mellencamp

John Mellencamp: Congress must target search engines

John Mellencamp, the rock musician turned political activist who jointly launched the Farm Aid concert series, has found a new cause: attacking Internet copyright law.

Mellencamp says that U.S. copyright law should be rewritten to compel Google and other search engines to police Web pages they index -- that number in the billions -- and delete links to infringing Web sites.

The musician, once known as John Cougar Mellencamp, wrote in an op-ed yesterday that:

What's happening is your search engine leads you to an illegal downloading site where you can download -- you name the artist -- … Read more

Music tech guru says Web is not the enemy

The Internet is a killer of art--or at least that's how a couple of former rock 'n' roll gods see it.

John Mellencamp, known for such '80s hits as "Jack and Diane" and "Hurts So Good," last week said the Web is the most dangerous creation since the atomic bomb. Stevie Nicks, the Fleetwood Mac songstress, concluded in an interview this week that the "Internet has destroyed rock."

Jac Holzman, the man who discovered The Doors, founded Elektra Records, and nudged the big recording companies into adopting the compact disc, considers the Web … Read more

Top 10 must-have CDs, part 1

What follows is a list of my favorite sounding CDs of late, in no particular order. My preference is for realistic-sounding recordings, recordings that allow the band to sound "live." And sure, I like lots of recordings that are heavily processed, but I wouldn't by any stretch use them to "test" the naturalness of a speaker.

Here's the first half of the top 10 CDs; the second half will appear in the next Audiophiliac.

Elvis Costello, "Secret, Profane & Sugarcane"

I love Costello, especially his first five albums, and this new one, produced by T-Bone Burnett, is a winner. Acoustic and country influences predominate, and Costello's voice is in great shape. The sound is free of digital grit and glare, so instruments and voices sound like themselves. The tunes are all good; there's not a weak one in the bunch.

Mark Olson & Gary Louris, "Ready For The Flood"

Mark Olson & Gary Louris of Jayhawks fame joined forces to make this gorgeous sounding album. The two voices' harmonies are something to hear, and maybe it's just me, but there's echoes of the Everly Brothers and maybe Simon & Garfunkel in there. "Doves And Stones" is the standout track, but the album's pretty good from start to finish.

Dan Auerbach, "Keep It Hid"

Have you heard Auerbach's band, The Black Keys? Anyway, his solo CD presents more varied music than the Keys' hard-core blues-based blasts. Check out the deep bass pounding through "Heartbroken, In Disrepair." Granted, Keep It Hid isn't exactly an audiophile disc, but it sounds great cranked to "11."… Read more

Mellencamp mourns the death of the record biz

Don't take my word for it that the major labels and the system that propped them up for so many years are dead. John Mellencamp, who sang a string of rock hits back in the 1980s and '90s, thinks the business is dead as well. In an articulate and passionate essay on the Huffington Post, he argues that the long slide started well before the rise of file sharing, back to when the business started relying on SoundScan and Broadcast Data Systems (BDS).

With SoundScan, instead of relying on surveys from record stores, the labels could see exactly how … Read more

Buzz Out Loud 938: Dork day afternoon

Ron Richards from iFanboy joins us as we finish today's show with a discussion of "geek" vs. "nerd" and decide "dork" is the next wave. We also talk about a cow that poops money, also known as Jonathan Coulton's business model. And we get mad at AT&T.

Listen now: Download today's podcast EPISODE 938

AT&T working with RIAA http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10203799-93.html

How it works for a real musician http://www.jonathancoulton.com/2009/03/24/payday/

John Mellencamp: Back In The Good Old Days… … Read more