Sex vs free music? Free Music for 70%!

The Guardian report that Marrakesh Records and Human Capital surveyed 1,000 15-24 year-olds highlighting not just how important music is to young people, but their changing attitudes to paying for content.

Here are the stats….- More than 60% of young people would rather give up sex than music
- Rising to 70% for 16-19 year-olds.
- 70% don’t feel guilty for illegally downloading music from the internet.
- 61% feel they shouldn’t have to pay for music.
- 43% of the music owned by this age group has not been paid for
- Increasing to 49% for the younger half of the group.
- £6.58 is a fair price for CD album
- A downloaded album should be just £3.91
- And singles just 39p
- 75% have watched a music video online
- 70% bought a CD
- 62% played music on their phone
- 52% paid for a music download
- 45% had played music on their games console.
- 67% find new bands on the radio
- 63% get new band recommendations from friends
- 49% take new band recommendations from music channels
- Newspapers were rated by 21%
- Music mags and 17%
- Blogs just 14%.
- YouTube was the most popular site for exploring new music for 38%
- MySpace was cited by just 15%,
- Official band sites also 15%
- Facebook followed at 8%
- NME just 4%
- Last.fm also 4%.

Everyone’s 2nd favourite discussion point…

OK, everyone is currently talking about Twitter. But close behind on everyone’s radar is the Swedish music service, Spotify.

Spotify….

1) …is brilliant.
2) …is virally spreading like wildfire which is great news for both the music industry & the fans
3) …’s subscriptions model is good, but from my brief research (conversations), very few are opting for the paid model
4) …have only one (mightily annoying) advertiser (the energy saving trust) and their own subs advertising
5) …will be taking an enormous financial hit at the moment to pay the artists for use of their music
6) …will need to get more advertisers on board quickly, otherwise they could face a real problem…

I really hope that Spotify proves to be a success, however, unless they get some advertisers on board they’ll face some serious funding issues.

Kaws

For all you Art Fags out there….

Hi-De-Hi Camp(Bestival)ers…

In an era of festivals being launched with full page ad in the NME, the legend that is Rob Da Bank has taken an entertaining approach to launching 2009′s Camp Bestival festival….hosted by none other than, er, Peggy from Hi-De-Hi, aka Su Pollard.  Weird.  Nice to see a concert promoter embracing the modern age with an entertaining launch mechanic.

Yeah Dave – any chance you get me this CD?!

EMI Music has teamed up with Diageo to publish ‘Guinness 250 – Music from the TV ads’. The CD will feature 17 tracks and will coincide with the St James’ Gate Brewery 250th anniversary. (Source: drinkbus p50)

thefirstworldwidewebsitewherenothinghappens.com

OK, I could name several websites where nothing happens, but here’s one from KitKat

Credit Crunch creates music hits…

well, web hits anyway….some bright spark has been feeding stock charts through Microsofts new Songsmith software, to create music!

Christian Bale the musical…

So Christian Bale freaks out.  It gets posted all over the internet.  Then someone puts it to music…..(warning: we didn’t say the music was any good….)

Musicals are the new black

Ever since I was dragged, aged 10 and midway through a bout of mumps,  to watch Phantom Of The Opera, I’ve always had a bit of a problem with musicals.  But while the media were declaring 2009 as the year of electropop, musicals have quietly but confidently emerged as the real success stories for this year.  Gee’d on by the phenomenal success of the Mamma Mia franchise, everyone from Take That to Queen have delivered musicals in recent years, with the latest coming from Michael Jackson and one on its way penned by U2 of all people.  The latest to be announced is perhaps the worst of them all, as the face of rickrolling, Rick Astley has apparently announced that he’s writing a musical based on his songs.  He. Must. Be. Stopped.

Looking good there Kanye…

Pop star lesson number 1:
Always make sure the people around you look worse than you…