Steal This Album

Soundtrack: “The Day The Whole World Went Away” by Nine Inch Nails

So it’s been a while, hasn’t it? I apologize for the downtown but I have been feeling largely uninspired lately. Life has revolved around searching for employment and video games but there is a light at the end of the tunnel friends.

I am of course a little depressed about the state of music and the music industry. It isn’t what it used to be back in the glory days. After watching great documentaries on stories like Stax Records makes me wish that it was still about the music any more. But it is not about the music for about 75% of the industry, or so says my egotistical opinion.

Nine Inch Nails has been touring Australia recently and last night they performed in Sydney at the Hordern Pavilion. He asked about the price of his CD. Now, for some background, in international markets it is often a practice of the record companies to hike up the prices for dubious economic reasons. Last time Trent was in Australia earlier this summer he discussed this practice and slammed it.

In his follow up last night he told the audience to steal his album, a practice that I am sure would give the greedy monkeys in Metallica a heart attack. “Steal away. Steal and steal and steal some more and give it to all your friends and keep on stealin'. Because one way or another these motherfuckers will get it through their head that they're ripping people off and that that's not right.”

This brings up a moral quandary. Is pulling a Robin Hood to bring down the big bad wolf of the music industry, an industry that peripherally employs hundreds of thousands, is that right? There is always going to be a need for certain jobs, so those who have some experience will be able to find new ones. At the same time, many of these people make spit in a bucket compared to what the executives make, and every year these executives raise the price of their product a little more so they can enjoy the latest Ferrari or Aston Martin or whatever it is that gets them off.

I've made my choice. I've worked in both sides of the industry, behind the scenes and retail, and I'm going to steal, steal, steal some more. But I am not going to steal for the sake of stealing. Along with that comes supporting the artist directly. If I download the new Nine Inch Nails album (an album that I purchased, actually), I will go to their concert and buy their merchandise and support the band through the concert ticket. I also buy music from the iTunes store in order to support alternative forms of distribution. So go out there and steal and shake things up. Just don't take down everyone. Some people still need to eat.