ROGER McGUINN
Interview
July 18, 2000
with
Kevin Crossett
| The ROGER McGUINN Interview July 18, 2000 with Kevin Crossett |
|
Roger McGuinn is happy to have brought his music full circle. In the late
'50s and early '60s, Roger McGuinn toured and recorded with some of the
most well-known folk artists and folk groups, before forming the legendary
Byrds. McGuinn and the Byrds played folk songs with rock instrumentation,
and started a new sound that prevails in much of today's music. These
days, Roger McGuinn is again playing and preserving the folk music with
which he started, and distributes his new recordings of old folk songs in
the MP3 format.
Roger recently made a statement at the Senate Hearings regarding Music on
the Internet, and I spoke with Roger shortly after, discussing how he
produces and sells his MP3 recordings.
Q: Roger, you were invited to the July 11th Senate Hearing, regarding
music on the Internet, and you made a statement about your experiences
with music downloads. How did you get involved in the Senate Hearing?
ROGER: I was invited to appear by Senator Orrin Hatch (R, Utah), so I
guess he knew that I was into this sort of thing
Q: It's interesting that, as with so many different things today, this
whole controversy is not so much an issue of the technology, but of how it
is used. I read many of the statements made at the Senate Hearing, and it
seems that most people are coming from different directions. Did you get
that feeling while you were there?
ROGER: Yes, everybody had an agenda. Lars (Lars Ulrich, Metallica) was
pretty much clueless about the digital part of it, but he knew somebody
was stealing his stuff, and he didn't like it. The Napster guy had his
agenda, you know, where he wants to preserve Napster, the Sony Music guy
was putting up a smoke-screen about, "Oh yes, we're going digital and
doing it right." Michael Robertson from MP3.com was defending my MP3
position. There were a couple other guys with e-music businesses, and then
there was the Gnutella guy who was coming from the "pirate" point of view,
you know, the software hackers' point of view. It was kind of fun.
Q: Was the hearing just one day?
ROGER: Yeah; it was just a couple hours.
Q: I noticed that EMI is taking a pretty forward position on this, and as
of today (July 18, 2000) they are offering over one hundred albums for
purchase as a digital download, ranging from Frank Sinatra to Smashing
Pumpkins, and George Thorogood.
ROGER: I wasn't aware of that, but that's a really big step. What format
are they allowing you to download it in? Is it in an MP3 format?
Q: It sounds like it's not, because the news release I read about it said:
"Unlike the popular MP3 digital audio format, the WindowsMedia format
generally has higher quality playback while taking up less storage memory."
ROGER: Okay, so it's in the WindowsMedia files, and they are probably
water-marked or something?
Q: EMI mentioned that there is some kind of copyright management that
allows it to be copied only a certain number of times.
ROGER: Well, you know, that's really interesting. That's a bold step for
them. I'm surprised that they are getting with it so fast.
Q: So the MP3.com songs that you have on the Internet are also available
for purchase as a CD?
ROGER: Not all of them . . . So far I've got thirty-three (33) songs on
CDs available and I'm just compiling the next volume for Folk Den Vol. 4,
which will bring it up to forty-four songs available for purchase. But you
can't listen to them all on MP3.com, I only keep six or seven of them
going at a time.
Q: I noticed that there are two or three songs from each CD that you can
listen to on the site. Are they a short sample?
ROGER: No, the whole songs are there.
Q: So you'll just keep adding more songs all the time, and Folk Den will
be Vol. 4, Vol. 5, Vol. 6, and so forth?
ROGER: Yeah, well, right. . . . If I do one a month, I can come up with at
least one CD a year.
Q: That's terrific. What studio gear are you using to record your MP3s?
ROGER: If you go to my web site, you can see the microphone I'm using.
There's a button on my main page that says Digital Audio. Click on that,
and you can see the microphone and the software I use. It's a large
diaphragm tube condenser mic, and it's really high quality.
Q: So, is your recording system all software-based, or are you using any
kind of audio mixer?
ROGER: It's all software-based.
Q: I read that you had teamed up with Joan Baez for some recording, too.
ROGER: Yes. Joan and I did, let's see, we did one song, "Wagoner's Lad,"
and then I did two songs with Judy Collins, and two with Odetta, a couple
of songs with Pete Seeger, Jeanne Ritchie, and Tommy Makem.
Q: That's pretty cool!
ROGER: Yeah, it's going to be great!
Q: Roger, you were very early in this whole thing about digital downloads
available from your web site. You were actually doing that before MP3.com,
right?
ROGER: Right. I was doing it in WAV files. I started out back in, I guess
about '92 or '93.
Q: How did you become interested in making songs available like that?
ROGER: I was browsing the web, and I came across Michael Nesmith's site,
and he had some audio files of his songs, but they were just like, samples
. . . thirty second snippets. And I thought, "that's really cool, you can
put songs on there, too." So, I kind of analyzed how he was doing it and
they were 8 bit, 11 kHz WAV files, so I got the technology together and
then started recording stuff in that format for my contributions to what
then was the Byrds' web page, on the University of Arkansas site. I put up
several different pieces . . . like the intro to Mr. Tambourine Man,
pieces of Turn, Turn, Turn. About five years ago, I decided to put up
complete folk songs, in order to preserve them, because nobody else was
doing that.
Q: It's interesting that, as much as we've moved forward with the Internet
and other technology, it allows the potential to reduce, if not negate the
services of recording studios, producers, record companies, right down to
retail stores. Do you think that there will come a time when the majority
of musicians and music buyers do business this way, or will it always just
be a supplement to it?
ROGER: It's hard to say, but you're right. It has the potential to level
the playing field. However, these big guys are really big and powerful.
And as you said, EMI is just jumping into the digital music domain. I got
some email from Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple Computer. He saw my
testimony at the Senate and agreed with me, and wanted to give me some
nice support. His opinion, and I agree with him, is that the big guys who
are running everything now will be running the MP3 or whatever its
successor is . . . so, they're not going to go away.
Q: It seems like they really have to move with it, or it leaves them
behind.
ROGER: Yeah, right. Anyway, my reaction to him (Steve Wozniak) was that
yeah, that's probably true, but we're going to have some fun with them in
the meantime!
Q: That's for sure!
ROGER: It's kind of like radio was in the early ‘60s. FM radio was a new
thing and kind of uncharted territory, and when some experimental guys got
on there, and they would just play anything that came to mind. You know,
they would do sets of songs that had the word "blue" in it, or whatever
they wanted. It would just go all day long like that, until it became
extremely controlled, the way it is now.
Q: It's interesting that you mention radio, because the Internet has been
described by many as being the "new radio." For many years, we've been
able to record music off the radio and it was ours, so to speak, and you
know the Internet, in a way, doesn't provide anything but just a different
format from which to collect that.
ROGER: That was something I said at the Senate Hearing. It was exactly
that: I said, you know, radio stations get free CDs from record companies
and they play ‘em on the air and you can record them off the air so what's
the big problem, you know? They didn't like that, but it's true. In fact,
I would go so far as to say that with a good-quality FM receiver in a good
area close to the transmitter, and some good recording equipment, you'd
get a much better quality copy of the original than you would from an MP3
off the Internet.
Q: It's just like so many other things: There are some better uses and
some less honorable uses of technology, which is the reason for the whole
controversy with Lars.
ROGER: Right. You know, I don't think Lars knows what he's talkin' about,
but I mean, he does have a point that he's being ripped off, that's true.
His major concern was that unreleased demos were out there before he knew
it, and I see his problem there, but he's . . . he's missin' it! The best
thing about the whole thing is the publicity he gets.
Q: And that has been plenty, but not all good. That's an example of how
many different angles there are, like you're using it to your benefit:
Actually to retain more control over your music.
ROGER: Right. I have total control.
Q: Whereas in his situation, he's feeling like he has lost control, you
know?
ROGER: Right.
Q: I was pretty surprised reading your statement to the Judiciary
Committee, and of course, this is not a new story, as far as royalties are
concerned, but I was really shocked to read case, after case, after case,
about the lack of money that you received for all of your recording
endeavors.
ROGER: Courtney Love did a speech at some Hollywood digital thing, in May.
She does the math with what happens with the record company, and I'll read
you some of that. I've got a copy of it here.
Courtney Love Does the Math, is the name of the article. She says, "Today
I want to talk about piracy in music. What's piracy? Piracy is the act of
stealing an artist's work without any intention of paying for it. I'm not
talking about Napster-type software, I'm talking about the major recording
contracts, major label recording contracts. I want to start with a story
about a rock band. . . . "
Then she goes into this fictitious rock band that gets a huge deal with 20
percent royalty rate and a $1 million advance, and nobody has ever gotten
a 20 percent royalty, but this is for purposes of demonstration. And she
says, "What happens to the million dollars? They spend $500,000 recording
the album; that leaves the band $500,000. They give $100,000 to their
manager for 20 percent commission, and they paid $25,000 to their lawyer,
and $25,000 to the business manager. That leaves them with $350,000 for
four band members. They all get, well, after a $170,000 in taxes, they are
left with $180,000, or $45,000 a piece, and that's $45,000 to live on for
a year, until your record gets released. Now say the record is a big hit,
sells a million copies." Then she goes in to how that could happen: Well,
it's kind of a fixed thing, anyway, and then she talks about two videos,
and that "50 percent of the videos are recoupable, so the band gets
$200,000 and tour support and that's 100 percent recoupable, and the
company spends $300,000 on independent promotion, which is a way that
record companies use middle men, so that they pretend not to know that
radio stations get paid for playing the stuff on the air. And then the
independent promotion costs are charged back to the band. So the original
$1 million advance is also recoupable, so the band owes $2 million to the
record company, and if all million records are sold at a full price, with
no discounts, and the band earns $2 million in royalties since their 20
percent royalty works out to $2.00 a record. The $2 million in royalties,
minus $2 million in recupable expenses equals zero. The record company
makes $11 million; they spent $500,000 to manufacture the CDs, they
advanced the band a million, plus there is a million in video costs,
$300,000 in radio promotion, and $200,000 in tour support. The company
also paid $750,000 in music publishing royalties. They spent $2.2 million
on marketing, and that was mostly in retail advertising stuff." Anyway, it
adds up that the record company spent $4.4 million, and so their profit is
$6.6 million, and the band may as well be working at the Seven-Eleven."
Q: Wow! Those are staggering numbers.
ROGER: Yeah, and this is all fairly accurate stuff, you know? It's what
happened in every case of mine.
Q: Royalty-wise, is that a situation that's left open-ended?
ROGER: They don't close the books. They keep sending you statements that
you owe, you know, like $300,000. You don't have to pay them out of your
pocket, but they come out of future royalties and the number never seems
to go down.
So you know, the only good I ever got out of a record deal is getting a
hit record and then people came to concerts, and that did pay off. I mean,
there were times when I made a lot of money from concert appearances
because of the hit record, and I'm not complaining about that, but when
people complain about the Internet giving away the music, the point is . .
. we've been giving away the music anyway, so you might as well get the
most publicity you can out of it.
Q: Interesting analogy. So, then, from the perspective of the record
company situation versus MP3.com sales, it sounds like proportionally,
you're actually making much more through MP3 than you ever did with a
major label contract.
ROGER: Yes, that's true. I've actually gotten paid royalties from MP3.com.
Q: Roger, do you manage your own web site, and are you your own webmaster?
ROGER: Yeah, I learned HTML, and now you don't even need it, but it's good
to know.
Q: OK, let's move to some other Roger McGuinn business. Last year Martin
introduced the Limited Edition Roger McGuinn 12-string guitar, the
D12-42RM. Has that finished its production run?
ROGER: No, it's a two-year production run and it goes until the NAMM show
in January 2001, and it has been going eighteen months, now.
Q: Are there a certain number of them that are being manufactured, or is
it all on the time line?
ROGER: It's a time line. It's a two-year run. They wanted to do like
fifty, and we said, well, let's see what happens in two years.
Q: I noticed that you are endorsing Pyramid Strings. Are they an old
guitar string company, or are they a new company that makes vintage-style
strings?
ROGER: I think it's an old company, an old German company. And they've
been making strings like that for many years, as far as I know. They are
simply the best strings I've ever played. They are like the old
Rickenbacker strings used to be, when they were hand-made in Germany. It's
the same technique; it's a high quality, nickel, flat-wound string.
Q: There's a comment on your web site about a touring Byrds band that has
no original members. Does that cause any legal problems with the use of
the band name?
ROGER: No, we lost the legal rights to the band name about five years ago,
when we sued Michael Clarke‘s band, and the judge favored him because he
was using it and we weren't. Then he (Michael Clarke) died and left it to
somebody. I don't know who has got it now, but they have the legal name .
. . which is, you know, stupid, but that's the way it is. . .
Q: Here's kind of a tired question, but I think everybody always has to
ask: Do you foresee any reunions with any of the nostalgic cast of
characters?
ROGER: No. I don't see doing any albums or tours with them. Vanity Fair
magazine wants to do a photo shoot in late August, and we might get
together to do that.
Q: I see that you are touring often with a trio. Does your set list differ
a lot from your solo shows?
ROGER: Not too much. I do some of the stuff from the Folk Den, and some of
the Byrds hits that people wanna hear. It's just fuller with the harmonies
and everything. But I'm only doing that for a short time. That was just
like a little run for the summer. I wanted to take a bus out and do a bus
tour!
Q: Yeah, it looks like you've had a pretty busy summer so far.
ROGER: Yeah, it's been busier than I expected. I was hoping to have the
time to just sit home and edit all the recordings I've done, but all these
dates have popped up.
Q: Roger, you've long been known as a fan of technology, often being one
of the first in line to utilize new toys. I was wondering if you've ever
been involved in the actual development of anything?
ROGER: Well, I did kind of invent something, but it was one of those
things that was hard to market at the time. You know those little
amplifiers that you plug into and you can tune up back stage. I made one
of those back in ‘65, and I tried to get it marketed, but it was too
difficult to go through all that . . . you know, I didn't have the right
contacts. It was like a Pignose kind of thing. I did that before anybody
else.
Q: Roger, thanks very much for speaking with me today!
ROGER: I love talking about my MP3 stuff.
Q: Shall I send you the URL for that EMI news release regarding their
downloadable albums?
ROGER: Oh yeah, do that. That's kind of interesting. But I'm really not a
fan of water-mark protected MP3s. I kind of like the wild and wooly
Internet the way it is.
For more information about Roger McGuinn, go to www.mcguinn.com for tour
dates, discography, news, and MP3.
Roger McGuinn's MP3 site is at www.mp3.com/mcguinn
The Courtney Love article that Roger quotes from is located at
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2000/06/14/love/index.html
Roger McGuinn's Senate testimony is located at
http://judiciary.senate.gov/7112000_rm.htm
Interview IndexGuitarSam eZine
Copyright © 2000 Stable Management Corporation...All Rights Reserved
► Home