Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:44 | By

Eddy Says: Terminator or Predator? One of life’s more important questions

Eddy Says

Predator

We define ourselves as people by our tastes – particularly as social networking and online sharing becomes more and more a part of our daily lives. The elements of pop culture you clutch to your heart say as much about you as those you push away. This week Eddy Temple-Morris has a question that will ascertain what sort of person you are, based purely on your view of two Arnold Schwarzenegger movies.

This week I was reminded of a question I was once asked by one of the best lyricists I’ve been lucky enough to cross paths with in my life.

Dan Fisher wrote the words for The Cooper Temple Clause songs, and these days he’s fronting his own band, Red Kite, who are staggeringly good, but this piece is not about them, but about a random question Dan asked me last year, or possibly the year before.

There was a drinking session going on at my Losers partner (another a former Cooper) Tom Bellamy’s old place on the North Circular. It was a weekend afternoon and I’d joined a party that’d been going on for a while. Ciders were flowing, and Tom’s laptop was being passed, centrifugally, around the front room, where turns were taken with tune choice from Spotify. I love this game – when alcohol starts removing inhibitions, people’s tune choice can be very interesting and revealing.

But again, I digress, because in the middle of all of this a heated debate was taking hold. It was a debate that was sparked off by a deep question. It’s a question that, on the surface of things, doesn’t look that deep. But I assure you, it has ramifications way beyond its initial veneer.

Dan looked me in the eye and said: “Eddy, I have a question for you. It’s an important question: ‘Terminator’ or ‘Predator’?”

“That’s a very tough call”, I replied. “But what exactly are you asking me?”

“Which is the best one… the one you’d put on first?”

“But hang on, that’s two different questions and two different answers”, I ventured.

“No, it’s not”. Fisher (nobody calls him Dan, except possibly his parents) was unilateral. “The one you’d put on first is the best film”, he decreed.

I thought about this hard, and however I approached it, I could not get away from this thought: ‘Terminator’ is the best film but I’d always put ‘Predator’ on first.

“Aaaaah, then ‘Predator’ is the best film”, Fisher scoffed, while asking if I could pull another ‘apple juice’ from behind the sofa. Others in the room were joining in, allying themselves with one or the other, picking things they loved about each film.

“No it’s not, it’s the one I’d put on first. That doesn’t automatically qualify it as the best film”.

“Yes it does”, Fisher maintained. “If you put it on first, that means your saying it’s the best, there’s no argument here”.

“But there absolutely is!” I protested. “Look, ‘Terminator’ HAS to be the better film, it’s the genre prototype, Cameron’s vision, the script, the amazing story, the weird techno soundtrack, these are all things that make it stand out as a unique film that pushes the envelope”.

“But you like ‘Predator’ more?!” He interjected.

“Yes, I do”.

“And you’d always put it on first?”

“Yes, I would”.

“Then it’s the better film”.

“No, it’s not”.

This went on for some time, with hoots coming from various parts of the room. Our mutual friend, a lovely man called Matt Dunbar, was getting stuck in too, feet firmly in the ‘Predator’ camp. I don’t think we ever reached an accord. We just had to agree to disagree. Fisher gets famously bloody minded after a certain number of cans. But I’ve come back to this question again, and again, and laughed at how useful it is.

It’s a brilliant question, almost like a formula, or a metaphor, that can be applied across just about anything. I keep returning to this question, in the context of music, and in particular, this past year or two, in the context of dubstep.

Somebody on my Facebook wall last week said this: “Really hard to hate on Skrillex, but it’s slowly becoming a gimmick with repetitive sounds, patterns and arrangements though”.

My reply was immediate: “I know what you mean, it’s comparatively shallow but hugely entertaining, I think. Like watching ‘Predator’ instead of ‘Terminator'”.

His reply made me laugh: “That’s an excellent comparison!” Thanks Hugo!

But that’s it, isn’t it? That’s effectively the key to this whole Purist v Eclectic thing: Just replace ‘Terminator’ with, I dunno, Skream or Benga, and ‘Predator’ with Skrillex or Knife Party. There’s no question in my mind that the purist makes the ‘better record’ for a number of reasons, but when I’m in a club, or at a gig, the majority of my crowd are gagging for those big, fat, dirty noises, just like we love when the screen goes all ‘heat vision’ and you hear that guttural clicking noise that ‘Predator’ makes when he’s stalking his prey from the jungle canopy.

I LOVE ‘Terminator’, but next to ‘Predator’, it’s harder to watch. Cameron’s bleak vision is just not as easy on the eye as the sweeping, technicolor jungle panorama; and Brad Friedel’s haunting, stripped down, sort of 8-bit techno electronic soundtrack is much tougher than the huge, orchestral, rousing and stirring ‘Predator’ score by Alan Silvestri (who did ‘Back To The Future’ a short time before this). Like the theory of relativity, “‘Terminator’ or ‘Predator’?” is a question that can be applied across the whole of life, art, architecture, poetry, literature, or music. Respect and kudos goes to the envelope pushers, the genre definers, the frontier people whose talent and energy created something, but props must also go to the people that took that idea and made it more accessible by making it less deep and therefore more fathomable. When you go snorkelling in the shallows, the colours are brighter than when you go diving at depth.

So there it is: I KNOW ‘Terminator’ is the better film, and I love seeing it when it invariably comes on the telly, but if I’m honest, and I remember most people in that beautifully drunken room at Tom’s agreeing with me, if I had both DVDs in my hand and I had to put one of them on, it would have to be ‘Predator’. I’m a ‘Predator’ kind of guy. So shoot me. But please shoot me with one of those shoulder mounted Gatling guns, like the one Native American Billy Sole (Sonny Landham), scythed an area of jungle the size of Luxembourg with, when he emptied a whole box magazine in blind fury, ripping through branches, splintering boughs and shattering trunks. It sounded a bit like a Skrillex tune, didn’t it?

x eddy

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:43 | By

Approved: Saint Etienne – Tonight

CMU Approved

Saint Etienne

For a notably prolific band, it’s hard to believe that Saint Etienne’s forthcoming new album is their first in seven years. They’ve hardly been idle in that time (lush reissues, a Christmas album, Best Of and two films kept them busy) but it’s still good to have them back.

According to Bob, Pete and Crackers, ‘Tonight’ is “about how the unadulterated thrill of a great band or gig can sometimes feel like a hotline straight to your heart”. Of course, if you had to entrust one group to deliver a song that is both great pop and about great pop, Saint Etienne would be number one every time.

Produced by ex-Xenomania man Tim Powell, it’s an inevitably fizzy pop delight that proves a particularly welcome distraction for four minutes in these oppressively bleak times.

Released on 7 Mar, the track is up on Soundcloud now:

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:43 | By

Live Nation deals with more Springsteen ticket issues, while AEG discusses the roll out of its Ticketmaster rival

Business News Live Business Top Stories

Ticketmaster

The last time there were problems with the sale of Bruce Springsteen tickets on Ticketmaster’s American website all hell broke lose, leading to much ranting, quite a bit of litigation, and some talk about new rules to govern secondary ticketing.

Which is presumably why the Live Nation-owned ticketing giant was quick to issue a statement after Springsteen fans, struggling to get tickets for the Boss’s latest tour, noticed said tickets were already appearing for sale at marked up prices on resale sites.

In 2009, when the main Ticketmaster site struggled to cope with demand for the sale of Springsteen tickets, it pointed fans in the direction of the firm’s own ticket resale service, TicketsNow, which was already selling marked-up secondary tickets for the shows, even though primary tickets were still technically available. Springsteen was not happy when he heard what was happening, and the resulting fallout threw a spotlight onto the whole secondary ticketing thing, and especially Ticketmaster’s dabblings in the resale sector, in both the American media and US political circles.

Much of the drama happened in Springsteen’s home state of New Jersey, where demand for tickets was highest, though loud criticism of the boom in online ticket touting (or scalping, to use the American term) occurred at a national level, and one New Jersey congressman, Bill Pascrell, proposed new legislation on Capitol Hill which would have forced more transparency on the ticketing industry, and especially on the relationship between primary ticket sellers and those who resell for profit online.

Tickets for a new Springsteen tour went on sale last Friday, and the Ticketmaster site again struggled to cope with demand, with many fans finding frozen screens when they tried to buy. But the scalpers were seemingly getting access to tickets, because they were fast appearing on resale sites like StubHub.

Having learned its lesson in 2009, Ticketmaster is now much more cautious in the way it promotes its ticket resale site via its own primary tickets platform, so can’t be accused this time of prematurely directing customers to marked up secondary tickets itself. However, critics of the ticketing giant again wondered why touts were seemingly getting tickets, when genuine fans were not.

Ticketmaster admitted its servers had been particularly busy, adding that this was likely because touts were using software to try to buy up as many tickets as possible, putting a strain on the system. But, the company added, it was doing everything possible to ensure actual fans could get tickets directly, adding that primary tickets were still available.

Said the ticketing firm: “We have been experiencing highly abnormal traffic patterns on our site this morning that have impacted the fan buying experience for some customers. Early indications suggest that much of this traffic came from highly suspicious sources, implying that scalpers were using sophisticated computer programs to assault our systems and secure tickets with the sole intention of selling them in the resale market. We are investigating the source of the problem and are working to resolve it as quickly as possible, but tickets are selling so please stay patient”.

While Ticketmaster’s own secondary site was not overtly benefiting this time round, Pascrell still told reporters on Friday that he was aware of the problems Springsteen fans had had buying tickets from the primary seller and, assuming that was indeed in part due to scalpers employing bots to grab as many tickets as possible, there was now a case for Congress to give some new consideration to the ticket resales market. The congressman said in a statement: “Whether today’s problems are due to honest mistakes or dishonest market manipulation, regular folks who wanted a little entertainment were not able to get what they wanted at a fair price”.

The wider music industry, of course, has often dithered on the issue of secondary ticketing, on both sides of the Atlantic. While some key artists, managers and promoters have spoken out against the growth of ticketing touting in the online age – some calling on the political community to introduce new rules to limit the secondary market – it’s known some other artists, managers and promoters routinely resell their own ticket allocations for gigs via resale sites to generate some extra revenue, making it tricky for the industry at large to vehemently call for some kind of touting controls.

As Live Nation and Ticketmaster dealt with the grumbling Bruce Springsteen fans again, their main competitor, AEG Live, has been talking up its new ticketing platform, AXS, which had a low key launch in the US last summer, and which is set to grow in 2012. AEG, of course, decided to launch its own ticketing business after rival Live Nation merged with Ticketmaster in 2010.

And one of the services due to be included in AXS as it rolls out is ticket lottery system, whereby users can pre-register for in-demand events, and tickets will be distributed on a random basis, presumably with efforts to filter obvious touts out of the lottery process. AEG hopes the lottery system, similar to that used by Glastonbury Festival, might overcome the frustrations felt by fans when tickets for big tours sell out in minutes while they struggle to get the relevant webpage to load.

Other AXS features revealed by AEG’s ticketing chief Bryan Perez in a briefing yesterday, according to the Wall Street Journal, include the option for friends to book seats in a block, but each pay on their own credit card, and widgets that will make it easier for sponsors and other music services to sell tickets using the AXS system via their own sites.

AEG’s new business partner, Mark Cuban, was also on hand to discuss the previously reported brand extension, AXS TV, which will appear in place of Cuban’s existing US TV network HDNet. He confirmed the new network will air recordings of concerts and other live events, and would also have a regular entertainment magazine show called AXS Live.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:40 | By

Mega data given two week reprieve

Digital MegaUpload Timeline Top Stories

MegaUpload

The lawyer currently speaking for MegaUpload has told reporters that the server companies which hosted the now defunct file-transfer service has said it will hold onto all the web firm’s data for at least another two weeks, ending fears said data could be deleted this Thursday.

As previously reported, MegaUpload was taken offline earlier this month when the US authorities raided server facilities in Virginia that hosted much of the web company’s online operations. The shutdown occurred as various execs linked to the company were arrested on charges of copyright infringement, money laundering and racketeering.

But, while the Mega companies are accused of making millions by providing downloads and streams of unlicensed music, movies and TV shows, the MegaUpload service did have a legitimate element, in that users could distribute and store their own content via the Mega platform. Many now wonder what will happen to the legit content that belongs to Mega’s former customers, said users being unable to access their Mega accounts since the service was taken offline.

All that data is stored on the servers of two US companies, Carpathia Hosting and Cogent Communications, neither of whom are being paid by Mega anymore, the rogue web firm having had all its bank accounts frozen. The American authorities seemed to shirk any responsibility for the legit data stored on the Mega platform last week, saying it was a matter for Carpathia and Cogent, while a court submission from the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia said it was under the impression the server companies would begin deleting Mega data this Thursday.

But MegaUpload attorney Ira Rothken, himself keen to ensure the legit content on Mega’s servers is not deleted so it can be used as part of his client’s defence, told reporters yesterday the server firms had given him more time to negotiate with government officials in a bid to find a way to rescue the at risk data – presumably by freeing up some of Mega’s frozen funds to pay Carpathia and Cogent to somehow return legit data to customers.

Rothken told reporters yesterday: “The hosting companies have been gracious enough to provide additional time so we can work out some kind of arrangement with the government”.

As also previously reported, while US authorities seem disinterested in the at risk data, some former Mega users in Spain are planning to sue, claiming that by switching off the Mega servers with no notice America breached Spanish laws on “misappropriating personal data”.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:38 | By

Survivor man sues US presidential hopeful over song use

Business News Legal

Frankie Sullivan

Another American politician is being sued for using a song on the campaign trail without the songwriter’s permission, though it’s not certain how successful this particular legal attack will be.

According to TMZ, Rude Music, the company of Survivor guitarist and songwriter Frankie Sullivan, has sued Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich, for the former congressman’s use of his song ‘Eye Of The Tiger’ at political rallies. Sullivan co-wrote the track in 1982 as the theme for ‘Rocky III’.

Sullivan’s lawsuit reportedly accuses Gingrich of violating his copyright by playing the song at his rallies, and is seeking an injunction to stop its use.

Sullivan is by no means the first artist to hit out at a politician for using one of his songs as a campaign tool, with many musicians fearing that the use of their tracks by political types implies some sort of endorsement. Artists in both the US and UK have complained about the use of their songs in this way, though its only really Stateside that said artists threaten legal action.

The problem for Sullivan, though, is that where legal threats have worked in the past the offending politician has used a song in some sort of online content, usually syncing the song to a video. That’s a more straightforward case of copyright infringement. But if venues where political rallies take place have public performance licences from the US collecting societies – Sullivan is an ASCAP member – then the presidential wannabes are probably covered copyright-wise if they only use songs at live events.

Though few politicians would enjoy the prospect of facing off a popular musician in court during campaigning season, so it may be that Sullivan’s lawyers know a mere threat of action will be enough to persuade Team Gingrich to compile a new soundtrack, even if copyright law is not especially on their side.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:30 | By

NME award noms out

Awards

NME

So, the noms are out for the NME Awards 2012, where Kasabian, The Vaccines, Florence Welch and The Horrors are also due to play, while the host has been confirmed as posh boy stand up Jack Whitehall who, noting an incident at the 2006 NME awards show involving that year’s host Russell Brand, told reporters yesterday: “It’s brilliant to be able to host the NME awards, I’m one step closer to having Bob Geldof call me a cunt!”

Whether Geldof plans to be present at the Brixton Academy on 29 Feb isn’t clear, but many of the following nominees presumably will be, so maybe one of them could take on the “call Whitehall a cunt” duties. And talking of the noms, and not that we would wish to influence the voting (which is now open at this URL), but would it not be wonderful if Beady Eye were declared Worst Band on the same night Noel Gallagher was declared a Godlike Genius? Or is that just me? Anyway, those noms…

Best British Band: Arctic Monkeys, Bombay Bicycle Club, The Horrors, Kasabian, Muse

Best International Band: Arcade Fire, Foo Fighters, Justice, Odd Future (OFWGKTA), The Strokes

Best Solo Artist: Adele, Florence Welch, Frank Turner, Laura Marling, Miles Kane, Noel Gallagher

Best New Band: Foster The People, Lana Del Rey, Tribes, The Vaccines, Wu Lyf

Best Live Band: Arctic Monkeys, Kasabian, Muse, Pulp, Two Door Cinema Club

Best Album: Artic Monkeys – Suck It and See, The Horrors – Skying, Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds – Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, PJ Harvey – Let England Shake, The Vaccines – What Did You Expect From The Vaccines?

Best Track: Arctic Monkeys – The Hellcat Spangled Shalalala, Bombay Bicycle – Club Shuffle, Florence + The Machine – Shake It Out, Hurts – Sunday, Lana Del Rey – Video Games

Dancefloor Anthem: Azealia Banks – 212, Foster The People – Pumped Up Kicks, Justice – Civilization, Katy B – Broken Record, Metronomy – The Bay

Best Video: Arctic Monkeys – Suck It And See, Beyonce – Countdown, Hurts – Sunday, Lana Del Rey – Video Games, Tyler, The Creator – Yonkers

Best TV Show: Dr Who, Fresh Meat, Misfits, Never Mind The Buzzcocks, This is England 88

Best Festival: Bestival, Glastonbury, Reading & Leeds, T In The Park, V

Best Film: Black Swan, Drive, Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part Two, Inbetweeners, Submarine

Best Music Film: Back And Forth – Foo Fighters, Living In The Material World – George Harrison, Talihina Sky – Kings Of Leon, There Are No Innocent Bystanders – Libertines, Upside Down – The Creation Records Story

Greatest Music Moment: Brian May joins My Chemical Romance on stage at Reading Festival, Kasabian see in 2012 with their epic O2 show, Noel Gallagher launches solo career with classic press conference, Pulp steal the show at Glastonbury with secret set, The Stone Roses reunite

Best Re-issue: Manic Street Preachers – National Treasures, Nirvana – Never Mind, Primal Screen – Screamadelica, Rolling Stones – Some Girls, The Smiths – Complete Re-Issues

Best Book: Jarvis Cocker – Mother, Brother, Lover, Noel Fielding – The Scribblings Of A Madcap Shambleton, Jared Leto – Notes From The Outernet, Shaun Rider – Twisting My Melon, Malcolm X – A Life Of Reinvention

Hero Of The Year: Alex Turner, Dave Grohl, Matt Bellamy, Noel Fielding, Noel Gallagher

Villain Of The Year: Justin Bieber, David Cameron, Nick Clegg, Liam Gallagher, Lady Gaga

Worst Album: Justin Bieber – Under The Mistletoe, Coldplay – Mylo Xyloto, Lady Gaga – Born This Way, One Direction – Up All Night, Viva Brother – Famous First Words

Worst Band: Beady Eye, Coldplay, Muse, One Direction, Viva Brother

Best Album Artwork: Arctic Monkeys – Suck It And See, Bjork – Biophilia, Bombay Bicycle Club – A Different Kind of Fix, Friendly Fires – Pala, Jay Z and Kanye West – Watch The Throne

Best Band Blog or Twitter: @Example, Frank-turner.com/blog, @kaynewest, @Ladygaga, @Theohurts

Best Small Festival: Field Day, Hop Farm, Latitude, Kendall Calling, Rockness

Most Dedicated Fans: Arctic Monkeys, Hurts, Muse, My Chemical Romance, 30 Seconds To Mars

Hottest Male: Matt Bellamy (Muse), Andy Biersack (Black Veil Brides), Dom Howard (Muse), Jared Leto (30 Seconds To Mars), Gerard Way (My Chemical Romance)

Hottest Female: Marina Diamandis (Marina And The Diamonds), Amy Lee (Evanescence), Katy Perry,
Florence Welch, Hayley Williams (Paramore)

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:25 | By

Xfm New Music Award shortlist announced

Artist News Awards Media

Xfm

The shortlist for Xfm’s annual New Music Award, which is presented to what is deemed the best debut album of the previous year, has been announced.

The shortlist is voted for by the station’s listeners, while the overall winner is selected by a panel, which this year includes Xfm presenters John Kennedy and Mary Anne Hobbs, producer John Leckie, Muse drummer Dom Howard, Peter Hook, and one Xfm listener.

Says John Kennedy: “A classic debut album is both the culmination of a lifetime of experience and the launch pad for a future life of musical creativity. It’s great that Xfm recognises this and seeks to give it the attention it deserves. 2011 was an amazing year for debuts, to choose one for the Award will be quite a task!”

The winner will be announced on 8 Feb at The Ritz in Manchester.

The shortlist is as follows:

Beady Eye – Different Gear, Still Speeding
James Blake – James Blake
Chapel Club – Palace
Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds – Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds
Ben Howard – Every Kingdom
Miles Kane – Colour Of The Trap
Benjamin Francis Leftwich – Last Smoke Before The Snowstorm
Scroobius Pip – Distraction Pieces
Ed Sheeran – +
The Vaccines – What Did You Expect From The Vaccines?

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:23 | By

Live Nation boss tops Billboard’s power 100

Business News Industry People Live Business

Irving Azoff

It’s always brave of an industry trade magazine to publish one of those ‘most important people in our business’ lists, given the politics of ensuring no key advertiser, subscriber or other influential contact is left out.

Old timers in the British record industry will remember that Sony-lite Music Week power list, and the subsequent fallout. But Billboard has put such concerns to the back of its mind and ploughed ahead with its first ever Power 100 list, lining up what it considers to be the 100 most important people in the American music business.

Five years ago the safe way to play it with one of these lists was to stick at geek in the top spot – usually Steve Jobs – so that all the egos actually within the music industry vying for the number one position could be told “well, you know, it’s all about computers these days, innit?” But Billboard hasn’t chickened out and gone with Mark Zuckerberg or Daniel Ek at the top, and instead has named Live Nation co-chief and veteran artist manager Irving Azoff the most important man in music.

Putting Live Nation, the biggest live music company in the world, ahead of Universal Music, the biggest music rights company in the world, is interesting for sure. Presumably Universal boss Lucian Grainge will take it on the chin though, partly because Live Nation and Universal became business partners last year, and partly because being officially labelled as only the second most important music company in the world could come in helpful when trying to convince American anti-trust regulators that letting Universal swallow up the EMI record company isn’t that big a deal really.

Grainge, though, isn’t even second, with Coran Capshaw, boss of artist management power house Red Light Management ahead of the Universal chief at number two. Although Capshaw has successfully dabbled in various music and online ventures over the years, his management agency is his core business. And given that Azoff rose to the top of Live Nation via his Front Line management business, now an important part of the live music conglom, I guess Billboard is really telling us the veteran artist managers have the real power in music at the moment.

Though the major label and publishing chiefs do start to appear as you scan down the list which you can find in full on the Billboard site below. And while most parts of the industry are covered, including music rights, live, management, digital and media, it’s not an especially diverse bunch. Certainly, if Billboard is to be believed, old white men are very much still in dominance at the top of the American music business.

The full 100 is here.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:20 | By

Will.i.am adds Britney and Shakira to solo album roll call

Artist News

Will.i.am

Britney Spears and Shakira are the latest guests to join the all-star line-up on Will.i.am’s fourth studio album, ‘#willpower’, which is due out later this year.

Mick Jagger and Jennifer Lopez appeared on the recently released single ‘THE (The Hardest Ever)’, and Alicia Keys, Swedish House Mafia, Swizz Beatz, Eva Simons, and LMFAO will also feature on the album. Oh, and Busta Rhymes is on there somewhere, but that’s pretty much a given these days, there are few albums he doesn’t appear on in some capacity.

Speaking to Capital FM, Will.i.am said: “I have a song with Alicia Keys – me, Alicia and Swedish House Mafia. Me and Shakira have been trying to finish the stuff we started, and me and Britney is really crazy. So we got a song with me, LMFAO and Eva Simons. A song with me and Busta Rhymes and Swizz Beatz. I got a whole other bunch of collaborations”.

Discussing the album’s social networking-ready title, he explained: “#willpower is just a reminder to myself of staying consistent with the dream – keeping the dream alive. It was all a dream when I was fifteen years old – 20 years later I managed to take the dream from an idea to physicality. So #willpower is uplifting songs, encouragement for those that need it”.

Joy. In other Shakira news, the Colombian singer has been made a Chevalier De L’ordre Des Arts Et Des Lettres (or Knight Of The Order Of The Arts And Letters) by the French government. So that’s nice.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:17 | By

These New Puritans writing new LP

Artist News

These New Puritans

Work has started on a sequel to These New Puritans’ much-acclaimed second studio LP ‘Hidden’, the band have announced.

The new record will come out on London-based independent Infectious Music (Local Natives, Temper Trap) rather than via the band’s former label Angular Records, a move that has seemingly involved a lot of tedious legal shenanigans.

A TNP tweet reads: “We are making a new album. We spent months with lawyers and are pleased to have moved to Infectious Music for its release”.

So, that’s that.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:13 | By

Jack White details solo debut, streams new track

Releases

Jack White

Jack White is streaming ‘Love Interruption’, the first single taken from his debut solo album ‘Blunderbuss’, online at this very moment. Said long player, which was produced by the ex White Stripe at his label Third Man Records’ Nashville studio, is slated for release via XL/Third Man on 23 Apr.

Says White of his long-awaited lone venture: “This is an album I couldn’t have released until now. I’ve put off making records under my own name for a long time but these songs feel like they could only be presented under my name. These songs were written from scratch, had nothing to do with anyone or anything else but my own expression, my own colours on my own canvas”.

The really rather good ‘Love Interruption’ is also available as a digital single as of today, backed with  non-album cut ‘Machine Gun Silhouette’. Meanwhile listen to ‘Love Interruption’ online here.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:07 | By

I Like Trains name album

Releases

I Like Trains

Having shared studio time with Wild Beasts’ producer Richard Formby, post-rock troupe I Like Trains have at last revealed a title and release date for their forthcoming third LP. ‘The Shallows’, as they’ve titled it, is expected out via their own label ILR on 7 May.

Meanwhile, it’s available for pre-order in both standard and deluxe CD/vinyl format at the ILR web store.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:05 | By

Libertines doc director offers extras via Pledge partnership

Artist News

Libertines Documentary

The company behind new Libertines documentary ‘There Are No Innocent Bystanders’, Pulse Films, has teamed up with PledgeMusic to offer fans access to all sorts of extra material filmed by director Roger Sargent when he followed the band on their brief 2010 reunion, which climaxed with their sets at the Reading and Leeds festivals.

The film is due to be screened at various Academy venues around the UK in March before going on general release in April. Fans can pre-order the DVD version and other related content, including a live EP, artwork, and all sorts of extra stuff via the Pledge website, which is offering a number of different packages in different price ranges. The Pledge initiative has enabled Sargent to delve deeper into his footage and make lots of extra bits and pieces available to fans.

Says PledgeMusic MD Malcolm Dunbar: “The Libertines are a hugely important band and we are extremely pleased to be able to help them connect with their loyal and committed fanbase for this fantastic new project. The fact that we have already reached our original target in such a short space of time demonstrates the appetite out there for this new film and highlights the viability of getting fans involved at an early stage”.

More here.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 11:01 | By

New Order to tour

Gigs & Festivals

New Order

Recently reformed, if minus the presence of a certain original bassist, New Order have announced a healthy portion of UK tour dates. These will precede several festival fixtures in the band’s forthcoming live calendar, which include Serbia’s Exit and Spain’s Benicassim.

Tour dates:

26 Apr: Manchester, Apollo
29 Apr: Birmingham, Ballroom
2 May: London, Academy Brixton
5 May: Glasgow, Academy

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 10:59 | By

Fixers announce album, tour

Gigs & Festivals

Fixers

Fans of Oxford outfit Fixers’ cosmic psych-pop meld (as is neatly typified in new single ‘Iron Deer Dream’), will be pleased to know that the band are all set to release their debut album, ‘We’ll Be The Moon’, on 14 May.

The announcement comes matched with news of a set of headlining live dates, upon which Fixers will embark after supporting Kaiser Chiefs on their February tour. You’ll find details of the headline shows nestled beneath the ‘cereal horror’ happenings of the ‘Iron Deer Dream’ video.

11 May: Southampton, Joiners
12 May: Exeter, Cavern
14 May: Cardiff, Buffalo Bar
15 May: Bristol, Thekla
17 May: Oxford, Academy 2
18 May: Birmingham, Institute
21 May: Glasgow, King Tut’s
22 May: Newcastle, Cluny
23 May: Leeds, Brundell Social Club
25 May: Belfast, Aunt Annies
26 May: Dublin, Whelans
27 May: Manchester, Deaf Institute
28 May: Nottingham, Bodega
30 May: London, Scala
31 May: Norwich, Arts Centre
1 Jun: Sheffield, Leadmill

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 10:55 | By

Clock Opera plot tour around debut album

Gigs & Festivals

Clock Opera

Avant-pop architects Clock Opera have announced the release of their debut album, ‘Ways To Forget’. It’s due to surface on 9 Apr via Island/Moshi Moshi, after which the band will set off on the following live outing:

11 Apr: Newcastle, Academy 2
12 Apr: Sunderland, Little Rooms
13 Apr: York, Fibbers
14 Apr: Glasgow, King Tut’s
15 Apr: Leeds, Cockpit
17 Apr: Sheffield, Harley
18 Apr: Birmingham, Rainbow
19 Apr: Cardiff, 10 Feet Tall
20 Apr: Guilford, Boiler Room
21 Apr: Cambridge, Portland Arms
22 Apr: Southampton, Cellar
24 Apr: London, Scala
28 Apr: Oxford, Cellar
29 Apr: Brighton, Green Door
30 Apr: Portsmouth, Registry

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 10:53 | By

Festival line-up update – 31 Jan 2012

Artist News Festival Line-Up Update Gigs & Festivals

Primavera Sound

BENICASSIM, FIB Heineken, Valencia, Spain, 12-15 Jul: French DJ and all-round decks-pert David Guetta serves to supplement the Benicassim bill, setting a beat for fellow line-up residents The Stone Roses, New Order, Florence And The Machine, Miles Kane and Katy B. www.fiberfib.com

GREEN MAN FESTIVAL, Glanusk Park, Powys, Wales, 17-19 Aug: Feist rides the initial wave of acts to strike this year’s Green Man roster; confirmed, as she is, to close the festival with a headline set. Other acts announced include The Walkmen, Yann Tiersen, Junior Boys, Cass McCombs, Slow Club, Ghostpoet, The Wave Pictures and Islet. www.greenman.net

PINKPOP, Landgraaf, Limburg, Netherlands, 26-28 May: Perennially-popular folk troupe Mumford & Sons have been booked as warm-up men to already announced festival headliners Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, who top a triple-barrelled bill alongside Soundgarden and The Cure. www.pinkpop.nl

PRIMAVERA SOUND, Parc Del Forum, Barcelona, Spain, 30 May – 3 Jun: Amongst the latest batch of additions to this year’s Primavera programme are the varied but very good likes of Beirut, Girls, Iceage, Atlas Sound, Death Grips, Sharon Van Etten and Erol Alkan. The Rapture, Laura Marling, The War On Drugs, Yann Tiersen, Wavves, Real Estate and Dominant Legs also join co-headliners Björk, The Cure and Franz Ferdinand on a thriving overall bill. www.primaverasound.com

SOUNDWAVE CROATIA, The Garden, Tisno, Croatia, 19-23 Jul: This self-styled boutique happening has amongst its musical cast such beat-smart sorts as Ghospoet, De La Soul, Plaid, Kwes, Fink, DJ Yoda and, of course, Craig Charles. www.soundwavecroatia.com

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 10:50 | By

Bebo offline, but owners blame technical problems

Digital

Bebo

So, before we start this story here’s an important bit of background information you’ll require in order to understand what follows: Bebo was, until yesterday, still a live social network. Who knew? But is it still a going concern this morning? Well, that’s been very much of debate.

The one time MySpace and Facebook competitor, often dubbed as the kid’s social network in the UK, but once particularly big news in Ireland, went offline last night, leading to speculation that the site, offloaded by former owner AOL in 2010, had finally bitten the dust.

We still can’t connect to the site this morning, but apparently a spokesperson for Bebo has told Techcrunch that it is simply experiencing technical problems (well, according to Techcrunch the spokesperson said the site was down due to a “technical clusterfuck”), and that normal service will be resumed shortly. Which I’m sure will reassure the service’s nine remaining users.

Even Bebo’s original founder Michael Birch seemed to think the site had finally died, tweeting as much last night, though he too later announced technical problems were to blame for Bebo.com being offline, saying via Twitter “Hold the press (too late for that), Bebo should be coming back in a matter of hours”.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 10:46 | By

More MIDEM announcements: Rara.com, Deezer, Eicall, CueSongs

Digital

MIDEM

OK, a few more digital style announcements from the MIDEM conference in Cannes for you.

First, Omnifone’s consumer-facing streaming service Rara.com, which launched last month, announced it had secured a pan-European deal with PRS For Music to cover publishing rights. Omnifone’s licensing man Jez Bell, himself a former PRS exec, told reporters: “Working closely with rights holders to license a great range of content for the next-generation music services powered by Omnifone is our priority, and alongside PRS For Music, we’re striving to redress the damage done to the music industry by online piracy”.

Second, GEMA, Germany’s publishing rights collecting society, confirmed it has licensed French-based streaming music platform Deezer which, as previously reported, is currently pursuing an ambitious roll out programme around the world. Getting licences from GEMA to operate in Germany has proven tricky for many streaming services, but the society recently published a new set of online tariffs, which the Deezer deal is based on. GEMA CEO Harald Heker told reporters: “We are convinced that signing the contract will send a signal to other online providers. The new rates make it clear it is indeed possible to reach agreements with GEMA that are lucrative for both sides”.

And third, both online music licensing platform Ricall and Peter Gabriel announced new ventures to make it easier and cheaper for smaller and grass roots organisations wanting to use music in videos to licence tracks by featured artists. Ricall Express announced deals with both EMI’s record labels and publishing company, plus music firms Imagem, Peermusic UK, Music Sales, Concord and others for its simplified grass roots sync licensing service.

Gabriel’s company is called CueSongs, and is led by Ed Averdieck, who previously collaborated with Gabriel at early download provider OD2. They also have a stack of both record companies and music publishers on board, including Sony, Peermusic, Cooking Vinyl, New State and Downtown Music. Said Gabriel: “Young and minority interest artists will be able to get their work in front of people all over the world looking to license something interesting and different. Successful artists will find that a lot of their catalogue that is now rarely touched can generate a lot of use, with easy access and the right price”.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 10:43 | By

Universal partners on yet another musical telly talent show

Media

Universal Music

Universal Music yesterday announced a new partnership with Dutch company the Talpa Media Group in relation to yet another talent TV show format to be called ‘The Winner Is’. Talpa is also the company behind talent franchise The Voice’, which is due to come to British screens in March via the BBC, and Universal is the record label partner on that programme too.

The press release describes the new show as follows: “Exceptionally talented singers are given the unique opportunity to earn money each week by using their vocal talent. But first they must beat their opponents in a series of die-hard vocal duels”. Singers of all ages and types, including professional artists looking for a televised comeback, will be welcome to take part, and there’ll be big cash to be won, with a million dollars up for grabs on the final edition.

Yeah, sounds shit doesn’t? It’ll probably be huge. Universal will then get to work with these “exceptionally talented singers”. Says Universal top man Lucian Grainge: “UMG is about breaking and nurturing new artists and their music. Our partnership with John and his team has provided the right combination of innovation, platform and talent to do just that in dynamic new way”.

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Tuesday 31 January 2012, 10:42 | By

Stone Roses’ Mani discovers £2m in bank account

And Finally

Mani

Stone Roses bassist Mani received a shock recently when he checked his bank balance at a cash machine and found £1.8 million had been deposited.

According to The Sun, Mani told friends in Stockport: “It’s madness. I only went out to buy milk and things. I went to the cashpoint and someone has stuck nearly £2 million in while I wasn’t looking. The whole world’s gone crazy. I could have fallen over backwards when I saw the balance”.

That this was a surprise to him suggests he didn’t read his contract for the band’s upcoming reunion tour very closely, the money being his share of the advance.

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:29 | By

Five Day Forecast – w/c 30 Jan 2012

CMU Planner

Andy Malt

Hey, it’s the end of January. That means we’re well on the way to putting this whole winter business behind us. Now, if I could only find my scarf, the rest of it would probably be a little more bearable. You could take your mind off the cold with the latest CMU podcast or (or indeed and) this selection of events, gigs and new releases that are available for you to enjoy this week. They’ll keep you indoors, at least.

01: MIDEM. The music industry’s jolly to Cannes started this weekend, of course, but there are still two days to go. And today is ‘Visionary Monday’, which sounds impressive. Ad agency Saatchi & Saatchi’s CEO Kevin Roberst will deliver a keynote address on how marketers can build brand loyalty through music partnerships. Plus producer Paul van Dyk and cellist Zoe Keating will discuss how musicians can build a sustainable career with digital tools, and Mark Ronson will talk about the Olympics campaign he’s involved in.

02: Super Bowl. Yeah, I wouldn’t normally feature sporting events in here. And I’m not now, really. There’s some big American football thing happening this coming weekend, but the sport bit is not what I’m interested in. I’m interested in Madonna’s big halftime show. After years of refusing, the singer has finally bowed down and given in to the massive pile of cash she can expect to receive in return for her performance. Plus, that ridiculous film of hers won’t promote itself.

03: Shhh. Music’s often very noisy. Especially live music. Thankfully, annual all-dayer Shhh returns this Saturday with some quiet music that doesn’t involve anyone shouting about how they got drunk in the club or any of that nonsense. Amongst those playing the eight hour event at The Gallery in Bethnal Green, East London are Tom Rogerson of Three Trapped Tigers, Tiny Ruins, Leah Kardos and Rob St John. It will be excellent.

04: New releases. Lana Del Rey‘s album is out, people. You’ve probably already voiced your opinion on it to half the world, but now you can actually listen to it too. Unless your original opinion was based on an illegal download of it I suppose, but I’m sure it wasn’t. The Chemical Brothers‘ live film ‘Don’t Think’ also goes on general release this week, following its premier in Hackney last week. As well as that, Charlotte Gainsbourg releases ‘Stage Whisper’, a collection of previously unreleased studio and live material, and Prinzhorn Dance School have their second album out.

05: Gigs. Following the release of his ‘4everevolution’ album last year, Roots Manuva will be out and about around the UK on tour this week, starting tomorrow night in Brighton and ending up at The Roundhouse in London on Saturday. As well as that, Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs, The Misfits, Thomas Truax, and Wild Flag will also be playing shows around the country too.

Andy Malt
Editor, CMU

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:27 | By

Approved: Battles – Dross Glop 1

CMU Approved

Battles

Particularly attentive CMU readers may recall my review of Battles’ ‘Gloss Drop’, an album which I was not exactly complimentary about. However, in the interests of balance, here is a more favourable piece on their new release, which consists of remixes from said album by various electronic types. ‘Dross Glop 1’ is the first in a four part twelve inch series, and it’s quite good too, if only (ie primarily) because it, er, doesn’t sound much like Battles at all (sorry, Battles fans).

The Field’s technofied remix of ‘Sweetie And Shag’ is somehow simultaneously epic and minimal, whilst Gui Boratto’s nu-disco take on ‘Wall Street’ keeps minute fragments of the original, but builds the track around a mariachi-esque brass refrain and twangy Spaghetti Western guitars, amid precision-tooled beats.

Released on 6 Feb, both tracks are up on YouTube now.

Sweetie And Shag:

Wall Street:

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:26 | By

What will happen to the legit files on the Mega platform?

Business News Digital Legal MegaUpload Timeline Top Stories

MegaUpload

The focus in the ongoing MegaUpload saga may this week turn to the possibly millions of legitimate files stored on the rogue web company’s servers, or, rather, the servers of the American companies it outsourced much of its storage to.

As much previously reported, the various Mega websites were taken offline earlier this month by the US authorities, who also arrested the firm’s top executives who are accused of mass copyright infringement, money laundering and racketeering. The shutdown followed an in depth investigation by the Feds prompted by anger in the music and especially movie industries that the Mega directors, and especially its founder Kim Schmitz, were making millions out of an operation that relied heavily on the distribution and streaming of unlicensed songs, films and TV shows.

However, as the Mega enterprise’s bosses are sure to stress if and when the criminal cases against them reach the American courts, the company’s file-transfer service did have legitimate uses too, allowing paying customers to move their own digital files across the net, and to have back-ups of their own content safely stored “in the cloud”, as it’s almost still fashionable to say.

When the Mega servers were shut down with immediate affect when the US authorities swooped the week before last, that meant the firm’s customers lost access to their own files as well as all the unlicensed music, movies and TV shows they may or may not have enjoyed accessing via the Mega platform. What will now happen to those files is unclear, though many fear they may all be deleted, as soon as this week.

The problem is that Mega didn’t store its customers’ files on its own hardware, but on servers it hired from two American companies called Carpathia Hosting Inc and Cogent Communications Group Inc. The US authorities didn’t actually seize the servers hosting Mega’s files, rather disconnected them from the net, and took copies of some content to use as evidence of the web outfit’s copyright infringement when the case comes to trial. Carpathia and Cogent are now left holding all that data.

In theory they could try returning legit data back to the customers who uploaded it, but that would be a time consuming endeavour, and just hosting all the data in the meantime is an expensive business when the Mega companies – with their bank accounts well and truly frozen – are now unable to pay the two server companies their hosting fees.

Although Carpathia and Cogent are yet to formally comment on their plans, according to US media a letter submitted to court by the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia on Friday indicated the two firms might now just delete all the data sitting on the servers Mega rented, starting the big disk wipe as soon as Thursday. The US authorities who shut down the Mega enterprise have seemingly washed their hands of what to do with the legit data stored on those offline servers, saying it’s a matter for Carpathia and Cogent.

Meanwhile, MegaUpload attorney Ira Rothken has confirmed to reporters that his clients are not able to pay its server providers to keep hold of any data because all the company’s funds have been frozen, though he added that he was negotiating with prosecutors to try to find a way to stop any widespread deletion of files, partly for the benefit of Mega’s former customers, and partly because he hopes to use the legit content stored on those servers in his clients’ defence.

Despite heightened fears that the big delete would start on Thursday, Rothken concluded by saying he was optimistic the content could be saved, telling the Associated Press: “We’re cautiously optimistic at this point that because the United States, as well as MegaUpload, should have a common desire to protect consumers, that this type of agreement will get done”.

As previously reported, the Spanish branch of The Pirate Party had already raised the issue of the legit files stored on the Mega servers early last week, threatening to sue the US authorities for depriving the web firm’s customers from accessing their own content, on the basis doing so breached Spanish laws on “misappropriating personal data”. Whatever the legalities, if deletion goes ahead, you can expect other branches of The Pirate Party and related organisations to shout loudly about this.

It’s not known quite how much legitimate content was actually stored on the Mega platform, but if even only a relatively small number of legitimate files are now lost as collateral damage stemming from the Mega shutdown, it’s certainly going to provide new ammunition to those who oppose new anti-piracy laws – such as America’s SOPA and PIPA proposals – on the grounds that protecting the copyrights of the few will have a negative impact on the legitimate web use of the many.

And if it turns out that a large number of people do lose legit files if and when the Mega servers are wiped, that might also mean that the Mega shutdown poses other problems for other players in the cloud-storage market. As previously reported, since the Mega swoop other file-transfer and storage companies have either removed those elements of their respective services that most tangibly enable copyright infringement, or blocked access to American users, or crafted statements to stress how their business is very different to that of MegaUpload.

But if word gets around that the cloud-based storage space you’re renting, partly to ensure all your files are safely backed up for eternity, might just be switched off overnight, then the whole concept of cloud-storage – a big growth market at the moment – might become less attractive to mainstream customers.

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:24 | By

Google is the problem, U2 manager tells MIDEM

Business News Legal Management & Funding Top Stories

Paul McGuinness

U2 manager Paul McGuinness’s vehement demands at MIDEM 2008 that it was high time the internet service providers stood up and took some action against online piracy was one of the undisputed stand out moments of the annual music business conference in recent years, so most delegate eyes were on McGuinness again this weekend as he returned to the MIDEM stage in Cannes.

True, moves in the subsequent four years to persuade and force the ISPs to act – by suspending the net access of file-sharing customers and/or blocking access to copyright infringing websites – have had limited success worldwide, but McGuinness’s 2008 speech certainly buoyed those in the industry who had been quietly fuming about ISP inaction on piracy for years, so everyone in Cannes this weekend was keen to see if he’d have any more bold words this time round and, if so, who would the enemy be in 2012?

As it turns out, it’s Google which is most pissing off McGuinness at the moment, partly for so vocally supporting the campaign against web-blocking legislation in the US earlier this month, and partly for not doing enough – in his opinion – to stop illegal sources of content from appearing high up in artist searches on the web giant’s core search engine platform.

On Google’s support for the recent Wikipedia-led campaign against the web-blocking SOPA and PIPA proposals working their way through US Congress, McGuinness said that we should “never underestimate the ability of a monopoly to defend itself”. Google had done a good job at employing the sort of viral marketing and social media campaigning that has become a core part of American politics in the Obama age, he admitted. But that didn’t mean all the people who ticked the search engine’s box to oppose SOPA and PIPA had understood all the arguments. Rather, he argued, the web giant’s one-sided spin on the issue sounded attractive at the time to the company’s customers.

Turning to his more general problems with Google, he said: “It amazes me that Google has not done the right thing. The experience of people when they go on Google and look for U2’s music or PJ Harvey’s music is a shopping list of illegal opportunities to get their songs. They have done nothing meaningful to discourage this fact”.

McGuinness’s comments this weekend follow the publication last week of a submission made by various UK-based entertainment industry trade bodes to media minister Ed Vaizey last November, in which they too expressed frustration that illegal content sources too frequently outrank legit sources on Google and other search engines.

In the confidential document – published following a Freedom Of Information request by the Open Rights Group – the BPI, Motion Picture Association, Premier League and others called on the government to introduce some sort of body to instruct search engines to remove copyright infringing websites from their results, something that would have also been introduced in the US under SOPA. The content industry trade bodies argued that, despite Google voluntarily introducing some measures to prioritise legitimate content in the last year, the situation had actually got worse.

Which is the same view that was also expressed by global record industry trade body the IFPI when it reviewed Google’s anti-piracy measures just before Christmas, in that previously reported document that concluded much more still needed to be done.

Back to MIDEM, and despite his very vocal criticisms of Google et al, McGuinness conceded that the solution was to convince the big tech companies that there are advantages – for their own businesses – in working with the content companies on the piracy issue, rather than relying on politicians who will too often shy away from measures which, on the face of it, will be unpopular with voters. And, he insisted, there is a compelling argument to present to the big web firms, because “ultimately it is in their interests that the flow of content will continue – and that won’t happen unless it’s paid for”.

While Google is the enemy in McGuinness’s eyes, he was more positive about Apple, the tech giant responsible for much of the record industry’s booming digital revenues. While admitting that Apple also drives a hard bargain, he said that working with the company was “challenging but worthwhile”, agreeing with fellow panellist, author Robert Levine, that the team at the iTunes operator were “tough bastards who respect copyright”. The U2 manager was also more positive about the other big emerging player in digital music, Spotify, blaming artist reservations about the streaming platform on the secrecy behind the major labels’ deals with the Swedish company, and adding that he felt such services had a long term future in the wider music business.

MusicAlly has a more detailed summary of the McGuinness session at MIDEM here.

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:22 | By

Lords approve final amendments to Live Music Bill

Business News Legal Live Business Top Stories

Houses Of Parliament

The House Of Lords gave speedy approval to the Live Music Bill on Friday, meaning the much previously reported legislation – which will remove much of the bureaucracy inflicted on the promoters of small music events by the 2003 Licensing Act – should now be law by March, with the Queen due to apply her rubber stamp sometime next month.

Although a private members’ bill, introduced twice by Liberal Lord Tim Clement Jones, the legislation – being approved by both the Coalition government and its original opponents, the Local Government Association, in its final form – was able to get through both the Lords and the Commons in the short time dedicated to non-government initiated proposals. Having passed the Commons the Friday before last, the Lords just needed to approve some final amendments last week.

Commenting on the impact his bill should now have by simplifying the process for staging small-scale gigs, Clement-Jones told reporters: “This is a modest Bill but one which I believe will have a major impact on the performance and enjoyment of live music, the livelihood especially of young musicians and the viability of our pubs and clubs’.

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:20 | By

Murray asks to be released from jail pending appeal

Jacksons v AEG Timeline Legal

Conrad Murray

Conrad Murray asked to be released from jail on Friday, so that he can prepare to appeal his manslaughter conviction outside of prison. He’d willingly agree to electronic tagging or other forms of house arrest, he added.

Murray, of course, was last year found guilty of causing the death of the late king of pop by negligently administering the drug propofol as a cure for insomnia. He was given the full four year jail sentence allowed for the crime by Judge Michael Pastor, who seemed angered by Murray’s refusal to speak in court, instead giving his side of the story to a TV documentary.

Murray plans to appeal both his conviction and jail sentence, and filed papers with the court on Friday asking to be freed while he goes through the appeals process. Attorney J Michael Flanagan, who seems to still be working for Murray despite the doctor saying he was broke and needed state-funded legal assistance for his appeal, wrote in the court submission that his client’s sentence was “very severe” given the circumstances of the case. He added that the doctor is being kept in solitary confinement which his hands chained to either his waist or a table at all times.

Flanagan added that Murray’s conviction stemmed from “an unusual situation, a close friendship with Michael Jackson and a desire to assist him through a difficult situation. Dr Murray may have made wrong choices and not have exercised good medical judgment at times, but he never intended to injure anyone”.

The court filing asked that Murray’s request for release from jail be heard on 24 Feb.

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:18 | By

Russian media firm and US agency in legal fight over Gaga booking

Business News Legal Live Business Media

Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga is at the heart of litigation between a Russian TV company and a US-based management agency, even though she is not personally involved in the dispute.

Russian media firm ZAO, which operates a music channel called MUZ-TV, says it paid Miami-based NWE $1.5 million with a view to the US agency securing the Gaga to play its TV network’s awards show in June. But ZAO is now trying to end its deal with the Miami firm because it believes NWE is not in a position to secure a Gaga booking, and is suing because the US agency is allegedly refusing to repay all the money the Russians handed over.

According to ZAO, NWE wants to charge $300,000 to compensate for the termination of the two companies’ deal, presumably disputing the Russian media outfit’s claims regards its ability to book Gaga for the MUZ-TV awards.

According to TMZ, ZAO want the courts to force NWE to hand over a full refund plus damages.

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:15 | By

NRJ Awards presented

Awards

NRJ Awards

The annual French pop awards bash that is the NRJ Awards took place in Cannes alongside MIDEM as usual this weekend, with the Bieber and LMFAO among the international winners, and Adele and even little old Mika representing the Brits. Here’s the winners list…

Francophone Revelation Of The Year: Keen V
International Revelation Of The Year: Adele

Francophone Male Artist Of The Year: M Pokora
International Male Artist Of The Year: Mika

Francophone Female Artist Of The Year: Shy’m
International Female Artist Of The Year: Rihanna

Francophone Song Of The Year: M Pokora – A Nos Actes Manques
International Song Of The Year: Adele – Someone Like You

Francophone Group/Duo Of The Year: Simple Plan feat. Marie-Mai
International Group/Duo Of The Year: LMFAO

Music Video Of The Year: LMFAO – Party Rock Anthem

NRJ Award Of Honor: Justin Bieber and Shakira
NRJ Award Of Diamond: Mylene Farmer

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Monday 30 January 2012, 12:12 | By

Billboard celebrates Seymour Stein with new award

Awards Business News

Billboard

Elsewhere in award giving in Cannes this weekend, veteran record business exec, industry conference regular, and champion rock n roll storyteller Seymour Stein was presented the Billboard Icon Award, a new prize to recognise lifetime achievements in the music industry. That the Sire Records co-founder deserves the prize is sort of a given, surely, but if you need convincing Billboard has posted a review of his career and a video of top names bigging Stein up at this URL.

Commenting on the award at the breakfast bash where it was presented, Billboard’s Editorial Director Bill Werde noted the impact one of Sire’s most famous signings, The Ramones, had on him personally when growing up. Said Werde: “The Ramones are really the band that changed my life. That was my gateway drug… That was the band that took me on my path and got me into cool music and got me into all these things. To some extent, you can blame Seymour for my being here at all. And Seymour, I personally thank you very much for that”.

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