// Pop Music
The end of DRM?
So, much to everyone’s surprise, Apple and EMI have agreed that they will make “unlocked” versions of music downloads available on iTunes from May, with Steve Jobs predicting many other companies will follow suit.
Clearly they’ve reasoned that locking people’s files in the way they have been to date has not really given them a friendly image or helped in the fight against piracy. Everyone’s been telling them this for ages anyway, but the music industry has been historically very slow to keep up with the demands of its customers - usually viewing them as people to be penalised rather than serviced (as it were).
So today’s announcement is quite a bold and welcome move as far as I’m concerned. And yes, we’ll admittedly pay more for this privilege, but we’ll also get an additional benefit in that the quality of the recording will be higher as well, so I think it’s great news.
Now if iTunes allowed non-AAC media players to benefit too then life gets even easier for us e-music purchasers. Okay, I suspect we’ll see pigs flying first, but after today I think I’ll keep watching the skies just in case.
Posted on April 2, 2007 | Filed Under Pop Music, The World we Live In | 0 Comments
The Parade - Terrorize the Dancefloor
This has to be one of the best flop songs out there. It completely bombed despite being infuriatingly catchy and bouncy and upbeat and all the things I like best about pop music.
One of the reasons for its failure, though, may be the video which - whilst being, to my mind, quite stylish arty and sophisticated - doesn’t quite gel with the dance track. But hey.
Here for your aural pleasure (or not) are “The Parade” with “Terrorize the Dancefloor”.
And the lead singer? Oh you so would, wouldn’t you?
Posted on March 31, 2007 | Filed Under Pop Music | 0 Comments
Here we go, impossible again…
Now, my love of hating Eurovision is something which many people are surprised by. It is assumed that as a card-carrying gay man - and one with a fervent love of pop music - I must adore it, but I don’t.
It’s like drinking gin. Somehow it’s one of those aspects of being a gay that doesn’t appeal.
Generally the songs don’t move me because I find them just a little bit too trite (classics such as Gina G, ABBA and Bucks Fizz aside). And I refuse to sit through the tedium of the performances and scoring just to hear the genius that is Terry Wogan being rightly disdainful of the whole misplaced purpose of the thing.
I think I also bridle at the assumption that “you’re gay, you like pop, therefore you must like this or be a bad gay”.
Well… if so I’m a bad gay. No biscuit. (You can hit me on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper if it would make you any happier).
I do, however, have a vague interest on a national pride level of how well we do. And I’d quite like us as a country to do something un-self-consciously poppy, bright, breezy and produced in a way which doesn’t suggest a quick sequencing job in the back of a mini on the way to the studio.
So people… who’s in the running this year then?
Ah. It’s that oddball who used to be in the Darkness, some thug who used to be in East 17, some bint who used to be in Atomic Kitten and… hang on a second… bloody Scooch!
Now, as someone with a lot of fondness for Scooch (they had some great singles and their cover of the Littlest Hobo theme is amazing) a part of me is really glad to see them back.
But from the tiny clip available on the “Making Your Mind Up” site I can only assume that the studio was in the middle of nowhere and the mini had a fair bit of off-road to do to get there.
Still, I suppose there’s no danger we’ll bankrupt the UK by hosting the contest next year…
Posted on February 28, 2007 | Filed Under Film and Television, Pop Music | 0 Comments
Stefy - Chelsea
This one somehow sneaked out on release in the UK last week without me noticing. (I tried to buy it on iTunes last year but because it was only on the US Store I couldn’t.)
I love it. A nice simple piece of electro-pop with a Eurythmics-esque bassline.
Amazing that it’s a US band, really. It’s not the sort of sound I usually associate with the States.
Posted on February 27, 2007 | Filed Under Pop Music | 0 Comments