alfa.org.uk

As someone who’s only discovering Morrissey (and the Smiths) as a result of his recent renaissance, I enjoyed reading What To Say About Morrissey. Spot the Smiths lyrics…

./~ Oh happy day! ./~

Dear MR PARTRIDGE,

Congratulations.

You have booked to attend KEANE at Carling Academy Brixton, London on WEDNESDAY 17/11/2004 at 19.30

You have booked 2 STANDING at £16.50

I’m a closet Justin Timberlake fan (damn, just outed myself again). His best song is clearly “Senorita”, with it’s funky piano riff. He obviously borrowed a lot from people like Chick Corea and Prince, but even so, kudos to him for having good taste.

Here’s the riff, for other people that like it…

– The Streets - Dry Your Eyes

I was searching online, trying to see if there were any sites that properly analysed some of the piano voicings McCoy Tyner uses on A Love Supreme. I couldn’t find exactly what I was looking for (any jazz buffs know if such a thing exists?) but I did come across this site, which has some of the best-explained jazz theory I’ve seen online.

Well-written and accurate.

Sometimes I even surprise myself. A few days after I pointed out that since bandwidth is cheap and noone wants CDs cluttering up their houses there is a big opportunity for companies with innovative media distribution methods, Napster Canada has announced interactive streaming audio for $9.95 a month.

Hopefully this kind of thing will catch on over here too.

Do you ever get that feeling?

You know the one I mean. It’s where you find a new album, unexpectedly, and it’s just the best thing you’ve heard in ages. Well, I’ve found it.

My last best album was a few months ago (Mew - Frengers). It’s a shockingly good debut album which I can only really describe as Danish Radiohead with lashings of Sigur Ros and a healthy dose of wry irony. Buy it - it will make your life better.

My latest best new album is: Estbjorn Svensson Trio - Strange Place For Snow. They make a lot of noise for a trio, and it’s all good. Yes, it’s jazz, but jazz is good, right?

Any group who can write a song called When God Invented The Coffeebreak and base it around a pseudo-Bach fugue with what I can only describe as acoustic drum’n'bass underneath is Okay By Me.

They are Swedish and clearly excessively talented. The piano playing is crystal clear and owes a lot to Chick Corea and Thelonius Monk.

They’re not afraid to end a jazz album with a screeching electric guitar/synth blowout.

Fantastic.

So, the RIAA have sued 493 more filesharers. They don’t seem to realise how completely futile this is, and how they’re only scratching the surface of the problem (”Oh, you’re only tracking down people who use Kazaa or LimeWire? What about those using other distribution methods? Bittorrent, WinMX, SoulSeek, even DCC on IRC ffs?”).

They hope that by making enough noise in the press they’ll scare people away from file-sharing. Well, sorry, it isn’t going to happen. Napster made people realise not only that the Internet could make everything available on their doorstep, but that sharing it could be fun. People much cleverer than me have been telling the industry for years that the Internet will become the new distribution method for media, and they’d better get used to the idea.

Apple caught on first (as usual). But in order to get the big four record labels interested there had to be DRM involved. Cue DVD Jon to crack it. Again.

The games industry has realised what’s happening. People want to play multi-player games over the internet, and they’re willing to pay for it. That’s because they’re not interested in the physical game itself, but the potential for social networking it can offer. Just look at EverQuest.

The music industry should take a leaf out of the games industry’s book. People are quite uninterested in physically owning the media and holding it in their hands. They’re quite happy with an iPod full of tunes, and nary a CD in sight. The industry should tap into the potential for huge cost-cutting this offers, and make real products that people would be interested in.

Micro-payments are the way forward. Why should I buy an album when I’m only interested in one song? More to the point, why should I pay a fixed price for one song, regardless of the number of times I play it? Why not charge 1p per play, for any song? Bandwidth is cheap and the internet is ubiquitous.

Supply and demand, man. Supply and demand.

Or maybe the industry is scared of the people having real commercial choice over where their money goes.

Shameless plug, this one:

City of Southampton Orchestra
Saturday 22nd May 2004, 7:30pm
at Romsey Abbey

Conductor: John Traill

Berlioz - Overture: Roman Carnival
Mendelssohn - Violin Concerto
Soloist: Catherine Nassif
Tchaikovsky - Symphony No. 5 in E minor

Tickets (reserved): £12.00 & £9.00; (unreserved): £5.00
Concessions available
Romsey Tourist Information Centre (01794) 512987

Don’t know if anyone else is into this kind of stuff.. but you can download bootlegs of Radiohead’s show over the weekend at:

http://lostchildisback.free.fr

Get there before they’re taken down… Seem to be pretty good quality for bootlegs, although there’s a fair bit of crowd noise from around the taper.

P.S. Translation for the French is (I think): “A new concert for you, recorded at the Festival of Arts and Music, Coachella on May 1st 2004. Download all then rename to .mp3″.