Surprise, surprise: album sales continue to drop in the U.S. Industry folks will blame illegal digital downloads, and there is certainly a case to be made. But the real culprit is likely the abundance of free and legal ways to hear music coupled with the disposable nature of what is produced. When you can hear a bad song once, you've no need to drop money on the right to hear it again and again.

According to industry figures, album sales dropped for the eighth time in nine years, falling 12.7 percent to 373.0 million units in 2009. Want to know why? Michael Jackson, whose sole appeal during the year was that he died, was the top selling artist. He didn't release new music during the year, which means the rest of the world's artists couldn't compete with someone whose music is already in many, many collections. Taylor Swift and Susan Boyle also were in the upper reaches. I'm sure Swift is a nice girl, but I haven't heard a note of her music and can't say I feel any detriment from that lack. And Boyle is a novelty who was guaranteed to sell. No one else singing that kind of material will ever sell like she did, so that's an anomalous blip and nothing more.

While Internet piracy is blamed, it's interesting to see that in a recessionary year, spending on concerts actually increased. Could it be true, as often stated, that getting music into peoples' hands, however it is done, can create fans willing to spend money on other experiences? That seems to be the case.

Legal downloads continue to climb, with sales rising 8.3 percent to 1.16 billion tracks. Most amazingly, some tracks sold more than 4 million digital copies. That's an amazing statistic that shows people are engaged with music, they're just choosing to get it in different ways. Has a single in any past format -- 7" vinyl, cassette or CD -- ever come to 4 million in sales? It seems as if the era of ubiquity in pop singles is over, but I'm probably wrong, chalking it up to the fact that I'm old and haven't listened to anything but NPR on the radio in a decade.

One report on the sales figures from the Chicago Tribune's Gret Kot points out "one of the more delightful oddities of the digital era, vinyl album sales continued their recent resurgence. Though representing only a small fraction of the overall market, vinyl is the one physical product that continues to defy trends, with sales up a whopping 33 percent to 2.5 million."

That's no surprise, however. People willing to spend money on music are passionate about it. The most passionate are those willing to spend money on vinyl. While a digital download is an afterthought, a vinyl purchase is a declaration of intent: I like this artist and want the most permanent artifact I can acquire to cement that fact. There is more great music being made than ever before, it's just not selling worth a darn.

Labels: commerce, music

A lot of things coalesced for me today thanks to, of all things, a piece in the Wall Street Journal. What it comes down to is that the establishment will always find a cultural boogie man against which to rail, and this will stand in for true societal ills.

The WSJ piece was a reprint of an editorial from Aug. 29, 1969, "By Squalor Possessed," taking offense at the Woodstock festival. It was part of a larger look back celebrating the pending 40th anniversary of the festival. One sentence really hit home, and confirmed my long-held thought that each generation eventually opposes the one that follows, only to see that following generation become the status quo that complains about the next.

"For various reasons it is being suggested that many rebels will not abandon their 'life-styles (the cliches in this field!) and that there are enough of them to assume some of the levers of power in the future American society," they wrote. "It would be a curious America if the unwashed, more or less permanently stoned on pot or LSD, were running very many things."

Of course, this is exactly what happened, and "the unwashed" are now donning power suits and complaining about the violent video games and risque Internet usage of their kids and grandkids. I'll leave comment about the the further-expressed worry that "it will be at best a culturally poorer America and maybe a politically degenerated America" to sharper political minds than my own.

This is nothing new. I recently slogged through David Hajdu's 2008 book, The Ten-Cent Plague, a book about the creation of comic books and the campaign against them waged in the 1950s. Though Hajdu seems to have modeled early chapters on the first books of the Bible (his tedious and exhaustive life histories of each player reading like a he-begat-she-who-begat..." section of the good book), he does eventually get around to describing the hilariously absurd lengths to which Congressmen, parents, teachers and religious leaders went to demonize what were only words and pictures printed on the page.

These people, while winning short-term victories, ultimately failed. Comics persevered, and were quickly superseded at the top of the cultural and societal evils list by films (which by that point already had already been attacked by puritans aghast at the idea of bare flesh on the big screen), television and yes, rock 'n' roll.

But guess what? Each of these art forms outlasted their opponents and took on a depth and breadth and richness that made them absolutely indispensable chroniclers of our time in a way that the most erudite, reasoned opposition to these forms did not. "Today, the young's addiction to rock is at the same time a rejection of classical and the more subdued types of popular music, and considering the way rock is presented it must be counted a step down on culture's ladder," reads the WSJ editorial. Who needs parody when the real thing is so blissfully out-of-touch and funny?

"In any event, opting for physical, intellectual and cultural squalor seems an odd way to advance civilization," the WSJ writes. I wonder what they thought about that squalor as they saw it's celebration become, over the years, a multi-billion-dollar cash cow. That, of course, may be the biggest lesson of all: Where there is a dime to be made, even the most repulsive things will be tolerated, if not embraced.

Labels: commerce, music, Woodstock

So, Saturday was Record Store Day. Did you make it out? I did, hitting Iowa City's two record stores, each of which was participating. I was late, so I missed out on the Guided by Voices disc (hello, eBay), but did pick up singles from Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan (which were available in quantities that lead me to believe there is little "limited" about them), and the Sonic Youth/Beck split from Matador (the sale of which on eBay, if current prices are to be believed, would fund purchase of the GBV record).

The stated goal of Record Store Day is: "On this day, all of these stores will simultaneously link and act as one with the purpose of celebrating the culture and unique place that they occupy both in their local communities and nationally." So, did it work? According to anecdotal evidence reported by Billboard.com, it did. Several stores reported higher sales and much greater traffic than normal. It didn't hurt that independent and major labels created 82 special releases available that day only, drawing collectors to stores in droves. Did it draw anyone else? Hard to say. Because most of the special releases were by smaller bands and on vinyl, an appeal to the masses this ain't. What it did, I suppose, is show people like me who have largely given up on independent record stores because of sketchy selection, high prices or lack of convenience, that record stores are still happening places.

The most compelling argument for the value of record stores came from Steve Albini. the Chicago Reader blog Post No Bills shared an ad placed by Chicago's Reckless Records that includes an essay from Albini that, in its tortured analogy to a farmer's market, actually makes a case for the value of record stores. To explain it would mean practically retyping it here. Just go read it here.

Labels: commerce, music, Record Store Day

Great yet puzzling news regarding I.R.S. Records today: The label, thanks to the corporate efforts of Capitol/EMI, is releasing a big chuck of its back catalog to digital stores starting Feb. 10. Then through March 17, each week will bring a new batch of albums and tracks.

That last part is the puzzling part. Rather than just release whole albums, the label is taking a piecemeal approach by culling some key tracks from its albums. That might make sense if it was picking the random standout from a lesser-known album, but it seems to be doing nearly the opposite, issuing entire albums from the likes of Drywall (?) and Alarm guitarist Mike Sharp while pulling only eight tracks from Let's Active's catalog.

Why not just make everything available, or at least the full albums from which you pull tracks? There must be a business or legal reason behind the decision.

The heavy hitters on the I.R.S. roster already are available digitally, with albums by R.E.M. and the Go Gos in circulation. Perhaps a good response to this latest batch will spur those behind the effort to go the rest of the way and put everything out there.

Labels: commerce, music

Paul Westerberg continues to intrigue. He -- or more likely his distributors at Tunecore and Amazon -- pulled his just-released digital album 49:00 from sale. In its place comes "5:05," a new single. All of these numbers make some sense for those who have been paying attention. 49:00 was subtitled ...of your life (the word time was crossed out and life inserted), yet the album-long track clocked in at 43:55. It's clear that "5:05," which, when added to that previous track brings the total time to an even 49 minutes, is the missing link.

But it's not entirely clear after all. Why, for example, would the last song of an album-long track reference its length in the lyric, as this does? The only reason 5:05 has meaning is because fans know that's what was missing. If it was part of the rather seamless album itself, it wouldn't matter. There is speculation that 49:00 was pulled down because, toward the end, Westerberg offers a mish-mash of covers, all just a few seconds long, followed by a longer take on the Partridge Family's "I Think I Love You." Did Ruben Kinkade demand royalties?

One thought: The missing 5:05 was actually a different song for which Westerberg couldn't get clearance. So, he dropped it at the last minute, then changed his mind, pulled 49:00 and replaced it with a big old "f-you" to whoever raised a stink, recording that track so it exactly matched the length of the excised tune.

It's difficult to hear the lyrics on the new track, though there are plenty of lines that leak through the lo-fi production clear as day, such as "It ain't about the money" and "you wanna sue me, see right through me." Westerberg is obviously mad at someone, and those of us quick enough to download both tracks are the beneficiaries.

One last note. 49:00 was available for 49 cents; "5:05" can be had for 99 cents or $5.05 through Tunecore. You chose. Even at the higher price, you're getting nearly 50 minutes of new Westerberg for less than $6. Not a bad deal at all.

Labels: commerce, music, Paul Westerberg

Paul Westerberg has become one of the most interesting artists of the past decade, and his latest release solidifies that position.

After watching his band, the Replacements, flameout and his solo career fizzle, Westerberg stepped away, or rather down, into the basement, where he recorded two albums of fairly lo-fi rock that married his early knock-it-out aesthetic to his latter-day lyrical and musical fascinations. The result was 2002’s Stereo/Mono, his best work in years. In the six years since, he has released more material than in the previous 15. It has been hit or miss – the Grandpaboy stuff largely accounting for the misses – but the hits outnumber those found on his first three solo records. His prolific output means the fan becomes the editor, a job that isn’t always terribly rewarding. But, as with standard bearer Robert Pollard, Westerberg’s practice means that a lot of music that would not have otherwise been released will indeed leak out, and so much the better.

Which brings us to 49:00, Westerberg’s new album. Yes, it’s an album, despite the fact that it was released on Monday as one 44 minute downloadable mp3 for 49 cents from Amazon.com and Tunecore. With 20-some-odd songs and snippets mashed together to create one long track, it really plays like a good 12-track album with a lot of little snippets bridging the longer songs. Again, Pollard and Guided by Voices are an apt comparison.

Westerberg is getting a ton of press for this sneak attack on the marketplace, and it’s to his credit. He’s probably making as much from this as he would from a traditionally released album, and he’s receiving much more notice than he would otherwise for this batch of songs. If this was a new album on Vagrant, the follow-up to Folker, he’d get a couple of magazine write ups, some online coverage and then nothing. Releasing it this way ensures that he’ll be called a visionary and earn him the kind of notice usually reserved for acts like Radiohead.

And yet, I’d guess that was not his intent; not fully. He certainly didn't put a lot of thought into the presentation, calling it 49:00 despite it's 43:55 runtime. According to his manager, Darren Hill, "He finished it on Monday, sent it to me on Tuesday and it was out this weekend." So reports Billboard.com. “It's almost like you're scanning a radio dial. You're getting a glimpse inside of Paul's head here." That was more likely his goal: a brain dump with no strings attached and, thanks to the unpretentious presentation, no expectations. If you like it, it’s a bargain. If you don’t, who’s to complain about wasting 49 cents?

And this is no waste. There are a good half dozen songs here that are as good as any Westerberg has released in the past few years, and a few others that are at least pleasantly disposable. Hill told Billboard.com that this is "just the tip of a really large creative iceberg. Paul has been writing and recording at a furious pace." Here's hoping the response to 49:00 convinces him to continue putting it out.

Labels: commerce, music, Paul Westerberg