The real pirates are in the music industry

                               It's our damned song now, matey!  We stole it fair and square.

One of the many amusing features of the otherwise serious disputes about so-called "online piracy" and of proposed legislation to stop it -- SOPA/PIPA -- for example, is the use of the term "piracy" by organizations that have been stealing artists and consumers blind for decades.  Thus, to cite just one category of abuse, it was long standard practice within record companies to trick songwriters into signing over the long term rights to their songs, the "publishing" rights.  That meant that the corporation, not the artist, received royalties for any further recordings of the song. Several generations of musicians were led to believe that "publishing" was something like printing the sheet music copy of the song and since they didn't want to be involved in the printing business, of course they wouldn't mind signing that "little" feature of a contract waved in their faces.

Today's puffing and spouting by large corporations about "piracy" of songs and movies has much the same character.  It turns out that those most concerned about the "theft" of music online are still busy stealing songs themselves.  This article from The Hollywood Reporter tells the story of the voracious Universal Music Group (UMG) and its war against some rap musicians.

The contract between UMG and YouTube over use of a "Content Management System" remains secret, but the ability to remove videos from YouTube could become controversial quickly. Just witness what happened to one rap group who found it impossible to put up one of its own songs on YouTube.

The rap group known as After the Smoke had created a song entitled, "One in a Million."

The song included a dancing keyboard rhythm and a scattered beat that was catchy enough that it became the underlying music to a track, "Far From A Bitch" by another rap group artist known as Yelawolf, signed to a UMG label.

When Yelawolf's song was leaked without authorization, UMG allegedly stepped in and had the song removed.

But in the aftermath, YouTube's filtering technology, perhaps on the lookout for any reposted copies, took down "One in a Million," angering  group member Whuzi. "We were like, 'Wait a minute? What's going on?'"Whuzi told Vice Magazine. "When I looked into it deeper and tried to contact YouTube and went through the all the correct procedures, they told me the entity that owns the copyright to our song was Universal."

After the Smoke is not signed to any Universal label.

                                                                                         
                                                                                          
                                                                                    

Song for our Great Depression: "Apple Days Are Here Again"

 

      Workers at Foxconn making Steve Jobs' wonderful iPhone 

During one of those end of the year 2011 wrap-up programs on the BBC, several CEOs of major corporations were asked to give their predictions for the year ahead and years beyond.  Would the U.S. and Europe emerge from what amounts to a persistent recession, or are there better days ahead?  Their predictions, made in separate interviews, varied in many of the specifics, but they were basically upbeat and looked forward to economic “recovery” within the next year or so. 

A recurring theme in the businessmen's statements caught my ear.  Here’s my rough paraphrase and summary:  “The future of a vibrant economy depends on new ideas and technological innovations, ones that will produce new levels of wealth and well-paying jobs in the decades just ahead.  Look at Apple, the iPhone and iPad, for example, that’s the model for the new economy.  That's where we should be looking.”   

In interview after interview the good news was: Apple, Apple, Apple, Apple, Apple.   Apparently, there are going to be dozens, maybe even hundreds of Apples, new corporations with jazzy new products to produce and sell, making us all rich once again.  I was struck by the univocal conclusion with its one lonely exemplar. All of this came, by the way, at the same time that the news was full of hyperventilating praise for the recently deceased Steve Jobs and the economic wonders he'd generated during his career. 

Today's New York Times runs a story, "How U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work," by Charles Duhigg and Keith Bradsher that casts a shadow over these happy fantasies.

Apple employs 43,000 people in the United States and 20,000 overseas, a small fraction of the over 400,000 American workers at General Motors in the 1950s, or the hundreds of thousands at General Electric in the 1980s. Many more people work for Apple’s contractors: an additional 700,000 people engineer, build and assemble iPads, iPhones and Apple’s other products. But almost none of them work in the United States. Instead, they work for foreign companies in Asia, Europe and elsewhere, at factories that almost all electronics designers rely upon to build their wares. 

 

“Apple’s an example of why it’s so hard to create middle-class jobs in the U.S. now,” said Jared Bernstein, who until last year was an economic adviser to the White House. 

“If it’s the pinnacle of capitalism, we should be worried.”    

  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * 

The Times story pulls away the curtain from one of the central, delusional happy talk American narratives of ourtime.  We are asked to put our faith in "innovation" and in wonderful new corporations that will bring the return of prosperity by generating high tech product lines that, presumably, will be made by American workers and thereby restore prosperity to the land.  But what about all the contractors and sub-contractors and sub-sub contractors hiring hundreds of thousands of low wage laborers at places like Foxconn in China?  The delightful tales of a "new economy" just ahead never bother to mention such dreary details.  As always, people in the fading U.S. middle class  are urged to be more forward-looking and "optimistic."

In that bubbly spirit, we should rewrite the lyrics of the Depression era song, "Happy Days Are Here Again." 

Apple days are here again

The skies above are clear agin

So let's sing a song of cheer again

Apple days are here again!

                                                                                

                                                                        

                                                                             

                                                                                

From Amsterdam: a musical play about Captain Beefheart

                                                         Don Van Vliet, Captain Beefheart

The legacy of Don Van Vliet, his art and music, endures in a number of ways, including occasional tribute concerts, especially those of Gary Lucas, former Magic Band member and now noted jazz musician.  For both new audiences and older fans, the internet is well stocked with Beefheart recordings (both legit and bootleg), videos, and memorabilia along with photos of Don's paintings and drawings, his sole artistic pursuit from the early 1980s til his death in December 2010. 

Recently, I received news of a Dutch musical theater piece, "Low Yo Yo Stuff," based on the life of Captain Beefheart and staged a couple of weeks ago in Amsterdam.  Ferry Rigault, an acquaintance of mine from the early 1970s with whom I attended a Beefheart concert and after concert drinks with Don, alerted me to the production.  Here (slightly edited) are his comments on what he saw and heard.

It was in a theatre called Bellevue, not so far from the hotel we talked with the Captain.  It really was a very good play, with a great actor, Frank Lammers, and a fantastic band.  Frank plays a crazy fan who thinks he is born in the head of captain Beefheart after he visited a Beefheart concert in the small village of Roden in the east of Holland in 1980 (historical). He's looking for Beefheart's Lost Record, that never came out due to conflicts with studio bosses.

The decor is a sixties/seventies boysroom with a fourarmed pickup, a giant
taperecorder (Sony), old album covers and a table full of empty bottles. In
fact the play is about a search for regaining artistical and social freedom.
The text is very weird, associative, surrealistic and sometimes ununderstandable,
just like the Captain.   

Of course there is a lot of great Beefheart music: "Electricity," "Zigzag Wanderer," "I'm gonna Booglarize You," "Low Yo Yo Stuff," "Abba Zaba," and many more. Even the dialogue "Fast 'n Bulbous" with the Mascara Snake from Trout Mask Replica was there. The play ended with a Beefhartesque song in Dutch.  Also his painting are in the play, and even some live painting. [?]
There were also quite a lot of young people in the audience (under 20) and, as far as I could see, they enjoyed the play.

*  *  *  *  *  *  

Mr. Rigault was nice enough to send along a video promo clip for the play along with two songs tastefully and energetically recreated by by Frank Lammers and his version of the Magic Band -- "I'm Gonna Booglarize You, Baby," and "Electricity."

Another YouTube treasure Ferry enclosed was a television appearance Captain Beefheart and a rather tacky band made during his tour of Europe in 1973 (or was it 1974).  This a period in which the fabulous Magic Band of "Trout Mask Replica" and subsequent albums had completely fallen apart, leaving Beefheart and his Las Vegas manager with a group composed of L.A. and Vegas studio players.  Don seemed humiliated, but he slogged on if only to keep the money pouring in.  (Take a look at the cover of "Unconditionally Guaranteed" from that period in his career.)  At the Concertgebouw concert, Don asked his clarinet player (yes, clarinet player) to do a dixieland solo on "Sweet Georgia Brown" at one point and then, several songs later to play the damned thing again!

The treasure here is an appearance Don made on a Dutch comedy television show during the same tour.  He walks on stage with two bumbling comedians as a young woman is singing a ballad.  After some rather lame jokes by the Dutch buffoons, Beefheart lip syncs and mugs a song, "Upon the My Oh My," from "Unconditionally Guaranteed," drawing out the autobiographical pathos in the lyrics: "Tell me, good Captain, how does it feel, to be driven away from your own steering wheel? Upon the My Oh My ...."

What's wonderful about the video is that your can see very clearly Van Vliet's characteristic posture, body language, impish facial expressions, and, well, his attitude as he moved along the always awkward boundary between his private life and public persona.  What was it like to be in his presence?  The video will give you a pretty good taste.  It ends with Don walking over to keyboard player on the set. "Can you play 'Yesterday'?" he asks.   The pianist plays the song as Don starts whistling, which he always did by inhaling, his mouth half open.  Check it out below.

That's my contribution to internet Beefheart for today.  Keep listening!