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Ten years ago, as the Internet began to mushroom in popularity and emerging technologies enabled consumers to make nearly perfect copies of digital content, the recording industry embarked on a two-pronged strategy in response to the changing business environment. First, it emphasized copy-control technologies, often referred to as digital rights management (DRM), that many in the industry believed would allow it re-assert control over music copying. Second, it lobbied the Canadian government for a private copying levy to compensate for the music copying that it could not control. While the industry’s approach proved successful on the legal front — the… Read more »

WEST HOLLYWOOD, California – When he was once asked, “Can you ever conceive of a circumstance in which the Police would do a reunion tour?,” Sting replied, “I think that’d be a good cause to have me certified insane.” So … “Yes, I am certifiably insane,” Sting joked Monday (February 12) at the Whiskey a Go Go after the above sound bite was played to begin a packed press conference announcing a Police reunion tour. “If anyone comes at me with white coats, just let them through.” More than 20 years after the Police last toured – behind 1983’s massively… Read more »

Starbucks Entertainment announced today that it will release a CD of 15 original tracks by Starbucks partners (employees). The first-of-its-kind compilation is the result of a company-wide contest that invited Starbucks partners to submit original solo or band recordings. “Off the Clock Vol. 1: New Music from Up & Coming Starbucks Artists” will be available exclusively at Starbucks Company-operated locations in the U.S. and Canada beginning April 3, 2007. This newest venture continues Starbucks unwavering support of new talent — in this case, from within its own family of partners.”Off the Clock Vol. 1: New Music from Up & Coming… Read more »

During the first two weeks in January, the most popular album in the country was the soundtrack to “Dreamgirls.” But that statistic was less impressive than it might have been, because for those two weeks, “Dreamgirls” sold around 60,000 copies each week, which made for the two lowest totals for a #1 album in the history of the SoundScan era, which began in 1991. Granted, January is always a pretty slow month for album sales and releases. But around that same time, the new Fall Out Boy album, Infinity on High, leaked online and was one of the most eagerly… Read more »

Around the time Brett Gurewitz was launching Epitaph Records in 1981, his father was lecturing him to take guitar lessons. The Bad Religion guitarist and punk-rock entrepreneur never sat down for courses with a guitar instructor, although he did go to school to learn to be a recording engineer. However, no amount of schooling could have prepared Gurewitz for the next 25 years of his life. Epitaph Records brought a new era of punk rock to the masses in 1994 when the Offspring’s “Smash” turned into one of the biggest rock records of the decade. The success of the label’s… Read more »

Washington D.C.-based metallers DARKEST HOUR will travel to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada on February 19 to start the pre-production and recording process for their new album with producer Devin Townsend (STRAPPING YOUNG LAD, LAMB OF GOD, SOILWORK). A June/July release via Victory Records is expected. The band has issued the following update:  “All is good from the underground bunker where DARKEST HOUR is riffing out our new songs. We have nine songs (that’s a full album, dudes!) and we will definitely have a few extra tracks that will be floating around after the record is recorded to so we hope… Read more »

Gwen Stefani has a pair of complaints about her last solo tour: One, she didn’t feel she had as much material to showcase as she did with No Doubt; and two, she was pregnant. “I was about four and a half months pregnant, which was totally not a good idea,” Stefani said. “I highly recommend not getting pregnant and going on tour! So if you’re thinking about going on tour, do not get pregnant” . With no impending morning sickness or mood swings, the singer can’t wait to start her 40-city Sweet Escape tour “It’s so much fun to create… Read more »

Independent record labels behind artists like The White Stripes, Deep Purple and Arctic Monkeys announced a global deal Saturday to pool access to their catalogs, seeking to grab a bigger share of online music sales from the major record companies. Indies and their trade groups from more than a dozen countries signed up to Merlin, a nonprofit licensing agency that will cut deals on their behalf with download sites under the terms of the agreement unveiled at Midem, a music industry gathering in the French Riviera town of Cannes. Smaller record companies with just a handful of successful artists fear… Read more »

A surge in downloaded songs and mobile-phone ringtones failed to make up for declines in sales of compact discs last year, an industry group said. Music downloads almost doubled to about $2 billion last year, accounting for about 10 percent of the industry’s global sales, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry said in a statement today. While that’s up from 5.5 percent in 2005, it’s still not enough to offset the revenue lost due to piracy and declining sales of physical media such as CDs. “I would like to be announcing that a fall in CD sales is being… Read more »

After a hectic year which saw the band crisscrossing the globe, performing to sold-out crowds and grabbing several awards, Seattle horror-punksters, Aiden are set to accomplish even more in 2007…with Conviction, which will be the title of their upcoming full-length effort on Victory Records. The band begins pre-production on their eagerly anticipated release January 15, according to leading WiL Francis, 14 songs have already been written. “I’ve never been more excited about new songs,” he declares. “I’ve never written songs like this, mainly because I was scared that it wasn’t “punk” enough. But I woke up one day and asked… Read more »