Thursday 26 August 2010, 13:29 | By CMU Editorial

Of Montreal plan EP release

Releases

Of Montreal’s new album, ‘False Priest’, isn’t out yet, and already the band are planning a new EP. Entitled ‘The Controller Sphere’, it will feature three outtakes from the new album.

Frontman Kevin Barnes told Consequence Of Sound: “There’s three songs that we were initially going to put on ‘False Priest’ that we decided to cut at the last second. I haven’t decided which I want to put on there, but there’s a lot of material to choose from”.

The EP is expected to be released in spring next year, while ‘False Priest’ is out on Polyvinyl on 13 Sep. Right now you can watch the video for new single, ‘Coquet Coquette’, here: youtu.be/hx01UXtjuFg

Lissie unveils weather-influenced interactive video

Releases

Singer-songwriter Lissie has unveiled the video for her new single, ‘Cuckoo’, which sees her and her band placed at the whim of her viewers. In a tie-up with some weather channel, the weather conditions in the video can be linked to those anywhere in the world simply by clicking different areas of a world map.

So, you could send her the sun from a Spanish beach, or subject her to the freezing conditions of the North Pole. Well, I’m assuming so, my computer didn’t like it, so I didn’t get to play. But you can have a go here: www.lissie.com/weather

‘Cuckoo’ is out on 30 Aug and features a cover of Lady Gaga’s ‘Bad Romance’.

Klaxons announce tour dates

Gigs & Festivals

Klaxons have just released their new album, ‘Surfing The Void’, now they’re going to go on tour. It’s all go.

Tour dates:

12 Nov: Norwich, UEA
13 Nov: Bournemouth, Academy
16 Nov: London, The Forum
17 Nov: London, The Forum
22 Nov: Leeds, Academy

Best Coast announce tour

Gigs & Festivals

With their debut album ‘Crazy For You’ causing a buzz so loud that things keep vibrating off the mantelpiece and smashing on the floor, Best Coast have now announced some UK tour dates:

29 Nov: Manchester, Sound Control
30 Nov: Birmingham, Glee Club
1 Dec: London, The Scala

Festival line-up update – 26 Aug 2010

Artist News Festival Line-Up Update Gigs & Festivals

LOOPALLU, Ullapool, Ross and Cromarty, Scotland, 17-18 Sep: Kassidy, Rachel Sermanni and James Mackenzie & The Aquascene have all been confirmed to play at next month’s Scottish fest, joining the previously announced Idlewild, Turin Brakes and The Magic Numbers. www.loopallu.co.uk

Weezer reveal real inspiration for album title

Brands & Merch

Despite the fact that the cover of Weezer’s new album features a picture of ‘Lost’ character Hurley Reyes, played by actor Jorge Garcia, it was apparently not named ‘Hurley’ after him. In an interview for AEG Live’s YouTube channel recorded at the Mile High music festival, guitarist Brian Bell says the name is actually taken from clothing company Hurley International, which funded some of the album’s recording.

Bell explained: “[Hurley] was funding the record at the beginning of the process. We actually did some sort of advertisement… I don’t even know how they’re tied in so much, although we got some clothes and we did a photo shoot and we were wearing these clothes, and I think we’re selling these clothes in malls”.

He continued: “How that’s tied in, I don’t know. I think it’s this whole, like, tying-in different medias and then using Hurley, the character from ‘Lost’, which I’ve never seen in my life, as our mascot for this record is somewhat postmodernist, maybe. I hope people don’t look at it as too jokey, cos it certainly comes across that way without reading into it a little deeper”.

You can see why when he was asked about the album cover by Spinner recently, frontman Rivers Cuomo just said: “I just loved this photo of Jorge Garcia – it just had this amazing vibe. We didn’t want to do a fourth self-titled record and we knew people would refer to it as ‘the Hurley record’ even if left it without that title, so we just called it ‘Hurley’. No words are on the cover because all we wanted was his amazing face”.

You can watch Bell’s interview in full here: youtu.be/W-llWCENnyk

Pandora add genre choice

Digital

US-based streaming music flim flam Pandora marked its fifth birthday yesterday by adding a new bit of functionality so that users can kick off their personalised music stream by picking a whole genre rather than a specific artist or song.

Said Pandora Senior Music Curator, Michael Zapruder: “Our listeners have been telling us for a while that they’d like an easy way to start a station from popular genres with the option to personalise the station from there. We wanted to find a uniquely Pandora way to address this consumer need so we created a number of genre stations that are carefully seeded with relevant songs and constantly refreshed with new releases”.

So that’s all exciting. In related news, Music Week has reported that Elevation Partners, the equity group in which Bono has an interest, wants to buy a stake of Pandora. Which is not exciting at all.

EMI publicist promoted to new role

Business News Industry People Labels & Publishers Marketing & PR

EMI publicist Debra Geddes put on a lovely cardigan yesterday to celebrate being promoted to the new role of Senior Director of Artist Publicity at the music major.

It’s an interesting sounding job, newly created, in that it will cut across the various record labels within the EMI empire, and might be a sign that the major plans to do publicity work around key artists on a more on-going basis rather than just tied to new album releases, something that is highly sensible in an era where every artists’ entire back catalogue is on sale (digitally) all the time. It would be interesting to know if Geddes will work on artists signed to EMI’s growing merchandise empire too.

Alas a quote from EMI Music UK President Andria Vidler about Geddes’ new role revealed little: “Bringing together our artist publicity team under one senior director creates a strong and flexible team that will allow us and our artists to maximise the great publicity skills we have in-house and the opportunities of the rapidly changing media landscape”.

For legal reasons, we must stress that Debra Geddes was not wearing a lovely cardigan yesterday. The cardigan mentioned above was figurative.

For legal reasons, we must stress that that doesn’t mean Debra Geddes was wearing a horrible cardigan yesterday. We don’t actually know what she was wearing, but are confident every item of clothing was marvellous. Especially the shoes.

Apple announce extra special announcement

Digital

Apple are going to announce something. Yes, people, now is indeed the correct time to piss your pants, you are well ahead of me. Yesterday the tech company sent out invitations to an event next Wednesday in San Francisco. They didn’t say what they were announcing, but the invitations do feature a picture of an acoustic guitar, so it’s assumed to be music-related.

At this time of year, Apple generally unveils its new range of iPods. But that’s boring, so I’m going to join everyone else in speculating about what new product might be about to hit the market. I’m pretty sure it’s going to a brand new type of music player, which predicts future trends and automatically writes and records music for you based on your own personal tastes. As a result, there will be no need for actual musicians any more, thus solving the problem of illegal file-sharing.

This will all be officially announced at 10am PDT (so, 6pm in the UK) on 1 Sep.

Sugababes to launch perfume range

And Finally

The current Sugababes have announced that they are to release a range of perfumes. The three fragrances, one for each member of the group, are called Tempt, Tease and Touch.

Jade Ewen tweeted on Tuesday: “Just seen our final mock-ups for our fragrances! Can’t wait for you guys to smell them!”

I hope whoever Touch relates to washes her hands regularly.

Diana Vickers on the perils of legal highs

And Finally

There’s a lot of talk about drugs at the moment, and in particular legal highs, as new stimulants flood the market faster than the government can draw everyone’s attention to them by banning them. Who better to comment on this than Diana Vickers, who has apparently been to some festivals.

Vickers told The Sun: “At festivals this summer, I’ve seen people passing out and people who don’t know where they are or what they are doing after taking drugs. I was even around someone who thought that their friend was a fridge. Being that out of control scares me. Just because a drug is legal, you cannot assume it is safe”.

Thinking that someone is a fridge is, of course, utterly ridiculous. But he did keep our beer so very cold.

Approved: Does It Offend You, Yeah? – We Are The Dead

CMU Approved

After two years, Does It Offend You, Yeah? are finally coming close to finishing work on their second album, ‘Don’t Say We Didn’t Warn You’. There’s still a little way to go, sample clearing and mastering mainly, so it’s not clear when it’ll actually be out yet, but the band have put a new track online for all to enjoy.

Entitled ‘We Are The Dead’, the track is a definite progression from their debut album, opening with acoustic guitar and voice, before dropping a load of beats all over the place a minute in, the first of a number of twists and turns throughout the song. As well as downloading the complete track, you can also download the individual parts in order to create your own remix (or if you just fancy listening to the bass on its own).

www.doesitoffendyou.com/wearethedead.html

Q&A: James Blackshaw

Artist Interviews

Originally starting out in punk bands, James Blackshaw now primarily plays an acoustic twelve-string guitar and has been compared to the likes of Bert Jansch, Robbie Basho and Jack Rose. Having already released eight studio albums, James is about to release his ninth, ‘All Is Falling’.

Produced by John Hannon and Blackshaw himself, the album was recorded last December and sees James’ first foray into the realm of the electric twelve-string guitar. With that album out on 30 Aug via Young God Records, we caught up with James to ask the Same Six.

Q1 How did you start out making music?
I’ve been making music in some form or another since I was about thirteen years old. I used to play electric guitar and bass guitar in a couple of punk rock bands as a teenager, sang a bit, even attempted drums, which I was terrible at, and the piano. Guitar was definitely the first instrument I took seriously, but conversely, for a while I totally lost interest in it, until I was in my early 20s. I had heard John Fahey some years before and was kind of fascinated and bemused by his music, but at some point I got really engrossed with the idea of guitar as a solo instrument. I listened to Fahey, Robbie Basho, a lot of old blues and initially just copied what I heard. I also started to get interested in classical music, minimalism, drone and a lot of different types of music from India, Japanese koto playing and Indonesian gamelan, and wondered if I could incorporate all these interests somehow. When I picked up a twelve-string guitar for the first time when I was 23, everything just seemed to fall into place.

Q2 What inspired your latest album?
I really don’t have any kind of grand plan when I start work on an album, but this time I bought an electric twelve-string guitar and became really interested with the sonic properties of the instrument. I think by default it meant my playing style changed or adapted to fit the guitar itself. At some point, I was coming up with a lot of different ideas, all in the same alternative tuning, and I could just hear that these parts or fragments somehow belonged together to make one long piece in different movements. I also bought some better home recording equipment around that time. The album wasn’t recorded at home, but it did allow me to figure out arrangements for other instruments, like violin, cello and winds, way in advance, so it was more carefully composed ahead of time, as opposed to some previous occasions where that sort of thing has been more spontaneous. ‘All Is Falling’, the title itself, was a phrase I stole from one of Dutch artist Bas Jan Ader’s notebooks. I’m a big fan and I liked the ambiguity of how that could be interpreted.

Q3 What process do you go through in creating a track?
Things almost always start life with me sitting and playing, usually guitar or sometimes piano. As I said, I normally have no idea what I want to play or where it’ll go from there. I guess I’m attempting to channel some kind of mood or feeling I might not be able to articulate in words. I can’t really explain it much better than that. Starting work on something is the hardest part for me, then when I have a certain amount of material, my overall sense of the what the album is starts to take shape – how it should be recorded, what other instruments I’d like to hear etc.

Q4 Which artists influence your work?
A lot of minimalist composers – Philip Glass, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, La Monte Young, Charlemagne Palestine, Rhys Chatham etc – and of course a lot of those guitarists on the Takoma label. I think recently I’m also kind of influenced by a lot of stuff I don’t like, if that makes sense, in terms of what I don’t want to do. I just really appreciate anything that’s well crafted, has been carefully thought out and has a lot of heart. In terms of more recent stuff, Jim O’Rourke is definitely someone whose music I’m genuinely in awe of.

Q5 What would you say to someone experiencing your music for the first time?
Just to try to be patient and open-minded, I guess. My music’s not for everybody, but I’m happy that some people really get something from it, whatever that might be.

Q6 What are your ambitions for your latest album, and for the future?
I’ve got a lot of touring coming up soon with Swans in the UK and Europe this autumn/winter. I’ve just been taking a break, so am looking forward to getting out there again. Beyond that, I really don’t know. I’m certain I’ll start on another album at some point next year and continue working with Current 93, but at this point, I don’t want to force myself to keep working on music for the sake of it. I’ve got one or two ideas, but they’ll need to some time to come to fruition. I’d love to do a soundtrack for a film sometime, that’s long been an ambition for me.

MORE>> www.myspace.com/jamesblackshaw

Festival Review: Summer Sundae 2010

Festival Reviews

Summer Sundae sits quite comfortably in its city shell, hidden behind the buildings of Regent College and De Monfort Hall. Unsurprisingly then, the clientele of this Leicester festival are mainly made up of the middle class, urban families ready for a weekend of soothing music with the children. It seems to bypass many in their adventurous early twenties who seek the thrills of the countryside festivals with their anything-goes atmosphere and psychoactive drugs. At Summer Sundae we get young daughters, drunk in their floral design dresses, old cooing mothers knocking back (plastic) bottles of red wine and middle-aged men in sun caps, reliving their youth. However, for all the safety of the family atmosphere it still holds its secrets, and it still continues to keep the line-up fresh and exciting year on year.

Arriving late on Friday evening, we got there just as the sun was beginning to set. A perfect time then to catch Steve Mason play his quirky brand of idiosyncratic pop. The Beta Band star performed songs from his latest album ‘Boys Outside’, including the singles ‘Am I Just A Man’ and ‘Lost And Found’. ‘Lost And Found’ resonated particularly well with the Friday crowd who were only just beginning to loosen up. However, his final words, “bomb the parliament”, did fall somewhat flat on the more conservative crowd.

Roots Manuva played at the top of the bill in the indoor arena. Making the De Monfort Hall stage his home for the night, Roots played a storming set, cutting up the floor with his home-spun dancehall-influenced hip hop. ‘Awfully Deep’ was a highlight and boomed from the speakers producing a monolithic sound. Equally his infectious character held the crowd and left us all remembering why his was at the top of the pile.

On Saturday, the rain dropped down sporadically covering the festival site in cool showers that would break up the intermittent sunshine. I got to the main arena early to see the bizarre and cultish Gaggle – a twenty-piece female choir. I was slightly disappointed that they weren’t quite as far out there as they were purported to be. Each song appeared slightly more formulaic than the last, simply droning, mindless chants.

Liam Frost proved to be a remarkable find in a mid-afternoon slot in the indoor arena. The whole hall felt the weight of every word uttered by Frost as he carefully seduced all with his soft, aching tones, played longingly over an electric guitar. For me electric guitars have always produced a fond, sentimental feeling when accompanied simply by vocals, and Liam Frost managed to find the sweet spot that afternoon. I hadn’t heard of him before his set so it came as a real surprise to find him so enjoyably heart-wrenching.

Tunng performed later that afternoon, also in the indoor arena, and again I was greeted with an incredibly high standard of performance. Tunng play the kind of experimental folk that works well in indoor intimate environments. With such a vast array of voices and the curious way in which Mike Lindsay and his bandmates moved around the stage the show they put on found a loving reception within these four walls. Tunng finished on ‘Bullets’ which gave us a resounding end to their set, they were of course applauded rapturously for their efforts.

After Tunng came Caribou, once more on the indoor arena. Their latest album ‘Swim’ has been one of my favourite releases this year and so accordingly my review might contain slight bias. Lining up two drum kits bass drum to bass drum, Dan Snaith and his band played mostly from their newest album relenting only at the beginning with a couple of tracks from their previous work. Highlights for me included the confusion-inducing ‘Found Out’, which includes a poly-rhythmic 3/4 guitar riff over a jangly 4/4 dance beat, and their first single from ‘Swim’, ‘Odessa’. The interplay between the two drummers created an added theatrical element to the show and flaunted Snaith’s multi-instrumental abilities. The audience danced and moved along with every rhythm, it was obvious that the indoor arena was the place to be that afternoon.

The Fall headlined the indoor arena that evening, bringing out of the crowd and that darkly lit room a certain atmosphere all of its own. Starting with ‘OFYC Showcase’ each band member came on one by one, starting of course with the drums. Six or seven minutes in with the opening riff rolling round and round on came Mark E Smith, the conjurer extraordinaire, whipping up the crowd into a frenzy with every twist off his tongue and flick of his wrist. Naturally, as is Mark E Smith’s wont, The Fall only played tracks from their latest album, ceding their vast back catalogue to the annals of time, however ‘Your Future, Our Clutter’ provided an excellent evenings performance and they worked the crowd easily into their favour.

Sunday was another damp day but the sun pushed through towards the evening leaving us with a warm and enjoyable night. The morning’s entertainment was a mixed affair, starting with These Furrows and Red Shoe Diaries, two bands who exist on opposite ends of the sonic spectrum. However, both are small, local bands with only a slightly noticeable difference in crowd size leaning towards These Furrows. Both were fitting starts to the morning and while These Furrows’ sound might seem a little alt-rock/emo from the early-2000s they are great representatives of the local scene.

Glasgow’s Errors played indoors at around 5pm. Perfect time then for an electronica/dance heavy experimental rock set. Inside the indoor arena the dark lighting and the intense shine of the stage lights gave off of an incredibly intimate atmosphere, and although the arena wasn’t full the floor was vibrating with the movement of the audience. They played through both their previous albums and treated us to loud and abrasive versions of ‘A Rumour In Africa’, ‘Pump’ and ‘Supertribe’.

Later that evening we moved to the main stage and waited in anticipation for Mumford & Sons. They appeared and the multiple-thousand strong crowd responded, singing back every hit to them in chorus. It’s amazing to see the transformation the band have made and how far they have come over the last year. Their headline show does not disappoint and they play through the big hitters – ‘The Cave’, ‘Little Lion Man’, ‘Winter Winds’ – as if they’ve played them for an eternity. The crowd gave them a fantastic reception as they wrapped things up and they appeared genuinely humbled by the moment.

Honest affection is what this festival has in spades; what it lacks in size or visibility it makes up for in the affection given up from every artist to their responding audience, and in this, Summer Sundae’s tenth year, the organisers have done incredibly well to collect such giving artists for the very welcoming audience. SJS

RIAA says US copyright law “isn’t working”

Digital Top Stories

RIAA president Cary Sherman has said that America’s Digital Millennium Copyright Act, drawn up by the US government in 1998 in collaboration with ISPs, internet companies and the content industries, contains too many loopholes which allow ISPs and other web-based companies to ignore online copyright infringement without any legal comeback. Sherman was speaking at the Technology Policy Institute in Aspen this week, CNET reports.

As much previously reported, the most common interpretation of America’s Digital Millennium Copyright Act is that online services are not liable for infringement, so long as they remove offending content as soon as they are made aware of it being on their systems.

Sherman said: “The DMCA isn’t working for content people at all. You cannot monitor all the infringements on the internet. It’s simply not possible. We don’t have the ability to search all the places infringing content appears, such as cyberlockers like RapidShare”.

However, despite his concerns, Sherman added that he did not see new legislation as the solution to this (though did not rule it out), preferring to reach agreements with web firms directly. He explained: “We’re working on [discussions with broadband providers], and we’d like to extend that kind of relationship – not just to ISPs, but search engines, payment processors, advertisers. [But] if legislation is an appropriate way to facilitate that kind of cooperation, fine”.

In the UK and France efforts to reach voluntary agreements with the net sector that would result in ISPs taking on a piracy police role failed, and new laws were subsequently lobbied for and passed (though not, as yet, activated).

Also speaking at the debate, YouTube’s Lance Kavanaugh disagreed with Sherman’s view on US copyright law, saying: “It’s our view that the DMCA is functioning exactly the way Congress intended it to. There’s legal plumbing to allow that to happen, to allow those small companies to innovate without [the] crushing fear of lawsuits, as long as they follow certain rules. Congress was prescient. They struck the right balance”.

Of course, YouTube would be supportive of the DMCA as it has been recently interpreted by US judges, because one such interpretation enabled them to defeat a multi-million lawsuit from MTV owners Viacom. The video site circumvented liability for hosting MTV content without Viacom’s permission because they operated a take-down system. Viacom are not impressed by that interpretation of the law.

As also previously reported, last week, following a joint announcement from Google and US ISP Verizon regarding so called net neutrality, in which the two companies announced a joint commitment to ensure that all net users will always “have access to all legal content on the internet” (ie so smaller online publishers won’t be disadvantaged in favour of the bigger service providers), a consortium of American music business types – including the RIAA, indie labels body A2IM and collecting societies BMI, ASCAP and SESAC – called on the two web giants to add cracking down on piracy to their joint mission.

Discussing Google’s anti-piracy efforts directly, Sherman said that although YouTube and other Google-owned sites operate their own filtering systems to catch illegal content, the web giant “could stop filtering tomorrow and have no liability”, provided it continued to respond to take-down notices issued by content owners. He also added that there was plenty more that could be done, saying: “If you enter in ‘Beyonce MP3’ [into Google’s search engine] chances are, the first thing you’ll see is illegal sites”.

Vampire Weekend model speaks out about lawsuit

Legal Top Stories

Ann Kirsten Kennis, the model whose picture appeared as the cover art and main focus of promotional material for Vampire Weekend’s latest album, ‘Contra’, has spoken to Vanity Fair about her subsequent lawsuit over use of the photograph without her permission.

As previously reported, the now former model launched a $2 million lawsuit against photographer Tod Brody, the band and their label XL Recordings earlier this year. Brody claims that he took to photograph in a 1983 television commercial casting session, pinning it up on the wall behind his desk for 26 years before selling it to the band in 2009.

Kennis, however, disputes that Brody took the photograph at all, speculating that it was actually taken by her mother: “It’s not even like it’s a Polaroid before a photo shoot, because the hair’s not done, the makeup’s not done, the lighting’s not done. Nothing. It almost looks like somebody caught me by surprise. The other thing that’s strange about this photo is that it’s not taken [in front of a] seamless [back-drop] like it would be in a photographer’s studio. You can see a door frame there and hinges right in the background”.

However, Brody refutes this suggestion, telling the magazine: “As a photographer, for them to try to say that I didn’t take the photo and I claimed I took the photo – that’s extremely damaging”.

Although this dispute over who took the photograph is likely to be discussed if the case goes to trial, the main focus of Kennis’ legal action is, as previously reported, a release form seemingly giving her permission for the band to use the picture, which she says was forged.

The document in question, which is apparently dated 30 Jul 2009, is an agreement between Vampire Weekend Inc and Kirsten Jonsen – Kennis went by the stage name Kirsten when she was a model, though her maiden name is actually Klendshoj. The model’s address is listed as that given as Brody’s residence in Kennis’ lawsuit. It is then signed by ‘Kirsten Johnsen’, who seemingly confirms she is handing over the rights to the picture for a fee of $1.

The article’s author, Jessica Flint notes: “The notion that Ann Kennis would have signed the document in 2009 using her old stage name, Kirsten, and a last name seemingly pulled from thin air stretches credulity, as does the idea that this veteran model, who was compensated at a level just below that of an elite supermodel during her ten year modelling career, would have sold the rights to her image for a mere dollar”.

Both XL and Vampire Weekend say that they believed they had licensed the photograph legitimately, though they are named on the lawsuit because Kennis feels that they did not go to far enough lengths to confirm that the signature and name on the release form were genuine.

If Kennis wins her case, she stands to receive substantial damages and potentially a cut of profits from ‘Contra’, which has sold over half a million copies worldwide.

Jean unable to appeal Haiti election decision

Artist News

Wyclef Jean will not be able to appeal the decision to disqualify him from standing in the upcoming Haitian presidential election, a lawyer for the country’s electoral council said yesterday.

As previously reported, Jean’s plans to stand needed court approval because the former Fugee does not pass requirements in the country’s constitution regarding presidential candidates, mainly regarding citizenship and being resident in Haiti for five years before running. When that court failed to give its approval, Jean vowed to appeal.

However, speaking to Reuters, Samuel Pierre of the Haitian Electoral Council’s legal department said that there is no process by which rejected candidates can appeal. Pierre said: “There is absolutely no possibility for Wyclef Jean to be added to the list of candidates approved to run in the next presidential elections. So, it’s over. [Attempting to appeal the decision] is a waste of time because, when it comes to electoral matters, the electoral council is the Supreme Court, meaning there is nowhere else to go”.

In an interview with MSNBC yesterday, Jean said: “I have spent half my life in Haiti going back and forth. The Electoral Council is very corrupted”.

French trois-strikes body launches information campaign

Business News Legal

Hadopi, the agency set up to administer France’s new three-strikes anti-copyright infringement system, has launched an information campaign to let illegal downloaders in France know about how the country’s new Creation And Internet laws could affect them.

As previously reported, the French government was one of the first to respond to the music industry’s call for new laws that force internet service providers to take a more proactive role in policing online piracy, by sending warning letters to and ultimately cutting off persistent illegal file-sharers.

Fully aware that the worst offenders when it comes to accessing illegal content on the internet are almost all car owners, the organisation distributed 260,000 leaflets to drivers on French roads last weekend, and plan to do the same again this weekend. It’s possible they were actually trying to target families and their evil file-sharing children, rather than car owners.

According to Billboard, the leaflet informs its readers: “[The] internet is a space of freedom, expression and sharing. The development of new communications technology allows an increase in cultural exchanges. Our practices are changing and offer greater freedom. Nevertheless, [the enjoyment of] new freedoms brought new responsibilities”.

It then goes on to explain that in return for all that new ‘freedom’ the government is going to kick them in the face (figuratively) if they fuck up and do anything wrong. I’m paraphrasing.

If French internet users are caught downloading illegal content, they will receive warning letters telling them to stop, after which they can be fined up to 1500 euros and have their internet access blocked for a month, while persistent offenders can expect to have their connections cut off for longer periods.

Those pulled up will be able to contest the claims against them in court, but not knowing that their accounts were used for infringement by others will not be a valid defence. By implication, of course, this obliges French net users to apply password protection to any wifi connections, an obligation that arguably already exists in Germany as a result of a civil file-sharing court case.

As previously reported, Hadopi demonstrated just how vigilant rights holders need to be in the internet age earlier this year when it unveiled it’s logo in January. It turned out that the font employed in the logo had been used without permission. What’s more, it had been designed exclusively for telecommunications company France Telecom. Hadopi apologised and no legal action was taken against them. It was still funny, though.

Songwriter George Weiss dies

Obituaries

George Weiss, who was responsible for writing a string of hits in the 40s, 50s and 60s, has died of natural causes, his wife Claire announced earlier this week. He was 89.

Born in New York in 1921, Weiss earned a bachelor’s degree in music theory from the Juilliard School and served as a military bandleader during the Second World War before becoming a professional songwriter. As well as writing songs for the pop and jazz stars of the day, he also worked on a number of musicals, most famously ‘Mr Wonderful’ in 1956, which starred Sammy Davis Jr.

His best known songs were ‘Can’t Help Falling In Love’, recorded by Elvis Presley for his 1961 film ‘Blue Hawaii’, ‘What A Wonderful World’, recorded by Louis Armstrong in 1967, and The Tokens’ ‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’, a reworking of a South African Zulu song first recorded in the 1930s.

He was also president of the Songwriters Guild of America from 1982 to 2000, and spoke widely on the subject of copyright.

Weiss is survived by his third wife, Claire, his sister, three sons and a daughter from his first two marriages and eight grandchildren.

Plan B not retiring Strickland Banks just yet

Artist News

Earlier this month Plan B said that he would be retiring the Strickland Banks character and the soul sound of his current album, ‘The Defamation Of Strickland Banks’, quite soon. Now, it seems, he’s had a change of heart. Well, sort of.

In an interview with The Daily Star earlier this month, Plan B said: “[Strickland Banks] is a soul singer who’s found success very quickly and it’s gone to his head. I’m just telling a story, a scene from my career and it won’t be around for ever. He’s completely disconnected, a fictional creation, fictional people, no relation to my life. Now the music is so successful it’s getting harder. I’m like a film director. On the album cover it says ‘Plan B presents… The Defamation Of Strickland Banks’. It’s me portraying this character Strickland Banks for this one project, this one album”.

However, in a new interview with tabloid this week, he said: “I want to do Strickland Banks’s Greatest Hits – the songs that made him famous. ‘Make Me Your Religion’, which I played at the iTunes Festival in London, is for that. There’s a handful of other songs that I wrote after the album [which] came out in a similar vein. They don’t tell Strickland’s story, but they sound like his songs”.

This doesn’t mean that Strickland Banks is here to stay forever, though. Plan B went on to reveal that the new tracks are for an expanded edition of the ‘Strickland Banks’ album, due for release later this year. The crafty bugger. He explained: “I’ll repack them with ‘Defamation’ but I don’t think I’ll do a whole new separate album about Strickland again. I want to keep moving on”.

I still think he’ll struggle to leave that soul sound behind completely.

Opeth live at the Albert Hall boxset details

Releases

Swedish death metallers Opeth have announced full details of their forthcoming live boxset, ‘Opeth In Live Concert At The Royal Albert Hall’. It’s a snappy title, I think you’ll agree.

Recorded in April this year as part of the band’s 20th anniversary celebrations, the show saw the band perform their 2001 album ‘Blackwater Park’ in full, followed by a second set of songs from across their career. Both sets are presented in the boxset, which is spread across two DVDs and three CDs. A limited edition vinyl version will also be available replacing the CDs with four 180-gram LPs.

For full details, take a look at: www.roadrunnerrecords.co.uk/opeth/preorder/. ‘Opeth In Live Concert At The Royal Albert Hall’ will be released on 20 Sep.

The band will also be giving away a free download of a live recording of ‘Dirge For November’, taken from the Albert Hall show, for 48 hours from 4pm today at www.roadrunnerrecords.co.uk.

Jimmy Page to publish photo biography

Artist News

Jimmy Page is to publish a photo biography next month, filled with over 650 snaps selected and captioned by the Led Zep guitarist himself. Page has also signed 2500 copies of the book, which is why he didn’t write more in the actual book itself. That alone knackered his guitar-strumming hand right out.

The book is due to be published by Genesis on 27 Sep.

Slipknot frontman to publish novel

Artist News

Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor has written a novel, a humorous and dark story based on the seven deadly sins.

Entitled ‘Seven’, it follows two homicide detectives, the soon to retire William Somerset and new-on-the-team David Mills, as the track a serial killer who is murdering people in manners relating to the deadly sin he claims they are guilty of. No, not really, I don’t know what it’s about.

Here’s what Taylor says: “I just finished writing it, and it’s being edited right now. We’re hoping to get it out by the spring of next year. It’s about the seven deadly sins and my take on them and how I don’t think they’re sins at all. They’re human characteristics. They’re just human flaws and things that we all experience. I’m telling stories from my past and balancing humour with serious, dark stuff. I’m really excited about it”.

Mary J Blige announces London show

Gigs & Festivals

Mary J Blige will play a one-off show in London later this year, performing at the O2 Arena on 2 Nov.

Tickets are due to do on general sale on Friday.

Lissie expands UK tour

Gigs & Festivals

Lissie has announced a new string of headline tour dates, tickets for which go on sale on Friday. She is also due to release a new single, ‘Cuckoo’, on 30 Aug.

Tour dates:

10 Dec: Northumbria University
11 Dec: Leicester, Academy
13 Dec: London, Shepherds Bush Empire
14 Dec: Oxford, Academy
15 Dec: Liverpool, Academy 2
17 Dec: Cambridge, The Junction
18 Dec: Sheffield, The Leadmill
19 Dec: Brighton, Concorde 2

Black Mountain announce September dates

Gigs & Festivals

Black Mountain release their new album, ‘Wilderness Heart’, through Jagjaguwar on 13 Sep, by which time they will already have begun a UK tour.

Tour dates:

4 Sep: Oxford, Academy
5 Sep: Birmingham, Hare & Hounds
8 Sep: Brighton, Concorde
10 Sep: Bestival
11 Sep: End Of The Road Festival
12 Sep: Leeds, TJs Woodhouse Club
14 Sep: Glasgow, Oran Mor
15 Sep: Manchester, Academy 3
16 Sep: Nottingham, Rescue Rooms
7 Oct: London, Shepherds Bush Empire

Festival line-up update – 25 Aug 2010

Artist News Festival Line-Up Update Gigs & Festivals

ICELAND AIRWAVES, Reykjavik, Iceland, 13-17 Oct: Chateau Marmont, Mondkopf, Rolo Romassi, Wild Geese, Olafur Arnalds and Hafdis Huld are amongst the latest artists to be added to this year’s Iceland Airwaves line-up, joining the previously confirmed Bombay Bicycle Club, Alex Metric, Joy Formidable, Robyn and Everything Everything. www.icelandairwaves.com

iTunes favours tracks not given early radio play

Digital

According to reports, iTunes has adopted a new policy of offering better promotion to tracks which are serviced to the download store at the same time as radio. In fact, one source told CMU that this is now the only way to get tracks onto the main page on the market leading download store, resulting in a number of lead singles (those released before a full album, so where there is no album track equivalent already available) expected to go to number one missing out.

As previously reported, the pre-release window traditionally exists so that record labels can build a profile for a new track through radio play and other promotional activity over a number of weeks, with the aim of maximising first week sales so that the single enters the chart in a high position. The high chart ranking then brings further exposure on radio and in the mainstream print media, normally securing further single sales and, it’s hoped, building wider interest in the album release that will normally follow.

The problem is that in the digital age as soon as a track appears on radio, many music fans want immediate ownership of it. It’s argued that because these people cannot legitimately buy the song they go onto illegal file-sharing networks instead. As early as 2004, a piece of CMU and MusicTank research reported that this was one of the excuses used by file-sharers as to why they went the illegal route rather than buying tracks from the then fledgling iTunes Music Store. However, most major labels still like to have the pre-release promotional window as part of their marketing plan.

This was the subject of a MusicTank debate back in March. Read CMU’s full report on that here.

If it is true that iTunes is refusing to promote tracks that have already received radio play, this could fore a change of policy from the majors and the closure of the pre-release window. Or it could be the point at which labels stop placing so much emphasis on the iTunes store as a digital marketing tool.

Playlist.com owes $25 million in royalties

Digital

US streaming music site Playlist.com filed for bankruptcy protection earlier this month, according to CNET, because it owes the four major labels $25 million in unpaid licensing fees.

Originally an illegal site, Playlist.com managed to secure deals with all four majors last year. As previously reported, EMI, Warner and Universal sued the online service, formerly known as Project Playlist, in April 2008. EMI dropped its litigation a year later, though Warner and Universal continued a little longer.

Announcing its deal with the digital service in March last year, EMI Music Services man Ronn Werre told reporters: “Making our music available on a fan favourite like Project Playlist is part of EMI Music’s mission to connect artists and fans and to give fans more ways to discover new artists. Project Playlist is becoming a fan favourite. Our artists also know that word-of-mouth among friends is a powerful part of music discovery”.

However, after the site defaulted on payments due to the majors at the end of May, a number of those deals were reportedly withdrawn, though content from all four companies is currently still available on the site, meaning that Playlist.com is not only in debt but now operating semi-illegally again.

According to court documents seen by CNET, the company is trying to raise new financing, in part to cover its debts. However, unless it does something impressive with the rest of that new financing, it’s likely to find itself in trouble again not too far down the line. Which doesn’t make it an especially attractive investment opportunity.

Fireplayer app allows fans to remix tracks

Digital

Fireplayer, a new iPhone music application that claims to be “the next generation of music app”, launched yesterday with content from Universal Music, Ministry Of Sound, Infectious and others.

Developed by Bounce Mobile, the software allows music fans to download tracks and create remixes of them, which they can then share on Facebook.

Available as a free download in the iTunes app store, Fireplayer comes packaged with two free tracks, Hed Kandi’s ‘La La La’, which has been commissioned for the application, and ‘Demons’ by South Central, which is available exclusively ahead of its release later this year. Further tracks will cost users £1.79 each – pricey considering it’s not possible to listen to or export the original version of the track, as far as I can tell from using it.

Once users have created their remix – done by dropping the track’s individual parts in and out and using a limited range of effects – they can be shared via Facebook or email, giving others the opportunity to listen to your shoddy work via Fireplayer’s own streaming music player.

Bounce Mobile CEO Martin Macmillan told CMU: “We developed an app which enables people to interact with their favourite music in a new, engaging and addictive way. We’ve worked hard with key content providers to offer music across a range of musical genres, which gives Fireplayer mass market appeal and a unique proposition. Our focus is on fun but our business model also means the artists, labels and publishers can drive new and complimentary digital revenue streams. “

At launch, there are six tracks available to purchase, including ‘ABC by the Jackson Five, ‘Call Me’ by Go West and ‘Break Your Heart’ by Taio Cruz, with more to be added soon.

For an idea of the app’s potential, here’s a mix of ‘Demons’ by South Central I just put together, largely by jabbing at the buttons randomly: http://stream.fireplayer.com/greyhound/dyn/music.mp3?action=stream.LinkServeMix&id=72

Thursday 26 August 2010, 13:29 | By CMU Editorial

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