Respecting The Darvocets...

The family attended the Taiwanese Hemp Farmer’s thirty something birthday party cookout this weekend over at his place and fun was had by all. I always think back to when I was Katie’s age when my folks would attend these functions with all five of us in tow and how much fun it was to hang out with a ton of other kids relatively unsupervised while our parents, never too far away, drank beer and talked about adult things. This meant we got to stay up way past our bed time. In the immortal words of Hue B. Mooksuki and Whitney Houston, “Oh hells yeah!”

During the latter part of the evening, the discussion drifted towards a favorite topic mashed out regularly on my blog and blogroll fairly frequently: the ethics of downloading and digital music. This ended up being an inspiring, if not spirited two front debate, certainly one worth having in my mind. I’ve noticed the last couple of get togethers, a couple of the fellows I golf and pal around with have been bating me on the subject by bragging about their music thievery. When the subject came up Saturday evening, it was time to talk about it.

The discussion started with perhaps the single worst justification I have ever heard for illegally downloading music: ”I’ve been buying albums and CD’s for years that only have one good song on them and the music industry owes me. I’ll download until I feel fully compensated…”, or something to this effect. The reparations excuse. There were many other equally sorry excuses that we’re all familiar with also but that one was a new one in my book. A couple of things are worthy of note before we dive in: First, with the exception of the owner of the above excuse(s), I was greatly relieved to discover that most everybody else agreed that pier to pier downloading of music without paying for it was wrong and they don’t do it personally, and neither do they allow their kids to do it. The other thing would not surprise anyone, and that is that those who freely admit to stealing music can very much afford to either pay for individual downloads or subscribe to Rhapsody, Yahoo Music, etc… and have access to virtually limitless catalogs of music for a paltry $12.00 per month. There’s really not much more I, or anybody else can add that hasn’t been discussed already on this blog and many others other than to say that I’d rather not hear about anyone’s escapades related to their music thievery and by now you know what my position is on the subject and how serious of a thing it is for me. If you have something to add to the discussion I’m cool with it and would love to talk, but excuses will fall on deaf ears.

The other front of the discussion I had was much more promising and educational. Hemp Farmer’s wife had many questions and posits that in retrospect revealed for me what many folks find mysterious and confounding about the musicians side of this debate.

I started by running down the position from the artists perspective by paraphrasing and quoting my esteemed colleague and friend Chrispy who I think stated it best in his previous comments on the subject (reprinted with his tacit permission):

"Flea's (read: artists) essential point was that he wants you to hear the music the way it was intended. This is completely legitimate, and I'm tired of people forgetting that, for the vast majority of musicians (and recording engineers) this career is not about money. It's about creating. Unfortunately, a lot of people have no understanding of this because they aren't creative, they are pure consumers. Now they can add nothing and take everything."

And this:

"Consumers are so caught up in having it "their way" that they've forgotten that they have no "right" to this music and no "right" to receive it the way they want. Until not long ago, the only music you could hear was performed live. If you couldn't play or go see someone play, tough. We've become so spoiled, so lazy, so quickly, that we forget that, for some of us, music (and sound) are sacred. It's not just another commodity or way to get rich. It's of an importance far deeper than someone like Bob can comprehend."

While counted amongst those who steadfastly reject stealing music off the internet, Hemp Farmer’s wife was miffed and remained unconvinced of the sincerity of recording artists and musicians seemingly anti capitalist position as did others participating in the discussion.

I used The Darvocets as a prime example of artists who exercise their right to control the method in which their music is listened to. For those unfamiliar with The Davocets, they recorded and pressed only vinyl copies of their latest release “Authentic Music From Another Planet". They could have easily pressed many more copies of this album to CD and thus perhaps made significantly more money than a vinyl only run. “But that’s silly, don’t they want more people to hear their music and buy their art?” A good question. The answer is yes, they would like people to hear their music, but what they want more is for people to listen to it the way in which THEY intended and are more than willing to forego the additional revenue they'd otherwise receive using a different medium. “That’s nuts!” was the reply I got, “it’s always about money…”.

Like Chrispy states, she cannot grasp that it’s not about the money for most in the business of music. If it was, nobody would be doing it since less than a sliver playing music for a living actually make anything close to “Rock Star” bucks. It was on this point that while replaying the discussion in my mind later that night and the next day it dawned on me why Hemp Farmer’s wife and many others can’t grasp the pain artists and musicians feel on this subject: Most folks, casual listeners of music, don’t KNOW or otherwise hangout with any musicians/artists and this is certainly the case here. Most in our little group are tech professionals, graduates of tech schools, and/or work in finance, law etc… They’re musical tastes are fairly mainstream and their listening habits are best described as casual. They’re exposure to the creative population of the world has been somewhat limited. I think this is why many have little grasp of how deeply devoted most artists are to their work. I remain convinced that if they got to know more artists, they’d understand better that the world of music goes far beyond the pimps, hoes, and posers of the pop music world who create music for the sole purpose of making money. With the exception of one other guy, I am the only “musician” in the bunch (a bad one at that) and we rarely talk about music when in company with this group of friends.

Perhaps an analogy would help make it clearer for them. Most in our group would have mad props and respect for a guy who, instead of going on to a civilian life and career, chose to play 20 years of minor league baseball knowing that he’d have zero chance of making it to the big show. Simply put, someone who is playing the game for his love of it. There are many ball players doing just that and they certainly get my utmost respect not to mention the countless thousands of kids not on scholarship playing sports at colleges not contending for national championships and TV exposure.

For as many in the pop music industry who make compromises to sell more copies of their records, there are legions of musicians and artists who would rather die than do that. Mike Doughty mentions how embarrassed and stupid Yani Lane of Warrant feels about his career in a recent post. Mike points out in VH1’s documentary “Heavy” to a snipet where Yani’s “talking about how he wrote "Cherry Pie" in one night, because his record company demanded a single; he hates it, spoke bitterly of promotional pie-eating contests and how the wretched tune would be his legacy, and actually wept on camera.” Yani made a poor career decision that he gets little sympathy from anyone on. However, on another level I can completely understand his emotional outburst at having compromised himself so much as a musician/artist and with that I genuinely feel bad for him.

Most make music for themselves and the pure pleasure of doing it. They would welcome the idea of their art taking off and making them a fortune and most can also grasp the fact that more than likely it won’t. Still, they dedicate their lives to it regardless of the life long financial challenges this reality presents. Most would just be satisfied to simply make a living of it and not have to work a day job.

There is nothing at all wrong with being a casual listener or fan of pop music. At the same time, I think it’s important to respect the artists right to own their art. At a minimum, respect them enough not to steal it, but also to respect their right to expose you to it (or not) in the way that they determine even if it’s to their financial detriment. Also understand that artists in turn respect the consumer’s right to not buy their art.

Ultimately, I’m glad we had the discussion Saturday night and hope nobody was put off by it in anyway. It was not an attempt to seize higher moral ground on my part. While I don’t make my living playing or recording music, it is nevertheless a HUGE part of who I am. For nothing else, a bunch of people now know what I’m most passionate about (other than my wife and my kid). There are many other aspiring artists and artist wannabe’s like me out there. Take the time to get to know them. You’ll be glad you did. If you do, I am certain you will discover a commitment, dedication, and passion you have never seen before, and you’ll find them just as worthy of respect as the guy slogging out a career in minor league ball for nothing other than the love of the game.