The Beatles and Streaming
On Christmas Eve, The Beatles’ music became available on seven streaming services worldwide, including Rhapsody, Tidal, and Spotify. The news (and streams) spread like wildfire, but to me, it’s too little, too late.
Why? Because streaming is the great equalizer for musicians. For people under the age of 35, it’s our radio. Terrestrial radio may as well be telegrams and Betamax to us.
Radio used to be the kingmaker. (MTV as well, but that’s a different subject for a different day.)
Since the 90s—perhaps even before that—radio stations have been corporatized and stripped of their local flavor and character. Now, no matter their location, they are treated as a franchise ala McDonalds or Burger King. They were forced to play a rotation of songs that data and polls told them would play, add more commercial breaks, and fire anyone who would do otherwise.
Turn on any non-independent radio station around the nation and you will be bound to hear the same songs, no matter where you are. DJs at classic rock stations nationwide must sympathize with Bill Murray’s character in Groundhog Day since they are forced to play “Stairway to Heaven,” “Hotel California,” or “More Than a Feeling” on repeat ad nauseum.
And people wonder why no one listens to the radio anymore.
This seems to be a motif in my blog, but the internet has changed everything. Mainly, how we consume music.
Before the likes of Napster, radio and MTV were pretty much the only way the public were able to see what’s new in music. If we wanted to listen to a song that wasn’t a single on repeat, we’d have to buy a CD, usually priced at $12.99-18.99. (Records used to be $8.99-10.99 before CDs, but the industry got greedy, raising prices because of “new technology.” Everyone expected the prices to drop, but people were still buying records, so they never did.)
So now instead of having to buy a whole album for just one song, you could get it for free. OF COURSE people are going to do it!
The industry, like a modern day Norma Desmond, refused to change with the times. They refused to believe that the gravy train has left the station, and at a last grab for those “good old days,” the RIAA sued countless individuals for thousands upon thousands of so-called “lost revenue,” causing them to lose any public support they had.
Just like when an artist moves up his album’s release date to counteract leaks, the RIAA should have joined forces to create a user-friendly online music store. By the time the iTunes Store and Amazon MP3 became heavy hitters, the damage had been done to the RIAA’s reputation. Still, over 25 billion songs have been purchased on iTunes alone.
The music industry has, on the most part, caught up with the times and has stayed with current trends. But then something will happen and then their old and bad habits will pop up again.
Look at streaming.
Acts like Taylor Swift, AC/DC, and Adele have taken their music off streaming services because they feel they don’t get paid enough. While the likes of Spotify have some issues that really do need to be looked and changed—including how artists get paid, these are three of the most popular and richest artists in the world.
Tidal, for example, was a classic case of what not to do. At their press conference, here was a group of artists on stage, which included Jay Z, Beyonce, Madonna, Daft Punk, Rihanna, and Kanye West, with a net worth of roughly $2.8 billion dollars (yes, you read that correctly) telling us why we should all sign up to a service that will make them even richer… and for more than Spotify and Rhapsody.
Know what the rest of the world was thinking? A collective fuck you, that’s what!
This brings us back to the topic at hand: The Beatles and streaming.
There’s no doubt that pretty much anything The Beatles release will be bought by millions. But outside of vinyl and boxed sets, not many people these days want physical. They want streaming. Spotify has over 75 million active monthly users, 20 million of those users pay monthly subscriptions. That’s over one in four users.
This all leads to one thing: music lovers want to spend money on the music they love. When not given a means, they’ll find a way to get that music, illicitly or not. The way many people see it, they’ve been screwed by the music business so many times that they just don’t care. (How many times have you bought Tommy? There’s the vinyl, eight track, cassette, CD, then all the remasters, the boxed set. And that’s not mentioning the symphonic version, tickets to the Broadway show (and its cast recording), and the film’s various formats (and its soundtrack as well)… I rest my case.)
So those artists holding out on streaming would apparently rather not get paid at all—and have fans pirate their music—because they want more. Someone needs to tell acts like Taylor Swift, Adele, and AC/DC that this isn’t the 90s anymore. They’re some of the most successful acts out there right now, and in a world where most musicians can’t make a living, they’re look like spoiled children stomping their feet in a Kids R Us because they didn’t get the toy they wanted.
So congrats, I guess, moptops. You joined streaming far too late. For a band that was so groundbreaking and ahead of the curve, you joined streaming far too late. (You also waited twenty years to remaster/reissue your CD/digital tracks.) So welcome to the digital revolution. You can start cashing in those checks now.
Lah-di-dah.
