Avenged Sevenfold will be producing their next record, and dubbed it the ‘Heaviest’.
“We were going to do it with Rob Cavallo,” said Shadows, referring to the producer behind Green Day’s 2004 LP American Idiot and My Chemical Romance’s 2006 effort The Black Parade. “It was such a great match — he loved the songs we’d been working on. But he was too busy working on Kid Rock’s next record, and he wasn’t going to be able to work on ours until later on in the year.”
Music Licensing companies are getting ‘serious’ collecting royalties.
‘ Whether it’s a professional recording taken from a Web site or an accordion player singing a Jimmy Buffet tune in a small venue, the industry is working to collect royalties for whoever wrote the songs.’
Nighclubs and coffee shops are facing crackdowns by the industry to those who refuse to pay BMI, ASCAP, and SESAC.
Last.fm has signed a content agreement with Sony BMG, meaning it can now carry music from three of the four major labels. Last.fm inked deals with EMI and Warner, and has deals with several indie labels, allowing it to play tracks through its embedded web player and personalized radio streams.
New Music coming soon…….
 Many industry executives noted that when peer-to-peer took hold in 2001-2003 thats when sales began to decline. “That’s when we went from music having real value in people’s minds to music having no economic value, just emotional value.”
The flood gates are now open and Sprint has signed on as the first company to underwrite a song to be distributed on file-sharing networks, agreeing to embed its logo on copies of tracks from Atlantic Records hip-hop artist Plies.
Sprint and Atlantic Records are teaming with ArtistDirect’s Media Defender division for the initiative, which essentially amounts to an advertising buy for the telecom company.
According to sources, Media Defender will push 16 million Plies song files embedded with the Sprint logo onto peer-to-peer networks over a three-month period in return for a “substantial six-figure” fee to be divided between Media Defender, Atlantic Records, Plies and his publishing company.
Once embedded, the Sprint logo will be attached to the files forever and will appear alongside Plies’ name and the song title on the screen of a desktop computer, iPod, cellphone or any other digital music player.
The vast share of music consumption, particularly for the under 35 set, is done on file-sharing networks. ArtistDirect CEO Jon Diamond said the initiative serves the triple purpose of generating advertising income for record labels, curtailing piracy and allowing brands to associate with key artists to reach a desired demographic.
According to Steve Yanovsky, a former record industry executive who consults for Mindshare Interactive, which counts Sprint as a client, the deal positions Sprint “as an innovator and will help drive perception of them in the marketplace.”
How it works…………..
1) Sprint pays for the right to embed its logo in 16 million song files
2) People download the song for free from file-sharing sites
3) When song is played, the artist’s name, song title, and sprint logo will appear on screen
4) Money is split between technology company, record label, artist and music publisher
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Swearing, confused messages, the failure of sing alongs, an unimpressive bill….
Check out and read an in depth observation of Live Earth:
Neil McCormick finds confused messages and an unimpressive line-up at London’s Live Earth concert “If you wanna save the planet, jump up and down!” urged Madonna.
Can global warming be stopped by an out-of-breath, middle-aged, super-rich narcissist in a leotard and high heels?  Â
The superannuated pop queen Madonna was certainly up for the challenge, but judging by the negligible response to the text message number displayed on stage, I suspect the public may have been justifiably confused by the link between aerobics and the environment.
As global satellite multi-media musical entertainment, Live Earth was just about adequate.
As a platform for stadium politics, it was a dismal affair. “Can you help save the earth?” bellowed Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles. Cue muted murmur of support. “We might be screwed if that’s the response,” he half-joked.
The whole tone felt misjudged: Al Gore appeared by satellite, to no great reaction in the stadium, and seemed to be addressing a small audience of native Americans, not seizing the world by the reins.
The message itself was confused: Keane performed in front of the legend “Insulate your ceilings and walls”. Razorlight performed America to footage of penguins. Duran Duran stuck to supermodels, but somehow tried to turn Girls on Film into an ecological anthem. Simon Le Bon urged the crowd to sing “Change, change, we gotta start the change” without much success, perhaps because he was having trouble singing it particularly well himself.
The failure of singalongs became something of a theme of the day, bands appearing to expect a much greater familiarity with their hits than was apparent. Only a smattering of acts made any genuine attempts to engage with the issues.
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Organizers of the global music concert – punctuated by swearing from presenters and performers – had predicted massive viewing figures.
BBC’s live afternoon television coverage attracted an average British audience of just 900,000. When coverage switched from BBC2 to BBC1, the figure rose to just 2.7million.
Live 8 peak audience…..
This year peak audience: 4.5 million
Two years ago: 9.6 million
Live Aid in 1985: 10 million
BBC blamed the poor figures on Saturday’s good weather, while critics claim the public snubbed the event because they thought it was hypocritical.
Musicians Bob Geldof, Roger Daltrey and the Pet Shop Boys pointed out that a concert highlighting climate change had itself generated huge carbon emissions. The BBC’s coverage, also sparked dozens of complaints about bad language.
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Between natural disasters, terminal illness, political agendas and social awareness, there seems to be more money raising than ever. But how effective are benefit concerts, really? With a new cause every other week, are they losing their meaning? Wealthy celebrities begging for money and the most frivolous artists appearing on CRIBS one day and lecturing the public about their irresponsible lifestyles the next?
Now, I’m all for social activism. I think it’s important as human beings to help our fellow man, even when the cameras are off. But how many people are really helped by Madonna flying her 100+ person circus on gas guzzling private jets to play a benefit show intended to raise awareness about environmental responsibility? People don’t tune into massive line ups of the biggest stars in music because they care about Africa or AIDS or global warming, and I don’t believe all of these artists show up because they care either. There are few benefits Paul McCartney and Bono aren’t a part of, and artists like Fergie will show up to the opening of an envelope. These shows are supposed to be about a cause, not the artists trying to appear human why they peddle their products. In the end, people won’t even remember what the causes were. They’re only watching to be entertained. So, what’s the point?
Benefit shows have turned into what? Organizers say things like “if we can change the thinking and habits of just one person, then we’ve succeeded.†REALLY?! That seems like a lot of effort to make ONE person start recycling. I don’t doubt that some of these people have their hearts in the right place, and I applaud the true efforts people make to better the world. However, I’d rather see these celebrities write gigantic checks to these causes than ask me to write one, or at the very least, practice what they’re preaching.
KOAR is not alone….more here:
Arctic Monkeys shiver at Live Earth ‘hypocrisy’ ….
Superstars flying 222,623 miles between them to get to the LIVE EARTH concerts…
Click here to watch all the shows live and online.
Live Earth fails to pack large-scale punch…
Earth underwhelmed by environment pop extravaganza…
Live Earth Internet streaming sets record: 9 Million Streams…
AJ/KOAR
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