I Am Alive

Hello,

After much telling off from mum I'm back on the blog, who needs a boss when your mother reads your blog? (Hence why it's quite tame in places)

So where have I been? Some creek or other without a paddle would be a good description. Referring back to one of my first ever posts, I genuinely need to clone myself as I think I can pretty much do anything (which I can of course) however, I have recently given up sleep as one of my passtimes.

My recent time has been domniated by working on a couple of big film projects for internal and external use. I've just done a video with The Electric City who I'm well into so that was weekend before last and many spare moments over the past week or so taken up. I worked on an internal video at work, plus I have to get the podcast together. :-(

On top of that I'm still trying to get this whole process re-vamped and more straightforward as an A&R submissions process and also make life a bit easier for me :-)

Plus I'm still booking bands for the nights I've got coming up. As usual I have a couple of 11th hour slots for this Saturday should anyone want to get involved? Just send me an email/message.

Here's a low res version of one of the recent projects I've been working on. It looks amazing because my mate Tony put this one together, I just did the camerawork. I'm going to get a hi-res version up somewhere.

The Electric City

Hope all is well and easy going with you.

IB


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David Perry
I think you should get us a video of the Bubble Song and we'll about have all we need for entertainment for a long while.
funkcartel
why gives your record company the right to distribute our recordings to whoever they want and why have they assumed all rights and control of our recordings indieBoy? have they done this to any other artists?
funkcartel
correction - what gives your record company the right to distribute our recordings to whoever they want to for free and why have they assumed all rights and control of our recordings indieBoy? Have they done this to any other artists?
David Perry
Not to interrupt funkcartel's grievance but I'm interested in any further detail you could give on this statement:

"On top of that I'm still trying to get this whole process re-vamped and more straightforward as an A&R submissions process and also make life a bit easier for me :-)"

Thanks very much,
Dave
Indieboy
I haven't assumed any control/rights over the music here, I promote the acts featured with their permission.
Indieboy
I'm simply trying to get it re-structured a bit so it's an easier process for both the artist participating and for me going through the music.
funkcartel
We did not say that you have as an individual indieBoy - we are making reference the major label who employs you and which you represent here at Vox.
Indieboy
Sony BMG isn't distributing their music via this page, I am. As mentioned I work closely with the acts I promote so I don't see what the problem is. As to what gives me the right to promote their music I think explicit permission is enough.
funkcartel
How much easier can it get ? The artists write the music, play the music, record the music, produce the music, mix the music, master the music, convert the music to mp3 and load the demos to vox - sometimes with cover art that they designed - Then they submit them to a specified group so all A&R have to do is access the web page and click play - is that too much for label reps? It seems to be so...... amazing
funkcartel
Once again, lets make this clear, we are not directing this at you as an individual indieBoy. Just for clarity, please give us a brief run down of who owns who. What's the relationship between the likes of Sony RCA Columbia and CBS etc etc etc. We cant always believe what we read on-line and things do change so what's the current state of play between the labels mentioned?
funkcartel
Would it be safe to say that Sony and CBS have RCA and Columbia under their 'roof' among others - which helps make up the 25% of the market share in the music industry today?
Indieboy
Not sure what you're getting at? I have RCA and Columbia written at the top of my page which probably illustrates that. Plus there are many other labels/imprints that are part of Sony BMG.

I would suggest getting a copy of Music Week or similar to catch up on market shares and such as I'm probably not the best person to ask.
funkcartel
Well according to the current media information Sony own CBS - CBS own RCA and Columbia so in effect these companies are all the same as far as the general public are concerned and the current 25% of the market share held by Sony will fluctuate day by day, week by week. We do check, regularly. You are therefore by association a representative of CBS who own Last.FM and also own RCA and Columbia and loads of other subs. Without splitting hairs here, you must have enough knowledge as an employee to agree with this comment yes?
David Perry
[this is good]
Great, I look forward to seeing the new form in place.
David Perry
I'm also curious as to what form this distribution you speak of is taking. Are tracks posted here on Vox being played somewhere else or featured on another website without our consent?

Technically it is us who assume the distribution of our own tracks because they start as posts on our own blogs and then we add them to the A & R group. Where else have you seen your tracks posted that you didn't intend?
Indieboy
What are you getting at FC? I don't see how this is relating to demos or A&R. Maybe have a look at http://www.sonybmgmusic.co.uk/about/ which lists the labels of SBMG. Otherwise without knowing what the punchline of your argument is I don't think I can be very helpful.
David Perry
I don't know. It is straightforward from my perspective but I don't know what challenges the A & R face in going through stuff. It seems to me if someone was just watching recent submissions to the A & R group on a daily basis they could keep up with it, but maybe there's some aspect of the process that complicates things. There isn't an overwhelming amount of artist participation here on a daily basis, it seems.
Indieboy
I can only think FC is getting at the fact that I've put videos on here featuring artists. Which I host on youtube (with consent). Other than that, the tracks reside here.
David Perry
FC, just site the specific example that is at the heart of your first post/complaint and then maybe Indieboy will address the whatever issue exists.
David Perry
Are any of the artists you've featured in your blog members of funkcartel?
David Perry
Sorry for my badly worded previous post. FC is being very coy with this matter so if the action that resulted in FC originally taking offense can be explained in detail it would help bring a clearer answer.
funkcartel
We are discussing this in a Sony A&R website. IndieBoy, you are the on-line rep for RCA and Columbia at Vox, the only one known to us who we respect and have had any dealings with thus far. Let's take Sony CBS RCA and Columbia as a single corporate label for the sake of this post and lets not distinguish between that major labels url on any specific platform. The major label you represent indieboy is distributing our recordings all over the world from usa to london to portugal and god knows where else and they are giving our recordings away for free and have been doing so all year without our consent. Every time we address these issues with anyone related to the label we are either ignored or told that we have contacted the wrong department and they remain adamant that they dont know who the correct department is - which is utter rubbish. So maybe you can inform us of this - Is there any representative of CBS Sony RCA Last.FM or Columbia that can take responsibility for anything at all regarding the issues raised above? Or, are you going to tell us it has nothing to do with you and you don't know because that is the stock answer for this corporation it seems.
funkcartel
We are discussing this in a Sony A&R website. IndieBoy, you are the on-line rep for RCA and Columbia at Vox, the only one known to us who we respect and have had any dealings with thus far. Let's take Sony CBS RCA and Columbia as a single corporate label for the sake of this post and lets not distinguish between that major labels url on any specific platform. The major label you represent indieboy is distributing our recordings all over the world from usa to london to portugal and god knows where else and they are giving our recordings away for free and have been doing so all year without our consent. Every time we address these issues with anyone related to the label we are either ignored or told that we have contacted the wrong department and they remain adamant that they dont know who the correct department is - which is utter rubbish. So maybe you can inform us of this - Is there any representative of CBS Sony RCA Last.FM or Columbia that can take responsibility for anything at all regarding the issues raised above? Or, are you going to tell us it has nothing to do with you and you don't know because that is the stock answer for this corporation it seems. [please delete above copy - it turned out huge type for some reason] apology made already and if this turns out huge type as well - then sorry!
David Perry
Which recordings?
David Perry
You are saying they bootlegged and distributed five of your albums?
David Perry
Seems to me you have a legal issue and need a lawyer to address the copyright violation, if you can produce evidence of it taking place.
Modern Day Chicane

Hi Indieboy.

Long time no speak. Just wondering where the "listened to..." tags have gone - are subs even being heard..? It just seems to have gone..... very..... quiet. I've not seen them for our last 2 subs, but then again, haven't seen them for anyone else.

Thanks for all your effort revamping/stremlining this - I too look forward to any changes.

Glad you're alive,

Ryan

(previously "Ryan Anthony - Singer/Songwriter", now "Ryan Anthony - frontman of Modern Day Chicane")

funkcartel
No David we are not saying that. We have a lawyer, a very good one, only the corporate label will not inform us who their lawyers are. We want to start proceedings but until they tell us who represents them the situation remains in the starting gates.
Modern Day Chicane
Heh-heh. You're funny.
funkcartel
and what do you find funny?
Modern Day Chicane

Are you really talking lawyers....? "Funkcartel vs SonyBMG"..?

It just seems a little.... drastic.

Anyhoot, sorry if I caused offence. I'll sign off and leave you to it.

Peace etc

MDC.

funkcartel
Yes we are REALLY talking lawyers and we are 99% sure we will win the case hands down. We have the best law firm in the UK behind us and we have the Chief Partner as our representative so we have nothing to worry about really. No offence caused MDC - it's just that we do not find this funny at all. We consider this to be extremely serious.
Indieboy
The program that I used to generate those messages when I listened to stuff stopped working, I'm still listening to heaps.

I'm hoping to get the thing fixed this week. Something to do with VBA apparently.

Will try doing it manually from my end until then. Hope you are well.

IB
Modern Day Chicane

Well I just spent my weekly "20 mins in the life of Indieboy" trawling the audio pool of the A&R page. It was feckin' exhausting...! Touche!

I often 'graze' in the audio page as a gauge of how our stuff stands up/compares.

Have you considred any kind of genre specific landing pages? The constant mixture of rock/dance/rap/indie/trance was doing my bonce in something chronic.

Although I guess some contributors would swamp all genres with the same tracks in the hope of being heard by someone. You can't expect the masses to follow guidelines and behave themselves. Tricky.

.....still, I don't miss sending out CD's. I still think this is the future, by a country mile!

Ryan Anthony, MDC

Indieboy
I tired genre specifc groups n such and you're right, people just flood every group with their material so it can only be one pool of submissions unfortunately.

I wish everyone saw the benefits of this over CD as I still receive CD submissions which I subsequently have to recycle. Ugh.
Modern Day Chicane

Universal are doing something similar with digital A&R, but you make a one-shot submission with up to 3 tracks and 3 photos, with a biog. You can't edit it once it's been uploaded though. I'm not sure what stops people sumitting material more than once in different genres - I suspect you need one e-mail address per submission. I did it for my old "Ryan Anthony" stuff before I got MDC off the ground.

People can 'vote' on sumissions, you can download a banner which links to your sub etc, to generate buzz I guess. It's something to do with a project dedicated to John Peel.

Mozartandfriends
Hey Indieboy,

I would set up more rules for submissions.
Let them include the genre in the headline for example.

cheers,
Fred

--
Frederik Boutahar
Junior A&R Manager
e-mail frederik@mozartandfriends.com
web www.mozartandfriends.com

Indieboy
That's not a bad idea, though again it may be the case that someone submits the same track with several genres. I have already had quite a few instances of the same track being submitted under different names. :-(
Mozartandfriends
Oh yea haven't thought of that. I know what you mean.
I think feedback could solve this problem...now I know that it's impossible to reply to every submission with appropriate feedback ,that would take away all the time from the actual reviewing-process.

But wouldn't it possible to automate the reviewing process?
Perfect would be a system that works like that:

1. You get the submission
2. You listen to the track
3. Now in the submission post you got two options:

3.1 Automated feedback:
You just have to click a button and the sender gets a standart "thanks for your submission but unfortunately your track is not what we are currently looking for"-reply

or

3.2 If you like the music: Custom feedback


I think ppl re-send the music because they think you haven't listened to it.
Simple as that. Now if they receive feedback ,they know you checked their music and it wouln't make any sense to re-send the track.

Maybe the Vox.com staff could integrate a feature like this?

cheers,
Fred

--
Frederik Boutahar
Junior A&R Manager
e-mail frederik@mozartandfriends.com
web www.mozartandfriends.com





Indieboy
I have suggested a bespoke interface for my interaction with the audio on here but it has been a longwinded process. It's much quicker to get stuff put together 3rd party then integrate, such as the widgets/analytics I use or comment generating app.

I will forward your comment on though as a good example of what would help the process along. Thanks for that.

IB
Mozartandfriends
No problem ;).
If I can help you with anything ,let me know.

cheers,
Fred