Clear some kiosk space at DC9,Warehouse,Iota,Black Cat

[edbert]

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/040429/music_on_a_stick_3.html
 
 New Device Allows Recording at Concerts
 Thursday April 29, 8:36 am ET
 By Lukas I. Alpert, Associated Press Writer
 New Technology Allows Recording to Your Keychain Right After Concert Ends
 
 NEW YORK (AP) -- Oh, how far we've come from the 78, the 45, even the CD.
 Now, minutes after your favorite band sounds its last note on stage, you
 can load a live recording of the concert onto a cigarette-lighter-sized
 hard drive
 
 Take it home, toss the digital files onto your computer and then e-mail it
 to all your friends with the message, "Dude! These guys are awesome!"
 
 On May 21, new digital kiosks offering the tiny drives will be installed at
 Maxwell's, a small indie-rock club in Hoboken, N.J. At $10 a pop for the
 recording, and $20 for the reusable, keychain drive, let the downloading
 begin.
 
 "This is a tool that allows fans to take home and share some of the best
 independent music from small live venues around the country," said Daniel
 Stein, CEO of Dimensional Associates, a private equity firm that owns
 eMusic Live, which created the machines, as well as eMusic, a music
 file-sharing Web site, and The Orchard, a marketing firm for independent
 labels.
 
 For Scott Ambrose Reilly, president of eMusic Live, the idea is to let fans
 have a legal copy of a live show, which gives smaller artists and their
 labels creative control over the quality of the recording and a commercial
 stake in its distribution.
 
 The understanding is also that it is not a one-time recording. Fans can
 share the files with their friends, providing free word-of-mouth publicity
 for smaller bands.
 
 For eMusic Live, the devices are just the next step for a service that it
 and other competitors already provide: burning CDs of live performances
 right after a show ends.
 
 "What we were seeing is that a large number of people were taking their CDs
 home and ripping them to MP3s, so we thought it would benefit music fans to
 eliminate that middle step," Reilly said.
 
 The technology is quite simple: The music fan goes up to the touch-screen
 kiosk after the show and buys the keychain drive with a credit card from a
 dispenser alongside the screen. Once that's done, the miniature drive is
 inserted into a slot in the kiosk, and the recording -- stored as MP3 files
 -- is loaded onto the device's 128-megabyte hard drive. That is enough
 space for 110 minutes of music.
 
 A receipt for the transaction is sent to the concertgoer's e-mail address.
 
 "I can remember when I started the debate was whether the 45 or 33 would be
 more successful," said Richard Gottehrer, author of hits like "My
 Boyfriend's Back," and "I Want Candy," and chairman of The Orchard. "Now
 the Napsters of the world are yesterday's news and this is the newer,
 legal, next step."
 
 Whether the technology will take off remains to be seen. But its creators
 are optimistic and hope to roll the machines into venues around the country
 soon.
 
 "Admittedly this won't be for everyone," Reilly said. "But since the
 direction of music is increasingly going digital, I don't see why this
 wouldn't find its niche."
 
 At a demo for the device at a sound studio in Manhattan on Tuesday, a New
 York-based band, Elysian Fields, performed three songs, which were quickly
 loaded onto the "pen drives" afterward.
 
 Later, at home, the device was inserted into the USB port of a laptop
 computer and voila! singer Jennifer Charles' smoky, lilting lyrics and Oren
 Bloedow's reverbed-out, brooding guitar lines filled the living room.
 
 Charles called the new technology "a beautiful thing."
 
 "I'm very excited to be a part of this incredible and sexy technology," she
 said between songs. "It makes us feel very James Bond. You can have your
 little pens -- wow, beam me up Scotty."
 
 On the net:
 eMusic Live: http://www.emusiclive.com

[Bags]

I tend to think DC is usually on the back end of these advancements, but we'll see....
 
 May 2, 2004
 
  Rock's Best New Souvenir
 By CHRIS NELSON
 The New York Times
 
 VANCOUVER, British Columbia
 
 THE Pixies, the critically lauded alternative pop pioneers, are currently performing on a much-anticipated reunion tour. And this time, a mere hour after the final notes of each concert, fans can listen to the same performance all over again, thanks to a new distribution strategy that allows concertgoers to buy recordings of the event â?? legal, band-sanctioned versions â?? on the spot.
 
 For most of rock history, fans who wanted to hear concerts had two choices. They could record or obtain bootlegs, which involved poor sound, high prices and questionable legality. Or they could wait months after a tour's end to buy a record that supposedly offered a band's best performances. These "live" discs were often not full recordings of actual tour dates; instead, they presented a kind of dream concert, compiling cuts from various stops throughout a tour. Prince's "One Nite Alone â?? Live!" (2002), for instance, was actually cobbled together from nine nights of shows. What's more, many live albums have been doctored in the studio to fix bum vocals or botched solos.
 
 In the last several years, the choices have started to expand, as groups like Pearl Jam, Metallica and Phish â?? all of which have long allowed concertgoers to tape-record their shows â?? have begun selling CD's or downloadable song files of almost every gig they play. Customers typically receive recordings in a matter of hours for downloads, or in days for CD's.
 
 But now, fans can get the music even faster. On-the-fly CD recording, or burning, brings the promise of a new kind of concert album: one that is clean, legal, instantaneous and marketed as a concert souvenir, along with T-shirts and baseball caps.
 
 A New York company called DiscLive is producing the Pixies' two-CD sets, which come in foil-stamped, numbered cardboard CD cases. Two hundred burners housed in a tractor trailer outside the venue create 1,000 copies for each show. Half are sold online before the concert for $22 and picked up after the show; half are sold at the venue for $25. DiscLive has also produced discs for the reunited Doors, Billy Idol and others. All of the Pixies pre-show orders have sold out. Another company called eMusiclive recently announced it would soon allow fans to download shows immediately from kiosks in clubs onto portable disk drives.
 
 Aside from convenience, the main allure of on-the-spot concert CD's is their authenticity. Whatever happens in range of the microphones makes the disc, from groupie screams to transcendent improvisations to crash-and-burn fiascoes.
 
 "Part of the beauty of this is you never know what's going to be on the disc," said Sami Valkonen, the president of DiscLive. "It's a documentary of the night, so whatever happens, happens."
 
 Todd Connell, 31, who attended the Pixies show in Vancouver, British Columbia, on April 22, said that he bought the CD as a memento of the concert he attended. "That's the main thing: the connection to the actual disc you're getting," he said. "I wouldn't be interested in tomorrow night's CD."
 
 Steve Arrowood, 30, flew in from San Diego for two Pixies performances in Vancouver. He said he fell asleep the night of the show listening to the concert CD and has played it constantly since. "All the other great concerts I've ever been to turn into these untouchable experiences in my memory, where there is no live recording and so anything I remember is right about them, which is always positive," he said. "I'm just making stuff up for all I know."
 
 DiscLive is marketing the live CD's as collectibles, and already they have become highly prized. Trevor Derrick, a 35-year-old from Vancouver, bought two copies of the CD of the April 22 show. He said he planned to keep one and sell the other on eBay, hoping to recoup what he spent on his ticket, a T-shirt, the CD and his bar tab. If he gets the $100 some of the live CD's from the tour have commanded online, he may succeed.