Rock Bands contribute to the demise of the single format
Posted on July 6th, 2003 by Shawn L.
Various music artists, including Metallica and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, refuse to have their songs sold over Apple’s iTunes music store (Reuters via MacCentral
“Our artists would rather not contribute to the demise of the album format,” said Mark Reiter, with Q Prime Management Co., which manages the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Metallica and several other artists.Some people have called this greedy. I just call it stupid.
It used to be that artists released singles off their albums quite regularly. The very first time a bought music, as a kid in the early 80’s, it was a 45 record. The only singles that I see in the stores today are from artists I really have no interest in. But now I’m able to get songs that I’ve wanted but really had no interest in shelling out the money for a full album.
The classic example for me was Alanis Morrisette’s “Uninvited” which was on a movie soundtrack album. I liked the song when I heard it on the radio, but none of the other music on the album was what I wanted. I had hoped that it would be added to one of her own albums. It was added to later printings of one of her albums that I had already owned. Now through iTunes I was able to puchase that song. (Admittably, it was off an MTV Unplugged album, and not the studio version of the song, but it was close enough)
Now maybe Metallica and the RHCP may consider this an “artistic” thing. Well, to paraphrase Steve Jobs… Real artists sell. And bands who refuse to sell music per song are screwing themselves out of sales. By making this an all or nothing proposition, nothing will all too often be the response of potential buyers.