we make love

Lauren Burrows, the very cool radio host from CBC Radio 3, interviewed Andrew about creative commons and our remix project.

You can hear the interview here.

(And if I sound like some heavy breathing perv, it was because I completely out of breath.  I was wrestling with my daughter - who actually hung up on Lauren the first time - when she called).

Andrew was recently interviewed for an article in the University of Western Ontario’s Gazette paper. They got a bunch of things wrong (like, we’re not based in Guelph, for starters), and some of the quotes were just, well, weird. So here is the responses we sent them below. The article is here.

1. Why is free access to music and art for all important to you?

The software industry synthesizes the various meanings of freedom with the gratis vs libre (free as in speech or free as in beer) distinction. We’ve released our music for free (as in beer - i.e., they don’t have to pay for it, and they can copy it for their friends and family), as well has giving people the opportunity to use the music in new and creative ways to create new art and new music. Both are important to us right now.
Releasing our music as for free (as in beer) has enabled so many people to hear our music that wouldn’t normally have heard it. It allows people to download it for free, risk free, and they tell two friends, and they tell two friends, and so on, and so on, and so on.
Releasing our music for free as in speech allows people to use it in new and interesting ways without worrying about bizarre licensing issues. If they want to sample it, they can. If they want to use it in a podcast, they can. If people want to use it for the basis of new, non commercial works, they don’t need to ask.
Isn’t art derivative anyway? For us, this openly acknowledges this and allows other artists to build upon old and existing ideas in new ways. We’re just allowing this process to happen a little easier, and a little more honestly.

2. What are some examples of the implications that Bill C-61 would have for music groups like you?

Copyright should serve artists, not umbrella organizations or corporations. Copyright should secure our right to choose how our art and music can be used by others. It should protect our ability to make money from our work in ways that we choose, to prevent other entities from unfairly profiting or using our work in ways that we find anathema to us. Bill C-61 is an American styled law, pushed by large, and frankly, morally bankrupt organizations like the RIAA. It’s not grassroots, it isn’t being pushed by artists. We believe that Canadians should have the rights to use art in new and challenging ways. Bill C-61 makes this confusing, difficult, and often illegal.

3. You are quite liberal with your music – posting it up for free on telephone polls and making it free for anyone to download. Do you think this reduces your income?

Definitely not. If anything, it’s made our music more available to people throughout the world. This wouldn’t have been an easy thing to do 10 years ago. We’re very lucky that we’ve got the technology and know how to do this today. The music industry has changed. There isn’t only one path to success now. You can actually give your music away for free and still have hundreds of people pay for it at the same time. If you have something of value, and of interest, and something that you can hold in your hand and use in ways you want, people will pay for that. Our first EP selling out so quickly is testament to this.
And our music is still for sale on various websites (iTunes, eMusic, our website), etc, in DRM free format. We don’t quite get as much money for it through these mechanisms, but people are buying it. They’re certainly convenient services that people like and use, and they’re changing the music industry, and that’s not so bad either.

4. What are your favourite lyrics on the Kill Bill C-61 demo single and why?

Personally, I like the keyboard solo the best, followed by all of us yelling ‘And now we’re paying for it’. That’s pretty fun and exhilarating when six people get cooking.
How’s that for political?
Here’s the thing - we’re actually a million times more fun than we are political. Having fun, intense, poppy, hooky, intense and sweaty live shows is the most important thing we do. It’s why we do it. We love playing live. We love playing together. We love working hard on music. People really like to talk to us about copyright reform though. We wish people would talk to us about our music too. We think we’re doing way more interesting things with it than we are with how we license it.

5. Does Bill C-61 protect the music artists or the music industry (ie. labels, corporations)? Both?

I can tell you that it certainly does nothing for us. I don’t know anybody in the independent music scene that was involved in crafting the law.

We had an opportunity to speak to the very nice people at Hi-Sci-Fi last night, a radio program that runs on Friday nights in Vancouver on CJSF. Despite the technical difficulties brought on by a new iPhone (i.e. Andrew accidently hanging up as soon as he said hello), it was a cool opportunity to speak to some people who are doing a very cool radio show on cool topics. Awesome levels of nerdery.

So if you want to hear a dork sounding dorky and scared on live radio (*cough* Andrew *cough*), maybe they’ll post an archive. If you want to read about some really cool and nerdy stuff, check out the Hi-Sci-Fi site. Thanks Irma!

See, we’re just a little band trying to do big things, so we relish any attention we get, for whatever reason. EPIC FU is a very cool weekly web show that covers online pop culture. It’s fun and smart. Like us, right?.

Anyway, check them out. They mentioned us earlier this week, and pulled together a slick little package that makes us look fucking cool. And they show a part of a video where you can see Scott break his on stage intensity and swagger and break a smile on stage for the first and only time in modern history. Video is embedded below… Thanks EPIC FU!.

We weren’t originally going to release the Kill Bill C-61 CD out in the electronic realm, because we wanted it to be a neat thing for a few people (and really, Menergy is an unfinished, partially mixed, unmastered demo). But we’ve had a lot of people asking for a copy of the CD, and since we can’t really afford to burn and print anymore, we’ve decided that we’ll post the songs up on our music page so people around the world can have an opportunity to grab the songs.

Anyway, everybody, thanks for all your support and emails and well-wishing. We really do appreciate it.