Latest / The Price of Music / Radiohead and Kesha are furious; Artists are struggling to tour; Football cosies up to music; and buying a slice of your favourite artist

Transcript

Radiohead and Kesha are furious; Artists are struggling to tour; Football cosies up to music; and buying a slice of your favourite artist · The Price of Music

• 0:03
  Hello and welcome to The Price of Music, brought to you by
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  Music Ally, the show that both looks at the finances of the
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  music industry while also bringing you stories and
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  comments from the past week in the pop business.
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  He's Stuart Dredge. I'm Steve Lemack.
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  If you want an easy guide for what's going on in the music
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  industry and how it all works, then here we are this week.
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  One or two AI stories, of course, but ones which we'll be
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  approaching from slightly different angles.
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  Plus, if Radiohead really are annoyed with the American
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  government, why aren't they suing them?
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  We'll be addressing that. And is this new June app any
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  goods? We have a question about that
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  we'll get to in a bit. But to start, as always, here's
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  a big number you can quote to people this week.
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  Stuart, give us your stat of the week.
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  What is it this week? My stat of the week OK, it is
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  162 million and this is how many Instagram views this year's Brit
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  Awards got. All right.
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  Which is up from 32.4 million last year.
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  So basically Instagram views quadrupled.
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  Which is just a little statement about where awards shows are
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  now. This is the big headline about
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  how popular the Brits were. It's not about TV viewers, it's
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  about Instagram. Views yeah, absolutely.
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  And what, why why do you think it's gone up so much this year?
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  Was it just it was a particularly grand affair and
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  there were a lot of big performances which I imagine
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  were, if you clip them up, make quite good sound bites.
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  I think that's it. I mean the the the people behind
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  the brick wards are putting a lot of effort into socials
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  nowadays, clipping everything up.
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  They got a big deal with Mehta which owns Instagram as well as
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  Facebook and WhatsApp. So they had a red carpet live
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  stream on Instagram before which would have pushed things up.
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  They had I think you could vote for the songs of the year in
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  WhatsApp, like kind of these partnerships they have are quite
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  common. So it just and the press release
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  goes the press release about how popular they were goes paragraph
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  on Instagram, paragraph on Facebook, Reels paragraph on
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  YouTube views paragraph on TikTok views paragraph on ITVX
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  on demand streams and then and by the way, viewers on TV,
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  which, but that's, that's how things are now.
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  I think when we the the glory days of the Brits, when it would
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  be like how many people watched on TV and how many tabloid
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  headlines were made by by bad behaviour.
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  Nowadays it's all about the socials.
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  OK, three of the more interesting talking points of
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  the week. The first one, as mentioned,
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  it's, well, it's radio. Well, Radiohead and Keisha are
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  the latest artists who are furious that their music has
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  been used in social media posts by the US governments.
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  But can they do anything about it?
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  Because this comes up quite often, doesn't it?
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  Artists who don't want their music used by political figures
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  or regimes, but apart from sending them a cease and desist
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  letter, is there anything really they they can do?
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  Well, not much other than go on socials and say how much you're
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  cross about it. And it's true, this has been a
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  thing happening increasingly US and it seems to be a strategy in
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  the US, doesn't it? I think that the White House or,
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  or the different bits of administration, they'll put a
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  social post out and they'll put someone's music on it that they
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  know is going to be annoyed. They've done it with Olivia
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  Rodrigo, with Sabrina Carpenter. I mean, Radiohead obviously, if
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  there's any band less keen on having their music featured in
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  the White House post. So yeah, they used Let Down,
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  which is obviously a massive song on socials, which is Sign
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  of the Times equal in itself on a montage of, and I quote this,
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  criminal illegal alien violence. So one of their kind of posts
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  about how terrible immigrants are and how they're committing
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  loads of crime in the US And then it was, it was used.
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  It was, I think it was like a core version.
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  So it wasn't Radiohead's version.
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  It was a core cover of it. But it sparked this really,
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  really fun statement from the band who simply said we demand
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  that the amateurs and control of the ICE, social media council,
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  ISIS, the immigration agency there take it down.
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  It ain't funny. This song means a lot to us and
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  other people and you don't get to appropriate without a fight.
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  Also, go fuck yourselves. And Keisha had a similar thing.
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  Her purse song was using a post about to do a war related post
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  and she said that this is disgusting and humane.
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  It's not what music is about. And it just goes on and on like
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  this is this has kind of become a strategy in that they put
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  these songs in posts, the artists complain, everyone talks
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  about it and it gets more headlines and the original post
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  gets seen more. So in one sense, the artists are
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  kind of playing into the hands of the people posting the post
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  because they're giving them the policy they want.
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  On the other hand, I mean, there isn't much you can do.
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  I mean, there's there's been no lawsuits in the US from an
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  artist saying the White House used my song in a post on
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  socials without permission. There have been lawsuits for
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  brands. So like, for example, fitness
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  companies have used songs from major labels in their socials
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  and the labels have sued them and said you haven't got a
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  licence for that. You need to come and get a sink
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  licence. But no one seems to know how
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  this would go if you sued the actual government that the
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  president himself. And also there's the risk of
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  actually, do you want to be in a legal battle with a very
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  litigious man who might come back and sue you for $10
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  billion? There was a case actually The
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  White Stripes sued Donald Trump a couple of years ago for using
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  7 nation army in a social post. So I think one of his team did.
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  And then that they dropped that case and didn't pursue it, which
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  was they didn't say why, but it was seen as a sign of this is
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  going to be difficult. Suing the president for social
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  media post using music is going to be difficult.
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  So really it's you say how you, you, you protest and you let
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  your fans know we're not on board with them.
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  We don't like it, but other than that, no one really is going to
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  court. Do do they get paid for the for
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  the use is, are the US government covered by any sort
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  of licensing agreement or do you can you recoup any, any
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  royalties or does it come through the royalties you get
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  from the social media? Yeah, I mean, if it was on, if
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  it was something like YouTube, you could claim the video using
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  its content ID system and you get you get money then tick tock
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  and things. It's it's very, very, it's very
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  unclear. So I don't think road ahead of
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  making money from this. But one of the reasons I think
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  you protest as an artist is because you don't want people to
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  think you are, you think you're comfortable with that.
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  So in a way, although protesting brings the original video more
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  attention, it's I, I can understand why.
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  I just want to do it because they want to make it very, very
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  clear we're not, this is not done with any mission, but it's
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  going to carry on, I think. And this week there was an
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  example, I think Franz Ferdinand.
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  Take Me Out was used in a video by Israel's different force
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  about bombing Iran. And the band said we didn't
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  agree to. This is not what this song is
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  about, but it just either your lyrics are appropriate for a
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  video about war and so it's used, or it's a careful strategy
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  to say, like, let's pick someone who'll get really pissed off
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  because then it will get even more publicity.
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  Yeah. Franz Ferdinand, that wouldn't
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  be the first band who I would pull out their hat.
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  But anyway, right next, a report from the House of Lords, Well, a
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  House of Lords committee here in the UK about AI has been
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  strongly welcomed by the music community, and Stuart will
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  explain why. Yeah, And I should do a bit for
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  non British distance first about the House of Lords, shouldn't I?
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  Because it's our upper house in our Parliament, so the
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  equivalent of the Senate in the US or Australia, except with
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  some very British aspects that we don't vote for them, they
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  just get appointed or they get elite.
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  They kind of born into it. But the idea is there a check,
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  isn't there a check on the government?
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  And they, they look at legislation and they've been
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  looking at AI and copyright and creative industries.
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  And yeah, this report, I mean, this report came out on Friday
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  and says essentially AI is a clear and present danger to the
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  creative industries, including music.
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  If AI companies like to just train their models on anything
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  they want or the music or the books or the art without
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  permission, which is exactly what the music industry has been
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  saying for the last two years. And yeah, it's telling the
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  government, oi, you know, don't give these guys a free pass,
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  Make them license stuff properly, which was very
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  topical, untimely because of the same day on Friday this report
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  came out. There were these news stories
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  saying the government was considering possibly, I think it
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  was called a commercial research exception.
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  And what that is, is if you're an AI company, you can train on
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  everything you want without asking, but only when you want
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  to commercialize it, actually launch a product, then you have
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  to go and get licensing deals. And if it did that, the problem
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  with that is it might give them unfair advantage of negotiating
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  with the go to the music company.
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  We've used all your stuff. We've trained our model.
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  It's look good. We want to make a product now,
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  so here's some money, take it or leave it.
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  It doesn't, It takes them. So this report came out saying
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  don't do that. At the same day when it emerged
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  the government might be considering doing just that.
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  All right, this is another actually the stain with the
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  subjects of AI. Apple Music subscribers will
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  soon know exactly how AI has been used in the music they're
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  listening to, although there is there is one rather large
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  loophole. Yeah, there is, but this is
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  interesting. So you know, we've talked about
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  the idea of people want to know if they're listening to AI music
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  or not. Yeah.
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  So this is this new things called transparency tags.
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  So if you're uploading music to Apple Music, so it's not an
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  artist, there won't be a label distributor.
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  But if you're, if you're putting your music out through a
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  distributor as an artist, you would have to give them these
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  tags. And it's 4 tags.
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  One is artwork. So if you've used AI to make
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  your cover art, another one is track, if you've made the music
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  using AI. Another is composition, which is
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  kind of the lyrics and the actual song itself.
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  And then be music video if your music video is using AI.
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  So if you have used a material portion of AI, which is one of
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  the loopholes, because that's that's quite a vague definition.
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  If a material portion, you have to say.
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  And the idea being then is that those tags could be shown.
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  So as an Apple Music user, you might see A tag saying this song
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  used AI for its track, but it could also be used by Apple if
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  they want to treat AI music differently.
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  So if they wanted to give lower royalties or, you know, not
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  promote it. But yeah, the loophole
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  essentially is that the person uploaded music has to decide
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  whether to use these tags. Like in a way it's saying you
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  should use these and if they go well, OK, but I'm not putting it
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  on because I don't want to. We don't quite know yet what
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  Apple will do if it detects that you're, you're sort of trying to
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  pretend not. But I think it's good.
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  I mean, I think, I think it's one of the big, the lowest, the
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  literally the lowest thing, lowest bar here is that people
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  should know what they're listening to and then they can
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  make their own decisions. And Apple's doing this.
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  Spotify has got its own plans to have tags.
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  These are tags. AI music like this is I think in
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  the next year we'll see some kind of system on every
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  streaming service where you should know if something has
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  been using AI. The difficulty though, if you're
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  an artist, if you're using AI, for example, say you're using AI
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  to like mix your song or master it, which is one of the, do you
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  say that here? And then people think your track
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  has been made by an AI when it's been made by you.
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  So there's there's all kinds of little blurry bits around the
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  edge that artists might worry if they, if they haven't been using
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  it to make the whole track, do they get tarred with that brush?
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  So there are a few things to work out.
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  OK, any other business actually, let's start with something from
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  from the Price of Music inbox. This is this coming from Karen
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  Ashton, who's been in touch asking about the new Dune app or
• 11:30
  I think it's it's new newish June.
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  That's DUNE is well, it's where fans can buy stakes in in an
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  artist's work. Karen says.
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  I'd be really interested to know what you think about the app,
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  how much it will help artists, which artists it will appeal to
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  and how it all works. Thank you very much, Karen, for
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  for this. Because it wasn't something I
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  was aware of. So, so I downloaded the the
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  thing I went and had a look at it.
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  I mean, I've got quite a lot of questions for you now, Stuart,
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  given that I don't really understand how it works.
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  So you should explain it seems sort of what it, what it is,
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  what it does, what it's there for.
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  Yeah, sure. So it was announced in November,
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  I think last year when they raised some money.
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  And yeah, it's kind of in a way it's, it's treating artists as
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  if they were like public companies that you can buy
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  shares in. So the way it'll work is as an
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  artist, you go on there and you do a sale.
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  So you'd say I'm selling, I don't know, 100 shares in
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  myself. And you buy a share and then you
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  own it as a fan and you can, you can sell it if you want to.
• 12:32
  And the price will go up and down based on that artist
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  streaming stats. So if the artist is doing well
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  on streaming, the price of the share goes up.
• 12:39
  If it's not doing so well, it goes down again.
• 12:41
  And so it's two things really. It's kind of a stock market for
• 12:45
  artists in that sense. They have to be in on it.
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  So it's not like Taylor Swift is in there.
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  An artist has to sign up and say, I want to be part of this.
• 12:53
  So it's mainly independent artists like BC Camp Light is 1
• 12:56
  the Hun or another. And yeah, I think artists keep
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  70% of the money from their initial sale.
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  So if they put 100 shares on sale for $5, they keep 70% of
• 13:08
  the sale. Yeah, so they get some money.
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  And as a, as a, as an owner of a share, you can get benefits and
• 13:14
  the artist can choose to give you stuff like exclusive videos
• 13:18
  or giveaway prizes or VIP meet and greets, ticket, pre sales,
• 13:22
  merch, discounts. So the owes are by owning a
• 13:24
  share, you're not just hoping to get rich if it goes up.
• 13:27
  You're actually, it's more like you're getting these perks of
• 13:29
  being a fan of the band. So that's the the basic gist of
• 13:33
  it. Right.
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  So is it so it is partly about fans supporting artists they
• 13:40
  like by giving them some some money.
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  But also, so I guess part of is part of the rest of the appeal
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  is that you can you can make some money by Wheeling and
• 13:51
  dealing as if as if you are playing on the Stock Exchange
• 13:55
  and it But if so, so how? How do you make money?
• 13:58
  You buy a so you buy a you buy a share in BC Camp light for 5-5
• 14:03
  dollars. How do you how do you make
• 14:06
  money? Do you wait till BC?
• 14:07
  When do we know that BC camp light is shares in BC Camp light
• 14:12
  have gone up? Is that is that how it works or
• 14:16
  and what? And it goes up if the streaming
• 14:18
  figures go up? I don't.
• 14:20
  So it's based on their, their average monthly streams of their
• 14:23
  music, which the idea behind that is just like not a sudden
• 14:27
  spike. So for example, if, if today is
• 14:29
  100 streams, tomorrow's 1000 streams, the price rockets.
• 14:32
  So they kind of they, they level it out.
• 14:34
  But yeah, if your streams go up, the value of that share goes up
• 14:37
  and it might be $7.00 or $9 and so on.
• 14:41
  I mean, I think thinking about it and looking at it, it's not
• 14:45
  it's no, you're not going to get rich doing this.
• 14:48
  Like you really aren't going to get rich by sort of piling all
• 14:50
  your savings into BC campaign and hoping his albums as well.
• 14:54
  I think it is much more about the fandom aspect and getting
• 14:56
  the perks. And I don't.
• 14:59
  And honestly, I think if you buy a share and you get good stuff,
• 15:03
  do you want to sell that share even if the price has gone up?
• 15:05
  Or do you want to hang on to it? And you've got so, so I think it
• 15:07
  is more just another way of putting some money in their
• 15:09
  pockets and getting something in return.
• 15:13
  I mean, the, the, the, the, the alternative is you could go to
• 15:16
  BC Camp Lights band camp and buy an album or go buy some merch.
• 15:20
  So there is that argument. If you want to put money in
• 15:22
  someone's pocket, there are less, there are less complicated
• 15:25
  ways to do it. But I think the one thing I was
• 15:30
  this made me think of, I'm sure something else was like this.
• 15:34
  And there's a quite a bad example in the past that June
• 15:37
  has learnt from, I think. So there was a thing called
• 15:39
  football Index, which I don't know if you remember that it.
• 15:41
  Was a few years ago. It was, it was like a virtual
• 15:44
  stockade for footballers. So you could buy shares in, you
• 15:48
  know, footballers and then see them go up and down based on
• 15:51
  influence in the real world. And that all collapsed very
• 15:54
  badly. People lost thousands.
• 15:57
  It just, it was a big kind of controversy where people had put
• 16:00
  lots of money into these shares and they ended up being worth
• 16:03
  nothing and they got movements. So June, when you dig into how
• 16:07
  June works, it's been quite designed.
• 16:10
  So there's, there's, there's no, there's a ceiling on it.
• 16:12
  So shares can't go over $100. If they get to that month, they
• 16:16
  split and they, so if you've got a $100 share and it goes up, you
• 16:20
  don't have $250 shares. It's split in two, which is kind
• 16:23
  of a financial thing and it can't go below $5.00.
• 16:27
  So in that sense, like BC Campbell, for example, his share
• 16:30
  is $5 at the moment. So if you buy it, you're not
• 16:32
  going to lose money. You might not be able to sell it
• 16:35
  later, but you've only lost a 5A fiver then.
• 16:38
  So I think they've looked at what happened in football and
• 16:40
  said, right, we're not going to do that.
• 16:41
  That was that was really bad. So it does feel much more
• 16:45
  towards this is not get rich quick.
• 16:47
  It's not a money making thing. It's a support the artist you
• 16:49
  like. So yeah, it's it's a way to put
• 16:53
  money in their pockets. And there are other ways, but
• 16:55
  it'll be interesting to see if it catches on because obviously
• 16:57
  depends on that. That's the thing, isn't it?
• 16:59
  I mean, having having having looked at it, there's not a huge
• 17:03
  amount of artists who've signed up to this as yet, although I
• 17:07
  did not. So I think the journalist John
• 17:08
  Rob's band the Membranes are listed and currently one of the
• 17:12
  trending artists is the band, the Manchester band, North Side.
• 17:17
  So the north side like I think, yeah.
• 17:22
  Well, well, are they? I mean, that's the that's thing.
• 17:26
  I mean, but the singer Dermo from North side still does
• 17:30
  stuff. I think that I think North side
• 17:32
  are advertised as doing gigs, although sometimes it's just
• 17:34
  him. But I mean, I guess you could, I
• 17:37
  mean, if you were a if you're a heritage axe who streams, well,
• 17:44
  then I guess you, you, you could become part of this even if you
• 17:47
  weren't doing any gigs or anything.
• 17:49
  I guess you could just say, you know, buy into whatever dormant
• 17:53
  bands it it. It may be because they still
• 17:56
  stream well. But yeah, we saw something I
• 18:00
  guess. I guess we'll wait and say, just
• 18:01
  out of interest then, if BC Camp like did by the by the end of
• 18:05
  the month, BC Camp Light straight BC Camp Light puts out
• 18:08
  there. Because here's the thing, this
• 18:09
  will always be slightly skewed by do they have a record out?
• 18:13
  When they have a record out, they'll be streamed loads more,
• 18:17
  I would imagine when they're in the press or on, you know, in
• 18:20
  promotion or on tour. But anyway, suppose BC Camp
• 18:24
  Light goes up to $10. How?
• 18:27
  How do who do I sell? Who do I sell my share to?
• 18:30
  And how do you how do you sell it?
• 18:32
  And more importantly, does that money just come to me?
• 18:37
  I'm not going to do this, but does that money come to me?
• 18:40
  None of that money then goes back to the artist.
• 18:42
  The artist has had their $5 every every time there's a
• 18:45
  transaction after that. I presume the money is held by
• 18:49
  the person who owned the share or has just sold the share.
• 18:53
  Yeah, So in terms of selling it, so I understand it works is you
• 18:58
  you say I want to sell my share, it gets listed and then it gets
• 19:00
  matched with a buyer if there is a buyer.
• 19:02
  And that's the other thing if no one wants buying shares, then
• 19:05
  you don't you can't sell it. Yeah.
• 19:07
  Do you know I don't know about the artistic I I know I
• 19:09
  definitely get 70% the original sale.
• 19:11
  I don't know if they get a portion of the the follow on
• 19:13
  sales. And I think it's yeah, the the
• 19:18
  the challenge it faces, I think is say you come to this because
• 19:21
  you're a fan of BC Camp Light and you buy a share in him.
• 19:26
  It only kind of works if you end up looking at the other artists
• 19:29
  and buying shares. And as well, like it needs a
• 19:31
  community. People buy it who want to buy
• 19:32
  shares in different artists rather than just a bunch of BC
• 19:35
  Camp Light fans here, bunch of media fans here you need to
• 19:38
  have. So I think that's going to be a
• 19:40
  challenge. It used to get lots of fans
• 19:42
  interested in the idea and like you say, who it signs up would
• 19:46
  be important because they'll bring people to it.
• 19:47
  But it's interesting and I think to to the question it's, it
• 19:52
  doesn't look like something where you're going to lose money
• 19:54
  that you, you can buy a $5 share, you might lose that
• 19:57
  $5.00, but you'll have got some benefits, so.
• 19:59
  OK, all right, we shall wait and see.
• 20:01
  Thank you, Karen for that. Karen, by the way, also sent us
• 20:04
  some recommendations for our playlist of bands on Spotify
• 20:08
  with less than 1000 plays. In our attempt to drag some of
• 20:13
  them out of the the sub 1000 ghetto.
• 20:15
  Of course, under 1000 plays you don't get paid on Spotify.
• 20:20
  So have a look for these. I mean, I'll confess I haven't
• 20:23
  listened to any of them yet, but apologies, Karen.
• 20:25
  But that's because this week I have mostly been listening to
• 20:29
  about 200 artists who are playing this year's South by
• 20:32
  Southwest festival, which is where I'm off to on Thursday.
• 20:35
  But if you're interested, everybody try these out.
• 20:38
  True Heads and a song called Public Pressure pamphlets by
• 20:42
  Chester sell with confidence. That's a good band name we've
• 20:46
  got a track called Aiming and then brilliantly, Glue Smells
• 20:50
  that is that's one of the band names of the week.
• 20:53
  Glue Smells and they attract TV moms good work well done
• 20:58
  everyone right. There's some good news today for
• 21:01
  artists in the UK who are struggling with the economics of
• 21:03
  touring. The UK Artist Touring Fund has
• 21:07
  just opened for applications. It's partly driven of course by
• 21:12
  the much discussed 1 LB contribution being raised at a
• 21:15
  selection of gigs for the capacity of more than 5000
• 21:18
  people. A pound.
• 21:19
  A ticket then goes to the new Live Trust.
• 21:24
  The Live Trust, which as we reported made its first payout
• 21:28
  recently, something like half £1,000,000 to various grassroots
• 21:31
  organisations. Some of that money that first
• 21:34
  pay out went to UCAT. You should explain for a start
• 21:39
  who UCAT are, who's a part of this and what are they going to
• 21:43
  do with the money. Yeah, sounds like AK Pop Group,
• 21:46
  doesn't it? But UCAT, UK Artist Touring
• 21:48
  Fund. So it's a, it's a fun focusing
• 21:50
  on artists and by extension promoters and managers.
• 21:56
  And it's overseen, I think by it's through the featured
• 21:58
  artists Coalition, the error maths, the manager's body and
• 22:00
  the musicians union. So three people would know their
• 22:02
  onions when it comes to sort of supporting artists and
• 22:04
  musicians. And yeah, they got 125 grand.
• 22:08
  And so I throwed into because they've denounced the details of
• 22:11
  how they're going to split it up.
• 22:13
  And I think so from today, as this comes out Wednesday,
• 22:17
  artists can apply for up to 7000 lbs each.
• 22:21
  And there were some strings. So you have to be playing a
• 22:23
  headline tour of small to mid sized venues.
• 22:27
  You've got to be playing at least three dates and 3/4 of
• 22:30
  them have got to be promoted, but with guarantees.
• 22:32
  Not so. So I suddenly thought there is
• 22:35
  that that's avoiding A loophole, isn't it, where you could just
• 22:37
  book a bunch of village halls and say you're playing gigs
• 22:39
  though and claim some money and just a matter of yeah, so
• 22:42
  they've they've kind of seen that coming and gone, right.
• 22:43
  So you have to do proper gigs, headline gigs.
• 22:47
  And I think the key thing, and this is something I hadn't
• 22:50
  thought about as well, is it's not about paying for the tours.
• 22:52
  It's not about paying all the costs if you're a tour, it's
• 22:55
  about you have to be show them that you're going to make a
• 22:57
  loss. There's a shortfall between what
• 22:59
  you're spending and what you're making with tour and it's
• 23:01
  covering that. So that's why 7000 LB isn't
• 23:04
  enough to fund the whole tour. But it might be the the thing
• 23:06
  that tips you back into profit and make sure your managers and
• 23:10
  crew get paid because that's part of this as well, isn't it?
• 23:12
  You have to pay everyone fairly to help you do that.
• 23:15
  But it's, it seems like a good thing.
• 23:17
  I mean, the only thing I think is like 125,000 / 7000, but it's
• 23:23
  going to be limited. Like there's a certain amount of
• 23:24
  artists that can help, but I suspect they'll be over over
• 23:28
  applied, won't they? But.
• 23:30
  Yeah, I mean it's more FAC has have have their own funds where
• 23:34
  they've been helping artists go out on tour.
• 23:36
  So this and this is much more money than has previously been
• 23:41
  available for this, but I think it'll be interesting as, as a
• 23:46
  first, because I, I think when you launch something like this,
• 23:50
  as you say, you, they've already spotted some loopholes.
• 23:54
  You've got to work out how, how do we actually, how do we best
• 23:57
  help artists to get out on tour? And I think as this, this will
• 24:01
  be a, this will be a real learning curve.
• 24:03
  A lot of things around the live trust and some of the
• 24:05
  organisations who are receiving money.
• 24:09
  It's got everything is a sort of learning curve as we work out
• 24:13
  what's it's the best way to support the grassroots economy
• 24:16
  and everyone who is part of it. So I think it's as a initial
• 24:21
  funding, I think it will give them, it will give them a lot of
• 24:25
  experience I think because also just imagine how many artists
• 24:31
  will probably be in touch with them.
• 24:33
  So someone needs to go through all the applications for, for a
• 24:38
  start. But yeah, I mean, it's, it's
• 24:41
  really into the, I mean, the idea is, as you say, if you're
• 24:44
  an artist, I think what UKAP would really like to do when,
• 24:47
  what the problems they're addressing is not an artist who
• 24:50
  can't afford to go out on tour. It's about artists who are doing
• 24:56
  6 dates, but they could do 9 if they only had more money.
• 25:01
  Now where? Why?
• 25:02
  Why is this important? Because the other three dates
• 25:05
  might be in places where venues are struggling to book artists
• 25:10
  because artists are doing much shorter tours and they're only
• 25:13
  going to Glasgow, Manchester and London.
• 25:18
  And so being able to do the three extra dates hopefully
• 25:23
  means that you can you can get an artist to areas where gigs
• 25:29
  are becoming thinner on the ground.
• 25:31
  And the obviously, as all the things we've said about that
• 25:33
  means you support that local music community.
• 25:36
  People don't have to travel so far.
• 25:39
  I don't have to get a train or a bus and leave just before the
• 25:42
  encore. It's all those things.
• 25:43
  So there's that and definitely what you were saying about just
• 25:47
  being able to fund the tour properly, paying the tour
• 25:50
  manager, paying maybe for a sound person.
• 25:53
  So because what their argument is particularly the FAC I think
• 25:57
  is, you know, artists want to do the very best, they want to do
• 26:00
  the very best show, the very best gig they can do.
• 26:03
  And they're having to cut corners because they don't have
• 26:05
  the money, which means they can't take even if it's, you
• 26:09
  know, a solo artist with a couple of really hot session
• 26:13
  players, right? Like you can't afford the, the,
• 26:15
  the session people, the session musicians or you, you know, you
• 26:20
  can take 3 of the bands, not five of the bands.
• 26:23
  It's, it's being able to, you know, I guess, you know, this is
• 26:28
  what the seven grand is for. Do it, do it really well.
• 26:32
  And it's, you know, in a way it's a new version of tour
• 26:36
  support, which used to be a thing in the 90s and part of the
• 26:39
  noughties. And very few artists now get
• 26:41
  tour support from their labels. So it's a little bit like that.
• 26:44
  But I think creatively, I think this is probably better.
• 26:49
  But we shall see. But yeah, yeah, have a have a
• 26:52
  look. If you're an artist with a tour,
• 26:54
  as I say, you know, you might, you might have seven.
• 26:56
  You might be thinking I can, I can do seven dates, but then got
• 27:00
  to take X amount of time off work.
• 27:02
  The cost of the van, the cost of the crew, Maybe we could just do
• 27:06
  4 date. Maybe this is for you.
• 27:08
  If you are just as, as we've said, struggling with
• 27:12
  essentially the bill for your tour, this might be an
• 27:16
  interesting way around it. This is a story.
• 27:20
  This next story is, I mean, this could also be a part of our
• 27:24
  former colleagues over At The Price of Football, part of one
• 27:27
  of their shows. As you may have heard, John
• 27:31
  McClure from Reverend and Makers as a new part time job.
• 27:35
  He's become the chairman and part owner of the world's oldest
• 27:39
  football club, which of course is in Sheffield.
• 27:43
  It is Sheffield FC, founded in 1857.
• 27:47
  You're playing the 9th tier of England's football pyramid,
• 27:50
  which for for in a reference that will appear to everyone
• 27:52
  that there's 22 rungs below Bishop Stortford.
• 27:55
  I think it's a Northern Premier League.
• 27:58
  But yeah, I didn't realise. So I was really, we knew
• 28:00
  actually interviewed didn't it this week.
• 28:01
  But he he tried to buy them before, I think a few years ago
• 28:04
  and didn't work. Turns out I didn't realise.
• 28:06
  I didn't realise that when he, when he first said, when he
• 28:10
  first sent us a WhatsApp about it, I, I, I mistakenly thought
• 28:14
  he was going to attempt to buy Sheffield Wednesday, who were
• 28:18
  looking for new owners at the moment.
• 28:20
  But yeah, Sheffield FC, oldest football club in the world.
• 28:24
  I mean, he talked very passionately about this, you
• 28:26
  know, the, the one thing he said we're just not very good in
• 28:30
  Sheffield of actually telling people about the stuff we've
• 28:35
  done. He said Manchester a great self
• 28:38
  publicity, Sheffield rubbish. And he said we've got the oldest
• 28:42
  football club in the world and we never really sing, sing out
• 28:46
  loud about. It even play in Sheffield, do
• 28:48
  they? And that's one of the things is
• 28:49
  they want to bring back to. Sheffield.
• 28:50
  Yeah, it's yeah, exactly that. But I do.
• 28:53
  Worry about though, like because he's, he seems like a real good
• 28:56
  egg. You know much better than I do,
• 28:57
  but he seems like a good egg. But if there's one way more
• 29:00
  guaranteed to lose you money than going on tour as a band,
• 29:03
  it's it's running a football club.
• 29:05
  So I hope he's got good, good backing around him.
• 29:07
  So he's not going to be. I think there is some money in
• 29:09
  the rest of the consortium and I imagine John is the the front.
• 29:13
  I mean there's also Dave Bianchi, David Bianchi, the
• 29:16
  manager. John's manager is very well
• 29:18
  known manager. He's part of this as well.
• 29:22
  So yeah, we we'll wait and see. I did say to him, what's what's
• 29:25
  the first thing you've what's, you know, what's your job in
• 29:27
  tight? Are you going to get a big coat?
• 29:29
  You need a big Chairmans coat, don't you?
• 29:31
  You need a Chairmans coat and an Arthur Daily car and then you're
• 29:35
  set to be a football chairman. I want to see him hanging out of
• 29:37
  a window on transfer deadline day.
• 29:39
  That's one of the managers job isn't it?
• 29:40
  Maybe he could do that. And finally, who, who?
• 29:43
  Who knew? 2 football stories in a week as
• 29:47
  we bring you this news that the latest entry to the pantheon of
• 29:52
  professional interviewers of musicians is a footballer.
• 29:56
  But actually a footballer doesn't play it in in step 9,
• 30:01
  who's the footballer and what are they doing?
• 30:04
  Yeah, it's Arsenal's Bikay Osaka who is part of the Arsenal,
• 30:08
  which is a brand new Wizzy app that is the home for Arsenal's
• 30:13
  sort of hashtag content. Describe it.
• 30:17
  So this kind of comes back back to the beginning of this show,
• 30:19
  isn't it? Like everything in football is
• 30:21
  so much about Instagram and social numbers nowadays.
• 30:23
  Like new signing videos are kind of either movie epics or like
• 30:27
  really painting comedy. So Arsenal launch this new app,
• 30:30
  which is going to have basically mini TV shows about the club.
• 30:33
  The the best one before we get on to suckers.
• 30:36
  The the big Match, which is a dating show for Arsenal fans
• 30:41
  where they they pairs pairing single gooners for a blind date
• 30:44
  at the Emirates Stadium, which you think of it's someone
• 30:47
  someone's grandchildren saying, how did you meet?
• 30:49
  Well, I watched someone push a goalkeeper over so that Gabriel
• 30:51
  could nod in a corner. So but then there's this show,
• 30:55
  which basically because sucker, who's an amazing winger and by
• 30:58
  all accounts, again, another really good, solid good egg.
• 31:02
  He's interviewing celebrities. And the first one is Thames,
• 31:04
  who's one of the big breakout Afrobeat stars from Nigeria.
• 31:07
  So yeah, it's him sitting down in Abbey Road with her playing
• 31:10
  interviewer, which was the best bit, is where she goes to our
• 31:15
  influences. You know, I love Céline Dion and
• 31:17
  sucker looks off camera and goes, I don't know who that is.
• 31:21
  And she goes, you don't know who Céline Dion is.
• 31:24
  So it's kind of, you know, he's not a terrible interviewer.
• 31:27
  There's kind of some good, good moments in common.
• 31:29
  He's better at interviewing than I am at whipping corners in from
• 31:31
  the the right wing. But yeah.
• 31:34
  Colchester United now do a match day mix where one of the players
• 31:38
  each game chooses 5 songs which they listen to on a match day or
• 31:42
  they think would be good pre match music.
• 31:45
  And imagine how much I was swearing at my phone the other
• 31:50
  week when one of our players, who I won't name, but one of our
• 31:53
  players in this list. And it's all pretty much, I
• 31:56
  mean, it's obviously mostly dance music, R&B, bit of, you
• 32:00
  know, bit of soul, the odd Afrobeat track.
• 32:03
  And in the middle of in the middle of all this, one of our
• 32:06
  players said, yeah, Fleetwood Mac and I.
• 32:11
  Do you think, do you think they're going to troll you one
• 32:13
  by one now? Every week, Yeah.
• 32:14
  I think so. That's it for this week.
• 32:17
  Thank you very much for listening.
• 32:18
  If you are enjoying the show, please do spread the words.
• 32:20
  You can also support us via Patreon Effects if you sign up
• 32:24
  to be a super fan. You can also join us for our
• 32:27
  weekly lock in. That's the bit where some of you
• 32:30
  get to stay behind after hours. This week during the lock in at
• 32:35
  the bar, we will be discussing, well, what are we doing this
• 32:40
  week, Eurovision, I think some more on South by Southwest bit
• 32:44
  more AI stuff and also the play that's been written about the
• 32:48
  battle of Britpop. You can gain access to that by
• 32:51
  becoming a super fan of the show at patreon.com on Slash.
• 32:54
  The Price of Music. Alternatively, if you'd simply
• 32:57
  like to get in touch with us like Karen did, send us an
• 33:01
  e-mail. Anything you don't understand,
• 33:04
  if you're looking for opinions or advice, if you're a musician
• 33:07
  who's trying to navigate their way through the music industry
• 33:10
  and you think we might be able to help you out or point you in
• 33:13
  the right direction, please do get in touch.
• 33:15
  It's The Price of Music podcast@gmail.com as Stu will be
• 33:20
  flying solo next week while I'm flying back from self by self W
• 33:25
  Actually you're not flying solo, you're you're talking to
• 33:28
  somebody next week. Yeah, I'm actually talking to an
• 33:31
  actual band, which is kind of the two of us the least, the
• 33:34
  least qualified. But yeah, we talked to Picture
• 33:36
  Parlour, who are a really interesting band who have got a
• 33:40
  lot to say about kind of the the the challenges of touring,
• 33:43
  trying to making ends meet. What we've been talking about
• 33:45
  this week. They've been one of the artists
• 33:48
  working with the featured articles and to highlight these
• 33:49
  issues and they're going to come on and tell us about what
• 33:52
  they're doing and also about the the touring fund that we've been
• 33:54
  to Wet today. We're going to have David on the
• 33:56
  the Fact bus with them. So it's going to be an
• 33:59
  interesting show, I think. Excellence.
• 34:01
  That will be in a week's time. Till then, take care of
• 34:03
  everybody. Cheerio.
• 34:05
  Goodbye.