben said:
I searched for this song for ages after seeing it on the show - and also couldn't find it anywhere to buy!
Dominik said:
I couldn't agree more. I live in Berlin, the same city the artist lives in. The same city the bloody record label is seated in. Even here it's impossible to get the stuff online. The German iTunes Store only features one single called "Fieber".
How in the name of sanity can a record label be so incompetent. Hey Warner, listen, if you won't deliver, people will get the shit via torrent and support the artist directly. Not the record company.
Adam in Alabama said:
It's just another example of big business (especially the music business) not "getting it". Or wanting to have too much control.
And as long as this mentality proliferates, piracy will thrive.
Tim said:
The song will be officially released in Germany 08/15/2008, so until then I guess there's no way to get it legally.
As for the walled gardens problem, at least American ppl are on the green side of the wall. They get most of the good stuff relatively early (be it gaming, movies or music).
I, for example, was pretty pissed to learn, that Wall-E won't come out in Australia and Europe until september.
Anyway, full agreement here. Break down the walls!
Matt Gowdy said:
You know, I was actually going to ask about that, I checked out Peter Fox's website and it said album coming soon, but there was no store to buy anything from.
I mean, it would be awesome if it were available as a digital download, but I'd go ahead and buy this as a hard copy album if it were available.
I guess the only way to get an mp3 copy of the current single is to run a transcode of the music video through something like Vixy. Hmmm... I may have to do that...
MythMan Jay said:
Zadi? You should fill us in on the historical doom that is/was LiveWire and edit this post to link your mention of it to the posted doom.
Jorge said:
I think that companies and politicians need to understand that borders are the thing to bring down, not to build up. We already built them up on the 20th century and the results were not good.
The other easy solution is to start a global music store, but then the idea is go get all the record labels to like you and to send you the material for you to sell. I think it will be fair easy with indy record labels, but not that easy with the big ones.
Annie said:
One of our YouTube viewers, SuzanneFrou, had this to share with us:
"Hey guys,
I heard people were asking you about Alles Neu by Peter Fox. I don't know if you guys found it yet or not but it's available on amazon.de. Though I'm pretty sure it's a pre-order because it's not coming out for another 3 weeks. Hope that helps :)
Cheers!
Suzanne"
Thanks Suzanne!
Jeff Rizzo said:
Hah! I was just getting ready to *look* to buy this online, but I guess I'll save myself the trouble.
Though (reading the last comment) perhaps I'll make my second-evah purchase from amazon.de :)
jonndailey said:
You're exactly right, Zadi. Either the band, or the record label should make all the music readily available. If I really liked a video I saw on Vimeo or Youtube and there was a "Buy From.." link right in the info, the chances of me actually paying for that song would shoot up dramatically. They don't understand us...
