please don't stop emusic

Abstract:
The excellent music subscription service, emusic, is raising its rates and cutting the number of downloads in subscriptions. Me sad. Also, I haaaaaaate people who comment on things like this and say "BYE" to whatever thing changed something.

Full text:
As those who know me are aware, I'm an avid consumer of music. This has meant shelves of CDs that hog most of the usable wall space in my room. I've probably spent way too much (I like to think that it's nothing compared to what I would have spent on a car had I ever owned one). Partly due to the money/space issue, I've gotten over my aversion to buying mp3s and I've been an emusic subscriber for a while.

With their continuous lures of 30 day trials with 30 free downloads (of individual tracks) and a well stocked armory of records from independent labels, I couldn't resist. They use a monthly subscription model at different pricing tiers (kind of like a health club).

A big plus is these are REAL MP3s. No streaming, funky file types, or DRM. The music is paid for and the cord is cut; it is mine.

I had a wonderful thing going. 90 downloads a month for $19.99. Ridiculous. Around $0.23 a track. A 12 track album would cost $2.67. Plus, I was grandfathered in past a rate hike. Of course it couldn't last.

Then came news of the impending arrival of some of the back catalog of one of the big 4 mega labels Sony, with "labels like Arista, Columbia, Epic and RCA - that means artists including the Strokes, Bruce Springsteen, Leonard Cohen and The Clash to name a few" according to the blog post of emusic's CEO. Which is great, that would definitely lead to some pretty good gains for me.

Unfortunately, also announced was the hiking of prices and lowering of downloads per tier. No grandfather clause either. Most probably having to do with pressure from Sony wanting some real money from the deal. I'm also going to speculate that it's probably so that emusic can pad out its razor-thin profit margin.

My sweetheart deal will now be 50 downloads a month for $19.99. Around $0.40 a track. A 12 track album would cost around $4.80. Not bad at all really, but still a bummer.

What is really annoying is a classic problem I seem to have with the billing periods: making sure you get your money's worth. Since monthly accounts go by 30 days instead of the same date every month, it's harder if you are trying to make sure you are using as much of your monthly downloads as possible. Multiple times I've meant to download albums in what I thought was the end of a cycle, thus using up my remaining downloads. But sometimes I couldn't make it in time.

It's sort of like how Netflix works from the customer's perspective. You think you're getting a deal by paying $20 a month and having 3 DVDs cycling in and out. But if you hold onto the DVDs, which it seems most people do, it's not much of a deal for you (though there are no late fees). You get more bang for your buck if you use it as much as you can.

So there is the constant feeling of missed opportunity. Which I hate. A year ago emusic had the entire Rolling Stones back catalogue from 1964 - 1970. I was excited and thought about what the best attack plan was going to be. Then it was gone because ABKCO, the label controlling the music, got freaked out and pulled everything. I had downloaded nothing and looked back wistfully.

Well, I hope at least that this means the artists will be paid a better share.

So now here I am. Faced with a download cut, I look back at how many albums I could have downloaded using all 90 downloads every month. Lives could have been changed, the world's colors made that much brighter.

In closing:
So, as you can see, I'm kinda pissed (mostly at losing a rate that I had been grandfathered) but I'll live. Emusic subscribers are still getting a HELL of a deal. If you like indie music (and soon music from at least one mega-label), you are getting music at a good to really good discount than what you can get from Amazon or iTunes (again, this is IF you are using your subscription).

But as with any announcement having to do with anything on the internet has been the chorus of groaners. It's hard to know if these haters are actually individuals who utilize or interact with the subject in question since trolling has long become its own brutalist art form on the internets. The thing to do in a reaction to change is to say "BYE" or something short and similarly stupid-sounding. Hard to argue with that.

Even when it concerns awesome things like Conan O'Brien hosting the Tonight Show (some idiot on twitter actually said "Conan? Goodbye Tonight Show... YOU LOST ME!" to which I say "great" and why don't you lose yourself from society?). Or free iced coffee with a sandwich at Dunkin Donuts (for which I imagine: "I LIKE PAYING FOR ICED COFFEE. NO LONGER. EPIC FAIL. BYE DD"). Ah the rank smell of haters.

Little Boots

(Photo: Tom Oxley)
Little Boots Kicks Ass

i was reading a post at Pitchfork.com regaling the masses about the South by Southwest (SXSW) (the yearly super mega media explosion in Austin, TX that allows you to see all kinds of up-and-coming unsigned bands, crowd favorites, Metallica performing at a large BBQ (kinda hilarious), and forums on new ways of communicating through whatever medium possible).

I checked out acts mentioned like Ebony Bones (myspace) (check out "We Know All About U" and let it build up, find some live performances on the web, it's insane!), the ridiculous charm, fashion sense and legs of the woman in Chairlift (they did the song featured when Apple rolled out the new ipod nano), Kid Cudi blowing people up when he added the Crookers remix to his performance of Day N Nite (featured here before), amongst others.

LITTLE BOOTS
I came across a mention of Little Boots who apparently melted the heart of the Pfork reviewer, Tom Breihan:

"Her nervous between-song banter and goofy onstage dancing both completely won me over, but neither one competed with her songs. This lady knows how to put a tune together; every track is a deliriously catchy wub-wub dance-pop machine, none better than the set-closing monster single "Stuck on Repeat". She reminds me a bit of Cut Copy, a vaguely awkward and totally likable person making songs that build up and break down at the exact right moment, working a crowd until it's built up to total hands-in-air hysteria. She knows exactly what she's doing.

Toward the back of the venue, I saw Perez Hilton dumbing out with what sure looked like genuine joy, and it made me hate that guy just a little bit less."

That's a pretty big endorsement.

Little Boots is a 24 year-old lady from the UK whose chosen moniker does come from Caligula. She is a semi-self-made up-and-coming popstar that's been making the internets rounds for over a year now. She writes her own stuff using keyboards, synths, and now a Tenori-On (a ridiculously awesome synth machine that you'll see her use in the videos below), with a skill and ease that has made her very popular online.

She has been playing music for most of her life (she's 24) and had come into fame recently by performances at her house uploaded to youtube (Little Boots youtube). She does originals and covers and displays some pretty good pop chops, propelling her in youtube rankings and allowing her some publicity. A number of British media outlets named her a pop act to follow in 2009. Thus I did and was impressed.

She has a heartfelt love of pop music as you can see from her "funtimes" selection of covers and she can pull the tunes apart pretty well so that she puts her own signature on them with her keyboard and synth arrangements. Sometimes her little brother helps her with drums.

Her new album will hopefully drop by the middle of the year. (For the US) In the meantime there is a downloadable EP that's come out on emusic, iTunes, and AmazonMP3 (see details at the end).
HER MUSIC
As mentioned before, a huge single for her has been "Stuck on Repeat" (produced by the dude from Hot Chip) which to me sounds like all the wonderful electro bits of Kylie Minogue, Depeche Mode, and Saint Etienne blended together:
Listen here: Little Boots Myspace
and Live at SXSW 2009 or Live in Aberdeen

Another big song out is "Meddle" (the original version which you can also hear on her myspace page). A performance of this song in her room (see here) landed her on the front page of youtube. The producers of Later... with Jools Holland (preeminent UK music program) decided to put her on performing on a bill loaded with big name talent. What you get is this great and buzz-building performance that is less of the dancefloor but shows off her skills in a very effective way with a piano, Tenori-On, stylophone (what she uses a stylus on), and handclaps.

Little Boots "Meddle" live on Later... with Jools Holland
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cHX-znop8Q


COVERS
What finally possessed me to write this was seeing a youtube clip of her whipping out her Tenori-On and effortlessly doing a cover of Hot Chip's "Ready for the Floor". One of many excellent covers:
Little Boots "Ready for the Floor" (Hot Chip cover)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6tLRCDqJ2c


and for comparison if you didn't know, one of the best songs last year:
Hot Chip, "Ready for the Floor": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AW94AEmzFhQ


SO
So, I like. Judging from whatever clippings I've amassed, she seems like a pretty cool person and I hope she gets some success and puts out her album soon.

A BUNCH OF INTERVIEWS AND LIVE PERFORMANCES
Last Call with Carson Daly performance and interview via Perez Hilton

The FADER cover story

Pitchfork interview

BBC 6 Music Hub Session (Jan 2009)

MTV Spanking New Sessions

New York Magazine interview
BUY
Little Boots - Arecibo EP:

emusic: sample/buy (hint: you can get a trial membership and free downloads) (I recommend sticking with it. I'm a subscriber and it's an amazing and super affordable service if you enjoy indie music).

AmazonMP3: sample and buy here

iTunes:

Nowhearmeout: Where's Me Jumper?

Because content requires effort, I present another rehashed old Now Hear Me Out post of mine. More poignant because the group seems to have died. Enjoy!

"It's alright to say things can only get better, YOU haven't lost your
brand new sweater.."

Now, hear me out,

Sultans of Ping FC: "Where's Me Jumper?"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWsHXX_HLKs

Back when I was a happy-go-lucky admin working at the Joslin Diabetes
Center, I got to listen to music at my desk at a pretty loud volume.
It was awesome. I would tune in to BBC's online station 6 Music. It has a good mix of indie-
ish"alternative" music, old and new. It was miles and miles (or
kilometers and kilometers) better than the soul-sucking mainstream
rock radio here. It also clued me in to songs that were classic tunes
for the UK indie pop crowd. The station helped to prepare me for
visiting Carolyn in London and sounding knowledgeable with the cool
kids at her school.

It was through 6 Music that I became aware of an obscure Irish group
from the 80s-90s called Sultans of Ping FC (their name seemingly a
brilliant play on the Dire Straits song "Sultans of Swing") and their
big 1992 underground hit "Where's Me Jumper?" It is a song about a man
that loses his jumper at the disco. You could dismiss it as a novelty
comedy single, but I think that it is just part of the rich history of
Irish/British indie pop.

Primer for Americans:
a jumper is a sweater. i did not know that.

This song always makes me smile. Especially when I imagine how the
video would look if I directed it. Particularly when the singer is
listing the individuals who would be "so, so angry" at him losing his
jumper.

The song has managed to stay in people's minds to this day. A few
years ago a renegade art and culture movement in the Irish city of
Cork had called itself "Where's Me Culture?". The website is gone and
I don't know if it still exists, but there's a t-shirt.



Well, that's it for me today. I'm just going to click this button...
wait, what's that noise? Its... its... no, it can't be! aaaaaaaagh!

THE END.
-bow-

-JSNK-