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Bay City Beat For the record, boycott
new CD’s
Steve Stajich
Mirror contributing writer
Any day now somebody is going to start publishing a magazine called
When Music Was Cool. Fans of MOJO magazine might argue that
publication has taken the lead, with articles that provide deep
background on bygone, mostly dead rock artists. It’s a kind of
“Rolling Stone: Time Tunnel Edition.”
What I think will drive new publications about old rock is that the
mainstream record industry, especially as represented by the
repressive RIAA, is eating itself alive. The prognosis is not good.
The RIAA or Recording Industry Association of America is described on
one anti-RIAA website as “a killer octopus whose tentacles are always
reaching out for prey. That prey would be us, the music fans, and even
the recording artists themselves.” (Personally, I prefer the more
compact moniker “suits.”) Edgy artists like Sheryl “I’ll be appearing
at the new Albertsons store” Crow and The Dixie Chicks, who now check
weather forecasts before taking a stand, have put their signatures on
RIAA anti-file swapping threats.
Yeah, that’s right. Threats. The record industry should theoretically
be one of the most open-minded and progressive industries in America.
Their products are essentially messages of love, poetry and freedom,
personal and otherwise. Songs are reflective creative works that probe
the human soul.
But at this moment in entertainment history, the RIAA prefers to
function as a police force ready to push down doors to nail anyone
copying a music file. In newspapers across the nation, they’ve printed
full-page announcements of their intent to sue private file-swapping
citizens.
The record industry ignored computer music technology, didn’t bother
to stabilize its position in that cosmos, and is now litigating
instead of building bridges to the 21st century. Coming after the
industry’s long and proud history of screwing artists — notoriously in
blues and rhythm and blues — out of royalties and payments and
credits, it’s time that consumers sent their own full-page message
back to the RIAA.
Simply do not buy any new compact discs for one year. Boycott new CD’s
until July 4, 2004 … Independence Day.
I’m asking you to do this for the clean, crisp, refreshing feeling
that comes when you stop contributing to repressive capitalism. It
won’t necessarily change the RIAA’s bad attitude. Looking at our
planet right now, the RIAA might not seem a priority. But why submit
to being pushed around and played like a harmonica by corporate
entities so consumed with profit margins that they actually choke
their own customers over alternative technology issues?
I apologize to artists that are, in fact, hurt by file swapping. They
won’t like you boycotting new product for a year, either. But exactly
where do consumers enter the dialogue here? How would you like to be
sued by Sony Pictures because you didn’t go see the “Charlie’s Angels”
sequel and instead borrowed a friend’s old VHS copy of a good movie?
For one year, instead of contributing money to an industry that has
loudly announced that YOU are the enemy, buy used CDs or burn copies
of a friend’s CD or make cassette tapes or get CDs at your neighbor’s
yard sale or turn on a radio or play your old LP records or wind up a
music box or play a guitar or beat the daylights out of your congas or
whistle. Utilize any of the alternative sources of music that are, at
the time of this writing, still legal in America.
Remind the RIAA that it needs you.
This Week’s “Know Your News” Quiz 1) The Clippers signed a four-year deal with
a) Coach Mike Dunleavy.
b) Bridesmaid Magazine.
c) Runner-Up Shoes.
2) The CIA now admits
a) the HULK is computer-generated.
b) bad intel on Iraq uranium.
c) its file on Dub’s mental health is HUGE.
3) Last week’s high ozone levels
a) prompted smog alerts.
b) improved “For Love or Money”
c) were better than glass in Big Macs.
Answer Key
(a) “I’m here to help.”
(b) “We just wanted to help.”
(a) “Not breathing helps.” |
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