He’s just trolling, leave him… I’ve arrived at the point where I read his posts as if they were very sarcastic, and then his posts actually become funny. Maybe you should try that too
@Hallucinogen:
Hey man, I just wanted to have my 2Cents. I love shpongle and your previous work, but seeing you whine about how much money twisted has in the bank account really pissed me off. Okay, maybe my music isn’t as great as yours and I definately wasn’t “inb4” the internet, but I tried my hardest, formed soundsystems with friends, tried producing limited batches of home pressed CD’s and selling those at
Shpongle and younger brother are both top artists in my last.fm profile and every time someone asks me what my favorite artists are, I say Shpongle/Younger brother. They share a #1 spot for best artist ever together with Tool.
The first post in this thread made me wonder how much of a dick you are if you post a review of the album a few weeks before the release. Auch… In these days you cannot prevent a prerelease in the illegal circuit it seems. I have to be honest here: Without piracy I would never even have heard about shpongle or even Infected mushroom (the first, now rediculous, artist that sparked my search for psy). I was very ashamed when I read Simons reply. Damn, that must have hurt… I always said I did not have enough money to buy original cd’s, but I realised I now had, and that I cannot take myself seriously if I keep ripping cd’s and call those artists ‘the greatest guys in the world’. Lets Show Devotion I thought I bought 4 cd’s and I will give them as presents to friends.
tl;dr I actually fell for Simons crying and bought some cd’s.
Now come to the Netherlands for a show, I really hope so!
So some fucker has released the album on the internet already…. thanks a lot, whoever it was… Maybe twisted will still recoup, maybe not… all i know is that we are teetering on bankruptcy, and are seeking deals elsewhere…. the 12 loyal fans on this forum are not enough to sustain a record label….
I’d like to quote Simon here, because people keep saying he was ‘crying’ to his fans. This looks like anger to me. Anger, because the CD was given to a ‘trusted’ acquaintance, who may have been aware of the circumstance, and chucked it online regardless.
If any of you, who thought this was ‘crying’ to the fans, gave a promo to someone ‘trusted’ and then found they’d stuck it out there, I’m sure you’d be pretty pissed off too. Right?
I’m glad it seems that the quality wasn’t all that great. I didn’t even know there was a torrent floating out there, so I don’t know how degraded it sounds. But I’ve got pretty good ears and the album itself sounds crystal-clear to me!
This is a vote for active support of the label we love.
I’m wondering what effect the p2p and torrent technologies have on the sales of Twisted Records in total. Personally, if it wasn’t for free downloading, I probably wouldn’t have heard the music at all (I live in a pretty isolated place, not considering the internet). And then of course I wouldn’t have bought all the releases I now enjoy almost every day. I know that most of the crowd don’t buy anything, although they love the music. I’ve introduced Shpongle, Ott, Hallucinogen, Prometheus and Younger Brother to all my friends and they seem to love their efforts. We went to the Roundhouse last year and to the Ozora festival this summer, and had a blast. All the same, none of my friends have bought any records, being content with the quality of their downloaded files.
Now, new information is at hand, information that changes everything. It was good of Simon Posford to tell us about the current economic situation of Twisted (I never imagined it was that bad, in my mind Twisted always was a hugely successful, albeit small and independent label). I shall put an effort into making my friends buy Twisted releases. Please, everyone, do the same with your friends. Every little bit helps, as the old woman said when she pissed in the sea…
Alot of people talk about a post-file sharing business plan. I’m curious of how you could actually do this.
What most people care about is the music. The problem is if the music itself is free do you really think that a Shongle video game or Shpongle wallpaper are going to pay the band’s expenses? I give alot more of a shit that Shpongle is putting out a new album than if they sold branded cup holders.
Where I am not seeing the business model not working here is basic economics: The music takes time and money to make, but people aren’t paying for it. For most of us these days (superstar dj’s aside) making music is generally a losing investment. Money for software,hardware, hard drives, effects processors/plugins, mic preamps, etc. Then you can expect maybe a hundred or so for a show every few weeks. Meanwhile, you work another job to pay the rent. Where does this pay off?
I’ve been hearing of artists these days giving up on music as a career and instead making free offerings from time to time and asking for donations.(Bluetech for ex) Many artists would probably be better off as a street performers.
So if the music doesn’t directly make the money, let us think about the consequences of this: To make money on peripheral items entails investing LESS in the music and music production. I find it ironic people blaming Twisted for pulling the stops on albums and concerts, and then ask for more quality recordings and shows.
If Twisted Records’ primary focus was something other than the music, something which according to this new business model would be necessary for profit, would we be ok with fewer, more rushed and low budget releases, and more stripped down live shows?
Would fans feel that the time and money for a Shpongle lunchbox or whatever was worth skimping on the recordings and concert production? Major labels made this transitions long ago, bastardizing and commercializing the art until all you have left are model tv/film crossover artists with clothing lines gracing generic auto-tuned radio garbage tracks. That is what happens when the music ceases to matter and becomes a means to sell other things.
Shpongle and younger brother are both top artists in my last.fm profile and every time someone asks me what my favorite artists are, I say Shpongle/Younger brother. They share a #1 spot for best artist ever together with Tool.
Thanks! I get so hung up listening to I-gadgets all the time, I had forgotten about last Fm, brill, thanks. My prof
I have to pipe in and say that I buy tracks all of the time off of Beatport and Amazon. If this were an option I would be all over it for this newest record. I purchase tracks all over the board (from Drum and Bass to Tech-house) so websites that offer a la carte seem to be a great way of dealing with this type of situation. I’m not too concerned with the artwork really so side-stepping that is fine with me. As far as revenue, I think something like this would only be a second avenue without any competition. Plus it would give the music a totally different avenue for promotion.
I’m sorry to hear about the label having a tough time. I ran a label that went belly up recently so I can definitely sympathize.
I agree that branching out into other avenues would be a good idea….Beatport for sure. I know lots of people who have become accustomed to dropping obscene monetary sums on that website just as they would in record shops back in the day. So get on there Simon!
And I’ve gone ahead and bought the album as well, and am encouraging others to do so. I actually also decided to purchase all the other albums I’ve downloaded off of soulseek that are on Twisted’s label, some of which I didn’t even know were from Twisted! (U-Turn by Koxbox in particular…whoof what a killer album that one is.)
So yeah, rah rah rah! Hopefully this will have at least a small ripple effect as well…support artists! Now is the time to put your money where your mouth is and support artists directly, and subvert the corporate machine. Show the world at large that you’d rather spend your hard earned cash on genuinely quality music rather than the latest Top40 single.
I’d like to quote Simon here, because people keep saying he was ‘crying’ to his fans. This looks like anger to me. Anger, because the CD was given to a ‘trusted’ acquaintance, who may have been aware of the circumstance, and chucked it online regardless.
If any of you, who thought this was ‘crying’ to the fans, gave a promo to someone ‘trusted’ and then found they’d stuck it out there, I’m sure you’d be pretty pissed off too. Right?
Oh it’s definitely crying. He’s angry, impotent, and now whining about it on the internet.
I bought 4 cd’s and I will give them as presents to friends. 
