“Startnakedtruth
Confession of a Rock Concert Bootlegger” is a seven and a half
thousand word blogspot post written by a rock concert bootlegger. It
provides an insight into the motivation behind bootlegging, the move
from concert goer to trading, producing and selling, the clashes with
security guards and fans about bootlegging and eventually the threat
of legal action by musicians and artists. He concludes that
technology made taping and trading eventually obsolete.
“My name
is Mad Raving and I had been collecting bootleg video tapes for a
long time as hobby (since the late 80's). Most of these were
purchased at record/video shows (usually held in malls) or via mail
purchase from a bootleg seller advertising in Goldmine magazine - the
ultimate magazine for ads involving old time records but also audio
and video bootlegs. Soon we would both get involved in trading copies
of our vhs tapes for other collectors live concert vhs tapes. I would
eventually get involved in trading on my own as my brother was now
supporting a family by the mid and late 90's….
(NOTE:
BOOTLEG VIDEO TAPERS would be simply known in the bootleg world as
"Filmers" or "Bootleg Filmers".I will use the
term FILMERS more often in this story.)
My brother
and I were big concert goers from as long as I could remember. It's
easy to remember our first concert since it was The Who in Orlando on
November 27th,1982. Since then it has been a passion. Right from
waiting on the lines early in the morning to purchase the tickets, to
the pre-concert tailgate parties, and then the show itself. For
myself, the passion would remain up til 1998, but it would be for a
different reason….
I met a guy
named Bill at a Jefferson Starship concert on a Sunday afternoon at
Gulfstream Park in Hallandale,Florida (spring 1998) while he was
standing to the right of the sound desk and video taping the concert
on a tripod. He told me he was given permission by the band's manager
about 30 minutes before show time. But he told me that was rare, that
most of the time he had to hide the camcorder with a shirt and sneak
(stealth) tape a show. He told me he had the tripod in his car, and
once he was given the permission, he went back to get it. But in most
cases in the future for myself, if you used a tripod in a sitting
down situation inside an arena, a minitripod was what you would use.
Also known as a lap pod. This was used for sneak/stealth/bootleg
filming….
He gave me
some tips on how to get started. But one thing he was adamant about
was that he only traded copies of his master video tapes. He was big
against selling them. At this point I was only interested in the
trading aspect of it anyway. We both agreed to start a website called
http://www.southfloridatapers.com/
for bootleg filmers locally to
trade copies of our master tapes with each other. I spent some time
at his home with his wife and we became good friends. I would also
get involved in other national and international message boards and
forums where bootleg video tapers (known as "Filmers")
would discuss and advertise their own filmed shows for sale. I was
told I could make some good money. At this point I had declined the
notion of doing such a thing. First of all, I was a bit wary of the
risks involved. I was also afraid to betray my new friend Bill…
I saw no
sign of him on the national bootleg filmer forums and started to
interact in conversations via these message boards and in doing so,
learned a lot about what type of camcorder was the ultimate type for
stealth filming. What type of mic,tapes,batteries,etc. There were
tips on the best way to sneak the camcorder and the additional
equipment into the venues. I would eventually learn my own methods to
get inside. I had read that some boot filmers would get caught at the
door more often than others. I was adamant to not let that happen to
me. My stories on how I got past pat down searches and metal
detectors on a daily basis are included in the a few of the concerts
below…
Then there
was the information about where to advertise your video tapes for
sale. I learned there were fan based message boards for most of the
rock bands. You could find the busiest ones by doing internet
searches. I would technically become a spam artist. Some fans of that
certain band would object to the advertisement, but most would be
very appreciative and very excited over the chance to purchase a
decently bootleg filmed concert of their favorite band…
My first
attempt was a Stones show in Sunrise at a brand new arena in Sunrise
in March 1999.It was good practice. The show was sold out and there
was a lot of security and this was a major band. Remember, at this
point in March of 1999,I was in the trading community only. So there
was no pressure, other than that I was green and scared just by what
I was attempting to do.I recall filming openly and no one caring.
Security just never saw me. I lucked out. I was told by other filmers
on the forum that I would need to hide the cam with an exta shirt,
leaving the lens uncovered of course. The next several months would
involve me saving money to upgrade everything. As you read my concert
film chronicle below, you will see the progress via my notes.
In January
2000,appx. 10 months after I started filming shows, and appx. 12
years after solely trading tapes - I was now official a bootleg
seller. My first show was prolific in profits. It was Davy Jones
(ex-Monkee) at Gulfstream Park (see the story below).How ironic, the
same venue I met Bill at. My internet search would lead me to find
out that there were hundreds of Monkees and Davy Jones fan based
message boards…
I had
continued to be a member of the traders only group at the
aformentioned south Florida website and had kept the secret from Bill
as long as I could. But of course he found out, and lectured me and
the he dropped me as a friend immediately. I was ok with it, I was
moving on. I soon found out that he wasn't much of a taper. I soon
found out that I would end of being the ONLY bootleg filmer in all of
Florida. And I would soon become internationally known and almost as
prolific as the notorious North East filmers (Kevin in NYC,Joe in
Philly,and so on)…
Soon, I
would start selling on Ebay. Going through numerous different
accounts each time I would get suspended. There was no way to figure
out why ebay suspends some bootleggers and others never get
suspended. One thing was known. Ebay had a watch group that involved
band's lawyers, their record labels (Warner,Epic,etc) and various
spotters who would red flag suspicious auctions (bootlegs for sale!).
I would go through a dozen different ebay accounts using different
credit cards and various bank account information. Using different
user names and so on. My business got so out of hand. I was filming
the shows and then advertising on forums and selling on Ebay. I would
answer hundreds of questions from potential buyers almost daily,
while I took in the payments via paypal or snail mail money
orders. I designed the bootleg case covers artwork. I ordered new dvd
cases every 3 weeks. As well as cases of vhs and dvd mailers…Most
of the time things went well. But you had to deal with anything at
anytime. This also involved some fans sending me hate email which
included "turning" me into the RIAA or the band's
management themselves.
Our
favorite band, The Who, announced a Summer/Fall tour for 2000.I would
plan Mike and I's first road trip to see several shows. The bootleg
business would help a great deal in the finances involved in seeing
these shows. I filmed over 900 concerts in many different venues in
South Florida and some in North Florida. I only include notes to
concerts of interest as far as incidents involved with the filming or
sneaking in each show…
Not
mentioned in the story are the 30 or so times I got caught. Honorable
mention includes being roughed up by Bob Dylan's personal crew at Ft.
Lauderdale stadium a few years ago…I also learned to never attempt
to film a Dylan show ever again. His boots never sell well anyway.
Not worth the trouble…
At a YES
concert in W.Palm Beach, I was caught by one security guy..a young
but big dude. He demanded my tape, but I had asked him if we could
walk down stairs and away from crowd to avoid the embarrassment. He
agreed and as we walked, I trailed behind him just enough to eject
the tape and stuff it down my pants. I replaced a blank tape (usually
my decoy tape is at the midpoint, so if security examined it, it
looked used)...but I didn't have it with me, so I had use my blank
tape, which I was going to need for the YES encore, which was about
to begin when I got caught…
The fun
part about the Amphitheater that would change their name like four
times, was their security was in huge numbers and all over the place
in this venue. But somehow I managed to film over 100 shows here and
only got caught a few times. I would soon start dealing in importing
PROFESSIONALLY Filmed concerts from various sources (TV,Euro and
Japan pay per view or free tv events, In House video screen,etc).The
main imports came from Japan and Germany and involved classic rock
bands (60's,70's,80's).The stuff that was surfacing from 2003-2006
was exciting. You talk about super visual quality and sound quality
pro filmed shows..complete. It would make the bootleg filming/taping
a secondary interest…
At this
point I had only been trading my own copies with other bootleg
filmers. This was my first attempt at selling copies to fans - and
what a way to start! i always knew The Monkees continued to have a
massive fan base even as of today...especially Davy Jones, the idol
of the band. I saw that the fans had over 100 busy message boards,
more than the Beatles. This video/film of the show sold nonstop for 4
years. He never came back this far South until another Monkees show
later would also do well for me.
Janis's
lawyers (Janis Ian) sent me a letter to "cease and desist"
in any distributions of copies of this show, after a fan on her
message board rats me out to her Lawyers. I would receive about a
half dozen of such legal letters to comply to from these actions via
various bands, like Cheap Trick,Journey,etc in the future…
I would
continue to film shows from 2004 to April 2009.But my days of filming
have slowed down to a rare show here and there by 2009 and
the trading and collecting days are just about over in this age of
Bit torrent uploading and down loading”.
Reference
“Starknakedtruth;
Confessions of A Rock Concert Bootlegger 9 October 2012”
www.startnakedtruth.blogspot.com
viewed 13 January 2013
