can't knock the hustle

for the past few months, there has been somewhat of a minor uproar, at least among those who care, over the fact that sony has shelved fiona apple's new record due to what they consider to be its lack of marketability (i.e. the absence of a "single".) now, this certainly sucks, as it always does when the endeavours of an artist are refused or adulterated by a bunch of suit-wearing cads who have far less use for the artistic process and its results than they do for large stacks of green colored paper. on the flipside, however, there is the fact that fiona apple signed to sony of her own volition, and regardless of how ill-advised a move this may have turned out to be, she certainly could have refused their offer. it is no secret that the major labels are fairly disinterested in the well being of anyone and anything that doesn't directly benefit their financial interests. this isn't news. fiona could have gone another, albeit far less monetarily fruitful, route. john darnielle talks about this whole situation here, and he does a good job of articulating this point, with which i wholeheartedly agree.

there's no doubt that it's a shame either way. when there is a record out there that one is truly curious to hear, it's quite frustrating to think that one will be deprived of the right to buy it based on the fact that sony doesn't feel that there are enough like-minded consumers. not nearly as frustrating as the state of the music industry in general, but as jd points out, that, too, is ultimately the responsibility of the consumer (pssst...that's you and me.)

in the more recent past, i have been coming to terms with my feelings about downloading music. i have certainly downloaded my share of songs over the years, although i have never been interested in downloading entire albums, mainly because part of the draw for me, insofar as music goes, is the complete package. i want the artwork, the liner notes, the disc itself, to be genuine. i want to have them on hand, i want to be able to keep them on the cd shelf in my living room. i also want to support the people who make the music that i so adore, and although i used to justify my downloading by the fact that my downloads were usually of songs by artists that i had a singular or only a few-song interest in, that really shouldn't matter, and at this point i have all but stopped downloading entirely. i utilize mp3 blogs to hear songs by bands that i have never heard, and then i spring for the whole deal, usually putting my to-buy list into some sort of order based on how much my interest was piqued by the sneak preview. i also go on recommendations from people i "trust", and for the singular-song dilemma, i do the i-tunes thing, or the musicmatch equivalent.

anyhow, i say "all but stopped" for one reason: i have broken down and downloaded the fiona disc. i simply couldn't help myself; once it leaked to the internet, i read one too many bits on it, all of them extolling its virtues. with no actual release date in the forseeable future, i felt that i had little other option if i wanted to hear this record. and boy, am i glad i did. it's really quite a thing, 'extraordinary machine', and i will certainly be buying it, if and when the parties involved manage to get it on to the shelves. right now, i am on about my fifth listen, fully enraptured. i will probably be in the 'extraordinary machine' force field well into next week, which for me means that it will stay in the discman, on the playlist, etc. the title track is a fucking brilliant piece of songwriting and production. it makes me wish that a song like that could alter current corporate conception of what is considered a "single".

now, without going so far as to encourage others in my behaviour (i'll let everyone do this on their own) i can tell you that simply googling fiona apple extraordinary machine will lead you to a place where you can listen for yourself. in addition, you can head over to www.freefiona.com and sign a petition to try and get sony to release the record. i truly hope that they do. it's an amazing piece of work, and she deserves to make a living from it.