Tuesday, June 9, 2009

No Dark Night for You, Sailor!


The June Wired magazine had a nice little article about America's favorite mash-up pirate, Danger Mouse, getting together with the mysterious Sparklehorse, and with filmmaker David Lynch, to give the world the star-studded album Dark Night of the Soul. Alas, by June 8 it was clear that EMI would not allow this project to proceed.

It's not as though this could not be foreseen. Johnny Rotten was warning us about EMI in 1977. Danger Mouse had his own problems with the non-release of the Jay-Z/Beatles Grey Album. I guess that the realities of certain projects like Gnarls Barkley just stood in the way.

In any event, this should clarify the stance taken by Trent Reznor, Jeff Tweedy, Terra Naomi, and thousands of other artists: Musicians must be a sworn enemy of their record label. The hand that feeds you must be constantly bitten. And piracy is the only ethical and moral means of acquiring music any more. Yo ho.

(This can be found, though I won't tell here. See me backstage.)

2 comments:

Ruth said...

Backstage: Are you the guy with the hoop earring?

Loring Wirbel said...

No, the slightly frog-looking greasy manager in the plaid suit.