At age 35, Stone Sour and Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor is old enough to long for the days when the liner notes of an album where like the holy grail to music fans. Like him, I remember studying their contents for hours and reading through the acknowledgements section. It's interesting to me though, because I recall always having an affinity for those that contained the song lyrics and being frustrated when artists chose not to include them.
I mean, this really wasn't all that long ago when the only place, beyond tablature books, to find the words to your favorite songs was in that little booklet. To gain access to them, you had to buy the album and hope that they were included.
Now, lyrics are ubiquitous. Rather being connected to the artist and the artwork supplied with the album—that you held in your hand and looked though as you listened to the album—lyrics are now freed from the constraints of yesteryear.
This is, of course, a great thing. But lyrics, much like many of the other aspects surrounding the mythology and identity systems of artists have become disconnected from their origins and fragmented throughout the social web.
Though Corey is right to be optimistic about the future of the record industry, he probably won't be signing ten million copies of his latest album anytime soon.
As well, it would be interesting to get his perspective on the whole “rock is dead" debate and hear him adamantly say that it may not matter what the rock charts say, because his tribe and subsequent culture is still thriving. Here's what he had to say about albums and the future of the record industry:
The way we (Stone Sour) looked at Audio Secrecy was, “What if this is the last album to ever get released by a band? What would you want to do with it?" Because in this era of zip drives and memory sticks, there's no guarantee you'll be able to release another physical album...
I can remember waiting in line to buy Iron Maiden and Metallica tapes and I would study the liner notes. I would read the names of the people they thanked or the little anecdotes and just wonder what they were thinking when they added that. I want to keep that going. I refuse to think that the record industry is dead because I've signed enough copies of my albums to know that people still buy them. (Read the rest.)
I mean, this really wasn't all that long ago when the only place, beyond tablature books, to find the words to your favorite songs was in that little booklet. To gain access to them, you had to buy the album and hope that they were included.
Now, lyrics are ubiquitous. Rather being connected to the artist and the artwork supplied with the album—that you held in your hand and looked though as you listened to the album—lyrics are now freed from the constraints of yesteryear.
This is, of course, a great thing. But lyrics, much like many of the other aspects surrounding the mythology and identity systems of artists have become disconnected from their origins and fragmented throughout the social web.
Though Corey is right to be optimistic about the future of the record industry, he probably won't be signing ten million copies of his latest album anytime soon.
As well, it would be interesting to get his perspective on the whole “rock is dead" debate and hear him adamantly say that it may not matter what the rock charts say, because his tribe and subsequent culture is still thriving. Here's what he had to say about albums and the future of the record industry:
The way we (Stone Sour) looked at Audio Secrecy was, “What if this is the last album to ever get released by a band? What would you want to do with it?" Because in this era of zip drives and memory sticks, there's no guarantee you'll be able to release another physical album...
I can remember waiting in line to buy Iron Maiden and Metallica tapes and I would study the liner notes. I would read the names of the people they thanked or the little anecdotes and just wonder what they were thinking when they added that. I want to keep that going. I refuse to think that the record industry is dead because I've signed enough copies of my albums to know that people still buy them. (Read the rest.)
