Search Results for: Radiohead

The future of the music industry is being held, quite literally, in the palm of a twentysomething’s hand. Not the “business” side of the music industry – you know, the folks you’ve perhaps heard weeping into their bowls of caviar over the 31 percent decrease in album sales over the course of the past year, a downturn the suits pin on the advent of digital music downloading and CD burning. No, the “art” side of music business is being forceably changed. Artists are either coming to terms with changes in the ways their music is distributed – or doggedly railing… Read more »

The Shortlist Organization announced today the complete “Long List” of eighty-six nominations for the 2003 Shortlist Music Prize, as selected by a panel of “Listmakers” including Flea, Erykah Badu, Perry Farrell, Chris Martin (Coldplay), and the directors Spike Jonze and Cameron Crowe. The ten finalists for the award will be announced in early September, and the third annual Shortlist Music Prize will be presented at a multi-artist concert on October 16th at the Wiltern Theater in Los Angeles. Plans for a Shortlist Awards Concert television special will be announced soon. “This year’s Long List features artists from five continents and… Read more »

Metallica’s eighth studio album, “St. Anger,” has been certified multiplatinum for U.S. shipments in excess of 2 million copies in a little over a month of release, according to the Recording Industry Assn. of America’s July numbers. Hip-hop innovator Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliott earned her first multiplatinum album with “Under Construction.” Fleetwood Mac earned its 14th gold record (U.S. shipments in excess of 500,000 units) in July for “Say You Will.” The classic rock group’s overall U.S. album sales have surpassed the 50 million mark. R&B icon Luther Vandross’ “Dance With My Father” was certified platinum for sales of more than… Read more »

It may have been the year of 50 Cent, but he’ll play second fiddle to Missy Elliott, Justin Timberlake and country legend Johnny Cash heading into the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards. Elliott led the pack with eight nominations for her eye-popping “Work It” video when the nods were announced Thursday morning. The clip counts nominations for Video of the Year, Best Female Video, Best Hip-Hop Video and Best Direction in a Video among its stash. Christina Aguilera and Coldplay were also unveiled as the first performers confirmed for the awards show when nominations were announced on Thursday. Right behind… Read more »

Boston College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, citing concerns about student privacy, moved yesterday to quash subpoenas issued by the recording industry to discover the identities of students the industry says are illegally distributing copyrighted music. The moves represent one of the first major obstacles for the recording industry in its campaign against ordinary computer users who share copyrighted music. Jonathan Lamy, a spokesman for the Recording Industry Association of America, said he was disappointed and vowed legal action to obtain the information. “These universities have chosen to litigate this in an attempt to deny copyright holders the right… Read more »

Long an artist’s sanctuary, the commercial recording studio is becoming a virtual fortress, guarding against the potentially devastating consequences of theft. The thieves’ targets are the rough mixes, outtakes, alternative takes and finished masters that traditionally have been loosely handled, even by the artists themselves. Leaks of this material are nothing new, but the advent of unauthorized file sharing on the Internet has greatly increased the consequences of this phenomenon. Recent albums by Eminem, 50 Cent, Korn and Radiohead were all available online prior to release, because unauthorized copies were leaked to unknown parties. In such cases, marketing strategies are… Read more »

Ticket sales are down, and big tours are scaling back to smaller venues. It looks to be a long, hot summer for the touring industry. On the cusp of the industry’s peak period, a number of high-profile tours and festivals have already hit snags, among them highly touted outings from Mariah Carey, the Field Day Music Festival, Lollapalooza, and Beck and Dashboard Confessional. Faced with a crowded tour market combined with high ticket prices, permit hassles, a sluggish economy and poor buzz, these tours and a handful of others have either had to scale back the size of the venues… Read more »

Despite the major labels’ success in clearing hundreds of thousands of tracks for purchase online through services like Apple’s iTunes Music Store, some top artists continue to resist authorizing the dismantling of their albums for Internet consumption as a la carte singles. Some acts are requiring that their music be sold exclusively in album bundles. For example, Linkin Park recently pulled its music as a singles offering from digital services. Sources say the band has expressed concerns about undercutting album sales. Other acts with similar stipulations about their work include Radiohead, Madonna, Jewel and Green Day, sources say. Top acts… Read more »

The Epic Records Group, a unit of Sony Music, is approaching the sticky problem of prerelease music’s being traded online with an even stickier solution. Writers receiving review copies of two soon-to-be-released albums – Tori Amos’s “Scarlet’s Walk” and Pearl Jam’s “Riot Act” – are finding the CD’s already inside Sony Walkman players that have been glued shut. Headphones are also glued into the players, to prevent connecting the Walkman to a recording device. By locking up the discs, Epic hopes to keep writers from converting the music to MP3’s that can then be traded over the Net. But even… Read more »