Elizabeth Platt ([email protected])
Thu, 3 Dec 1998 16:30:55 -0800 (PST)
Fri, 06 Nov 1998, Francesco Donadel <[email protected]> wrote:
> Hi,
> don't you really know how u2 could stop their bootleg market?
> yes it's very simple!
> If they'd make available every concert they have recorded onto cd-r format
> for every fan who wants to buy it.
Why CD-Rs, anyways? If a band really wanted to flood the market, it would
actually be cheaper to sell "regular" CDs. A more economical method would
be to broadcast shows on radio, or make them available for downloading
over the Internet.
On the other hand, even the most free-thinking band should pause and
consider whether it's wise to flood the market with product, especially
when we're talking about live shows that have fairly repetitive setlists.
As ever, I think the best tack to take is to allow those fans who want to
tape and trade/barter...
> All the money raised with the cds would be given for charity or to Aids or
> Cancer funds.
But consider how much time and money would be eaten up by the logistics
necessary to manufacture this quantity of CDs! Consider that a band can
perform at least 3-5 concerts per week when on tour...add to that the need
for design, mastering the tapes, etc., and then figuring out how to market
and distribute the discs...A band of U2's caliber would be churning out
more CDs than their own label! And since each step of the way would
require (at least) the band reviewing and OK'ing the work needed, it would
only serve to pull them away from their work as musicians...and jeez, we
have to wait long _enough_ between albums and tours! Finally, I doubt
that most retailers would welcome such an onslaught of "same-y" CDs from a
single artist. Sure, they'd love to see a big, popular U2 disc every
year, but 100? 200? Most with nearly-identical setlists? The record
industry is already cranking out an all-time high number of new releases,
and retail space is getting tighter. It would be impossible to get these
discs into the shops. And offering them by mail-order would just create
another level of bureaucracy--and cost--to the whole deal.
Getting all moooshy and saying the money would go to some "worthy cause"
doesn't make this any less of an issue...
> It's something i've thought about for years and i don't know if
> Principle Management or Polygram could allow this....
Let's put it this way: If you wanna be an anarchist kinda guy, fine, but
even anarchy has to conform to basic common sense! ;-) Even if PM or PGD
or U2 thought it would be peachy-keen to release a CD of every live show
they do, I'm sure that the time and cost involved to pull off this sort of
thing would be overwhelming. Again, it's far better for them to allow
fans to tape/trade shows, with any sort of regulatory zeal directed at the
"professionals" who mass-manufacture CDs, CD-Rs, and pirated discs.
> Maybe they could put out the cds on the Blue Mountain label which is u2 own
> label for live recordings.In this way u2 would have the entire control
> over the selling of their live recordings.
Actually, Blue Mountain is a publishing arm...U2's labels are Mother, Son
and Kitchen. I'd like to see U2 put out more CDs like "Melon", e.g.,
something unusual and offbeat, distributed through the fan club, etc. And
it certainly wouldn't hurt for them to consider polishing up something
live from their archives, though they're only just getting around to
releasing retrospectives of their _studio_ work! But I can't
realistically see them spewing out live shows on CD in such quantity...
What I would like to see is the band selling CDs at their concerts, right
along with the t-shirts, etc. Especially if the CDs featured material
that wasn't available in stores, e.g., an interview disc, or "b-sides"
type songs, or even (yes) live songs. I'm surprised this hasn't been
tapped as source of merchandizing revenue, especially given how important
that is in the concert industry these days...But I'm thinking of a few
well-picked discs, not a deluge of "product"!
> Inside of Windmill Lane there are tons of live tapes.
> Which is their purpose?Will those tapes be still good?(dat tapes don't last more
> than 10 years....)
I'm sure that most bands are aware that their archives are ripe for future
exploitation...As are unreleased studio tapes. However, there's that old
'common sense' stuff again--it wouldn't do any good for any band to flood
the market with live CDs, and the effort involved would be draining.
Also, consider that even a "bargain priced" CD costs about $10 (US), and
if U2 were to release _all_ future live shows on CD, well, do the math...
> Mmmm i don't know but if u2 could do this they'd do something great for
> fans and for people who are searching money for Aids or cancer funds.
> By the way they are very very rich and i don't think that if some peole
> make some money with the bootlegs,they loose something.....
The best way the could do something "great for fans" would be to loosen up
and allow the fans to tape concerts...and, for that matter, to bring in
videocameras and still cameras as well! And I don't think U2's wealth
should be an issue here--what's more important is the fact that fans
shouldn't feel obliged to pay big bucks for live bootlegs that are often
of really crappy quality...I'm sure that "quality control" is an issue for
the band as well...
> I want to tell you two episodes that i know are true:
>
> 1)When u2 came in italy for the Zooropa tour in 1993,in Rome some guys of the
> italian fan club met Bono and they gave him some of those cd bootlegs as
> a present...Bono appreciated them very much!
All the fellas in U2 probably have some pretty interesting bootleg
collections! As is no doubt true about a lot of artists. I heard the
story--maybe here on Wire?--about a guy who went to U2's 1992 show in
Atlanta. He taped the show, then went to meet the band after the concert.
When he met Edge, he whipped out his recording walkman, with the tape
still in it, and announced, "I just taped your show!". Edge's response
was along the lines of "we don't care", and then went on to point out that
their real gripe was with the professionals, and tour personnel who leaked
live tapes to the same, etc. Now, I'd like to see U2 actually put their
philosophy into practice here--if they really don't give a rat's arse if
their fans tape shows, why do they allow a situation to persist, where the
concert security are given free reign to bully, threaten and eject fans
who are caught taping, taking pictures, etc.? Who rules the roost at a
live show: the band, the promoter, or the record company?
U2 did produce a j-card insert (for cassette tapes) for fans who taped
their Point Depot/New Year's show off the radio some years back. The
insert was sent to Propaganda subscribers in Europe, and was also
published in a few music magazines (Hot Press?) in Ireland and England.
Island Records had a major hissy fit over this--even though anyone with a
clue would know that people routinely tape live concerts from radio
broadcasts! Bad office politics aside, this is something else I'd like to
see the band try (again); since they know damned full well that fans are
taping their shows, they should try selling sets of special j-card
inserts, yep, right along with the t-shirts and other doo-dads. I'm sure
it would give Island (et al) the willies, but it would (funnily enough) be
a novel way to actually profit from in-concert taping! >:)
> 2)Edge came in Rome in the march of 1994 to do a theatrical performance for
> a friend.Well.....he was also visiting Rome alone,the cool thing is that he
> stopped in a record shop and bought all the u2 cd bootlegs available in the shop
> to the much surprise of the shop owner!!!!
Hey, why not tell us a bit more about this "theatrical performance" thing?
Was he part of the performance, or just there to watch?
Anyways, as I said, the band have 'fessed up to owning/buying bootlegged
discs. In fact, with their income, they're about the only folks who can
justify paying the over-inflated prices charged for bootlegs!
Slan,
Elizabeth Platt
[email protected]
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0b2 on Thu Dec 03 1998 - 16:33:14 PST