Good morning, I hope you are well and rested. I was sitting down to write my normal Monday (Tuesday actually) blog but after reading some comments from last week I decided that, judging from the amount of comments regarding my iTunes explanation, I should spend this time responding to some of the replies posted directly on the FFH.net site. Thanks for being so interested in this, it means a lot to us that you cared enough to respond. For those of you who really don’t care, I don’t blame you and I’ll be back with some “life” stuff later. Responses follow…
ANGIE: You still can purchase our songs a track at a time and download them directly into your iTunes browser, no sweat. Thanks for the kind words too!
RUTHIE: I like turning physical pages too, and the smell of an old book in my hand. You as an author would empathize with us as artists who compile an ALBUM of songs out of a season of life experience. Just like you wouldn’t want someone to read just one chapter of a book that was deliberately compiled, we would hope that people would want to buy our whole album rather than just one song. Photo albums tell a larger story, one snapshot tells a smaller one. Song ALBUMS do the same. For now, though, we are still offering single tracks on our site and have no plans to stop doing it yet.
JPEG: If you knew us you’d know that we are not nearly cool enough for school. We’re just a married couple in a band on a journey with our kids and our fellow musicians. Furthermore, this won’t even be a blip on the iTunes radar, we know that. This is a matter of personal choice. ITunes may give us some exposure that we wouldn’t normally get but it will also keep those people at a distance. That’s not really the point though. Our issue is integrity of creativity. When I write a song and pour my life’s experience into it and then spend hours and money trying to communicate those thoughts to people I don’t want a company or a computer to tell me it’s value in the end. I’m sitting at a Starbucks typing this. Starbucks’ coffee is expensive, but it is good and it is reliable. Every Starbucks has the same vibe, and for the most part ,the employees are really pleasant. I would argue that if a mandate was given that every cup of coffee served in America was to become $1.00 places like this wouldn’t exist. Gas station coffee is cheap and works for me in a pinch, but I prefer Starbucks.
GRETCHEN: I know, I can’t figure out why my computer camera flips everything. Weird.
BEN: Give bandbox a chance. It easy, it’s cheap, and you will be sending money to the people who MAKE the music, not the ones who sell the music.
LISA: My sense of humor is pretty dry. I recorded that message on a drive home from writing and sent it to a few people to make sure it wasn’t offensive. They said go ahead but I still had reservations. No one who believes in Jesus is going to hell.
BRODY: Good point. When you are at a restaurant and you sample a great glass of wine or an amazing Carrot Cake you have to go somewhere else to buy it. With direct music sales someone can listen to our album and download it immediately. Granted a click or two to another site is easier that a drive to another location, but the premise applies, especially since it’s the one who actually MAKES the music getting the money.
KEN: People have been distribution music between one another since the days of mix tapes, then Napster, and it continues today. To think that iTunes has solved this problem is a bit nieve. Instead, they have allowed a music buyer to pick and chose the songs they want without having to listen to the whole collection of songs. I think this is convenient when it’s an old Fleetwood Mac song that I need for my collection. However, I still would much rather go to Fleetwood Mac’s site and buy the music from them and have the money go to them, the artist who wrote and birthed the music in the first place.
My family likes to shop local farmers markets. We like the closeness of knowing who grows the food and how they grow it. We enjoy knowing it travels from their farm in middle Tennessee in the back of their pickup to our market in Franklin. We pay a little more for the eggs but they are bigger and taste better and don’t come from a factory a thousand miles away. We pay what they ask for their eggs because we trust that they are worth the value and that we are supporting them and not a big company. Furthermore, we don’t buy one egg at a time. We buy a dozen, or a flat, because that’s how they come.
My biggest contention with your post is about your ability to avoid songs that you don’t like by buying tracks individually. This may be convenient for you but it is eroding the art of musicians. and I believe it will eventually be extremely crippling to even the most promising of new bands.
When we were kids we were fans (or listeners) of bands, or artists, not just their songs. When we heard a song on the radio that we loved we bought the record so that we could hear what else the artist had to offer. We didn’t get the choice to chose and we we’re better for it. We played the albums over and over and built a relationship with the music. When that band came to town we went to see the concert and knew all of the songs, not just the ones on the radio. I learned how to play music listening to and studying albums by Billy Joel, Elton John, Amy Grant, etc. If there was a song I never fell in love with I just hit fast-forward but I never felt cheated out of a dollar. Furthermore, you many not feel like you are building a relationship with us by purchasing directly from us but you absolutely are. You are giving your money to US, not to Apple. This is greatly appreciated.
Now, about the horses vs cars comment… I see your point. However, I would argue that cars do a good job of getting you from point A to point B, but a lot of interesting landscape is missed along the way. I’d also assert that the option of getting what we need from a Walmart twenty minutes away may be convenient for the consumer, it has been the demise of the local farmer who in trying to make a living has been out priced and overlooked in the process.
Technology is not something we can avoid apart from removing ourselves from society. But we still have to be responsible with the choices we make and to remember that EVERY SINGLE CHOICE has a direct effect on someone else, somewhere, at some time.
MIKE: I’m pretty sure we’ll see each other again before heaven.
COLEY: Your call, wish you’d reconsider.
JARROD: Thanks, we’ll see.
