Latest / The Price of Music / Why have The 1975 deleted a song? Can YOU tell the difference between AI music & real music (Answer: no.); An answer to why Fleetwood Mac are *still* popular; And music made £8bn for the UK in 2024…

Transcript

Why have The 1975 deleted a song? Can YOU tell the difference between AI music & real music (Answer: no.); An answer to why Fleetwood Mac are *still* popular; And music made £8bn for the UK in 2024… · The Price of Music

• 0:03
  Hello and welcome to The Price of Music, brought to you by
• 0:06
  Music Ally. It's the show that enjoys
• 0:08
  nothing more than pondering the finances of the music industry
• 0:12
  while trying to make sense of this weird pop music landscape
• 0:15
  that we live in. I'm Steve Lamack, He's Stuart
• 0:17
  Dredge if you want an easy guide to what's going on in the music
• 0:20
  biz and how it all works and how the figures stack up.
• 0:23
  And here we are every week. This week, good news, some good
• 0:27
  news, at least in the annual UK Music report bought the 1970
• 0:31
  fives Great disappearing song. Mystery solved.
• 0:36
  Also, two more grass roots venues have their futures
• 0:38
  secured and records made out of coal dust.
• 0:43
  But first, as is tradition, this week's impressive stats Stuart.
• 0:47
  This week's big figure is. My big figure this week is 713
• 0:53
  million, which is this is how many people are listening to
• 0:56
  Spotify every month according to its financial results which came
• 1:00
  out last week. So it's got 713 million
• 1:03
  listeners, which so there are two points here. 1 is a year ago
• 1:07
  it had 640 million. So it's added what's that?
• 1:11
  73 million people in a year. And you know how we talk quite a
• 1:14
  lot about people launching boycotts of Spotify or saying
• 1:18
  cancel your subscription and protests.
• 1:20
  This kind of puts the same respective where actually it's
• 1:23
  not really having an impact. It's growing pretty well still.
• 1:27
  And the other point is they there was financial results and
• 1:30
  Spotify's operating profit last quarter alone was €582,000,000.
• 1:36
  And this is one of the things about people say, Oh yeah, it
• 1:38
  loses loads of money, doesn't it?
• 1:39
  But no, not anymore. They're making a lot of money
• 1:42
  and they're growing fast, despite all the stuff we talk
• 1:44
  about that's controversial. Yeah, because it is.
• 1:47
  I mean, there was a point where it was posting loss after loss
• 1:51
  after loss, as you say, in recent times.
• 1:54
  No, they're very much in profit now.
• 1:56
  Very much so, yes. So it's a, it's interesting,
• 1:59
  it's a picture of the the biggest streaming service in
• 2:02
  terms of paying people. It's at 281 million people
• 2:04
  paying for Spotify now or at least on a paid account.
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  Some of them are family. So that's the kind of top of the
• 2:09
  market and everything else is kind of in its wake at the
• 2:12
  moment. OK, three interesting stories
• 2:14
  from the past week which we thought we'd be good to touch
• 2:17
  on. We'll start with this which only
• 2:20
  came out this morning as a new report which reveals that
• 2:23
  music's contribution to the UK economy last year was a record
• 2:28
  £8 billion. This is the annual UK music
• 2:32
  report, as I say only came out this morning, Wednesday morning.
• 2:36
  So I've only had a very brief chance to scan it.
• 2:38
  But you've you've seen this ahead of it's embargoes release
• 2:42
  I think. So what?
• 2:43
  What are the headlines, The major headlines, Stuart?
• 2:46
  Yeah. So it's that usual thing with
• 2:47
  the industry put where it's kind of some good news and some not
• 2:50
  so good news. So the good news is, like you
• 2:53
  said, £8 billion, that's music's value to the economy last year,
• 2:57
  a new record, it's up from 7.6 billion the year before, which
• 3:02
  is about, I'm trying to work it out in my head, it's 5% growth
• 3:05
  maybe or something. And the other thing is UK music
• 3:08
  exports, the value of British music around the world outside
• 3:11
  the UK, that grew by 5% to £4.8 billion, which is now a new
• 3:16
  record. So it kind of sounds like pints
• 3:19
  all round, hurrah. But there's a there's a downside
• 3:23
  to this. And UK music and the support.
• 3:25
  So UK music, it's the umbrella body, isn't it, for the music
• 3:27
  industry. So everyone else is below it.
• 3:30
  And it pointed out that the rate of growth is slowing.
• 3:32
  So I looked this up last year, the economic value had grown by
• 3:36
  13% and exports are grown by 15% and now it's down to 5%.
• 3:42
  So it's a very big slow down in the growth of this money, even
• 3:45
  though it's still a record. Yeah.
• 3:47
  So I thought it was interesting really.
• 3:48
  So yeah, it was kind of a big figures, but we've got some
• 3:51
  problems with just. I did notice there was quite a
• 3:57
  lengthy quote from I think Yvette Cooper talking about, you
• 4:02
  know, the value of British music around the globe.
• 4:06
  And so I'm thinking this is this is something we touched on, I
• 4:09
  think when Kevin Brennan, Lord Brennan was on the program the
• 4:13
  other week. Politicians are very quick to
• 4:17
  take music and champion it for all it's worth.
• 4:21
  But actually around this case, the government have committed
• 4:26
  some money, haven't they, to, to help the industry.
• 4:30
  And and I think that's something something like 3030 million
• 4:35
  pounds, is it? I think so, yeah.
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  So there's some stuff. And this is the other thing you
• 4:39
  just say is some stuff happening.
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  I was reading last week because there's some stuff happening
• 4:42
  with music education too, which is something the industry been
• 4:44
  asking for. So the government is doing
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  stuff. But yeah, the other thing is
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  that I think this report, and this is always the case with
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  these reports, they're often saying, right, but here's what
• 4:52
  we want next. And it's two things, isn't it?
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  I think 1 is we want you to regulate AI in the way we want
• 4:58
  you to regulate it. Make sure that we get paid.
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  And the other thing is, is that that that old chestnut Brexit
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  red. Tape.
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  And just that the whole thing of touring Europe is still full of
• 5:09
  red tape and difficult for bands and they want the government to
• 5:11
  do. And wasn't it?
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  Was it Keir Starmer last week was saying, Oh yeah, I see that
• 5:14
  it's a real problem, we're going to sort it out.
• 5:16
  I felt there was some movement on that recently in words.
• 5:19
  I mean, the, the music has been identified by the current
• 5:22
  government as potentially one of the big growth areas and it is
• 5:27
  committed to music, amongst other things, as being, they've
• 5:30
  identified that as somewhere where they'd like to exist.
• 5:33
  I mean, growth is what the government are always going on
• 5:35
  about at the moment, isn't it? So they've identified music as
• 5:38
  something which could be very valuable in this.
• 5:41
  But yes, there are things again, very, I saw very briefly in the
• 5:45
  report something about making it, as you say, easier for UK
• 5:49
  artists to get out and tour Europe.
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  And it's the, because, but touring Europe and I, I think it
• 5:56
  reports as well that an increased percentage of British
• 5:59
  artists saying, yeah, it's more difficult to tour Europe.
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  I've, I've made less money and it's more difficult.
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  And you know, in these days where we've already talked about
• 6:10
  how expensive it is for UK artists to go to the States
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  these days with the price of visas and everything, and I
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  can't see, I can't see America doing anything to make it easier
• 6:20
  for, for artists outside of America to go to America.
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  So Europe's a really important part of a group, an artist's
• 6:27
  career. And yeah, there are a lot of
• 6:29
  moves behind the scenes, I think to try and encourage discussion
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  between Europe and the UK government to create some sort
• 6:40
  of, you know, creative waiver scheme where it would be easier.
• 6:44
  But yes, the music industry is definitely pushing for more
• 6:47
  action from government to try and make it easier for for
• 6:49
  British artists to go to go abroad.
• 6:52
  Yeah, and I think it's because of these two issues, AI and
• 6:54
  Brexit, Like AI there are there are two sides.
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  There is the AI companies saying, please relax copyright
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  rules, stop making us pay for things and the music industry
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  saying don't do that, that would be terrible.
• 7:04
  And so there's the government is sort of between two sides.
• 7:07
  But with Brexit red tape, I mean, there's no, there's no one
• 7:09
  saying no, we should keep Brexit red tape.
• 7:11
  It's brilliant. Like there really is no argument
• 7:14
  for it other than it hasn't been dealt with.
• 7:16
  So, you know, I'm more hopeful of that.
• 7:18
  Some momentum there of saying, right, we need to sort this out.
• 7:21
  Yeah, I think part of what's happening behind the scenes is
• 7:25
  because there are, I mean, we think it's a one way problem,
• 7:27
  but it would, I think particularly the live music
• 7:30
  industry is trying to explain, well, no, it's not really
• 7:32
  because you're missing out on British.
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  European promoters are also now saying, well, we'd like more
• 7:38
  British artists to come and we want this band and this band,
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  but they won't come because it's too difficult, because there's
• 7:44
  too much paperwork and it's too expensive and the rules are so
• 7:48
  onerous when it comes to, you know, the ease of touring.
• 7:52
  So I think that's the thing. It's trying to get some of some
• 7:55
  of the European music industry people to go.
• 7:59
  No, no, actually, you know, it'd be in Europe.
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  Hello, hello, Europe. The powers that be in Europe.
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  Actually, we want it as well. We're the ones missing out too.
• 8:08
  And if you can make that argument, it'll be easier than
• 8:10
  just the UK saying sorry, we left you, but can we come back
• 8:13
  in? With our guitars, yeah.
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  Yeah, with our guitars. Yeah, exactly that right story
• 8:19
  too. Now this is a good one.
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  Although what the implications are for musicians from this and
• 8:24
  in fact that the entire future of pop music, I don't know.
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  But did you do you think, here's the question, do you think you
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  can tell the difference between human made music and AI
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  generated music? If we were to say here's an AI
• 8:36
  track and here's a humor track, could you tell the difference?
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  Because for Ringly, a study by the streaming service Deezer
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  suggests you might be wrong when it comes to this.
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  Almost certainly wrong. So this is, I mean, this is
• 8:51
  fascinating because I think, I think we, we would probably say
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  the same, wouldn't we? We can tell an AI track from
• 8:55
  human track. We love music.
• 8:57
  But yeah, so Deezer. So Deezer's really been banging
• 8:59
  the drum about AI music and the issues around it this year.
• 9:02
  And this release, I'll get into a survey in a minute, but this
• 9:04
  release came with this new stat that Deezer is now getting
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  50,000 fully AI generated tracks uploaded to its service every
• 9:12
  day. Every day.
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  And that is that is 34% of all the music uploaded.
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  So 50,000 AI tracks every single day.
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  On the aside, aside from anything else, I mean, that's
• 9:25
  good for the environment, isn't it?
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  I mean that's I mean just 50,000 tracks a day.
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  Do you remember when you saw was it landfill?
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  Indie was a genre genre a few years ago.
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  And this is landfill music and it's and this is it was in
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  January. This was 10,000 tracks a day,
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  which tells you what's happened this year.
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  But anyway, that's that's the background to this.
• 9:44
  But yeah, so these are surveyed. I think it's 9000 people in
• 9:47
  eight countries about AI music. And it asked them what they
• 9:49
  think about it and how they feel about it.
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  But it also played them two AI fully AI songs and one human
• 9:56
  song and asked them to tell which was human and 97% of
• 10:01
  people got it wrong 97. Really.
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  Is, is that now down to the standard of the AI tracks that
• 10:12
  they've become more believable or that they, they, they sound
• 10:17
  more music or what? Is it just the improvements in
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  AI itself then I mean? Yeah.
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  And what we don't know is what songs were played.
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  It could have been two really rubbish human tracks.
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  But yeah, I mean, so it says that we got to this point and
• 10:28
  the the fascinating and that the good news slightly is that they
• 10:32
  these have sent me their country breakdown because it would say 8
• 10:34
  countries. Turns out Brits were the best at
• 10:37
  spotting the AI track because 5% of us got it right, whereas in
• 10:41
  Japan only 1% of people got it right.
• 10:44
  So there's something to be sort of mildly boasted about there,
• 10:47
  but not much. Yeah.
• 10:49
  Is this something we should be worried?
• 10:51
  I mean, it makes me very, very nervous, all of this.
• 10:54
  I think it makes all of us, it's like there's something uneasy
• 10:58
  about it, isn't it, that we might not know.
• 11:00
  And actually, so this, this survey also asked people how
• 11:03
  they felt and it said, I think it was saying like 2/3 of people
• 11:06
  said they would listen to AI journeyage music at least once
• 11:09
  out of curiosity. And I think again, that a lot of
• 11:12
  us feel that way. But then 45% they'd like to
• 11:15
  filter it out on the streaming services and 40% said they would
• 11:18
  skip without listening if they knew it was an AI generated
• 11:21
  track. So there is a feeling out there
• 11:23
  people, they don't want to listen to this stuff.
• 11:26
  And yet what the survey shows is that we might not know unless
• 11:29
  it's, you know, and this is what Deezer's point of view because
• 11:32
  Deezer is one of the first streaming services to label
• 11:35
  music when it thinks it's AI generated, said this is AI
• 11:37
  generated. So you know, and it won't be
• 11:40
  recommended to you and if you find it, you will know exactly
• 11:42
  what it is. So it's kind of playing into
• 11:45
  what it's doing there. And, and this, I think this
• 11:46
  survey does, does this survey and that big stat of 50,000
• 11:50
  tracks a day does, does highlight that if you're a
• 11:52
  streaming service right now, you need to be thinking about what
• 11:55
  do you do about this? Do you, do you label it clearly?
• 11:59
  Do you kick it off if no one's listening to it?
• 12:01
  How do you deal with the fact that this stuff really is
• 12:04
  exploding And and the other thing is like, I mean, I think
• 12:07
  we talked before. So if 50,000 tracks a day is 34%
• 12:11
  of everything uploaded, that means about 150,000 tracks every
• 12:14
  day, 100,000 human ones and 50,000 AI ones, which, I mean,
• 12:19
  that's a lot of human music being uploaded.
• 12:21
  That's a lot of noise there even without AI.
• 12:24
  Yeah, yeah. So yeah, it's a, it's a, it's a
• 12:26
  bit of a wake up call, maybe for, for, well, the latest wake
• 12:29
  up call. It's something we'll come back
• 12:31
  to, by the way, in this week's Lock In, which is that it's the
• 12:35
  extra bit of the show for patreonsuperfansubscribersbutanythoughtsyoumighthavethepriceymusicpodcast@gmail.com.
• 12:42
  Story 3. This week, the 1975 song Human 2
• 12:48
  has disappeared from their last album on the streaming services.
• 12:53
  So if you look up 1975's last record, it's been, it's
• 12:59
  vanished, right? It's been.
• 13:01
  And obviously a lot of people were saying, well, what?
• 13:04
  Why, what? Why suddenly has this been
• 13:07
  removed? We know the answer now,
• 13:09
  apparently. We do, we do.
• 13:12
  Verified answer Yeah. So this, what was the album?
• 13:15
  Was it was it was being funny in a foreign language was last
• 13:18
  time, wasn't it? Was it about 20/23/23?
• 13:21
  211 Surprisingly short title for them, yeah.
• 13:25
  And it wasn't, it was #1 in the UK, like a big album.
• 13:28
  And yeah, this song has gone. And so the the what?
• 13:30
  Well, there's a community on Reddit, the website where Mattie
• 13:34
  Healy, the front man, actually has a verified account and he
• 13:36
  posts some replies to fans. And so a fan was there going
• 13:40
  What's happened to Human too, you know, Where's it gone?
• 13:43
  And he replied, he popped up and said basically, and I'll quote
• 13:45
  him, Human 2 is removed from the album.
• 13:47
  So the album is more how I want it to be and then followed it
• 13:53
  up. I doubt the same will happen
• 13:55
  with any other records as I'm pretty happy with them outside
• 13:58
  of What should I say from Notes on a conditional Form.
• 14:00
  So that may also be removed, who knows?
• 14:03
  And just left that hanging there.
• 14:06
  I mean, it's amazing, isn't it though?
• 14:07
  I mean, again, only something you can do in the streaming era
• 14:10
  all of a sudden. But the the idea that you can
• 14:13
  retrospectively just retrack, list your record, I mean,
• 14:17
  imagine, I mean, I suppose we do, you know, potentially we can
• 14:20
  do, we can all do that ourselves.
• 14:22
  Everyone can, you know, put the Stone Roses album into a
• 14:25
  separate playlist and take out the ones that they don't like.
• 14:29
  But I don't know why I picked some of the Stone Roses.
• 14:33
  But yeah, now, now you can just write.
• 14:35
  OK, what's wrong with this album?
• 14:38
  I know albums which will end up with three tracks on it if the
• 14:40
  people the ones who weren't any good.
• 14:43
  Well, that's it. Because I think I, probably
• 14:44
  every artist, can empathise with this.
• 14:46
  You look at the album and you can go, I hate that song now.
• 14:48
  That is not me anymore. Or some songs are problematic in
• 14:52
  hindsight because culture has moved on or you've written the
• 14:54
  lyrics. It's not, but it's interesting
• 14:57
  because yeah, I mean, I'm trying to think the, the closest
• 14:59
  parallel I can remember was there was a Kanye West album
• 15:02
  that came out and he kept tweaking with it and kept doing
• 15:04
  new mixes and uploads for a couple of weeks after it came
• 15:06
  out. He kept releasing new versions
• 15:07
  of tracks because he wasn't happy.
• 15:09
  Right. I've had a thing like when I
• 15:11
  about, I don't know, 15 years ago, I was spending a lot of
• 15:14
  time trying to discover new artists.
• 15:16
  Like I was really properly leaning into finding new stuff.
• 15:19
  And sometimes I look back at like my favorite songs of 2015
• 15:22
  playlist and I load them are grayed out because the artist
• 15:26
  has just deleted them from streaming, whether it's because
• 15:29
  they've left Spotify or so this is happening all the time
• 15:32
  quietly that songs do go. But this is probably one of the
• 15:35
  most high profile things. But I thought was interesting
• 15:38
  was like 1975. They've got a really committed
• 15:40
  fan community. Like they really go into bat for
• 15:42
  the band, don't they? But the reactions on this Reddit
• 15:45
  thread are pretty mixed. People are quite a lot of people
• 15:47
  saying, hang on a minute, like we love this song.
• 15:49
  It's part of our lives. There was one comment that was
• 15:53
  really interesting. It was like saying, I deeply
• 15:55
  respect your artistic decisions and I truly admire you as a
• 15:58
  position and you know, there's a butt coming.
• 16:00
  But I think maybe you're missing the point of your own idea that
• 16:03
  the band is something bigger than yourself.
• 16:05
  Because once an album is released, it belongs to everyone
• 16:07
  who connected with it, not just you.
• 16:09
  And I thought that was an interesting, thoughtful comment
• 16:11
  on why fans are upset. Even though it's his band, he
• 16:14
  can do what you want. I mean, if people do, and I know
• 16:17
  there's an argument that people don't often these days listen to
• 16:19
  albums in their entirety same way that we used to.
• 16:22
  But if they do, you do get into the rhythm of a record as well,
• 16:26
  don't you? And you know, you automatically,
• 16:29
  you know, the start of the next show when a track finishes, your
• 16:32
  brain's already going on. The next one starts like this.
• 16:34
  And to take a track out, I think it's a bit straight.
• 16:37
  I mean, old school. I just thought of the only old
• 16:40
  school rewriting of a band's history that I can use as an
• 16:44
  example. An illustration of sort of this
• 16:47
  is when Pulp Pulp's first greatest hits album came out.
• 16:51
  I can't remember what it was called, but if you take a scan,
• 16:54
  the track listing of the first Pulp greatest hits album, What's
• 16:57
  missing? Miss Shapes.
• 17:00
  Miss Shapes wasn't on the album. And and I asked about this and
• 17:04
  they said I've just fallen out of love It don't like it really,
• 17:07
  which which I mean, I mean, 1, you know, I mean, it's one of my
• 17:12
  own favorite Pulp songs. I don't know what, but actually
• 17:15
  you know, And also it's not a manifesto really, but for Pulp.
• 17:19
  But it is a song which describes Pulp, the character of Pulp so
• 17:24
  well. They just just wonder what
• 17:26
  they're thinking. What do you want?
• 17:28
  I mean, honestly, bands are rotten judges of their own
• 17:31
  music. That's the conclusion I came to
• 17:33
  20 years ago and I think probably still rings true.
• 17:37
  It did make me think though, do you remember a few a few
• 17:39
  episodes ago we were talking about wrongly track listed
• 17:42
  albums and you had some you had a quite a firm view on Blair's
• 17:45
  The Universe. Blair's The Universal.
• 17:47
  No. What's the album with The
• 17:48
  Universal on? Oh, great Skype.
• 17:51
  Was it great Skype? You had, yeah, you had some
• 17:52
  quite, quite firm views on, like how attractive should have been.
• 17:55
  Next time you see Damon, get him drunk and say, look, you know
• 17:58
  what you can do on streaming? You can retrack list it the
• 18:01
  right way and. Done that.
• 18:04
  I bumped into Diamond the other the other week at a friend's
• 18:07
  birthday party. That sounds like that's a very
• 18:10
  clunky name drop, isn't it? I never, I haven't seen Diamond
• 18:13
  for, you know, since the last time he was in the studio with
• 18:16
  us. We're not, we're not best mates.
• 18:18
  Just happened to be at this party.
• 18:20
  But I should have done that, yeah.
• 18:22
  Anyway, right, on to any other business for this week.
• 18:24
  Actually, we should. We should go back.
• 18:26
  I don't want to spend too much time on AI, but AI obviously is
• 18:30
  one of the most talked about issues in the music industry at
• 18:33
  the moment. And particularly in the past
• 18:35
  week. It's becoming more and more
• 18:37
  apparent, particularly after that deal between Universal and
• 18:40
  Udio, which we covered on last week's programme.
• 18:43
  More and more musicians now and their representatives have
• 18:47
  started laying down what they want from licensing deals
• 18:51
  between labels and AI companies, haven't they coming forward and
• 18:55
  saying, look, now you're starting to do these deals.
• 18:57
  These are the things that we as musicians, this is what we want.
• 19:01
  And I sense there's a, there's a, you know, potential for
• 19:04
  disagreement here. Yeah, in the music industry, I
• 19:08
  can't believe that. Yeah.
• 19:10
  So all the way along the music industry has been saying about
• 19:13
  AI, we need, you need to ask our permission to use our stuff, you
• 19:17
  need to pay us and you need to be transparent about how you're
• 19:20
  using our stuff. And yeah, so what's happening
• 19:22
  now is the people who represent musicians and artists and
• 19:24
  songwriters and managers are saying, right, well, those three
• 19:27
  things kind of apply to us too, if you're a label or publisher
• 19:30
  signing a deal. And so there's this body called
• 19:33
  the Council of Music Makers, like yet another umbrella body
• 19:36
  in the like more umbrellas than an umbrella shop, really.
• 19:38
  But it's the it's the umbrella body for the, the, the people
• 19:42
  who represent artists, songwriters, managers,
• 19:43
  producers. And they came up with kind of a
• 19:46
  manifesto, yes, saying, right, if you're doing an ideal AI deal
• 19:49
  was a label, here's what we want.
• 19:52
  And it's three things. It's basically consent.
• 19:55
  So a label needs to ask all its musicians, do you agree to be
• 19:58
  part of this? And that's got to be opt in.
• 20:00
  It's not going to be like you're part of this unless you say no.
• 20:03
  It's going to be you've got to say yes to be part of this.
• 20:05
  You want full control over how the musicians.
• 20:07
  But the third thing I thought was most interesting, which is
• 20:09
  like musicians should be fairly paid for all this.
• 20:12
  And the quote is including lump sum payments, equity and legal
• 20:16
  settlements, which is kind of dry.
• 20:18
  But I wanted to break it down because if you think about
• 20:21
  Universal Music doing a deal with Udio and there will be
• 20:23
  other deals like this, Firstly, it's settled A lawsuit and there
• 20:27
  could be a payment as part of that to Universal Music.
• 20:30
  And so I'll just say, OK, well, how are you going to share?
• 20:31
  Say they've given you £10,000,000 like number out of
• 20:35
  the air. How are you sharing that with
• 20:37
  the artists who you've been acting for?
• 20:40
  So they've signed a licensing deal, which could involve an
• 20:41
  upfront payment. Here's £10,000,000 for the
• 20:44
  rights to use music. How will that be shared out?
• 20:47
  And it's going to also it, it could even involve giving a
• 20:50
  label a stake in the company. So Universal Music could end up
• 20:53
  with a stake in Udio in the same way that all the major labels
• 20:56
  and Merlin, the indie body, had a stake in Spotify when that
• 20:59
  launched. And at one point Spotify
• 21:01
  floating on Stock Exchange, everyone sold their shares, got
• 21:04
  a big winfall. And then they did share that
• 21:06
  money with artists, but it's not quite the same as when an artist
• 21:09
  is getting, you know, you've been streamed 700 times, here's
• 21:12
  the money you get for royalties. It's like there's always other
• 21:15
  ways that labels get paid. And some musicians saying, yes,
• 21:17
  if you're getting paid by IO companies, we want to know
• 21:19
  exactly how and we want to make sure we get a fair share of
• 21:22
  that. And that is to your point,
• 21:25
  that's the argument that's coming next.
• 21:27
  Musicians want to know, right? You've announced a deal with
• 21:29
  this company or that company. We want to know exactly how that
• 21:32
  deal works so that we can understand how we we get paid.
• 21:36
  Yeah. So I mean, I suppose finally the
• 21:39
  other thing then from all that which you can deduce is what
• 21:43
  they what they really want as well as more transparency and
• 21:46
  wants to know how much and you know what the what the deals are
• 21:49
  and they. Also pointed out that no record,
• 21:52
  no contracts. Like if you're a musician you've
• 21:54
  got a contract with your label. It almost certainly doesn't
• 21:56
  mention AI if it was any more than like this year.
• 21:59
  So there's nothing in your contract saying what happens if
• 22:02
  they sign a deal with an air company and your music is part
• 22:04
  of it? And so the, the musicians bodies
• 22:06
  are saying, right, you can't just go and do this without
• 22:10
  asking our permission because our contracts don't cover it.
• 22:12
  So that's, that's the argument brewing as well.
• 22:13
  It's like there's no, there's no contractual clause that lets you
• 22:17
  do anything without asking us first.
• 22:19
  And that's their view. Music venue properties we should
• 22:23
  mentioned. I don't know if anyone saw this
• 22:24
  but the MVP last week secured the future of two more venues
• 22:31
  which was the From memory. It's the Craft in Bristol isn't
• 22:35
  it? And amazingly A venue which I
• 22:38
  really like The Joiners in Southampton which is a lovely
• 22:42
  little venue. So they say we should explain
• 22:45
  what music venue Properties is just in case it's passed anyone
• 22:47
  by. Yeah, well, it was set up by the
• 22:49
  Music Venue Trust, the charity, and it's basically it raises
• 22:53
  money from from fans and from the industry and it goes and
• 22:56
  buys venues that are in danger of closing.
• 22:59
  And so I think it's the 6th and 7th venues now.
• 23:02
  So it's got five more before that and it's trying to buy
• 23:04
  more. And the idea is it owns the
• 23:05
  venue so they can't be kicked out by property developers and
• 23:10
  it makes sure they have fair rents and it will contribute
• 23:12
  towards a maintenance every year to make sure they can keep
• 23:14
  things. I mean, there's a really funny
• 23:15
  phrase like a supportive and benevolent landlord, which is
• 23:18
  not a phrase you hear a lot. I was, I was looking at the list
• 23:23
  of gigs these venues have had, which is kind of hits home why
• 23:25
  they're important. Like I think the joiners have
• 23:27
  had Arctic Monkeys, Coldplay, Sharon, Green Day, Radiohead,
• 23:31
  Oasis, PJ Harvey, like in 1975 to go back to early stories,
• 23:35
  like I think the Crofts had Arctic Monkeys and Sharon and
• 23:38
  idols and Bring me the horizon. Like it's a really still like
• 23:41
  these are these are small venues and they've had all these
• 23:43
  amazing artists and they were going to close if this that
• 23:46
  hadn't happened. I think I read, I read a post
• 23:50
  might be, I think it was, might have been yesterday saying
• 23:53
  that's more than 2000 individuals had now invested in
• 23:58
  the scheme. So just fans.
• 24:00
  So there's at least 2000 shareholders who all own a bit
• 24:04
  of each of these venues. I mean, it's yeah, I mean, it's
• 24:08
  a great, it's, I mean, it's AI mean it's a great initiative.
• 24:11
  This alone won't save all the venues that are under threat at
• 24:14
  the moment. But as a long term plan, I mean,
• 24:18
  it's it's hard to fault, isn't it?
• 24:19
  Everyone, Everyone wins. And we're going out on Wednesday
• 24:23
  this week and I think so they've got their crowdfunding campaign
• 24:26
  for the next set of money they want to raise.
• 24:28
  It finishes this Friday or Thursday, maybe 13th of November
• 24:32
  and they're trying to raise 1.5 million, they're up to £1.3
• 24:35
  million. So if you listen to this and
• 24:38
  this is interesting, go and look for own our venues crowdfunder,
• 24:41
  because you could end up owning yes and bricks in those amazing
• 24:44
  venues in the history they. And and just as a final pointer,
• 24:48
  and it's not you're not giving your money away.
• 24:51
  It's it's not a donation you'll never see again.
• 24:53
  It's it's investment in a charitable organization which
• 24:59
  will pay you interest. So yeah, as I say, who who
• 25:04
  doesn't win out of this? Oh, well, now this is something
• 25:08
  we nearly did this story last week and ran out of time, but
• 25:12
  can I can I bring back the because in these days when we,
• 25:16
  you know, we're all enjoying albums again, but probably
• 25:18
  looking for alternatives to old school, not so eco friendly
• 25:22
  vinyl. This Enter ancestral reverb, a
• 25:26
  new vinyl record. So this is a new vinyl record
• 25:30
  made using coal dust. And yes, that sounds strange.
• 25:36
  I, I mean, I, I don't know how it works.
• 25:39
  People are making records, they have all sorts of stuff, aren't
• 25:43
  they Bamboo, coal dust, coal. Tell us more about Ancestral
• 25:47
  Reverb. Yeah.
• 25:49
  So this is, this is interesting because I think we all know when
• 25:52
  we think about something like coal and coal mining, we think,
• 25:55
  oh God, the pallet is burning and coal is 10 fossil fuels.
• 25:58
  And this is the project. I think it came originally from
• 26:00
  the Durham Miners Association and it's got a great high
• 26:03
  concept pitch. This record.
• 26:05
  It's Moby meets brass Doff, right?
• 26:08
  What they've done is they've got a poem which is taken from the
• 26:12
  words of miners and their families without by an artist.
• 26:15
  And they've got music from kind of the colliery bands, which is
• 26:17
  one of the, you know, those amazing set of, of, of brass
• 26:19
  bands. And that's the record.
• 26:23
  And yeah, they collected fragments of coal from, I think
• 26:25
  it's Blackhall Colliery Beach up in Durham to embed in the vinyl.
• 26:28
  So if you see it, it looks kind of dusty.
• 26:31
  It looks like it's got coal. It looks, you know, not
• 26:32
  disappointing in that respect. And it's, it's kind of So what
• 26:36
  it is, is it's about, it's a project that's trying to
• 26:38
  celebrate kind of the history of mining communities and how they
• 26:43
  kind of the stuff they stood for, like solidarity and workers
• 26:46
  rights and safety and obviously the famous standing up against
• 26:49
  government. But it's also then looking
• 26:51
  forward and saying, well, actually, these principles of
• 26:53
  these communities can be applied to help us keep the planet safe.
• 26:59
  So kind of applying the principles of the mining
• 27:01
  communities to saving the planet and bringing those two things
• 27:04
  together. So it's a really interesting
• 27:07
  project. And this is a really good way of
• 27:09
  kind of getting everyone talking about it, I think.
• 27:11
  And they were selling them and they made 100, they impressed
• 27:13
  100 of these things. And I think maybe only 40 of
• 27:15
  them were for sale. So it's quite limited, but you
• 27:17
  can listen to it on Bank Camp and I really liked it, Yeah.
• 27:23
  Last week, once again in the in the lock in last week, we were
• 27:30
  talking about, well, I was trying to make the case for
• 27:34
  changing the chart rules for the UK Albums Chart by suggesting
• 27:39
  that because it's so clogged up with old greatest hits records
• 27:43
  and albums that have been around for years and years and years
• 27:47
  and years. And maybe we take some of those
• 27:50
  out in a similar way. There's been a change to the
• 27:52
  Billboard singles chart rules. Anyway, as a part of this
• 27:55
  conversation, I did mention Fleetwood Mac's Rumours is still
• 27:59
  in the top 30 of the UK album chart.
• 28:02
  And they said, I mean, who who's still buying into this?
• 28:05
  And I think it was literally a day later when you, you came
• 28:08
  back and said, oh, I found an article about why Fleetwood Mac
• 28:11
  are still popular. What was it?
• 28:14
  Where was it from? Yeah, it's so it was an article
• 28:16
  in Variety, but it's from a guy who's written a book that's
• 28:19
  called literally why we still love Fleetwood Mac's Rumours.
• 28:21
  So he's written a whole book answering your questions and
• 28:25
  pointed out that yeah, it was the most streamed album from the
• 28:28
  20th century on Spotify two years ago.
• 28:32
  And and it's over indexing for Generation Z, so young people.
• 28:37
  And two things I got from this article.
• 28:38
  One point was like, it's the most one of the most famous
• 28:41
  breakup albums until Lily Allen. Isn't it like it's a really
• 28:43
  phrase? Like was it 3 two or three
• 28:45
  marriages in the band? We're just integrating and they
• 28:46
  recorded this and it's laying it all out.
• 28:48
  But apparently young people just see it as like good vibes.
• 28:51
  They're like they interviewed some people and like saying,
• 28:55
  yeah, I put it on when I'm in a good mood.
• 28:56
  I probably wouldn't put it on if I was breaking up with a
• 28:58
  partner. I'd put it on when I'm in a good
• 28:59
  mood because it's it's very nice vibes.
• 29:01
  So that's interesting. The kind of the context has
• 29:03
  changed, but also apparently the thing that that Gen.
• 29:06
  Z people respond to is it's not just a band of blokes.
• 29:09
  And the fact that it's a mixed gender band where the women were
• 29:11
  not just singing, they were they were writing the songs.
• 29:14
  They were a core creative part of it.
• 29:15
  That apparently resonates really strongly as well.
• 29:18
  And that's one of the reasons people cite when they say why do
• 29:20
  you like Rumours? There must be other albums of
• 29:24
  that era though. I guess if you're the if, I
• 29:28
  suppose it's, you know, it's fulfilling prophecy this.
• 29:31
  If you're in the chart, then more people are going to be
• 29:33
  aware of the records that they're going to listen to it.
• 29:35
  So it will carry on being in the chart.
• 29:37
  But there must be other records, examples of records that have
• 29:40
  the same vibe, if you like, from a similar era that you know have
• 29:44
  disappeared without trace. But.
• 29:46
  Also the algorithm. The algorithm does it.
• 29:48
  So when a lot of young people start listening to something,
• 29:51
  the algorithm go, well, you're young, you you might, yeah.
• 29:54
  But it's, that is kind of like like it's not just about what
• 29:56
  music sounds like, let's say other music.
• 29:58
  It's about what people who are like you demographically listen
• 30:01
  to. So if you're a record label with
• 30:03
  some 70s stuff, you maybe want to think about how do we get
• 30:07
  this? How do we get, how do we get the
• 30:08
  young folks start listening to this?
• 30:10
  Because once they start, then the algorithm start kicks into
• 30:13
  it for you. And I wonder if that's why we'll
• 30:15
  see people doing stuff on, for example, TikTok, like marketing
• 30:19
  campaigns for classic 70s albums on.
• 30:21
  You might start seeing a lot of that because that's what can
• 30:23
  often kick this off. But at the moment, Fleetwood Mac
• 30:25
  seem to be the Champions. OK, and finally this week, why
• 30:31
  might she want to listen to Thundercats remix of a famous
• 30:35
  Diana Ross song through A and I quote bone conduction lollipop.
• 30:42
  I mean bone conduction lollipop are probably playing the
• 30:45
  joiners. What?
• 30:48
  What is this? OK, look, I need to, I need to
• 30:51
  give you insight into my struggle as journalists.
• 30:53
  So I get a lot of press releases, and there's often no
• 30:55
  good pictures. Like, it's just, it's just a
• 30:57
  company logo. And this press release came with
• 31:00
  a picture of Thundercat in a lovely mohair cardigan with his
• 31:04
  hair in bunches sucking a lollipop.
• 31:06
  And so I was like, right, whatever this story is, it's
• 31:08
  important I'm covering it because it's not about the logo.
• 31:11
  But this is like a deal. So it's like a marketing thing
• 31:13
  really for a mobile game. Candy Crush Saga, which for for
• 31:17
  listeners who haven't played it, it's one of the biggest mobile
• 31:20
  games ever. I think it's, it came out a long
• 31:23
  time ago, like 10 years ago, it was the biggest mobile game in
• 31:25
  the world. It's still played by 180 million
• 31:28
  people every month. And they have this annual music
• 31:30
  thing where they just have music in the game and they have a
• 31:33
  thing around it. And this year, Thundercats
• 31:35
  remixed upside down by Diana Ross.
• 31:37
  So one of the bangers. Yeah.
• 31:39
  And they've made these bone conduction lollipops.
• 31:42
  So basically what you do is you put this lollipop in your mouth.
• 31:45
  Yeah. It's got a little vibration
• 31:46
  speaker in the stick, and it transmits the vibrations through
• 31:50
  your teeth and jawbone into your ear.
• 31:53
  So you hear the song, but it's not playing outside like it
• 31:56
  sounds. And I, and I, I actually went on
• 31:58
  thinking this sounds. I, I kind of know bone
• 32:00
  conduction sound is a thing, but is it real?
• 32:03
  And it's true that they can be done through your teeth in a
• 32:06
  lollipop. And so you hear this remix and
• 32:09
  you can go onto this website and order one for free.
• 32:12
  I don't know what you should have for it after you know 1
• 32:15
  missing. Well, I mean, if nothing else, I
• 32:19
  mean, that's, that's a party stopper, isn't it?
• 32:22
  Right. Have a go on you.
• 32:26
  Don't want to pass it around like you pass your earphones
• 32:28
  around though, Which no. No, you.
• 32:29
  Have a go on this lollipop. No, thank you mate.
• 32:32
  No, we're out of time for this week.
• 32:34
  Thank you very much for listening.
• 32:35
  As always, if you are enjoying what we're trying to do, please
• 32:39
  do spread the word. Tell your friends or colleagues
• 32:41
  or members of your family. You can obviously leave us a
• 32:44
  review. That always helps somewhere
• 32:47
  online. And alternatively of course you
• 32:51
  can support us as mentioned via Patreon.
• 32:54
  We do do an extra 1520 minutes of the show, which is just
• 32:59
  basically it's me and him chatting about music and
• 33:02
  occasionally money for, as I say, for 1520 minutes.
• 33:07
  But some of it's quite interesting and occasionally
• 33:09
  there's a good gag in it. And this week there's a
• 33:12
  challenge. There's a Deezer style
• 33:14
  challenge, I believe. Coming up, you can become a
• 33:16
  super fan of the show at patreon.com/the Price of Music.
• 33:20
  Or if you'd just like to get in touch with us, send us an
• 33:23
  e-mail, the e-mail address, thepriceofmusicpodcast@gmail.com.
• 33:27
  Any questions that you'd like us to attempt to answer?
• 33:31
  Anything you don't understand about the music industry or or
• 33:34
  how it works, we'll do our best to
• 33:37
  guideyouthroughitthepriceofmusicpodcast@gmail.com. We'll be back next Wednesday.
• 33:43
  Thanks again for listening, Cheerio.