[Rant] – Fuck You, Bloggers!

Before you get your panties in a bunch, this isn’t aimed at all bloggers and site owners, but I guess we’re all to be held accountable for the subject at hand, including myself.

In three weeks the Seattle Indie-Folk-Pop-Alternative-Rock band Fleet Foxes will release their much-anticipated second album “Helplessness Blues”.  On the last day of January the band released their first single from the album “Helplessness Blues” as a free download, and the internet went apeshit over it, not only because it was their first new music in a couple of years but also because it was so fucking good.  Then on March 21st they had “Battery Kinzie”, a new song, played on BBC Radio One and I posted a shitty radio rip of the song that was then posted around various other sites and blogs and again, everyone went apeshit.

Almost a week later their album leaked online and again the internet was abuzz with talk of the songs and their quality.  As the days passed blogs began posting songs from the album, obviously without permission, and now less than two weeks after the album leaked, thanks to bloggers looking for hits, you can get eight tracks out of the 12 from the album all for free. Obviously there are a multitude of ways that we can get music for free these days, but I’d like to think that as a site owner with a readership base who look to you to post new music, signed and unsigned, and who trust your taste in music, that if you enjoyed an artist so much that you wouldn’t post tracks from an album for people to download for free a month before the fucking thing drops.

I mean we (as bloggers and site owners) have to have some kind of responsibility in controlling what music gets out there. We don’t post shitty music, so why post illegal music?  I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve posted songs to the site, new and old, that I have no permission from anyone affiliated with the artist to do so.  I made mistakes, looking to get a few hits, thinking it wasn’t a big deal, and I cared more about more people seeing my site than whether or not I was contributing to people illegally downloading music.  Today, I’ll still post radio rips of new songs because I can’t possibly see how that would affect any kind of album sales or the artist making money, unless the music sucked, but then I wouldn’t post it in the first place (yes, my taste in music is the litmus test for “good”).  The song has already been played on national/worldwide radio for millions to hear, the quality is piss-poor, and 99% of the time there are people talking before and after it with radio tags overlaying the track, rendering any kind of longterm enjoyment null and void (how many people pull out radio rips at parties or throw them on their iPods?). Besides, these days if someone has a song played on the radio they generally give it away for free not long after.

When I post these shitty radio rips it’s because not everyone listens to the radio, not everyone can listen to it at work or from another country and so this is another way for people to hear them, and I only post them as a stream and not downloadable so it’s not like people can distribute them anyway.  Is it illegal? I’m not sure, I’m still unsure as to who owns copyright on public radio streams.  Is it that big of a deal?  I don’t think so.  I remember when I was a kid I’d tape Oasis interviews and songs from the radio because it was the only access I had to them. They were shit, but back then we didn’t have the kind of access to music like we do today and they were enough just for me to hear the music and nothing else.

Is there a difference between posting a stream of a song we’re not allowed to vs. posting the MP3?  Yeah, big time.  I’m completely fine with streams being posted as long as the songs aren’t able to be downloaded because what harm does it do?  If the artist/label are confident about the release and proud of the work they did then why the big deal when some of the songs are posted for people to listen to?  Again, listen….not download, just to listen to. BUT, even then that should only come down to songs/albums that have been released already, not MP3s of leaks. At least give the band a chance to release their fucking album before you start illegally posting their songs.  I understand that artists and labels want to be able to control the musical output of new albums and how and when people hear the music, and I completely agree and that’s the whole premise of this rant.

There are blogs and sites who did this with Fleet Foxes, some do it regularly and that pisses me the fuck off, and some never do it so I’ll cut them some slack.  Some of you I called out when it happened and others there’s no point in calling out because all you give a shit about is a quick hit on one of your obnoxious ads, but I’d like to think that if you’re considering doing it, then please don’t.  It’s not a good look.

I’m sure I’ll get shit from people about me posting full albums for people to listen to, but I’m just using the tools that Grooveshark are allowing me to use and I don’t post links to Mediafire or anything like that to directly download the album unless it’s actually been released for free, and I offer links to purchase the album in a bunch of formats from a bunch of different places.  I’m trying to promote the purchase of music by allowing people to listen to something before buying it.  To me, someone’s going to be more inclined to buy an album that they’ve just listened to if they have the ability to purchase it right there on the same page.  After someone’s illegally downloaded an album from a torrent site, what are the chances that once they have all of the MP3s on their computer that they’ll turn right around and pay for it?  I’d say slim to none.

The thing with the Fleet Foxes leak is that bloggers have taken it upon themselves to just post anything from the album that they wanted to and you know what, I’d say 90% of them did it to try to get some hits from The Hype Machine, and if not from that then from whoever finds their blog from Google after searching for “New + Fleet Foxes”.  I mean, you fucking did it for hits.  For something that is completely intangible.  It’s just a number.  You can’t touch them or hold them.  You can’t exchange them for money.  You can’t take them out for a walk or play Frisbee with or make babies with them, they just exist on that screen you’re looking at.  You posting one song might not seem like a big deal, but whenever 100 blogs all post the same eight songs or so, that shit translates into lost album sales.  Sixteen clicks on The Hype Machine and you can get 3/4 of an unreleased album. That’s some bullshit, why would someone want to buy it then? Oh, and you can also get the entire new album from Radiohead on The Hype Machine…the entire album.  For free.  Publicly. Thanks to people who should know better.

If you have to pay for a song/album, then you shouldn’t be posting it or parts of it online for others to take unless you have permission, and chances are you fucking don’t, so fucking quit it.  Like I said, I’m to blame too, I’ve learned a lot in the last year and I fucked up, but c’mon, if you like an artist so much then promote them as much as possible along with links for people to buy their music.  I know a lot of you DO buy music and DO support bands by going to shows and buying merch, but surely you can do without sacrificing your damn integrity for hits.

Integrity wins every time, guys.  Every. Single. Time.

Now, I’m about to step down off’a my high horse and go rip that new Arctic Monkeys track from the radio.