Rocknerd

Why Spotify wants some Blockchain; how music industry Blockchain dreams work.

27 April, 20179 May, 2018 Industry, mp3, Opinion 6

A detailed examination of why music industry Blockchain (capital B) dreams are not going to work out.

Followups: Free money from YouTube, windowing and piracy, totally not Pono.

25 April, 201728 April, 2017 Audio, Industry, Links, mp3 0

Ongoing sagas that remain perennial bad pennies of stupid.

Links: uTorrent, bogus RightsCorp DMCA notices, International 8-Track Day.

23 April, 201724 April, 2017 Audio, mp3, Rocknerd, Your rights 0

Ignoring the previous National 8-Track Day, of course.

Patti Smith’s last Australian gig, Festival Hall, Melbourne, 20 April 2017.

21 April, 201721 April, 2017 Live, Punk 2

Patti Smith is giving up long haul touring on medical advice. But at Festival Hall last night, which she called a “shitty little club” for all the right reasons, Smith looked anything but frail.

Musical user interfaces, copyright companies being themselves, the worst of Rolling Stone.

16 April, 201716 April, 2017 Links, Musician, Writing, Your rights 0

You need to see the ideas for music software interfaces.

Crimson Boy: Street Gods and Neon Dogs (2017).

14 April, 2017 Industrial, Pop, Record 0

Perth ’80s industrial synthpop duo, who have returned with an album at last.

Links: Portuguese DRM bypass law, majors and streaming money, personal desktop torrent search.

11 April, 201711 April, 2017 Industry, Links, mp3, Your rights 0

Some fun with DRM, BitTorrent and the legal streaming money never reaching the artists anyway.

Vortex zine #2 is up.

9 April, 2017 Indie, Writing 0

From the bowels of time, Vortex, Perth, December 1986.

Reviews: Cherry Heaven, Rainboy (2017).

7 April, 20177 April, 2017 Dance, Indie, Record 0

A couple of atmospheric pop collections.

Links: A dumped Steinway, Kim Dotcom’s terrible album, early TR-808 hits, the history of disco.

6 April, 201718 May, 2017 Dance, Links, Musician 0

“There was lots and lots of good music that was actually made but it never saw the light of day because it wasn’t Kim’s taste. His taste is what you can hear on that fucking atrocious album that actually got released.”

The Spotify-Universal 2017 deal, with windowing, probably won’t change much.

5 April, 20177 April, 2017 Industry, mp3, Opinion 0

Apart from revitalising the torrent sites, but everyone seems to have noticed that bit now.

Introducing Bitcache! Kim Dotcom’s Bitcoin shop front for MegaUpload 2.0.

4 April, 20172 May, 2017 mp3 3

You can totally trust Kim Dotcom, who is only slightly a convicted felon with an extensive history as a con man.

Record labels want money YouTube doesn’t earn, just because Google has some and they’d like it.

3 April, 20177 April, 2017 Industry, Opinion 1

With cites that they know this money doesn’t actually exist yet.

Links: Roland founder dies, workplace entrance themes, BitTorrent repivot.

2 April, 20172 April, 2017 Links, mp3, Musician, Rocknerd 0

And some notes on The Book.

Discopedia: a dance music search engine.

31 March, 20171 April, 2017 Dance, mp3 1

Search for dance mixes on YouTube and play them right there.

Reviews: Hidden By Ivy, The Trapezoids, Miserable (2016, 2017).

28 March, 201729 March, 2017 Metal, Post-Punk, Prog, Record 0

Complicated acoustic progressive sounds, and a bit of cheap synth.

Links: The history of records, copyright troll woes, Chuck Berry in space, the other Top 40 charts.

27 March, 2017 Audio, Industry, Links, Your rights 0

“My mum had a record of Winston Churchill speeches that played at 16⅔rpm. As we never owned a record player with that speed, I only ever heard the Pinky & Perky version played at 33.”

Music journalism: still dead, thank goodness.

26 March, 20173 September, 2020 Opinion, Writing 5

“Can music journalism exist at all?” “Do Music Journalists Matter Anymore?” I mean, if you have to ask …

Links: SoundCloud $70m, Facebook the label, Discogs, Bitcoin and Boss Baby.

24 March, 201724 March, 2017 Film, Industry, Links, Record 0

why does bitcoin keep coming up in my music links WHYYY

Links: Cogent overblocking again; 3800 pirate sites blocked in UK; blockchain!

22 March, 2017 Links, Rocknerd, Your rights 0

Pirates and blockchains. Arrr.

All these streams will be lost in time, like tears in rain.

20 March, 201721 March, 2017 mp3, Opinion, Record, Writing 1

There is no “cloud”, there’s just someone else’s computer. Will we find a listener who cares?

The Fall: Perverted By Language (1983).

18 March, 20179 May, 2018 Post-Punk, Record 0

“There was a time when I asked Mark if he’d heard that ‘Under Pressure’ song that Bowie did with Queen and he just said, ‘Yeah! They ripped that bass-line off “An Older Lover” on Slates. ‘” — Brix Smith