Premier Rock Forum

what do ya think?
this came from pitchfork:

Pixies to Sell Live CDs on North American Tour
Steve Albini to be "blandly entertained" by band at "their top dollar best"
Ryan Schreiber reports:
Looks like the Pixies have found another unique way to maximize profitability on their upcoming reunion tour: Billboard reported Friday that the band will be touring with a mobile studio, courtesy of DiscLive, which will allow them to record each show and sell the results on limited-edition CDRs roughly 10-15 minutes after the concert ends, though vouchers will be made prior to the shows. The discs from each concert will reportedly be limited to 1,000 copies, with 2,000 being pressed for the band's performance at Coachella on May 1st.

DiscLive's website reveals that their methods for recording concerts involves "a patent-pending proprietary technology" within a "mobile mastering and manufacturing facility" that allows them to create 800 CDs in 20 minutes-- the first 200 of which are finished less than five minutes after the show ends. All recordings are captured off a soundboard feed using ambient microphones, which allows for a professionally mastered recording. On Thursday, DiscLive's website began taking pre-orders for each show at $25 a disc, with the band's first stop in Minneapolis on April 13th having already sold out. The site claims these discs will not be repressed. (Until 4AD needs funding for the inevitable Colourbox and Wolfgang Press reunions in 2006.)

I had heard about this company before, and I thought it was pretty cool, until I got to the part that said the company retains the rights to the "masters". I guess what that means is, at some point in the future, if they wanted to put out a "best of" live CD with all a track from each of the concerts that they have recorded, they could do it with little to no interference from the artists. That's a little scary.

Overall, it's a very cool idea, though.

Yeah, I agree the idea is a good one. I wonder about the practice though. I understand these folks are not just doing it for the fun of it. They want to make money from it. So, more than just sharing the profits with the band the night of the show (the easy/fast money), it seems the rights of the recording are retained by the disc recording company (in this case below it's eMusic). I wonder if there is some sort of agreement that limits the future uses of said recordings or not. I mean, they talk about the possibility of "a track being on a best-of comp" but really it seems they have retained the right to do what ever they want with the show as a whole...sell a track to Budweiser, place a track in a movie, release the whole as a live CD... Again, I wonder about this back end of it and if the artist has any future say (or financial interest) in those matters. If not, it seems like the disc recorder company is getting exclusive rights to master tapes for an albums worth of tracks for a few thousand bucks (the split of the sales on show night) if that. Could this be right? Is there anyone out there who has dealt with a company or situation like this yet? Any insight into the agreements?

Here is an article in the Chicago Reader from a month ago about eMusic Live:

http://www.chireader.com/TheMeter/040305.html

Mayfair wrote:Yeah, I agree the idea is a good one. I wonder about the practice though.

In general, I would expect a band not posessing the mobile infrastructure and staff to record, master, hi-speed dupe and sell cdrs at shows to be willing to forego unlimited rights to the recording made under these circumstances and with this intent.

I don't suggest what exactly might be fair to trade for the service and the extra revenue that evening. The only term I can see from the collected materials is 25% royalty to the artist in the future, master rights to the recording company. (The DCN contract.)

As a freelance location recording engineer, I know what the recording company faces - owning a scattershot catalog of titles and likely seeing 75-80% of total lifetime revenue generated from 95% of all recordings to be realized during the night of the event itself.

My gut (and it is a sizeable one) tells me that 25-50% to the artist in perpetuity is in the ballpark of "fair." That's just in principle, though. Of course, the real problem presented is ensuring that the deals they make later and projects the press later include artist participation in royalties at all. This means trust is the real issue (as usual.)


-r

I guess the question then comes in of what about the quality? I mean, does the artist have any veto power once it is a finished 'product'? Editing options/rights? How weird to just sign off on something like that without knowing:

A.) how well the show will go

and

2.) how well they are going to record it.

I think Einsturzende Neubaten already did this on their own. They sold 200 cds after a show for twice the price of a regular cd, and they were sold out in few minutes. And yes, they are in full control of what they are doing, it is just another way to make money. Quality of the recording was excellent. I guess there's nothing wrong in doing it if you are in full control of what you are doing, especially if there are fans that support that. There will be a lot of people on this Pixies tour with pockets full of cash awaiting for their piece of memorabilia, I guess.