Dear RAc, I was trying to make a point at my previous post that you either fail to understand or just don't think important enough. I am glad though that you mention the movie DIVA, because it is one of my favorite movies, and I also paid attention on the aspect you mention.
But let me point it out once again. Even though in an absolute world your logic would really stand solid and the law follows suit in this, we are living in a world where there is not even one example of such behavior and action you so passionately defend. I don't believe that your opinion has to do with law abidance, but merely the moral dimension, so tell me about this : When an artist dies the recipients of his fortune sell every little scrap of work (paintings, drawings, photographs, recordings, shit in tin etc) proclaiming it is a hidden aspect of the artist's genius or whatever. Most probably things that would be destroyed by the artist if death was not sudden, or things that for the artist had great emotional value, but not artistic. These works are made public and legal, without the consent of the artist. Of course you can say that MK is still alive, but I dare you to deny that you have enjoyed some of the post humus works that were released (see: Hendrix, Doors, Janis Joplin, Marvin Gaye, Buddy Holly and numerous others) .
Should we consider all these works garbage and ignore them? Or maybe we should place them in the historical context and use them as a view of a "work in progress" / documentary, in order to discover the hidden aspects of a finished work we all love.
And do you think that apart certain examples (Van Gogh) the world would really pay attention to such works from an unknown artist? No it will always be from artists with solid reputation, whose works already sell very well and very high. And even in these cases how many people would even care? Only the die hard fans.
Now take MK, whose records' sales are heavily reduced since his DS heyday. How many die hard fans who really love and care for his works would look for such bootlegs? 300-500 worldwide? They are the real preservers of his legacy, living historians with a knowledge of the artist and his recordings, that some times is better that the artist has. And most of all THEY, and by they I include myself, so WE, admire the artist's his official work and can clearly separate the unofficially released work, respect the artist and his decisions, evaluate the extra work in context with the official one , put it in perspective and preserve it in time. Again I mention that we are talking about 300-500 people worldwide! I would consider myself lucky if I had such a following, taking good care of the work that I don't officially release(I am a photographer and I have more work unreleased than released) That said, your point still stands since you believe it so strongly.
Oh and Diva! I think (if I remember correctly) that a record company was involved with the release. And the problem wasn't so much the recording itself, but the intension of a well known company to release it worldwide. Of course if there was no recording, there wouldn't be any talk about releasing it. But, of course the whole point of the artist in Diva, was the sense of her performance which should have been unique and not reproduced ad infinitum. A point that if you care to look at my previous posts at other threads, I advocate but not very passionately, and is derived from Christopher Small 's book.
http://www.amazon.com/Music-Society-Education-Culture/dp/0819563072/ref=la_B001KI0UZQ_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1358708978&sr=1-3It mostly has to do with the uniqness of the experience from a preformance and how that changed with RECORDED music. Not official and unofficial but recorded music. So we can create a fixional moral issue, when in fact the whole music industry has destroyed the very sense you describe by selling tracks individually, by pricing heavily the deluxe editions for 3 or five extra songs and other schemes (additional songs in Amazon, itunes etc) . And the artist has no control whatsoever in this. Also, the hudreds of live recordings of MK can only be appreciated by very few people as a total number. I don't even count myself in these people, even though I try to find them and collect them . But, exactly because I can only spare time to listen to such concerts only once or twice, I find that I am closer to the original idea of music, which is a unique EXPERIENCE, and thus can not be repeated twice. (the point of Chris Small) Then it is more of a logical procedure, that gives you the pleasure, by each repeated play. The pleasant feeling of recognising and being able to follow with your mind. And of course for many of us, listening to these recordings is the only way to hear him live, since he rearly comes over.
And by writing this, I don't diminish the validity of your points, but I don't believe that it has to do with personal interest. Especially when you name it COLLECTING. It is a below the belt punch to most of us here, that don't to it for the sake of collecting, but listen to them. You have to consider that my life doesn't revolve around MK or any other artist. That it is only for pleasure and as such trivial and I can live without it. On the other hand the artist and his work has more to gain by fans like us, rather than lose, and of course the respect you claim we don't have, is simply a logical leap assumption.
And two other points in your mail: I would want to collect even things he wouldn't approve. And I would carry that knowledge when I listen to them and try to understand why. That is the exact meaning of fan. And if it is done post humus and in the context of a university it would be the meaning of scholar. It has nothing to do with the artist as a person but the artist as an image-mainly created through his works, since we don't know him personally. So, respect the artist, and respect every piece of work he has done good or bad, official or unofficial. That is the biggest compliment ever. Disrespect? I don't think so.
If you were an artist you would really not care a bit about these issues, you would only be intrested in creating new things and broadening your horizons.
If you were big, successful and rich, but a real artist you would even understand the nature of bootlegs and their huge part in the creation of music history and legends (have you ever found bootleg recordings by artists lost in time?) and accept their existance and many times even allow it (MK and Grateful dead being examples).
On another dimension of the topic, that you rightly avoid mentioning, I remember a nice story told by Robert Plant, when visiting Turkey. They entered a music shop with Jimmy Page and they came across dozens of bootleg records, both live and counterfeit, and Page outraged, just took them and left the shop without paying, saying something like : " since I don't get paid for my work when these are sold, I am taking them without paying, too". Plant was left behind, paid for the records, trying to justify (the just to my opinion) Page's attitude. Plant understood and accepted the simple truth that only commercial artists are bootleged, and usually these artists do not need the money and these bootlegs are creating the extra edge that actually helps the artists sell more officially.
Metallica and Dr.Dre went ahead with the Napster lawsuit, thinking that their diving sales were mainly due to the illegal downloading, when actually they were playing the game of their record companies, since they were bound to sell less because their recorded works at the time were far inferior, the record companies were over pricing the CDs for far too long, and they actually had not even considered the possibility of selling online at the time. !0 years after and itunes was selling like crazy, selling more individual tracks than whole records and turning a losing battle into a money maker. The result is that the new generation, think of music as a disposable way to be entertained. This is the end of music as we know it. So fans like us, are the relics of an older generation and what goes with it.
Sorry for the long post, since this is not live and a real dialogue, but rather two monologues in a row, I try to cover as many points as possible.
