Grab what you want, it’s free, right?

“I would have never heard of these writers or books had the net not been around and had they not been shared.”

So goes a typical response to the story of an author complaining that pirated copies of her work are eroding her income from sales. This is the same author who also has zero problem with designer knockoff handbags or downloading thousands of free songs. There may be *good* reasons in theory for why someone shares, (exposure to new music, The Man™ is screwing me, etc.), but no matter what excuse it is, the creator of the work ends up getting screwed. Do those arguments hold up anymore, if they ever did?

They call them Bon Jovi.

Wonder why I lose sleep at night?

“Hi

Some cool news from Square Zero and LOVE Commercials, who completed the new
commercial for legendary rockers, Bon Jovi's greatest hits album. The spot
just aired in the UK this weekend and is due to debut in the US any day now.
Info below - please let me know if you'd like to speak with the director and
creative behind the commercial, Najma Bhatti.  Thanks! ~ [name omitted]

SQUARE ZERO AND LOVE COMMERCIALS CREATE GREATEST HITS TV SPOT FOR BON JOVI

“You don’t have to put out the red wine...”

“Synchronicity lead me to craft a red wine blend of varieties not commonly seen together. The light and dark nature of the music pointed to a red blend that could express both a friendly and heavy side. Sting's unique vocals sent me searching for something special and powerful for the wines ‘voice’.”

Billed as "Great Tasting Wines Inspired by the Music of the Police,” I’m not really sure I want to know what walking on the moon tastes like. IT’S POLICE WINE THOUGH WITH THE BITTER STING OF ROBUSTNESS. Order you some now!

“The failure of major artists to deliver records on some kind of regular basis.”

Is just one of the reasons given back in 1980 on why the music industry was in trouble in this 20/20 report. Seems like they always have an excuse. Part two was going to be after the jump, but has been taken down only in the U.S. by Universal Music. THE CLIP THE MUSIC INDUSTRY DOESN’T WANT YOU TO SEE, apparently.

(Via Zeropaid.)

John Varvatos Turns 10 by celebrating with 100-year olds.

IT’S ALL PART OF HIS ROCK AND ROLL FANTASY. (That was Bad Company, right? *whew* Just checking.) Celebrating his 10 year anniversary, Varvotos gathered up many of the same rock gods who have graced his ads for a gianormic spread channeling the ghost of Sgt. Pepper’s. (If you need help spotting them all, fear not, there’s a handy behind the scenes legend after the jump. LEGEND, get it?) The collective ages here could actually celebrate 1,000 years of rock royalty BUT THAT’S JIMMY PAGE—the coolest grandfather you’d ever have. I’m not hating. Dude’s doing what I would if I had money and could have parties with every rock god I grew up with.

Apple introduces Ping. Why?

Join another conversation? I want to listen to music, not talk.

So as I sit here blogging angry while streaming Blip, I’m wondering how a brand like Apple, one that wrote the new rules on how people access and buy music, one with a leader like iGod who goes to great lengths to *get it right* before releasing music devices that wrote the new rules, could put out Ping.

I try a lot of things out before deciding if it works for what I need or not, and immediately I knew this was a fail, for no other reason than its interface feels corporate and lacks the features the majority of music sites offer. Others who have issues with it too, and hopefully Apple pulls the plug faster than Google did with Wave.

And they were these things called records...

And sometimes you’d even do TV commercials to promote them.

What’s that song again?

MysteryGuitarMan is a YouTube *personality* who makes music videos by simply exploring and playing round with YouTube’s format. Typically, his videos display a multi-shot/mega-edit/quick cut style of production that a few people use. One of his recent vids though is a twist on the Hollywood trailer staple: Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana, (Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi: O Fortuna). Play his version from now on for those moments in your life when you need to add some drama, won’t you? Granted, a lot of his pieces see his personality and dialog trying too hard at times to win you over. Still, you can’t help but admire the effort. Through sheer force of playing—literally and figuratively—he’s created a unique style that people have noticed. Since 2006, his YouTube channel has 1.1 million subscribers, over 107 million uploaded views and 13 million channel views. Comments for each video typically hit five figures. Not bad for a few simple songs.

One take it ’til you make it.

C’mon, one take is cute in She Runs from Tim Halperin, especially one that costs $500. Okay, so maybe the Canon 5D they shot it with is a little more than that. But you get the point.

Burger King jukebox v 3.0.

That’s just cool. Usually the shit Japan invents has four other gadgets with it, one of which allows you to go to the bathroom. But this? I need here in the good old U.S. of A. One Burger King in Japan now allows you to dock your iPod as the music plays through overhead cones focused directly below. (Done using the principle of modulated ultrasound waves.) The means should your guilty pleasure KC and the Sunshine Band accidentally end up in the mix that day, the deathcore kids in the next booth won’t know about it. Devil’s advocate: Would it create more kids hanging out than who would actually buy something? Maybe. All I’d say in that case is make up your mind: You want traffic or not. Entice them by offering free downloads with (X) amount purchased then, or you could get bands to release exclusive songs found only in restaurants.

(Via βurgerβusiness.)

Music? Books? Dead.

Or are they. Ford, Microsoft and MSN have an interesting series out called Play It 4-Ward. They’re short segments with a wide range of guests riffing on where tech is headed. Co-branded integration wet dream aside, a few of the current shows deal with the effects of digital technology on both the music and publishing industries. The publishing show features Thomas Dolby, Sheila E., Chris Kelly, and Marianela Pereyra, while the music show has Andrew Keen jumping in.

What I liked was how the effects of digital tech on books and music raise many of the same issues with the panels. Dolby on publishing seems to think the way forward for authors will be to promote work ahead of time among their fans instead of waiting for the traditional advance. (By the way, clicking on any person’s “+” symbol takes you to their extra video clip.)

As for music, he notes that the best thing about the influence of digital tech is that artists now just have to worry about playing and sharing their music with anyone, compared to the gauntlet the record labels had in place for an artist to navigate just to get noticed.

Robyn who? You know, the one with the cool music video? Oh.

Looking at what won awards at Cannes in terms of online/digital/social work, and the thing that jumps out is that a lot of the work seemed less about some amazing online experience and more about a practical, utilitarian approach to dealing with customers. Feels like where things are headed now is either in that direction, or it’s about eye candy for eye candy’s sake, where the only focus is on doing something amazing that grabs your attention—not helps you with your online reservations.

But that’s okay too. Trying out cool techniques, even when they’re used to promote mediocre product(s), leads to advances in design and advertising that others can take and run with.

Swedish pop star Robyn’s new music video as 3D site definitely does that. The 3D on top of an aggregated real-time twitter stream may be overkill for some, but it works. The song is Don’t Fucking Tell Me What To Do, and in it, she lists all the things in life that were getting to her after coming off the road. Users are encouraged to update on Twitter just what it is that’s killing them by using the tag #killingme in some way. (Click the image to see.)

This twist on the Pulp Fiction animated type technique takes key words from those updates and displays them large across the screen at a pace that matches the tempo of the music. Last time I really dug a new approach to music video was the Asher Roth site from a few weeks ago. Before then, Radiohead’s mathematical visualization approach on House of Cards was simply stunning. It doesn’t have objects or images, but this whole hand coded experiment is laying the groundwork for people to build on. (Like making the stream clickable as Renaldo is doing with his site.)

Nonetheless, it inadvertently raises an issue for content creators to think about: Does too much interaction with an artistic piece or event while it’s occurring lead to a disconnect between artist and viewer? The dynamic of any art (film, music, et al.) is that you’re usually focused on experiencing and enjoying the actual piece for its own sake and nothing else. You’re only *part* of the piece in as much as you’re a viewer.

(For all the talk of making things interactive for people, well, here ya’ go. Can’t get much more interactive than that, short of making areas clickable.)

This video has people watching so they can spot the one element in it which is them. And I did watch, for almost 20 minutes, not because I was transfixed, but because the load time for the site to update from Twitter took that long. So you may be better off tweeting and com back later.

Because you spend so much time watching for your name to appear though, you almost forget the song itself. The droning microhouse puts you in a spell, and I wondered if this effect could work in a song that had more than just a minimalist beat with sparse lyrics.

Either way, eye candy or not, this piece would not be out of place at Cannes next year.

(Agencies: Blip Boutique/Hollywood with Stopp Web/Stockholm.)

EmWow.

And nobody scooped up Vince before now? SHAME! (Er, shameWOW.) Well, if you haven’t seen it everywhere by now, you will. Check out The Vincester™ (Vince Shlomi) as he promotes Eminem’s upcoming June 21 release Recovery with his trademark rapid-fire delivery schtick, including a new expression to add to the family of fine Vince Quotes: The ShamPon. The meh: Too short, a weak delivery and a prop mic don’t capture the energy of the original infomercial. The good: Musicians drive views. Ozzy’s screamfest promoted the hell out of his single with nearly two million views while Eminem here has hundreds of thousands in less than two days.

Does Mick Jagger really need the money at this point?

A promo came on for Cold Case this week featuring a never-before-heard Rolling Stones’ track and I was like, do the Stones really need more promotion at this point? Doesn’t Keith own enough Jamaican hideaways? Look, I’m all for record labels promoting their catalogs, but there’s a reason unreleased singles have that never-been-heard before label. This is more about fist bumps between network execs over what they see as a brilliant integration of music and entertainment channels.

Really?

Quick, let’s scan Queen’s library and see if we can’t work a lost B-side into an episode of SVU. Get ready—you know that’s coming.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind rare tracks etc., of classic bands. Often, it gives fans a new perspective of a song they might have lived with forever. But I think it only works with alt or demo versions of classic tracks. (Beatles’ BBC sessions, et al.)

But add this to the another announcement I saw this week where Jim Beam and Kid Rock teamed up to offer a song downloads and you now see why I don’t sleep:

“These downloads, available via tear pad or on special edition gift cartons of Jim Beam and Red Stag by Jim Beam (where legal), mark the first time a spirits brand and major record label have worked together to distribute new music from an A-List artist via a non-traditional retail channel on a massive scale. ”

Come again?Music downloads now qualify as groundbreaking? Non-traditional retail channel on a massive scale from a spirits brand?

Talk about late to the party. Even Bacardi’s website, typical of brands and bands promotions, offered downloads from the bands in its music festival. Anomaly’s iTunes t-shirt slash song download at least served a greater good. Pepsi was offering under the cap (UTC) iTunes song downloads long before this. I’ll stop there off the top of my head.

Worry not, I don’t lose sleep over this stuff. But after 20 years in the business, Kid Rock’s been around long enough to come up with something more involved than this.

Maybe he could work his stuff into an episode of House. Wouldn’t that be awesome?