Metallica, The Pirate Bay interview row
p2pnet news view Freedom | P2P:- “If this thing leaks all over the world today or tomorrow, happy days. It’s 2008 and it’s part of how it is these days.”
That’s Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich on San Francisco radio station Live 105 on the news Death Magnetic, officially released on September 12, “was posted on the internet after reportedly being sold in a French shop,” said the BBC.
Ulrich said that?
He did, and he went on, “It’s 2008 and it’s part of how it is these days.”
It is indeed. But it’s no thanks to Metallica, one of the first major bands, if not the first major band, to attack P2P file sharing with a lawsuit.
But perhaps it shouldn’t come as a surprise. Ulrich did, after all, recently “thank” fans in an unctuous YouTube video.
Now, Metallica owner Universal Music cancelled the band’s interview with the Swedish newspaper Sydsvenskan last week, “after one of the paper’s writers admitted in his review of Metallica’s new album that he illegally downloaded an alternate version of the CD via the Internet,” said Blabbermouth yesterday, continuing »»»
Speaking to Dagens Media about the review and Universal’s decision to cancel Sydsvenskan’s scheduled interview with METALLICA, Universal Music Sweden president Per Sundin stated, “The reviewer is referring to a BitTorrent where someone has altered the original songs. The reviewer explains exactly where one should go in order to download the file that totally infringes on a copyright. It’s not only an illegal file, but an altered file. The reviewer also writes that this is how the album should have sounded.”
He continued, “File-sharing of music is illegal. Period. There’s nothing to discuss. That fact that Sydsvenskan has a writer that has downloaded this music illegally and then makes mention of an illegal site in his review is totally unacceptable to us.”
Sundin added that Universal Music has not yet determined what impact this incident will have on the label’s relationship with Sydsvenskan.
“We live in symbiosis with each other and we send them our artists’ record for free for review,” he explained. “But if they download the records illegally instead, then there’s no point in doing that.”
Meanwhile, the “enterprising young audio engineer” who claimed responsibility for the edited version of “Death Magnetic” e-mailed the MetalSucks web site on Thursday, September 11 and explained that “basically, I just wanted a new album by METALLICA that I could listen to without getting irritated by some lame lyrics or ploddy riffs that go nowhere for three minutes before turning into something cool. The original version of ‘Death Magnetic’ is the best thing that they’ve done since ‘…And Justice For All’, but it ain’t great. My version is great.”
Here’s part of what MetalSucks had to say on Saturday »»»
It was a mostly Metallica week here at the MS Mansion, but it turns out that some other stuff happened too. In summary:
- We re-christened the site MetallicaSucks.net for a day — all of our writers each reviewed Death Magnetic to varying praise (or lack thereof).
- Lars Ulrich gave us tips for appearing taller than you really are ……..
All the fuss will, of course, engender even more free publicity for the band. 
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BBC – Album leak welcomed by Metallica, September 4, 2008
unctuous YouTube video – p2pnet virus update (with Lars Ulrich ), September 11, 2008
Blabbermouth - METALLICA Interview Cancelled Over Controversial ‘Death Magnetic’ Review, September 14, 2008
MetalSucks - In which Metallica sucked, or didn’t, September 13, 2008
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September 15th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
I actually bought a copy of Death Magnetic. Sounds good so far (I’m listening to it right now)– but the packaging is crap. The die-cut cover actually eats into the printed lyrics, and the front clear plastic thing with the title printed on it is glued to the shrinkwrap and came right off. Also they’re not using a proper CD jewel case probably due to “eco-concerns”.
But hey, it was $8.99! If it were $16.99 I might have had second thoughts.
September 15th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
I wouldn’t buy any Metallica album for any price, even if it included lyrics, concert footage or pictures of Ulrich’s nads!
September 15th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
METALLICA are shit. don’t want their music for free either.
September 15th, 2008 at 11:16 pm
The thing that really bothers me about Metallica isn’t even that they got pissed about Napster (on a visceral level, as a musician myself, I understand how they could have believed they were “losing control” over their music. (Disregarding, of course, that signing with a “major label” automatically means that they’d forfeited just about all forms of creative control in exchange for — theoretically — bigger distribution, but that’s another issue which I won’t get into, in the interests of preventing any more “flamage”.)
So, yeah, I can see how Lars could have been puzzled and dismayed by Napster. But the thing of it is, prior to signing with a major label, they were extremely “taper-friendly”, encouraging fans not only to record their shows but — more importantly — to TRADE (”share”, you might even say) those tapes around. Hell, half of the fanbase of Metallica came from people turning other people ONTO them via mixtapes and bootlegs and such.
Why is this important? Well, let’s be honest: if you’ve built your entire fanbase on a particular set of principles and then suddenly decide to get all pissy when those same principles are put into practice on a larger scale, you’re gonna lose at least a sizeable chunk of your fans.
Add the fact that “St. Anger” was total crap, and you have Metallica in total free-fall.
Let’s not forget that what the actions Lars is “thanking” Youtubers for are the exact same actions which would otherwise get them slapped with “cease and desist” threats and/or having their accounts revoked. So, this whole “Do your own metallica covers” deal on Youtube rings a little bit hollow to a lot of people.
(Add to that the fact that Lars didn’t even really seem to know what they’re Youtube channel was called, but by his own admission “had been told” what it’s name was, and the thing looks like what it is: an attempt to get back into the good graces of the very same “Internet Culture” they shit on back in 2000.
Another really weird wrinkle in Metallica’s downright schizophrenic approach to this stuff is — as I mentioned before — their response to the parody/cover-band “Beatallica”, after they were slapped with “Cease and desist” threats. Lars especially leapt to that group’s defense, so it’s pretty weird all the way around.
(And no, I’m not a “hater” — “justice” was — and is — one of my favorite albums of all time. But you can’t shit all over your fanbase and then expect to just “walk it off” with a “do your own cover-version” contest.
September 16th, 2008 at 11:55 am
This album is a welcome return to a more “pre-1990″ sound. It seriously rocks. Thank you, Rick Rubin!
Yeah, they are not what they were in 1986, but no one good ever is. That’s the reason that all these artists that died before their time are so popular now. They never had the chance to grow away from what their fans loved about them initially.
September 16th, 2008 at 2:40 pm
Oh yeah, don’t get me wrong here: I truly respect the desire for artists to grow and try new stuff — look at Johnny Cash for example. Dunno about you, but I personally think he was a musical genius, and prefer HIS version of “hurt” to the Trent Reznor one…
What I DON’T respect is an act who started out with an explicity pro-”bootleg” stance when they were “on the way up”, turned a 180 and got all aggressive during their “major label” heyday, and, now that they’re arguably on the way down — not out, by any means, but way less trendy than, say, Slipknot — NOW they come out with a Youtube channel explicitly encouraging people to engage in “public performance” of their works. Admittedly it’s “authorized” public performance, but still…..
September 17th, 2008 at 3:47 am
So if a reporter from Canada downloaded the cd would they get pissed seeing it is still considered legal to download music here.
September 18th, 2008 at 10:02 am
Thank you, Henry Emrich.
How wonderful to read an intelligent, mature, and clear-headed opinion on this topic, instead of “Metallica sucks cuz of Napster”.