After the launch in September of iTunes LP, Apple has expanded its music content offering by opening a live music section on the iTunes store in partnership with Live Nation.
Apple has previously offered recordings from its stores and bespoke events like the iTunes Festival in London each year. This deal with Live Nation gives it a much deeper catalogue of live recordings.
Drawing on recordings from over 80 Live Nation-owned venues, users will be able to download a mix of audio and video content. All available recordings will come from events or venues owned by iTunes or Live Nation, thereby simplifying licensing deals. The deal is global but in the UK will, initially, be audio-only.
Video downloads will cost between $8 and $13 (£4.79 and £7.78) while audio-only downloads will average at around $8.
This comes in the wake of a flurry of activity around online concerts. Last month, YouTube streamed U2’s show in LA live, attracting 10m viewers during the show. Last week, EMI signed a deal with online video site Hulu (for the US only, currently) covering branding artist channels and exclusive concert recordings from acts including Norah Jones.
By Eamonn Forde
Monday, 30 November 2009
Sunday, 22 November 2009
Benjamin Zephaniah - Gangsta Rap (2004)
"School, what school? - My name is X-Ray-X, so be careful how you flex. I used to fresstyle in my bedroom, but me daddy got me vex. The teacher kicked me out of the classroom, now I'm rapping in the Rex"
Ray has trouble home, and he has trouble at school. Then suddenly he has no touble at school, but only because he and his friends have been permanently suspended. What happens to a boy like Ray? If he's lucky, maybe he gets a chance to shine.
The story of three boys who aren't easy. They don't fit in, they seem to attract trouble. But they know what they want, more than most perhaps.
Thursday, 19 November 2009
Like when Woolies shut on the high street...
Tuesday November 10, 2009 by Music Week
The Observer Music Monthly is to close next year as part of a redesign of the Sunday paper.
Under the plans, the re-designed Observer will have four weekly sections – news, sport, review and The Observer magazine – as well as the Observer Food Monthly. Observer Music Monthly, Sport Monthly and Woman will all close.
The Observer editor John Mulholland tells Media Guardian, “Like all newspapers, we had to make changes both to the way we work and to the products we publish. It has been a difficult few months for staff while we have worked through these changes as part of GNM's publishing review, and some hard decisions had to be taken given the extremely challenging economic environment for newspapers."
The news comes against a backdrop of heavy losses at the Observer parent company Guardian News & Media.
The Observer Music Monthly is to close next year as part of a redesign of the Sunday paper.
Under the plans, the re-designed Observer will have four weekly sections – news, sport, review and The Observer magazine – as well as the Observer Food Monthly. Observer Music Monthly, Sport Monthly and Woman will all close.
The Observer editor John Mulholland tells Media Guardian, “Like all newspapers, we had to make changes both to the way we work and to the products we publish. It has been a difficult few months for staff while we have worked through these changes as part of GNM's publishing review, and some hard decisions had to be taken given the extremely challenging economic environment for newspapers."
The news comes against a backdrop of heavy losses at the Observer parent company Guardian News & Media.
Sunday, 15 November 2009
Urban Development: Ladies Unplugged review
What: Urban Development – Ladies Unplugged
Where: Stratford Circus E15
When: 13th November
Who: Yolanda Brown, Shola Ama, Ms Dynamite, hosted by Fusion
First of all, big up Index from AG Publishing for getting me in, I had a great time bruv and appreciate it.
Got there about 10mins from the end of Yolanda Brown’s performance (yes, I am a late waste man) and was gutted; she is excellent, real energetic, smooth jazz and she’s stunning to look at too. No disrespect to the UK crew, but when someone makes and performs jazz music this well my mind automatically thinks they are from the States, but this girl is homegrown so go support, she will be big.
Ms Dynamite walked onto the stage after the interval as Index and I took our seats high above the auditorium and she murked it, especially with a spontaneous live band rendition of ‘Boo!’ She was politically and social enthused and is a whole lot of women (don’t think most of us fellas could handle her) and owned the stage, found it easy to create a relationship with the crowd and held up her energetic performance (out of breath slightly on Boo!).
Shola Ama took the stage to close the event, I’ve always thought she was special and she didn’t disappoint and came across quite humble in front of the audience. She’s got such natural vocals, X-factor and all that is good (shout to Danyl) but these are the standards people should be aspiring towards.
Fusion was class, funny and charismatic, blended the performances and stage-audience banter perfectly.
Where: Stratford Circus E15
When: 13th November
Who: Yolanda Brown, Shola Ama, Ms Dynamite, hosted by Fusion
First of all, big up Index from AG Publishing for getting me in, I had a great time bruv and appreciate it.
Got there about 10mins from the end of Yolanda Brown’s performance (yes, I am a late waste man) and was gutted; she is excellent, real energetic, smooth jazz and she’s stunning to look at too. No disrespect to the UK crew, but when someone makes and performs jazz music this well my mind automatically thinks they are from the States, but this girl is homegrown so go support, she will be big.
Ms Dynamite walked onto the stage after the interval as Index and I took our seats high above the auditorium and she murked it, especially with a spontaneous live band rendition of ‘Boo!’ She was politically and social enthused and is a whole lot of women (don’t think most of us fellas could handle her) and owned the stage, found it easy to create a relationship with the crowd and held up her energetic performance (out of breath slightly on Boo!).
Shola Ama took the stage to close the event, I’ve always thought she was special and she didn’t disappoint and came across quite humble in front of the audience. She’s got such natural vocals, X-factor and all that is good (shout to Danyl) but these are the standards people should be aspiring towards.
Fusion was class, funny and charismatic, blended the performances and stage-audience banter perfectly.
Top 5 Tracks for November
1. Baby Blue feat Wretch 32 – Run
2. J2K feat Wiley, Devlin, Wiley & Shola Ama - Trouble
3. Boy Better Know – Goin In
4. Kele Le Roc – Naked
5. Bashy - Life
Worst single of the month: Pitball & Nicole – Hotel Room. Please die.
2. J2K feat Wiley, Devlin, Wiley & Shola Ama - Trouble
3. Boy Better Know – Goin In
4. Kele Le Roc – Naked
5. Bashy - Life
Worst single of the month: Pitball & Nicole – Hotel Room. Please die.
disso part 1
Part 1 of my degree disseration. Taking part: 30 people including execs at major labels, underground artists, DJ's, promoters.
- Racism & The Music Industry : Attitudes & The Media
In the late 1960’s Stokely Carmichael, an activist in the American Civil Rights Movement was credited with coining the phrase ‘institutional racism’.
He described it as "the collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their color, culture or ethnic origin”. Unlike individual racism which involves the attitudes and actions of individuals that perpetuate racism, institutional racism takes the form of systematic policies controlled by organisations and governments that disadvantage people because of their race.
Taking this description into hand and reflecting it on today’s music industry, some may argue that this form of racism is prevalent at all levels within the industry.
Existing knowledge suggests that in the United States, black personnel have been systematically excluded from positions of power within the industry, therefore the starting point to fill knowledge gaps in regards to the UK, was to ask personnel from all levels in the British music industry if they felt that policies or practices existed which could be seen as disadvantageous to a person from a minority ethnic group. Co-Manager of independent label Illastate Records (Akala, Ms Dynamite) Rez Safina said:
“Yes it does exist, but it’s complicated. Unfortunately the business reflects attitudes in society, because the business caters to its audience, the British public, and there is so much unspoken racism there. So if the businesses want to make money they have to spend their most money marketing to large demographics, and smaller budgets to smaller demographics. The only way the music business could operate in a totally racially equal way would be if society did”.
A&R Manager Joe Kentish from major label Universal/Def Jam said that every decision or action taken is to do with business, and assuming that there is an element of discrimination was to overestimate the industry’s goals. He went on to say:
“The goals of this major record company is to make money full stop, end of story, and you are just giving it attributes that it doesn’t have, its doesn’t have any other motivations other then that. If it can make money of white music, black music, pink, brown, blue music it will do it, that’s the nature of the beast. If you make a million from an album and it’s a black person singing, they (label heads) will much prefer that then if a white person album made £999,999”.
The statements made by Safina and Kentish are in disagreement, while Kentish disregards that there is an element of racism, Safina believes that that institutional racism does exist, however he does not solely point the finger at institutions themselves, suggesting that there is unspoken racism amongst the British public and ultimately businesses have to cater to the majority who tend to hold these attitudes. Alex Ackon, producer of Mayhem TV suggests that there is a much simpler way of looking at it, highlighting the Brit Awards as an example;
“Because we’ve got the MOBO’s, they are trying to segregate us. We should be as recognised but instead they removed the Urban category”.
This lead to question if and where these attitudes existed amongst the British public, what had shaped them and if they actually impact on the how the music industry runs its operations in particular markets.
Literature pointed towards the media and its ability to shape public opinion and in particular the manner in which negative news concerning members of the black community often compares unfavourable with whites, which in the end attaches stigma, reduces sympathy, promotes fear and eventually breeds racism.
On an industry level and focusing on Hip Hop, labels have a job to market the genre’s authentic counter-cultural style and to achieve that on a mass scale is a difficult task as in theory the labels are trying to package what the public perceive and fear straight back to them. The question put forward was does negative media portrayal of black people in Britain shape stereotypes making it difficult to market the artist authentically? DJ FX from Pyroradio/SK Vibemakers felt that the media pick up on isolated stories and run with them, adding:
“Because they are so powerful, if they say something about black youth or a particular music scene it will damage them so the record labels will listen and end up sharing the same views”.
What FX suggests is that the media tend to generalise, as they did with groups like So Solid, and portray anyone who fits the stereotype as a possible criminal and everyone else a potential victim rather then individualising the defendants and victims.
Tendai Tyson, a Virgin Records artist from group Unklejam had a completely different take, pointing out artists such as 50 Cent who have been successfully marketed as counter-cultural artists, believing that blame for low sales is put on bad coverage in the media as a cover up and it’s really down to labels not knowing how to deal with black music that’s at the root of the problem. Tyson controversially added when black artists do become successful in the UK and build power they get:
“Shut down so they don’t become too big because England doesn’t want what’s in America; successful black owned businesses”.
- Racism & The Music Industry : Attitudes & The Media
In the late 1960’s Stokely Carmichael, an activist in the American Civil Rights Movement was credited with coining the phrase ‘institutional racism’.
He described it as "the collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their color, culture or ethnic origin”. Unlike individual racism which involves the attitudes and actions of individuals that perpetuate racism, institutional racism takes the form of systematic policies controlled by organisations and governments that disadvantage people because of their race.
Taking this description into hand and reflecting it on today’s music industry, some may argue that this form of racism is prevalent at all levels within the industry.
Existing knowledge suggests that in the United States, black personnel have been systematically excluded from positions of power within the industry, therefore the starting point to fill knowledge gaps in regards to the UK, was to ask personnel from all levels in the British music industry if they felt that policies or practices existed which could be seen as disadvantageous to a person from a minority ethnic group. Co-Manager of independent label Illastate Records (Akala, Ms Dynamite) Rez Safina said:
“Yes it does exist, but it’s complicated. Unfortunately the business reflects attitudes in society, because the business caters to its audience, the British public, and there is so much unspoken racism there. So if the businesses want to make money they have to spend their most money marketing to large demographics, and smaller budgets to smaller demographics. The only way the music business could operate in a totally racially equal way would be if society did”.
A&R Manager Joe Kentish from major label Universal/Def Jam said that every decision or action taken is to do with business, and assuming that there is an element of discrimination was to overestimate the industry’s goals. He went on to say:
“The goals of this major record company is to make money full stop, end of story, and you are just giving it attributes that it doesn’t have, its doesn’t have any other motivations other then that. If it can make money of white music, black music, pink, brown, blue music it will do it, that’s the nature of the beast. If you make a million from an album and it’s a black person singing, they (label heads) will much prefer that then if a white person album made £999,999”.
The statements made by Safina and Kentish are in disagreement, while Kentish disregards that there is an element of racism, Safina believes that that institutional racism does exist, however he does not solely point the finger at institutions themselves, suggesting that there is unspoken racism amongst the British public and ultimately businesses have to cater to the majority who tend to hold these attitudes. Alex Ackon, producer of Mayhem TV suggests that there is a much simpler way of looking at it, highlighting the Brit Awards as an example;
“Because we’ve got the MOBO’s, they are trying to segregate us. We should be as recognised but instead they removed the Urban category”.
This lead to question if and where these attitudes existed amongst the British public, what had shaped them and if they actually impact on the how the music industry runs its operations in particular markets.
Literature pointed towards the media and its ability to shape public opinion and in particular the manner in which negative news concerning members of the black community often compares unfavourable with whites, which in the end attaches stigma, reduces sympathy, promotes fear and eventually breeds racism.
On an industry level and focusing on Hip Hop, labels have a job to market the genre’s authentic counter-cultural style and to achieve that on a mass scale is a difficult task as in theory the labels are trying to package what the public perceive and fear straight back to them. The question put forward was does negative media portrayal of black people in Britain shape stereotypes making it difficult to market the artist authentically? DJ FX from Pyroradio/SK Vibemakers felt that the media pick up on isolated stories and run with them, adding:
“Because they are so powerful, if they say something about black youth or a particular music scene it will damage them so the record labels will listen and end up sharing the same views”.
What FX suggests is that the media tend to generalise, as they did with groups like So Solid, and portray anyone who fits the stereotype as a possible criminal and everyone else a potential victim rather then individualising the defendants and victims.
Tendai Tyson, a Virgin Records artist from group Unklejam had a completely different take, pointing out artists such as 50 Cent who have been successfully marketed as counter-cultural artists, believing that blame for low sales is put on bad coverage in the media as a cover up and it’s really down to labels not knowing how to deal with black music that’s at the root of the problem. Tyson controversially added when black artists do become successful in the UK and build power they get:
“Shut down so they don’t become too big because England doesn’t want what’s in America; successful black owned businesses”.
Bashy - Catch Me If You Can album review
See I’ve had a bit of problem with Bashy, stemming from an incident that happened way way back, so I’ve always found myself with a chip on my shoulder when it came to him because of it.
Felt a bit unfair as I see this guy is doing a lot of positive things in the scene and becoming a real artist, rather then just an MC from the ends.
So I get hold of this album for a bash (no pun intended) and stick it on from start to finish while I cotch with my breakfast…
In a podcast I listened to recently Bashy went on about how he’s “different” and how “there’s no one in the game that’s doing what I’m doing”. I agree, he does have something unique about him but at the same time I can’t say that his uniqueness is all that great. I mean, I make scrambled egg’s in a unique way, I don’t think anyone on my street does them this way, but are they good? Are they the best egg’s this side of Hoxton? Nah. My point is that from his Special Delivery days to his new stuff as a fully fledged solo artist he’s had something missing; I think his flow is sporadic at times, his punch lines lack weight behind them and his word play isn’t as smart as he’d like us to think. There were a few times I was reaching for the skip button as some tracks lacked either the energy or concept needed to sustain my interest.
On the plus side though, I reckon the collab “Ransom” with feat Wretch 32 and Scorcher, the conscious “Life”, the funky “Your Wish Is My Command” and the grimey “Kidulthood 2 Adulthood” are all stand out hits.
I’m feeling Bashy for his work rate and overall I think this a good album and possibly a marker for the rest of the UK scene on how to push yourself successfully and independently.
6 out of 10
Felt a bit unfair as I see this guy is doing a lot of positive things in the scene and becoming a real artist, rather then just an MC from the ends.
So I get hold of this album for a bash (no pun intended) and stick it on from start to finish while I cotch with my breakfast…
In a podcast I listened to recently Bashy went on about how he’s “different” and how “there’s no one in the game that’s doing what I’m doing”. I agree, he does have something unique about him but at the same time I can’t say that his uniqueness is all that great. I mean, I make scrambled egg’s in a unique way, I don’t think anyone on my street does them this way, but are they good? Are they the best egg’s this side of Hoxton? Nah. My point is that from his Special Delivery days to his new stuff as a fully fledged solo artist he’s had something missing; I think his flow is sporadic at times, his punch lines lack weight behind them and his word play isn’t as smart as he’d like us to think. There were a few times I was reaching for the skip button as some tracks lacked either the energy or concept needed to sustain my interest.
On the plus side though, I reckon the collab “Ransom” with feat Wretch 32 and Scorcher, the conscious “Life”, the funky “Your Wish Is My Command” and the grimey “Kidulthood 2 Adulthood” are all stand out hits.
I’m feeling Bashy for his work rate and overall I think this a good album and possibly a marker for the rest of the UK scene on how to push yourself successfully and independently.
6 out of 10
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