Time For The Friday Roundup
Ah yeah, it's that time again. It's actually a nice day outside so I might, you know, leave my house and go breathe some fresh air.
Hey, crazier things have happened.
*Sigh* I need a job. Badly.
Celtics v. Nets tonight in Boston. A must win game for the C's. Nets lost to Indy last night and their starters all played over 40 minutes. [Mr. Burns voice] Excellent! [/Mr, Burns voice]. Then the Kings come to town Sunday afternoon. If we can win those 2 games, the C's will have a better record than the Mavs (and Fatoine) through 6 games.
NOTES OF INTEREST FROM THE INTERWEB:
- NBC Chief: "Coupling...sucked."
- I am sooooooooooo sick of reading REM article's that say the group feel "as strong as ever". They've been saying that for the last 5 years and haven't released a decent tune since The Great Beyond. My old favorite band sucks now.
- CNN is on some cutting edge shit. Commercials raise musicians' profiles. Wow, commercials work better at selling music than radio does? Really? Ya think?
- Absolutely hilarious eBay rant. I don't think my ex-wife was in the Black Market Beanie Trade..but then again, I didn't know she was having an affair either![thanks Mr. White]
- www.yourthemannowdog.com [thanks ypersound]
- 5 reasons not to buy an iPod. I agree with #1 and #4 isn't Apple's fault but the rest are crap. Nice try.
- Ha! I spit on your download service. Apple sells five times the amount of downloads that Napster does in it's first week. Napster = Durst. Pitchfork agrees.
- McDonalds to give away one billion iTunes songs. Do you want fries with that?
- Well, someone out there likes Napster. Penn State will pay the service to allow students to download songs. Napster will get paid out of the $160 information technology fee students pay each year. This could be a good idea.
- If anyone out there has a subcription to ESPN Insider, there is a great article on the NBA's upcoming expansion draft for next year and how it will affect everyone's salary cap. It's paid content so no linky. Sorry.
- Money is tight right now so I still haven't seen Matrix:Revolutions. Reviews have been mixed at best. Aint-It-Cool liked it but Slate panned it. So did The Guardian. Well, it did $43 million in it's first day.
- Gizmodo breaks down what each cellular carrier is charging for number portability. Good to know if you are renewing your contract anytime soon. Right Foxy J? PS - I just realized I didn't have yer site in my blog links to the right so apologies for that. Thought I added it a while ago. Cheers.
- Presidential hopeful Wesley Clark weighs in on the Outkast break up rumours. In Quicktime no less. Genius. [thanks Off On A Tangent]
- It's The End Of The World As We Know It. Funny. [thanks Stereogum]
- Suede break up. A nation yawns. Sorry Coolfer.
- From the I Told You So file: Pearl Jam to release their new single as a paid download as they are still without a label.
- Monosyllabic clears up any confusion you might have regarding all the -ills bands out there right now. [thanks Catherine]
- MYV Europe Music Awards winners. Xtina's stylist is not among them.
- BRMC were forced to halt a gig in Leeds as the floor under the audience cracked and was in danger of collapsing. I wonder if White Light Motorcade were supporting? I always get those groups mixed up.
- Dammit, this shit is TOO EASY. Duke gets a commitment from a 6-7 point guard that's ranked as the #2 prospect in the country. Paging Roy Williams, time to get off your ass and recruit.
Happy Friday everyone.
Everybody knows what's going wrong with the world. I don't even know what's going wrong with myself.
CNN should get a Pulitzer for that crack investigative journalism. You mean to tell me licensing music for commercials can actually spur album sales?
To answer the question, who needs radio? Anybody who wants to sell a lot of records. That's who. You can get a commercial and it may or may not help. You can get some great press and that might help. College radio can help a bit. But you get consistant rotation at commercial radio and the sales are absolutely guaranteed.
But how much money do you have to pay to get consistant airplay at radio?
Spins on commercial radio are (indirectly) bought, not earned.
Well, I didn't mention anything about money did I? My comment was merely about the effectiveness of radio (which was to counter the article's claim that radio is dead). Of course it takes a lot of money. But that wasn't my point. My point was that radio play sells records. It's the best way to promote a record and artist. Hands down. (Not a dirty angry punk album, or some underground electronic artist. We're talking mainstream stuff here.)
Now, if you have the money to get past the gate keeper and actually get onto radio playlists, then you're going to reap the rewards. If you don't have much money, you can work your songs at college radio and not get nearly the results. Same goes for hiring a consultant to get your video onto MTV. First you've gotta make an expensive video that they'll want to play, then you've got to manage to get it onto MTV. But when you do, the sales will be there.
Not convinved about the video. Why spend $350,000 on something that MTV will play 3 times in the wee hours. The only way you get MTV airplay these days is if you are a hip hop artist.
When I worked in the industry, I got my band's video played on MTV and Fuse more than the major label we ended up signing to did. Not sure what that means, if anything, though.
I think commercials are a better way to push music because you get paid for the usage and you're guarenteed spins on TV and that will reach alot more people. The trick is to figure out how people will know what band it is.
But I don't care about music anymore. Only basketball.