I'm Alright Jack, Keep Your Hands Off My Stack!

I was reading a rather interesting interview last week with the current chairman of the Brit Awards Panel: Ged Doherty. He said the British Music Industry is currently in a good position and is coping well with the global recession. Nice of him to say, isn’t it, especially as he is probably ‘earning’ way in excess of a six figure pay packet plus other lucrative ‘kickbacks’ no doubt. He also followed with some typical British doom & gloom comments about those scurrilous pesky downloading kids currently ‘ruining’ his plans for global musical domination (and also reducing the contents of his wallet) that really got my goat. Doherty went on to say that out of the six top selling acts in the world currently, four of them are British (Leona Lewis, Amy Winehouse, Duffy & Take That) These acts are making millions each year out of album & download sales as well as sponsorship deals and commercials (the one with Take That frolicking around with that bevy of beauties at crimbo still makes me feel sick to my boots by the way), but they are still missing out on the extra pennies being siphoned off their profits due to illegal downloading. Well boo fucking Hoo!! My heart fucking bleeds for them. By the way, I’m sorry to keep banging on about The Brits, but shit sticks doesn’t it and I do mainly write about stuff that gets my goat. That’s probably the reason you all love me so much isn’t it? Haha Anyway, last time I checked this country (and most of the world) was in a deep recession that could last for years leaving families with serious financial problems. People are being laid off from their jobs left, right and centre and the world is on the brink of financial collapse. Yet, Doherty and the rest of his well off well connected cronies are moaning about the small handful of illegal down loaders cutting into their profit margins by an approximate 5% each year! What an absolute tight-fisted scare mongering greedy twat! Personally, because of people like Doherty coming out with such comments like he did, I think it’s no wonder people ‘obtain’ their music via Limewire, illegal Russian websites, Pirate Bay and pirate CD copying. They still sound the same so why not run the gauntlet of obtaining them against the law instead of paying the rip off prices you would pay for them legally? The chances of you getting caught are pretty unrealistic anyway and what’s the worse that could happen, a nasty letter from Richard Branson saying “you could be in very big trouble, Sonny”? I’m literally shaking in my brand new Virgin boots you silly bearded faced tit! Which brings me to the nice role model over-paid superstars of today: Not all of us can afford the nasty little habits the likes of Amy Winehouse, Pete Doherty and many other of these sauced-up musicians and record execs alike have. Doherty & Winehouse have probably emptied half of South America up there noses yet they still moan about being ‘tormented’ while they sit in their luxury flats throwing punches (and lawsuits) at photographers whilst crying poverty and moaning about isolationism and all the other bullshit that comes with it. Musicians are experts at exploiting themselves in the eyes of the media as some sort of victims who the world has dealt a ‘bad hand’ to. Sadly there are enough suckers who are taken in by it. Look at some of the current pop stars selling their ‘stories’ through tabloid newspapers and publishers (with the help of a good writer, of course). Last time I looked I’m pretty sure Cheryl Cole has had two or three autobiographies during her fledgling pop career. Coldplay have released at least the same. God knows how many Metallica have had. Yet you still hear them banging on today about how much money they are losing via the black market. Heartbreaking isn’t it? I mean, it must be hard living in million dollar mansions in plush suburbs of Los Angeles & London without a financial care in the world while shovelling astronomical amount of marching powder up their nostrils mustn’t it? Another thing that gets me about these bastards raking in obscene amounts of money is the fraud aspect that gives them so many sleepless nights in their luxury four-poster beds. Now, don’t get me wrong here, I’m not really that bothered about people downloading music illegally as it can be quite an expensive hobby to obtain music through official channels as I’ve pointed out, but given the amounts of money that does pump through the music industry don’t you think the people ‘at the top’ should start investing some of their money into more advanced fraud prevention measures instead of spending all their time sitting on their yachts in Monaco drinking champagne and snorting cocaine off their 19 year old girlfriend’s brand new fake tits? Whoever coined the phrase Thatcher’s (greedy) Children was indeed right on the money (no pun intended by the way) So, next time you hear about some stuck up rich pop stars or Billionaire record executives going on about how their impoverished and privacy-invaded lives are ‘getting them down’ and that they’re missing out on an extra few pennies or how illegal downloads are ruining music, don’t rush to buy their book or their ‘story’ in Hello magazine and certainly don’t waste your sympathy on them. Just laugh at them and don’t give them the steam off your piss. They’ll think and do the same if it were you in their position. And finally, if you think illegal downloads are ruining music in a financial sense, take a look at the lifestyles these dickheads have and then compare it to someone who wants to have a bit of musical enjoyment in his life in these hard times by listening to music … but can’t as they’re on the dole. Different world isn’t it? Mol