I was having a hell of a time coming up with an appropriate post title today. I want to cover a few semi-related topics and couldn’t quite encapsulate them all into a pithy tag line. So ya get what ya get, nahmeen? (Aw yeah, I just got all East Coast on ya.)

Anyway, I’m sure it’s safe to assume that virtually every musician has an opinion one way or another on the RIAA, filesharing, the record industry’s pricing model, iTunes, etc. A recent blog post suggests that within a three-year period, the RIAA collected a little over $1,000,000 from people who illegally participated in music filesharing. That sounds pretty good, until you read the part that says they spent $64,000,000 to do it.

Ouch! That’s a boatload of cash, and on the surface – from a business perspective – it seems like whomever signed off on that decision should be fired immediately. But digging deeper into the subject you realize that the purpose of the RIAA isn’t necessarily to be a for-profit corporation so much as a legal entity used by the major record companies to help stem the tide of illegal music filesharing. At least that’s one of their functions…

Profit and loss statements notwithstanding, we can all certainly agree that the music industry is in shambles. The industry is great from the consumer’s perspective (thank you MP3s and iTunes), and I don’t feel too bad for the record companies. However, the musicians are the ones that are being hit the hardest.

There are some musicians who love filesharing and just want to have their music heard. I believe these are, for the most part, up-and-coming folks who are more interested in getting their name out than making a profit right now. Players like Misha Mansoor have encouraged listeners to download their songs/demos in an effort to be heard. But now that his band, for example, has a record deal and their debut CD has been out for a few months, have his feelings changed? Would yours? How many bands out there today encourage their audience to record their shows and trade/swap them a la The Grateful Dead?

iTunes alone has done much to decimate the industry. Not only are people now able to spend significantly less money to buy a band’s CD, but consumers don’t even have to buy the complete product anymore if they only want one or two songs. From a music fan’s perspective this is the end of the rainbow, but for artists and the record labels this is a nightmare. Not only is revenue down, but now the labels and artists need to negotiate terms on a micro (song) level. Also from the artist’s perspective, the songwriting has become much more about songs individually rather than a complete set of songs as one unit. Back in the days of cassettes and LPs it seemed as if each record was seemingly more consistent; almost as if there was an unconscious mindset from musicians to write music that worked well together rather than just writing a hit song.

Now don’t get me wrong; I have no particular love for the record companies. I think for the most part they are greedy, they treat their artists like garbage, and they poison our airwaves with a lot of crap that’s based more on image than musical talent. But the ones who get hurt the most are the artists themselves. Certainly, the record companies are not going to take a smaller cut of the profits in order to do a solid for the artist. They are going to recover their costs first and maximize their profits as much as possible. So where does that leave the musician? I’ll give you a hint: they don’t have a paddle.

Music lovers have embraced the “try before you buy” model. Friends are sharing MP3 disks of their favorite tunes, filesharing and P2P networks are transferring millions of bytes of music illegally every day, and no matter how hard legitimate companies like YouTube try, they simply cannot stem the tide of music being pushed out to the public for free. It’s almost seems to be an inevitable consequence that the music industry as we know it is going to die a horrible death and no one can do anything to stop it.

If I hear something I really like, I buy the MP3s. You should, too.

Do I think the RIAA is stupid? Not at all. Their job is to recover revenue and stop the illegal distribution of music. Granted, the margin is way huge (assuming those numbers are accurate) but the principle is sound. Our “what’s the big deal?” mentality about stealing a musician’s music – and it is stealing no matter how you slice it – is very unhealthy. The irony of the situation is that most of the people doing the stealing are obviously doing it because they like the song. They don’t realize (or don’t care) that they are literally making it harder for the people they like as artists to be able to write more music!

Do I think filesharing is stupid? Well, not stupid, but definitely not healthy for people who are trying to make a living as musicians. I think musicians are entitled to make every cent they possibly can for the work they create. That is why most musicians have to tour a lot, as they make most of their income on the revenue from ticket sales and merchandising. It’s a double-edged sword, however, as the number of live venues has also been steadily shrinking over the past 20+ years. Not necessarily as a direct result of filesharing, per se, but the immediacy of being able to get music nowadays makes it easier for people to not want (or have) to go to live shows.

Is there a solution? Heck if I know. I hate to paint such an extreme and negative picture, but it just seems to me like our gluttony is going to get the best of us soon and very, very few musicians will be able to survive as full-time players. I’ll say it again: if you hear something that you like, pay for it. That’s really the bottom line, whether you hate the record companies or not, and whether you think it’s “no big deal” or not. It’s a big deal, truly, and musicians deserve to be compensated for their work. It’s no different than those of us producing work in our day jobs; we wouldn’t want our bosses to pick and choose what they pay us for and what they just take. We all need that paycheck!