October has been a big month for Sufjan Stevens (who I wrote about yesterday, if you missed it.) Run Rabbit Run dropped on the 6th, and today brings us the release of another Sufjan Stevens project - The BQE. Much like Run Rabbit Run, which is a chamber music re-imagining of Sufjan’s electronic sophomore album Enjoy Your Rabbit, The BQE is more of an interesting digression than a conventional album. Unlike Rabbit, this one actually sounds like a Sufjan Stevens record.

The BQE, which Stevens’ label describes as “a cinematic suite inspired by the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and the Hula-Hoop” was commissioned by the Brooklyn Academy of Music. The piece was originally performed at the in the Howard Gilman Opera House in October of 2007. Accompanying the musical score was an original film that spanned three separate screens and depicted the expressway, as well as a troupe of live hoola hoop girls called the Hooper Heroes.

Two years after its original performance, Stevens has adapted the work for a double disc format which includes both the soundtrack and the film. I will only be reviewing the musical portion because I haven’t had a chance to view the film.

Sufjan’s work has always featured complex, occasionally classically inspired arrangements. This time he goes all out, crafting a pseudo-classical symphony inspired by folk-pop, jazz, Philip Glass and 70′s era film score. It is certainly his most expansive project to date. Excluding the film, the choreography, the comic book (yes, the special edition version comes with a 40 page Hooper Heroes comic book) there are seven movements, a prelude, an introductory fanfare for the Hooper Heroes, and a postlude.

Sufjan performing The BQE

In many ways The BQE marks the return of Steven’s signature arranging style, relying heavily on brass and woodwinds and quirky, sentimental melodic themes. Run Rabbit Run was a significant departure, being performed exclusively by strings. Still conspicuously absent, however, is Stevens’ voice.  Sufjan is a gifted storyteller, and is no stranger to highly conceptual projects such as The BQE. We’re talking about the guy who once planned to write an album for each of the fifty American states. Yet, whether it was a requirement of the commission or a personal choice, Sufjan tells the tale of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway entirely through music and multi-media, rather than through words. And while part of me can’t help but feel disappointed, the result is undeniably a remarkable piece of music.

As a piece of classical music The BQE is a solid effort. He leans on many familiar conventions while sprinkling a decent helping of his own clever twists. Movement II – Sleeping Invader, for example, depicts the late night ambiance of car horns and squealing brakes by pairing the quiet rise and fall of strings with the distant rat-a-tat dissonance of a blatting trumpet. The fourth movement’s swirling synthesizers and manic dance-floor beat cut the album in half, providing a prolonged electronic interlude depicting the chaos of rush hour traffic.

At a few points it may become clear to the more discerning ear that this is Sufjan’s first foray into the classical realm. Thankfully, I am in no way a classical music aficionado (although I do love the work of Stravinsky, and more recently Philip Glass. My wife and I almost walked down the aisle to Glass’s Clouds.) I had no qualms about his handling of the genre.

The BQE is a great addition to the Sufjan Stevens catalogue, not simply for its novelty, but for its quality as well. It isn’t likely to satiate fans’ hunger for a true Illinoise follow-up, however. In the same interview I commented on yesterday, Sufjan says this in reference to The BQE:

I feel that The BQE is not really a song, it’s not really a movie, it’s not really just a soundtrack. It’s so ambiguous and diversified, it seems to lack shape. And the expressway itself lacks shape, so I feel like it’s all related to this existential crisis: Me versus the BQE, or me versus my work, y’know? And I don’t think I can win; I feel like it’s a losing battle…

Hopefully the songwriter’s existential crisis will come to a resolution soon so that the world will continue to benefit from his creations.

Listen to The BQE: Movement VI – Isorhythmic Night Dance with Interchanges

Buy The BQE on Amazon.

The new Arctic Monkeys video is an entertaining exercise in tongue in cheek minimalism. Its three minutes and twenty five seconds feature nothing but Monkeys frontman Alex Turner, an old-school cassette deck and a blank white wall.

Turner, clad in headphones and red sweater, croons at the camera while casually acting out the lyrics of the song in what has to be some of best choreography of the year. More proof that you don’t need a budget to be interesting.

Directed by Richard Ayoyade taking his third turn at the helm for the Arctic Monkeys.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=LIQz6zZi7R0

Buy this track on iTunes.

Woodstock 1969

I received this email yesterday from David Sherbow in response to a comment I left on a post he had written. I felt like his perspective was worth sharing, so I’ve included his message in its entirety:

Subj: An Old Man’s Perspective

Refe -

Thank you for your comment. I believe that you are one of the more insightful bloggers of your generation.  Let me say this.

Since Napster, the music business I grew up with has basically imploded and through its own stupidity and greed has charted a course for almost certain self destruction.  In case you haven’t read it, take a look at Steve Knopper’s brilliant tome, “The Appetite for Self Destruction” which gives a chapter and verse description of the breakdown of the music business since the advent of the CD in 1979. Technology and change has brought us enormous amounts of user generated music, its easy distribution and a music world that is wrought with extreme fragmentation. I agree with you that these changes have brought a certain amount of opportunity to a group of people that prior to 1999 would never have even been on the music map. For those who enjoy this increased popularity, it is a new day and the new music business is working for them.

I grew up in the three most significant periods of cultural change in American life over the past 50 years. First was the period from 1955-68 when post WWII America first started coming apart at the seems and baby boomers started to rebel against the All American image acceptable to my parents generation. Things changed soon after McCarthy fell in the mid 50′s and, in essence, parts of Texas and the deep south and its country, blues, and R&B music converged and rock and roll began to evolve. I got my first radio in 1957 for my 7th birthday and soon after became addicted to Top 40 radio then R&B radio.  Elvis, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Eddie Cochran, Hank Williams, Sr.,, Jerry Lee Lewis and Roy Orbison changed my world along with R&B groups like the Platters, 5 Satins, Smokey Robinson and Little Anthony and the Imperials and bluesmen like Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf  and John Lee Hooker. No disrespect meant at all, but you are much too young to have been moved by such amazing forces of music that changed my life forever and moved millions of others like me in ways that today are unimaginable.

Then came the Vietnam War, free speech movement, civil rights movement, the drug culture and sexual freedom all heaped upon my generation.  Groups like the Beatles, Rolling Stones and the Who, Cream, Jeff Beck Group and Led Zeppelin from England, The Beachboys, Bruce Springsteen, The Grateful Dead, Jimi Hendrix, Doors, Janis Joplin, Bob Dylan along with Otis Reading, James Brown, Temptations, Supremes, Four Tops and Aretha Franklin and many others changed the American music scene forever. Then there was Woodstock to bring it all together. It’s is impossible to understand how powerful this period was without living through the majesty of its immense political and cultural change.  Then the 70′s brought unbelievable heavy metal music and Disco. The 80′s brought Michael, Jackson, U2, Madonna and the 90′s brought grunge with Nirvana and Pearl Jam.  Every decade brought another group of artists that clearly articulated the feelings and moods of that generation.  People were toally swept up in the music.

Then came 1999 and Napster and over the next 10 years music became diluted, homogenous, and less than inspiring.  Today it is plentiful and ubiquitous. In my opinion, part of what truly makes music great from the days of Beethoven, Bach and Mozart to the present day, is the connection certain artists have been able to develop with the masses who then have a shared common experience they all can relate too.  It is this shared experience which takes music to another level. Its is something that your generations feels and sees in bits and pieces in between video games, surfing the Internet and Texting.  Music is ever present but it is no longer the focused force for change in our society. Music is still a part of everyone’s day to day life but it is no longer the focused cultural and political force it once was. A platinum artist is nothing more than a monetary designation that became the standard by which great bands were judged since Creedence Clearwater Revival was the first group to ship 1,000,000 albums in 1971.

Music has always evolved and changed without the help of the record business which has only been good at co-opting great talent and rarely developing it. I totally agree with you that it’s all cyclical and look forward to the next game changing music scenario.  We are a world of many niche artists and very few genuine original popular artists.  What American Idol continually tells me every year it maintains its immense popularity, is that is that the masses want artists to believe in and to connect with. So do I but I want them to be of substance, not manufactured by the remnants of the record hit making machine but instead I want my new music to emerge from the grass routes of the new American psyche motivated by meaningful cultural change.

I am by no means trying to say that my insight or love of music is deeper than yours or your generation. My perspective over 58 years is different than those in your generation.  I truly miss discovering and sharing music the way I used to.  I believe that eventually the Internet will develop a better mechanism for the discovery of popular music and I look forward to that day. I hope this wasn’t too much bullshit. You ought to call me sometime and personally share some of your thoughts.

David Sherbow

David is a music industry professional with over 40 years in the business. He has managed and booked major regional and national rock, r&b, and hip-hop artists, owned and operated a rock-n-roll booking agency, put out over 25 independent releases, made record deals and was head of promotion for WMG’s Asylum Records. Find out more about David at his blog or on Twitter.

Also check out yesterday’s post The Defining Sound of this Decade is… Undefined.

Here’s a recap of what went on in the music industry this week. Make sure to check out anything you might have missed and leave your comments. Know something we don’t? Submit a story.

Most Popular:

Why the Music Industry still needs Taste-Makers - With so much new music flooding the system listeners are dying for someone to tell them who to listen to.

The Resurgence of Vinyl Could be Just What the Music Industry Needs - A ghost from music’s past makes a comeback.

This Week:

Album Sales Continue to Drop – Down 18% in May – More bad news from Soundscan, but what does this means artists?

Why Free Music was Inevitable: Part One - The first installment in a series that seeks to explain why the value of recorded music continues to drop.

Study Confirms Longer Music Samples Sell More Tracks - Listeners want to try before they buy, but the major retailers still won’t let them.

Video Pick of the Week: Grizzly Bear Two Weeks - Grizzly Bear’s new video might make your head explode.

This Week in Music History:

On this week in 2003, a High court judge in London ruled that rap lyrics should be treated as a foreign language after admitting that he was unsure of the meaning of ‘shizzle my nizzle’ and ‘mish mish man.’ The court battle was over a copyright issue between the Ant’ill Mob and the Heartless Crew who had used the lyrics on a remix. (From This Day in Music.)

In a move that at first glance seems a bit behind the times, TuneCore has announced a partnership with Amazon.com to offer on-demand CD printing and distribution services to it’s artists. For $31 per year TuneCore will take care of everything from pressing and delivery for a 10-track CD. This is significantly lower than industry leader CDBaby’s price tag of $278 for 100 discs.

TuneCore is a great service, and adding low-volume physical distribution to their offering is a smart move. CDs are not dead (at least not yet) and making the option available to fans – even while focusing on digital distribution – is important for bands. In fact, at face value everything about this looks like it knocks CDBaby out of the water…

…Then you take a closer look.

First of all, there are really only a few good reasons left to press physical CDs, yet the Amazon deal seems to negate just about all of them. I’ll start with tracking. As ridiculous as it is, Soundscan is still the industry standard for tracking and reporting music sales. While TuneCore is touting the fact that the CDs will include UPC and bar codes, it glosses over the fact that their sales are not reported to Soundscan. Nearly all retail outlets – including online stores such as iTunes, Rhapsody and even Amazon itself – report music sales to Soundscan. Why TuneCore has chosen to neglect this I’m not sure, but it seems an unfortunate oversight.

Next up is profit: artists who use this service can look forward to the raw end of a 60/40 split with Amazon off the retail price of each disc. This is not a good deal. Granted, Amazon is incurring all of the manufacturing and distribution costs, but does that entitle them to a majority cut? The only real value that Amazon is adding with their service (over a band just paying to press the discs themselves) is on-demand manufacturing. Bands will have to carefully weigh if this is worth giving up so much per unit revenue.

The biggest downside to the TuneCore/Amazon deal is that CDs ordered through this service will ONLY be available on Amazon.com. Think about it – why do most bands need physical CDs in the first place? To sell at their gigs! Showtime CD sales can be a great source of extra income for touring bands. Fans like leaving a show with a souvenirs. Yet, if your CD is only available online, how is it any different than digital downloads?

One way that it COULD be different is by offering quality Artwork and liner notes. Again, the service falls short. Packaging is not fully customizable. Instead, the artist is given several different template options and must fit their design into those parameters. From the screenshots on the TuneCore site it looks pretty limited. Packaging is one of the last reasons to give a fan to but a physical CD instead of simply downloading it. If the packaging is streamlined like this that incentive is all but removed.

In short, TuneCore’s new offering is a great idea, but with flawed execution. There are some great positives to this service, and some glaring negatives as well.

Greg Kot, in his new book Ripped, focuses on the story of an unlikely but high profile independent artist – Prince. While the diminutive 80’s pop star and his music may not seem relevant to many of you, it turns out he is actually an interesting example of an artist bucking the traditional system and striking out on his own. In particular, his frequent release cycles and emphasis on touring have made him something of a forerunner. Prince had a deal with Warner that was reportedly worth up to $100 million, but he was unhappy with the control the label exerted over his creative process. Prince was (still is) a prolific songwriter and wanted to release several albums per year. The label limited him to one and also kept him from releasing Sign O’ the Times as a triple album in 1987. Apparently it is very unwise to cramp Prince’s style (and oh, what a style it is…) because after this he began to do everything he could to get under the label’s skin. He all but stopped touring, he wrote the word ‘slave’ on his cheek in black permanent marker, and famously changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol.

When his contract finally ended, Prince released a new album, Emancipation and went into business for himself. Prince has always been a bit nuts, and being independent hasn’t changed any of that – if anything it has only highlighted it further. Within a couple of years of being ‘set free’ from Warner, Prince had released nine albums worth of material. Album after album flooded the market – experimental tracks, archived material, new music, and who knows what else. People thought he was crazy.

Yet, look at the industry today. We’ve got thousands of artists and millions of songs that are available at the touch of a button. The days of waiting three years between releases are long gone. I’m talking frequency here, not volume – nine full albums worth of material is way more than necessary. But if you release a couple songs every few months, your fans will stay much more engaged and you will have the opportunity to remain front of mind in a crowded marketplace. If you really still want to release a full album, you can compile them at the end of the year and sell it dressed up in creative, high quality packaging along with some extras you had saved for the occasion.

Also, look at the way Prince handles touring. He is constantly changing things up. He’ll spend a few weeks playing one venue, or give away free post-midnight performances at previously unannounced locations. When he does do a conventional tour, he makes it worthwhile. He once packaged his new album in the price of the concert tickets and everyone who came to his show walked out with his CD. The record shot immediately to the top of the charts.

This is creative stuff. Not all of it is going to work for new or unknown artists, obviously, but it can all be scaled and applied to wherever your career is at right now.

There has been a lot of noise across the internet recently about a new study by UK licensing organization PRS that seems to question the validity of the Long Tail theory. You’ve probably seen all sorts of catchy blog headlines declaring the ‘Long Tail’ deceased – the topic has quickly become the music industry’s Ivy Bean.

What is the Long Tail?
Bear with me here, this gets a little heady: The Long Tail theory suggests that a small number of products (best-selling books, hit songs, etc.) dominate the market. That’s the ‘head.’ Retailers profit from selling a large number of these relatively few products by selling them at a premium.

Why should we care?
The implications of this for the independent music industry are huge. With the advent of digital technology, the cost of manufacturing and distributing music has been reduced to practically zero. That means that online retailers can offer tracks that brick and mortar stores could never afford to offer, such as obscure indie bands with no big label push behind them. More importantly, that means that those retailers can actually make a profit by doing so. For the first time in the history of music, it may actually make business sense for retailers to carry indie music!

New study questions Long Tail theory
As I mentioned above, the PRS recently conducted a study along with online music tracker Big Champagne that seems to suggest that the Long Tail theory is not proving true in the music industry. The study claims that the most popular songs on the traditional charts are also the most shared files on the internet. That could mean that the Long Tail – the large number of non-hits and less popular tracks available through file-sharing sites – does not have as much potential to be profitable after all.

Is the Long Tail theory really dead?
Probably not. In fact, almost definitely not. There are several things wrong with this study. First of all, this is clearly a case of a couple of organizations conducting internal ‘research’ and spinning the results to support their own interests. Big Champagne monitors file sharing. As Mike Masnick puts it, “The more the industry embraces file sharing, the more business Big Champagne gets.” Also quoting Masnick, the PRS represents the publishers, not the labels. The PRS “is looking to establish a new set of draconian compulsory licensing system, where you could still make use of file sharing, but where it would (perhaps with Big Champagne’s help) get paid for every download through some sort of system, whether sharing in the ad revenue or through subscription fees.”

All this study really proves is that popular music is popular. Remember – whether we’re dealing with the internet or the physical retail world we’re still talking about the same music industry. Is it really a big surprise that popular music would be popular across the board? This misses the entire point. Long Tail doesn’t ignore the ‘head,’ it simply suggests that the tail can be profitable as well. In that way, the study actually supports the theory, rather than disproving it.

The solution. Or at least, *A* solution.
In my mind, our response to this study should be to realize that there is a huge opportunity out there to capitalize on this untapped music. The way that we can do this is by providing the same service that the music industry is supposed to have been providing all along – find the good stuff and make sure people know about it.  All the great music that’s floating around on the internet and people are still choosing simply to download the tracks at the top of the charts? Why? Because someone is telling them too.

The music industry is dropping the ball. Labels are supposed to exist to take talent and grow it into success. The quick buck of a top forty hit is obviously not conducive to that model, but the Long Tail is and the internet has made this possible. The sooner people realize this, the sooner the industry as a whole can move forward.