Vinny Vero's Pet Shop Boys Christmas gift

NYC DJ and remixer Vinny Vero was recently commissioned by EMI to do some remixes for Pet Shop Boys' "Beautiful People." As he mentions on his blog, due to time constraints it was never going to happen.

With it looking less and less likely that EMI are going to release his efforts commercially, Mr Vero has decided to post the three mixes he's done on his blog, as a Christmas present for his fans.

These tracks are top quality. In his blog he discusses his idea of Pet Shop Boys remixes that stand the test of time, the ones that retain a majority of the song. The single and club mixes he's created thus stick to that ethos. The third mix is a mash up between "Beautiful people" and A Guy Called Gerald's "Voodoo Ray". Aptly titled "Beautiful voodoo" it works remarkably well.

On top of the Christmas present download, Vero's also written a passionate entry about Pet Shop Boys in general, touching on his work with them in the 90s, remixing the US only single "To Step Aside", and touching on the incredibly inept way EMI marketed the Boys' latest album "Yes," including the decision to not release "Did you see me coming?" as a summer single, and have third single "Beautiful people" be German only.

It's a great post if you're looking for top quality free music, and it's a great post if you're looking for a good read.

iTunes friendly download (30MB)
FLAC (110MB)

Pet Shop Boys' mis-handling by EMI

Neil Tennant via last.fm

We're used to hearing and reading how record companies don't have a clue about a great many things. To hear how one in particular can screw up the only thing it really knows how to do - release and market an album - well, that makes for interesting reading!

Tonight, when I got home, the latest issue of Pet Shop Boys' fanclub magazine, "Literally", was waiting for me.

Inside, was the story of the release of the duo's latest album Yes, back in March. It read like a catalogue of disasters the duo has faced at the hands of EMI's ineptitude. To be honest, the guys have been INCREDIBLY faithful to a label that has shown them contempt and disrespect over the years.

The problems, well documented but worth talking about again, would make me think twice about any allegiances I felt for my record label.

The download problem
On iTunes, 2 500 copies of the album had been pre-ordered. EMI ballsed up the release date data they provided to Apple, resulting in the album being available for purchase and download mid-week the week before actual release, and for the paltry sum of £5.49. It was eventually removed from purchase until the following week, but this action literally deprived the album of 2 500 purchases that would have counted to chart placement. A number 2 in the charts became a number 4.

As Neil Tennant says in the magazine, "All of the pre-order scams worked against the album, which makes my blood boil."

It was new technology that alerted the duo to EMI's cock up. Says Neil Tennant, "Someone Twittered us saying, 'I didn't realise the album was out already'."

Eastern promise
The physical release of lead single "Love Etc." was beset by issues of low to non-existent stock on shops like HMV or Amazon. This was put down to EMI pressing the discs in the UK and shipping half of them off to Europe for some reason.

Digital Bundle problem
One of the digital bundles EMI sold via iTunes for "Love Etc." featured two Yes album tracks as a pre-album taster. The plan was for the purchaser to only be able to purchase these tracks only as part of the single bundle with an offer to "complete the album" when Yes was released.

The tracks ended up being available individually and the "complete the album" offer never materialised.

Printing cockup
The initial run of the Yes Etc double CD set had a booklet that was printed with the pages bounded the wrong way round. A web page was set up where purchasers could apply to have a properly bound booklet mailed out to them.

This isn't a tale of EMI trying to come to terms with the new economy or trying to work out how to survive in the face of piracy. It's EMI trying to come to terms with releasing and marketing an album and single without cocking it up. Something they've apparently done for about 100 years.

Related articles by Zemanta

• EMI's CEO Admits Company 'Lost Touch' But Doesn't Seem To Know How To Fix It (techdirt.com)

Robbie to release new album, does anyone care?

Robbie Williams signed to EMI for a record advance and went on to release rubbish album after rubbish album.

Now after a three year gap, EMI announced today that Williams is being unleashed on the music world once more. Come November, his new album "Reality Killed the Video Star" will hit stores, prefaced by a single "Bodies" in October.

Anyone who knows me can testify how big a fan of his I was back in the day. However, that's been eclipsed by the material he's released since 2000 (i.e. the post Guy Chambers stuff) and the latter material has really made me reassess my opinion of his earlier output.

I can't say today's news is anything but a reminder that someone I thought had packed it in obviously needs to pay for a new house or his rehab bill.

The promise of a Trevor Horn production, a Guy Chambers co-write (he's probably the magic ingredient that went into the material I enjoyed) and the tease of a potential Sex Pistols cover for the first single (i.e. it shares the same title!) are about the only things I'm looking forward to.

We'll see what transpired when the new disc hits November 9th.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Robbie Williams announces comeback album (guardian.co.uk)
• Robbie Williams announces comeback album (news.bbc.co.uk)
• Robbie Williams to release new album (telegraph.co.uk)

EMI shoot selves in foot

Sometimes writing how the music industry get it wrong is really really easy.

Take today. EMI have announced they're going to stop selling CDs to independent record shops. The reports are from the states, but the ramifications are still big.

The large shops, especially in the US, feature almost exclusively top 40 releases. It's the indie shops, as featured in Nick Hornby's book "High Fidelity" that feed the powerful long tail of the industry - the people looking for catalogue titles, obscure titles or help with finding something in particular that an acne-scarred Wal-Mart teen won't be able to help out with.

I used to shop in a number of record shops - Record Time, Memories and Melodies, Repeat the Beat, etc. - in the greater Detroit area back in the day and NONE of them were remotely chain shops and all of them had the most knowledgeable staff you'd ever want to meet. I imagine I ended up buying more music via chats and their recommendations than I would ever have just shopping at Harmony House or Wal-Mart.

Now indies aren't completely out of the loop. They just have to source their stock from third parties, as EMI's decision seems to revolve around cost cutting. This is pretty much akin to you or I going to a shop and buying stock then trying to resell it without people wondering why they don't just get rid of the middle man.

If the labels really want to piss off the hand that feeds (well feeds outside the here today gone tomorrow top 40), they're doing a really good job.

It's hard enough surviving in the current economic climate without your suppliers pulling a fast one on you.

EMI scapegoating

What fortuitous times we live in. EMI announced yesterday that they're cutting loads of underperforming acts and chopping staff across the board. The reason? Internet piracy. What dross.

As Silicon.com recently pointed out, file sharing has had absolutely no tangible impact on CD sales. For one thing a lot of the material downloaded simply wouldn't have been purchased by the downloader to begin with, so where's the lost income?

I can remember back in the heady days of Napster playing the game of "Download the cheesiest song from the 80s". This is potentially a P2P-only game as I would never have forked over even 1p to buy a copy of Spagna's 'Call Me' or any of the other groan-inducers we used to while away the quiet times in the office.

Not to hark on again, but these labels really only have themselves to blame. The MP3 format has been around for almost a decade, PCs capable of sound have been around almost as long and the forces of alternate media (i.e. alternative places to spend your money) have been around as long as music. Books, the cinema, console gaimg, increasingly Sky packages and (recently) DVDs.

You can only cut the pie so many ways and to make it sweet enough to eat. The music industry seems to be sitting on their laurels, releasing utter crap and not really appealing to the music fans, and their slice of the cake justifiably seems to taste more bitter these days.

EMI, your days may be numbered, but you saw the writing on the wall and refused to act. Don't blame the general public for your lack of foresight.