Jul
03
Musicians are Laborers
Previously, I mentioned that the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) won its first lawsuit against people sharing music via the internet. As long as there has been copyright legislation, there has been “piracy” - I’m sure that someone was bootlegging copies of Beethoven’s symphonies. However, no one had before been charged for pirating something where they were in turn not profiting from its sale. Sharing music online is not the same thing as selling illegally reproduced music. Furthermore, all of this is being done in the name of the musicians - the RIAA argues that when people download music on file-sharing programs, they are stealing from musicians. But where is the money going from the RIAA’s litigation? Typically the money from lawsuits (not just about file-sharing) goes back to the RIAA and the major record labels. What follows is a brief explanation of why the RIAA and the major record labels are more exploitative of musicians than file-sharers. Future blog posts will further elucidate the erroneous nature of the music industry’s arguments about file-sharing. (more…)
On Monday evening I attended the third Fort Reno show of the summer. Fort Reno is one of those “real DC” experiences that anybody living in the area needs to at least check out. Part of what makes it great is that the bands seem to be chosen specifically because they would not normally be scheduled to play togehter. Does pretty much any club in the area offer a superior concert experience? Yeah, probably. However, they have an excellent sound system run by a professional engineer. The main difference is that the crowd is not necessarily there to see the bands as much as they are just there because it is the summer, so they have to go to Fort Reno A description of the experience and review of the entertaining shows by Batala, the Small Doses, and Cigarbox Planetarium follows after the jump. 
Every year thousands of people come to Washington, DC to see fireworks on the National Mall for Independence Day. While DC may not be Philadelphia (where the Declaration of Independence was written) or Yorktown, VA (where the Revolutionary War was won), the Nation’s Capitol is one of the best destinations to celebrate the summer’s biggest holiday. There is a lot of music playing throughout the region all weekend long (by the way it’s great when the 4th falls on a Saturday), so make sure you check-out the schedule after the jump. 
This Saturday, head out to the Alexandria Recreation Center to catch some great live music . . . for FREE! This year’s 
Free concerts at Fort Reno Park, near the American University campus, have been a staple of muggy DC summers for more than three decades. Beginning next week, there will be a show each Monday and Thursday evening through the end of July at 7:15. Fort Reno Park is near the AU-Tenleytown Metro. Fort Reno shows are still embued with the spirit of the DC straight-edge punk scene, though a variety of local bands will play. Dogs and kids are welcome; drugs and booze are not. Crowds can be large, with a wide range of ages represented, though most who come are teenagers who are very lucky to grow up in DC.
When I first moved to northern Virginia, I assumed (wrongly) that 
The recording industry is infamous for signing bands and artists into bad contracts that do not lead to greater things for the artists. Usually, the record labels explain the lack of success for their artists by claiming that the market couldn’t bear their music. It is rarely mentioned that this problem stems from the label investing more money in certain artists than others. The determination about which artist to invest in is frequently “from the gut” and has nothing to do with data, but rather with the feeling that certain executives have about particular bands. None of this even begins to discuss when bands are signed to eliminate competition.
After getting out of a bad record contract (more on the point of 