Roger and Pete in the News

Tue Aug 22 22:32:59 CDT 2006

I'm just not sure this one is completely serious:

http://www.redorbit.com/news/technology/627675/a_tangled_web_out_there_for_bands_and_their_fans/index.html?source=r_technology

A Tangled Web Out There for Bands and Their Fans
By Jeff Vrabel

Hey, remember Metallica? Nice kids, played the loud thrash metal, got a 
little piqued when some uppity dorm gremlins started snatching their music 
over the Napster for nothin'? Good times.

The sound bites that emerged then from yappy drum hobbit Lars Ulrich -- the 
ones about the artistic license and the creative control and whatnot -- 
sounded lovely. But the fellas' image took a hit, what with the way they 
seemingly turned on their dwindling fan base to squeeze the last bits out of 
their revenue streams. (Also, they've sucked since 1991, but that's just 
me.)

Anyway, having positioned itself pretty securely in the non- Internet camp, 
Metallica had remained one of the few remaining marquee bands to hold their 
music off online services (others include Radiohead, Led Zeppelin, Tool and 
the Beatles). In 2003, a spokesman for the firm that managed the band said 
they "would rather not contribute to the demise of the album format."

Yes! Take that, Short Attention Span Youngsters!

The band stuck to its guns and kept its music off the Web until . . . er, 
last week, when it made its entire catalog available on iTunes.

I'd make a joke here about Ulrich eating crow, but it's more likely he's 
eating sandwiches made out of money.

Well, I say, kudos to Metallica! Kudos for finally realizing that the Web 
has much to offer when it comes to established musicians, even if it came 
six years late. You're doing far better than The Who, who are back for some 
reason and recently pulled the plug on live Webcasts of their current world 
tour because Roger Daltrey couldn't figure out how to turn on his iMac.

Just kidding, although it's true that some sort of disagreement between 
Daltrey and Pete Townshend sank the idea; Townshend said Daltrey was not 
sure how "the Web has any real contribution to make to our career." (They 
had kinda the same problem with John Entwistle for a while.)

This was a bigger deal than it sounds. The Who had employed a massive crew 
-- including, no joke, some of the technical team from the Lord of the Rings 
films -- to broadcast each show of its 66- date tour online. The problem 
was, from the sounds of things, it was Townshend who employed the massive 
crew, and at some point in the past few weeks Daltrey got around to asking 
what all the people with cameras, boom mikes and hobbit feet were doing 
there.

"Roger is my partner in the Who," Townshend wrote wordily on his Web site. 
"He is not my partner in anything else. We love each other, but we are not 
regular social buddies like Bono and Edge, we do not discuss or share ideas, 
and we have no unified joint vision or strategy for the Who or for creative 
projects in general."

It's this exact kind of unbridled, passionate emotional rawness that's 
making me really look forward to new Who material in 2006.

Townshend goes on to write about 40,000 more spectacularly boring words 
about his publishing income and financial freedom, in case you want more of 
your youthful rock 'n' roll memories shattered.

Speaking of that -- note the segue here -- the Rolling Stones had good news 
last week for fans who find the tinny AM sounds produced by their 3-inch PC 
speakers exceedingly crisp and lifelike, on those delightfully rare 
occasions the player doesn't get stuck on BUFFERING 37% for hours at a time. 
Yes, for just $1.99, you too could hear seven-minute chunks of the band's 
Paris show over your home telephone -- "My gawd!" you could say to your 
envious friends who are engaged in real conversation, "they're playing Honky 
Tonk Women!"

And if you paid real close attention to that sentence, you have realized 
that to fully experience their satanic majesties through the raw power of 
your quarter-inch Motorola earpiece, you would have to call 18 or 20 times, 
depending on how long the band has to pause mid-show to pour fresh human 
blood into Charlie Watts.

Conservative cash outlay estimate: forty licks.

All we need now is a Stones lackey to recast this hilarious patheticness, 
using terms only a joyless businessman could truly appreciate.

"It's a great thing for the artists," Stones manager Marty Erlichman said. 
"It's passive income, and they're helping fans enjoy the experience without 
affecting ticket sales."

Yes! Yes! Rock!

Now all of you get off the damn stage, and let's have no more giving of our 
money to these people, OK?jeff.vrabel at jacksonville.com, (904) 359-4288