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MP3 conclusion

By DJ, In English, MusicNo Comments

I’ve been writing several blog posts about the fight between vinyl and mp3 supporters, archiving digital music and the relationship between a DJ and a music format. I’ve always tried to point out that there really aren’t any universal truths in this fight and that there are some facts you just can’t deny. And finally I’ve gotten to a conclusion:

I’ve been already thinking for some time what would be my response on the change of the DJ-culture. Follow the flow, sell my vinyl collection, start playing only digital music and make the best out of it? Or make a lonely fight-back, keep supporting vinyl and keep the amount of CDRs in minimum and play only promotional tracks in digi format?

The only what is certain, is that some changes have to be made. I’m happy that I’ve come to a conclusion which satisfies me both as a vinyl freak and as a music lover: With a “small” amount of work I’ve listed all the old records I still need in order to call my vinyl collection perfect and complete. In addition to that, I won’t leave the collection to the state “2006” but I’ll update it constantly with important releases and so-called future old-skool classics. I’ll also support certain labels by buying all their new releases in plastic to have a complete catalogue and collection of their music.

OK, that’s it about vinyl. What about mp3’s then? The amount of music mentioned above would easily fulfill the needs of my upcoming DJ-sets. But buying the music only for keeping the dancefloor pleased doesn’t lead anywhere (Miika wrote well about that already earlier). There are SO many better-than-average but far-from-classic tracks in online shops and it would be a pity to leave them there just because they are released only in digital format. And there are even more tracks which aren’t meant for dance floor but which you just happen to love. For the sake of keeping your sense of true music alive, it’s even necessary to buy tracks which you probably wouldn’t end up playing live. I don’t mean bad tracks, but tracks which are just interesting, but definitely not danceable. Would there be any better format for that than digital?

Hopefully this sums this up – for now.. :)

November 16, 2006

AllOfMp3 starts to “sell” music for free

By MusicNo Comments

AllofMP3, the notorious Russian music-selling site, has lost its Visa account and says it will switch to giving away free, ad-supported music. The site claims that its activities are legal under Russian law. Though it may not be legal under other countries’ laws for their citizens to download the music, AllOfMP3 says it has a blanket license to sell the music and no obligation to figure out what the laws are in each of its customers’ jurisdictions.

More: International Herald Tribune

via: BoingBoing

October 18, 2006

Is there a record company that is not evil?

By MusicNo Comments

Aula and Creative Commons Finland invite you to the next Aula Talk:

IS THERE A RECORD COMPANY THAT IS NOT EVIL?
By: John Buckman, CEO and Founder, Magnatune (www.magnatune.com)
Monday October 23rd at 19:00 – 20:30
Kulttuuritehdas Korjaamo
Töölönkatu 51B, Helsinki (www.korjaamo.fi)

John Buckman isn’t afraid to point out what’s wrong with the music industry. Hit-driven radio is boring.CDs cost too much, and artists only get 20 cents to a dollar for each CD sold.Online sales (such as on Amazon.com) often cost the artist 50% of their already-pathetic royalty. Record labels lock their artists into legal agreements that hold them for a decade or more.Napster, Gnutella and Kazaa proved that people love music, and they want to share it – butthe entrenched record industry wants to kill P2P and internet radio.

“Magnatune is my project. The goal is to find a way to run a record label in the Internet Reality: file trading, Internet Radio, musicians’ rights, the whole nine-yards“, Buckman explains. Unlike regular record companies thatshare a percentage of their profit with artists, Magnatune shares a full 50% of the licensing, cdsales, and merchandise revenue (not profit) with the artists.

“I thought: why not make a record label that has a clue? That helps artists get exposure, make at least as much money they would make with traditional labels, and help them get fans and concerts.” Come and hear Buckman describe his vision of a record company that is not evil and discuss the earning model for Magnatune’s opencontent distribution.

October 15, 2006

Zero7 & YouTube & Copyrights

By In English, MusicNo Comments

This just tells so well how different points of view artists and major labels can have towards copyright.

Zero7 just told on their MySpace page that they’ve registered to YouTube and have some of their music videos online. They are asking people to post their recordings from Zero7’s gigs, some covers and maybe cover music videos, too:

“For those of you who might not know, Zero 7 have their own YouTube page.
You can watch the band’s videos on there and if you upload your own Zero 7 videos onto YouTube, then it could appear on the page.
They could be videos you’ve recorded at gigs, or even your own cover versions!”

I wonder what Universal, Sony BMG and other major labels would say about that. At the moment Universal is telling that YouTube owns them millions of dollars due to these kinds of copyright infringements.
I think any artist would consider a possibility to see their music videos on the Internet for free as a very good and very cheap promotion and not as a baad, bääd copyright infringement.

This goes back to Finnish copyright laws, too. As I’ve earlier told, it’s basically illegal to rip your own vinyls to CDRs and play them on gigs. I wonder how many electronic music artists would really deny a possibility to rip their old records which aren’t available as MP3s and bring them to life again.

It might be it’s because I’m not a recording artist, but I really do not see any good in the way big copyright companies are working – from the marginal music style’s point of view, at least.
Killing a possibility to define your own ways of promotion does not do any good for the record and copyright companies – it just harms the artist. And I want to believe they are going to find it out when it’s too late. That would do good for them.

September 27, 2006

Levy-yhtiöt hävisivät vertaisverkko-oikeudenkäynnin Tuusulassa

By MusicNo Comments

Tuusulan käräjäoikeus hylkäsi eteläsuomalaista nuorta miestä vastaan nostetun syytteen mp3-tiedostojen jakamisesta ns. Finreactor-tapauksessa. Mies vapautettiin kymmenien tuhansien eurojen korvausvaatimuksista levy-yhtiöille. Syyttäjän esittämä näyttö ei riittänyt eli syyte kaatui todisteiden puutteeseen. Asiasta ei ollut suurta epäselvyyttä, sillä tuomio luettiin heti käsittelyn päätyttyä.

Read More

September 19, 2006

General Fuzz & Unity video

By In English, Music, Photos & VideosNo Comments

If you’re into any kind of chill-out/ambient music, I highly recommend you to check out the latest album of General Fuzz, called Messy’s Pace.
The album is completely free. >> General Fuzz’s website.

—

For a flyer freak like me, it was fun to get a copy of Club Unity’s latest flyer. The flyer itself is a DVD disk which contains a video of Unity’s past – 10 years of parties.

If you can’t get a copy of the DVD itself, there’s always a possibility to download the video in Quicktime format >> Club Unity 10 Year Anniversary Video.

Oh, it seems to be in YouTube as well. (Thanks, Niko)

September 10, 2006

Pretty productive weekend

By DJ, In English, Music, Photos & VideosNo Comments

A remix of Tilt’s “I Dream” got nearly finished last weekend. Here’s a short clip of what’s coming up next:

Tilt – I Dream (DJ Orion remix)

Snare Rush Collage.
Weird collage of clips and videos from the past…
You got to love this YouTube-quality… :P Here’s a link to a better quality mp4-file => download (38mb).

And finally a peek to the iTunes Music Folder.
Quite a nice way to present one’s musical taste in a visual way.
My iTunes Album Covers

August 28, 2006

The first news from Helsinki

By Blogs & Podcasts, Civilian life, In English, Music, Photos & VideosNo Comments

The week has passed incredibly fast. It’s been all about moving, doing the infamous vinyylijumppa to the second floor without any elevator and piecing together new furniture.

I guess carrying the music collection around was some sort of a last temptation to forget the vinyl, convert everything to CD-format and save your back from breaking before your 30th anniversary. I’m sure there was someone whispering to my ear “How much would that weight in mp3-format…?” when I climbed up the stairs with the 40kg vinyl cases.

Now after four full moving days quite much everything is done and we’ll be heading to Germany for nine days on Monday. I managed to finish most of the stuff on my todo-list despite the hurry:

First of all, after building up the new DJ-setup (which must be the best I’ve ever had what comes to sound and comfort) I recorded Spinni’s 10 Year Anniversary Mix. Spinni celebrates their ten year old way through the Tampere club history (more info here) and this “official” mix more or less describes the sound of the event’s second day. Techy progressive, breaks and trance in spirit of the oldskool, with a couple of fresh exceptions. Those who are subscribed to the podcast should get the mix any time soon, but you’ll find the link on the forums and Spinni’s website a bit later, too.

I visited Danceteria, DTM last night. Good way to get the first touch to Helsinki clubland – the place was crowded and atmosphere high. I shot restlessly a couple of photos while meeting new people and I have to say I felt pretty welcome – there were really nice people around.

Wait

The future looks bright. In October I’ll be heading to Northern Ireland for a week and before that I’ll hope to have some announcements to be made about some club and music related things. Oh, and nearly forgot – New York City based fitness radio station Exercise Radio starts to air some mixes of mine on their exercise related shows. It seems that vinyylijumppa isn’t the only way to get fit with vinyls ;)

And as a postscript: It’s never too late to start to love music. Or too early…
Heavy music has young fans...

August 5, 2006

Ör.

By MusicNo Comments

Hevi- ja kitaramusiikin paremmuutta muunmuassa konemusiikkiin nähden painottava Sue-lehti kirjoitti tammikuussa “asiantuntijan ottein” arvion DJ Orkidean uudesta levystä.

Viimeistään Lordin myötä Suomessa överiksi mennyt hevisekoilu saa Aamulehden kolumnistin kyseenalaistamaan tämän paremmuuden. Myös Sue-lehti saa osansa. pHinnweb scannasi artikkelin iloksemme.

July 2, 2006

Download problems?

By Blogs & Podcasts, In English, MusicNo Comments

Every now and then I hear complaints that someone is unable to download the mixes on this site.

The most common problems are:
1) When left clicked, the link does not save but opens a new Firefox window and starts to play.
2) When saved directly (Save Target As), the mix is saved as a kuuntele.php file.

Here are the solutions:
1) Check how your browser handles the mp3-files. You can change the Download Actions in Firefox easily: Preferences => Downloads => Download Actions
1.2) If this does not solve the problem, just left click the link and let it open in a new window. The mix starts to play. Select File => Save Page As. Now you can download the mix and close the window.
2) If you rather right click and save the file as “kuuntele.php”, make sure you rename the file afterwards. Anything with an ending “.mp3” will do. All the mixes on this site have full ID3-tags so they will show up correctly in your iTunes or Winamp, no matter what the file name is.

June 28, 2006

Gramex löi Radio KLF:ltä jalat alta

By MusicNo Comments

Suomen ainoana tanssimusiikkikanavana itseään mainostava Radio KLF on antanut seuraavan tiedotteen sivuillaan:

TIEDOTE:

Radio KLF kuuluu netissä toistaiseksi ainoastaan osoitteen www.taajuus.fi kautta. Syynä on Gramex-yhdistyksen vaatimien tekijänoikeuskorvausten hinnoittelukäytännön nousu. Viime vuonna rajaton kuulijamäärä maksoi KLF:lle 280 euroa kuukaudessa. Nyt 2000 kuulijan raja maksaa 6300 – 12600 euroa kuukaudessa. Siinä saa pipoa ja paitaa postitella.

Tänään 5.6.2006 Gramex-yhdistyksestä otettiin yhteyttä koska vihaiset kuulijamme olivat ottaneet heihin suurin joukoin yhteyttä. Gramex-yhdistyksestä luvattiin antaa sivuillemme lausunto, jossa selitetään kuulijoille hinnan nostoon vaikuttavat tekijät.

Odotamme siis sitä. Kuten myös etsimme rahoitusta jolla nettiradio jälleen saadaan auki.

June 8, 2006