Just in case it wasn’t obvious, now is probably not a good time to be working for a record company. Geffen and Interscope gave 15 employees quite the holiday present when they were unceremoniously laid off yesterday, following similar cuts by Def Jam and Sony BMG earlier this month.
The major labels aren’t going to recover anytime soon unless they change their business models. Each year the number of people buying CDs decreases, yet the majors still focus on physical distribution of music. If Apple never sold the majors on iTunes would we even be able to download most albums? These companies are going down the tube, and they have no one to blame but themselves.
Now I’m gonna hop off my soap box, and share some pre-weekend linkage:
- Chicago’s legendary Thrill Jockey record label turns 15
- Flight of the Conchords’ first full length album will hit stores on April 22nd
- NYC Fire officials delayed entry into Wednesday night’s Neil Young concert
- Stephen Malkmus shoots the shit with Pitchfork about his new album
- Check out these extremely NSFW Spank Rock videos
- Yonder Mountain String Band performs at KBCO’s Studio C on Sunday
- Neddy catches the Ribot/Krantz/Frisell trifecta in NYC
- Rumor has it Jimmy Page will produce Paolo Nutini’s new album
- We never imagined we’d be linking to a report of a crowd revolt at a Hall & Oates concert…but, hey, here we are
And finally in a sign of the coming apocalypse, a lock of John Lennon’s hair sold for $48,000. You don’t even wanna know what his merkin is going for…
2 Responses
I’m psyched that Paolo Nutini is getting some love from Jimmy Page…I really, really dig that kid’s stuff.
Good lord!
“The Police reunion trek led all tours in 2007 with a gross that has passed $212 million and is still climbing. The global tour few thought would ever happen moved more than 1.8 million tickets, according to Billboard Boxscore, prior to the Boxscore cutoff date of Nov. 13.”
http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003685265