buROCKeaucracy

Over the past few nights, my friend Matt and I have been trying to work out a way to do certain special effects for a video we are planning for 'Sharks'. A raid of our garage, which I suppose is not really our garage, but our landlord’s storage space, proved prosperous; we found several bits of material, all presumably belonging to the landlord, that could come in handy. Most nifty of these is an enormous piece of blue dust sheeting, which will make a great sea. After sketching out the structures required and listing marine life we will have to make, we felt we were ready to push things forward, and set a date for shooting the thing.

3rd and 4th April were the decided days, a sort of breather before the exam gauntlet begins (if anyone is in the Yorkshire area around then, do drop in; we need some extra hands). Matt had been keeping a sly eye out during his saunters around the university campus, and had spotted a room aptly suited to our enterprise, which we decided we would try and book for said date.

Naturally this is easier said than done: without recounting the tedious details too thoroughly, it turned out the room’s chunky size meant that something that takes place in it is apparently not just something taking place in it but a ‘minor event’, necessitating the filling in of a minor events form, and bringing up unwanted issues of ‘liability’. On handing this in we were met with furrowed brows and told to go and see Ginelle (who it turned out was actually called Ginenne) at the Student Union office. Ginenne was ill, so we bounded across campus to another office to meet Steve Wilkinson, Campus Faculties Manager. It’s probably fair to say at this point that Steve doesn’t have a sense of humour. A Risk Assessment form needed to be filled in. We told him we didn’t think there were any real risks involved. He replied “There are risks in everything”. So with this philosophical spring in our step we returned to the S.U. office, where a man whose name we never discovered stared at our form for a long time. “What’s it for?”, he asked. “Um, sort of a music video for a song”. He seemed very upset by the whole thing, and to be fair given how many risks there are in everything it probably means many more forms for him. He said he would help us with the Health and Safety check, but he needed to see a diagram of what we were doing.

So this morning I made the above drawing, and carefully coloured it in to demonstrate to him of our commitment to detail, and thereby safety. We haven’t yet got a response. I was annoyed to have to give away the secrets behind the special effects (and so I thought I’d post them publicly here to save him the hassle of leaking them onto the internet), but we kept back from him the design of “Watervision”™, which is the where the real money is: a contraption that makes the things behind it look like they are underwater. The only risk in that is the risk of utter brilliance.

it's not your money that they're after boy it's you

We're not on the tracklisting on the website, but we are there, about 1 hour 55 minutes in. That is excellent. He mentioned our money debate, as below, justifying the decision to put it up (my mother was against it; she thinks it's vulgar). So thanks again to Tom. I can see why Gayle has the hots for him.

There is now an Essay Like Nephew page on facebook, which has all of Burrows on it to stream (although not in order, for some reason) and some photos and videos to check out. If you're on facebook, just search for it and it'll come up. On the whole, it's a lot prettier and better than myspace (which has always struck me as a remarkably ugly and ungainly site for one so large and profitable). So go along and become a fan.

Regards etc

Fame, Fame, Fatal Fame

Woo Woo! Last night we were played on the RADIO. In fact, somewhat farcically, we were played twice. It was on the Tom Robinson 'Introducing' show on BBC6, and can be listened to here.

Not only was Tom good enough to accidentally double our airwave exposure, or radiation, if you will, but he also had something to say about the money issue, as in the post below. Thus:

Tommy's got a point, and so have you. Actually there's no reason why you can't sell the albums AND give away the tracks as free downloads. Have em on iTunes etc (use Tunecore - brilliant royalty rates, no long term contract) and on your website offer fans the option of buying physical CDs with premium packaging as well. Get the print done for the packaging, and then burn off CDRs as the orders come in. Result: £10 profit on each CD (as opposed to 90p via a record company). Most importantly - carefully read David Byrne's excellent article setting out the available range of business models here http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/magazine/16-01/ff_byrne
hope this is some help - and sorry about the cockup with Sunflower on my 6 Music show last night...

Tom Robinson

So this is all very good. Perhaps he is being nice to us because Ben told him that Gayle fancies him. On the topic of Gayle, that is her picture at the top. More here.

If you have a spare minute, you can vote for us to reappear on next week's show at the website above.

So bye bye for now.

The best things in life are free...

I don't know if anyone outside the band ever reads this. Perhaps my mother (hello Mummy). Just in case someone does, I thought it would be interesting to post an email that Tommy sent us recently. It's about money. He rightly has certain grievances about our attitude to money, and the making of it via rock and roll. I think it's an interesting part of the debate about how a small band ought to approach the idea that they might be able to live off playing guitar and singing. So here it is:

I feel I need to explain myself about my ranting about CD selling etc. and general money chat. I haven't made my thoughts very clear on the subject, because it's not fun, and I get a sense that you will all disagree with me. I accept that much of the things I have suggested regarding money are "token", and not particularly profitable. I feel that this is as a result of me compromising between what I think is the best thing to do, and what you guys think is the best thing to do. I'm afraid this isn't just about whether we should charge for the Burrows CD or not, but about longer term issues.

Ultimately, and basically, I want to play, record, and make music, and be paid for it. If I'm paid, I can keep doing music, otherwise, I need to divert my time away to other work. I'm assuming that this is a position we all share.

I have some doubts about our assumption that getting signed by a record company is the best, even the most realistic course of action. I definitely think that it is a good idea to pursue it at this stage, but I don't think we have considered the alternative, which is to do it ourselves. Even if we don't end up doing it entirely ourselves, we can learn a great deal just by trying.

I think this is important because the music industry is changing fast. The traditional deal between labels and artists was that the artists got royalties for each song sold. This could be as little as 5% of the street price of an album. In return for their cut, they would do a lot of the hard work, and put in the capital to launch artists into the limelight. The royalty structure tends to make the record label the boss, and the artist subservient to its wishes. This kind of thing, as I'm sure you are aware has gotten some record labels a bad reputation, though they might get the job done.

A new kind of business model is emerging. Some record labels are taking the approach of splitting profits, as opposed to royalties with the artists. EMI have launched a label in this way, as have ninjatune, with its famous 50-50 profit sharing policy. This is a more collaborative approach. It does mean that the artist has to be a little business savvy, since they will be involved in the money making/losing decisions. One of the reasons why we might be suited to this kind of deal is because we can do so many things in-house. We can record, mix, make artwork, websites and even film quite effectively between just the 4 of us. More importantly, we know what is good and what is bad when it comes to music, graphics and film. That's a lot
of expenses that the potential record label can save, (producer, graphic artist, photographer, director?) making us an attractive
investment from a business point of view, leaving music aside for a moment.

I can't accept that we should leave music to us, the band, and business to the labels. They are not separate issues. We need to
make money from our music, so we can keep doing it. I can't imagine a record label just making money for us, without it being costly in artistic and financial terms. I think we should start learning how to make money now, because it's what we want to do ultimately.

The time I spend recording with you guys, and the time I spend mixing is not cheap to me, not to mention the gear I have been accumulating over the years. I'm sure this is the case with all of you too. This reality is starting to bite into my wallet. Don't assume that getting signed is going to solve all these problems. I know a band who have been signed and dropped (by Rough Trade) with hardly any recompense.

My "CD selling obsession" is really only symptomatic of these thoughts. I accept that my money making schemes are fairly token and ineffective, but I feel like I'm on my own here. It's as if you think it's distasteful to deal with money. That's why my suggestions are so watered down. I didn't think that charging money for a CD that you can download free anyway was going to be all that contentious.

Sorry that it's turned into an essay, but it had to be said. Money is the looming elephant in the room, and someone had to bring it up.

Tommy

If anyone's bothered to get to the bottom of this, you are rewarded with a free cd. Just don't ask Tommy for it.

p.s. The picture at the top is by Duncan grant.