Support the Artists
Nov. 14th, 2009 12:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trickykittyI have a huge dvd collection. I love movies and tv shows. If I ever download a movie or tv show it's so that I can watch it and determine if it's worth purchasing at a later date when I have the money.
I loathe commercials. Commercials do not support the artists. They support the medium from which we get our artists' creations. Commercials feed us with such a horridness and general lack of human profundity that they should be considered illegal. Except for some of the Super Bowl commercials. They have some merit.
We finally have a dvr, but I have always had access to a vcr player to record things direct from the tv. I justify occasional downloads by the fact that I could have just as easily set any of 4 dvr's and 1 vcr to record direct from the tv and just skipped through the commercials when I went back to watch later. I really don't see a difference between downloading a tv show and recording it directly. We pay for the cable and the tv that offers the pretty lights and the dvr and the vcr and the electricity to run it all. I think I've paid my dues to justify a download, and if the movie or show is good enough, I'll spend the money and pay for my own copy of it.
I used to think the same of music artists. I thought they got the bulk of their money from touring and merchandise sales. I used to think that by sharing the music we were sharing the knowledge of the existence of these bands. If I didn't have free Pandora (yeah, they've added a lot of caveats recently, but access to free music is still available), there would be so many bands and songs that I never would have heard of otherwise. Ditto YouTube and LaunchCast.
I suddenly realized something today that is otherwise a "well, duuuuuh" kind of moment. I don't really go to concerts. I don't usually buy music performer merchandise. I pay a monthly fee for my XM subscription to have commercial-free music, or sometimes to get the music I want through the streaming online stations, but again, that's just going to the media providers and not to the artists directly.
I'm a horrible fan that is not properly supporting my favorite artists.
Back in grade school, I was considered to have a really nice, albeit kind of small, cd collection, although I've seen some cd collections (*cough*KO'ed*cough*) that rival my dvd collection. I've noticed recently that I do miss owning cds. I had a hard time justifying cd purchases before since you never really wanted to pay for a whole album only to find you only liked 1 or 2 songs. However, I have had the reverse - purchase an album for only 1 or 2 songs to find the entire album should be playing non-stop on some station completely dedicated to that band. This is why I lament the loss of those music stores that would open the cd and let you listen before you buy.
So, the moral of this long tale is that I need to start spending money on cds again.
And I found two bands to start with:
Spinnerette
- composed of members from other well-known bands
- the lead singer is much less toned down from her punk roots, but it's still nice to see the punk poking through on occasion
Baptised By Fire
Ghetto Love
White Rabbits
- I can listen to the first song over and over again
Percussion Gun
While We Go Dancing
- sorry this is live and not speaker-friendly, but now I really want to see them live
Kid On My Shoulders
- awwwww - they are so damned CUTE - I just want to go and pet them all, just like all of the little kittens we have on our back porch (they don't have heat either)
The White Rabbit Commune
I loathe commercials. Commercials do not support the artists. They support the medium from which we get our artists' creations. Commercials feed us with such a horridness and general lack of human profundity that they should be considered illegal. Except for some of the Super Bowl commercials. They have some merit.
We finally have a dvr, but I have always had access to a vcr player to record things direct from the tv. I justify occasional downloads by the fact that I could have just as easily set any of 4 dvr's and 1 vcr to record direct from the tv and just skipped through the commercials when I went back to watch later. I really don't see a difference between downloading a tv show and recording it directly. We pay for the cable and the tv that offers the pretty lights and the dvr and the vcr and the electricity to run it all. I think I've paid my dues to justify a download, and if the movie or show is good enough, I'll spend the money and pay for my own copy of it.
I used to think the same of music artists. I thought they got the bulk of their money from touring and merchandise sales. I used to think that by sharing the music we were sharing the knowledge of the existence of these bands. If I didn't have free Pandora (yeah, they've added a lot of caveats recently, but access to free music is still available), there would be so many bands and songs that I never would have heard of otherwise. Ditto YouTube and LaunchCast.
I suddenly realized something today that is otherwise a "well, duuuuuh" kind of moment. I don't really go to concerts. I don't usually buy music performer merchandise. I pay a monthly fee for my XM subscription to have commercial-free music, or sometimes to get the music I want through the streaming online stations, but again, that's just going to the media providers and not to the artists directly.
I'm a horrible fan that is not properly supporting my favorite artists.
Back in grade school, I was considered to have a really nice, albeit kind of small, cd collection, although I've seen some cd collections (*cough*KO'ed*cough*) that rival my dvd collection. I've noticed recently that I do miss owning cds. I had a hard time justifying cd purchases before since you never really wanted to pay for a whole album only to find you only liked 1 or 2 songs. However, I have had the reverse - purchase an album for only 1 or 2 songs to find the entire album should be playing non-stop on some station completely dedicated to that band. This is why I lament the loss of those music stores that would open the cd and let you listen before you buy.
So, the moral of this long tale is that I need to start spending money on cds again.
And I found two bands to start with:
Spinnerette
- composed of members from other well-known bands
- the lead singer is much less toned down from her punk roots, but it's still nice to see the punk poking through on occasion
Baptised By Fire
Ghetto Love
White Rabbits
- I can listen to the first song over and over again
Percussion Gun
While We Go Dancing
- sorry this is live and not speaker-friendly, but now I really want to see them live
Kid On My Shoulders
- awwwww - they are so damned CUTE - I just want to go and pet them all, just like all of the little kittens we have on our back porch (they don't have heat either)
The White Rabbit Commune
