I don’t know who made up the set list and who researched the fan bootlegs and professional videos but they were really dreadful. I doubt any music fan would buy a ticket to a concert off a collection of bootlegged videos like this one. I am wondering why Americans set up these sites to promote music in various cities and use absolutely crappy bootlegged fan videos to advertise the brilliance of musicians and artist they are allegedly supporting. The setlist selected sounded more like a favourites list than a reflection of Alan Doyle’s best and most recent music from The So Let’ Go and Boy on Bridge CDs.
Most of the bootlegged videos I had never seen before, although some of the bootleggers were regular Alan Doyle concert goers. The bootlegged videos selected were definitely not their best work. The first bootlegged video annoyed me something chronic and I would have been long gone if I wasn’t a fan. Firstly, there was the camera shaking and then a member of the audience tried to rattle Alan Doyle with constant noise, a kind of approval as he sang Dream of Home. The member of audience soon gave up after he failed to rattle him. A sign of his professionalism .
Towards the end of the selection there were four or five bootlegged videos by regular Alan Doyle pirater and bootlegger Lyndahere and most of them debut singles recorded over a year ago which I don’t really get. Why would anybody selling a live concert not realise that new music by any artist and musician needs time to settle in to a live audience and evolve but here they are? And this is where fans like Lyndahere who insist on being first fail the marketing and promoting section. They bootleg anything and load it up on to YouTube.
Lyndahere seems to be always there first at all concerts and no matter where they are and how much it costs to get there. I don’t think I am the only the fan who is sick of Lyndahere and her firsts and announcements. On this American leg of Alan Doyle’s tour she was the first to announce and record new songs. It seems okay for her to be surprised and she loves surprises but for those attending concerts and who belong to fans sites the surprise is soon over unless they switch off from social media.
Lynda @lyndahere “Brand new @alanthomasdoyle song tonight @MeadfordHall! Caught me by surprise-partial post-show. U’ts awesome. 29 January 2016
Lynda @lyndahere Two awesome brand new songs tonight – 2nd sung by @CoryTetford who’s co-producing the new album w. @alanthomasoy. Was ready this time. 29 January 2016.
In a blog post I wrote “Musicians, artists and music piracy policies” I wrote about what musicians and artists thought about bootlegging and piracy in early 2014. Canadian Neil Young writes in his biography ‘Waging Heavy Peace’ about being on the road, performing to today’s audience and the presence of technology at concerts “If you forget what you’re doing, it shows up on YouTube. If you do something new that isn’t ready, or something old that you screw up, it is on YouTube. If snot comes off your nose while you are playing the harmonica and slithers down the harmonica rack onto your T-shirt, it is on YouTube. If you say something stupid…”
Among this collection of bootlegs there are a couple of Great Big Sea songs that fans can expect to hear at an Alan Doyle and The Beautiful Gypsies concert. The recording of the song Fast As I Can is nearly is nearly five years old and from The Boy on Bridge Tour. During his introduction Alan talks about joining Twitter and taking requests from fans so that says how old it is. It is during this time that Alan mentions the requests that he took for Lynda and her friend and patron Christina Templeton which I found interesting. Alan Doyle must have sung this song a thousand times sing then. It is has been over a year and bit since Alan Doyle responded to Lynda’s daily tweets although he has retweeted some of her bootlegs, in particular those copyrighted out to someone else.
I don’t think this selection of songs on this setlist or the bootlegs and pirated videos do Alan Doyle’s music and concert experience justice. Fans who buy tickets will certainly get a better concert than illustrated in the selection of bootlegged videos. They are definitely not the best of the fan videos and seem more like a fan’s personal agenda than a selection that sells a concert. Although fans can make suggestions to the site about different bootlegged videos I doubt many do. I am sure Lyndahere has made plenty to make sure her videos are included even though they are not the best. I also think fans are entitled to get more for their data usage and time spent listening to music. If these sites are really interested promoting music in their cities then they need to be more selective about the quality of videos they use not just any old rubbish off YouTube.
Another annoying thing about these sites and those that sell tickets is they spam their client's social media sites advertising tickets and concerts. These sites really don’t think much of music fans who make contact with their favourite musicians and artists via social media. These sites spam their clients hundreds of times a day. Their fans and loyal supporter’s posts get lost in the flood. If I am really a fan wouldn’t I know where to get a ticket and I would get really annoyed that my post would be missed in the avalanche. While ticket sellers and concert promoters are gone after the concert in their city the fans are still there.
I wrote a blog post a couple of years ago about musicians and artists opinions of bootlegging and piracy. I have copied this here for those interested.
@lyndahere and musicians and artists opinions of bootlegging
It’s a new year and @lyndahere is off stalking and bootlegging Alan Doyle of Great Big Sea on some of his solo gigs in America and Canada in New Hampshire, LA, New York and Vancouver and British Columbia Canada. She did quite well in bootlegging the Russell Crowe New York Indoor Garden Party concerts at Joe’s Pub on 8 December 2012 on all accounts after receiving approximately 200000 hits for all the live recorded videos put up Youtube. Approximately $1000 tax free if she is collecting revenue from Youtube. Not bad for four hours work when the average American wage per hour is low.
On her Twitter page @lyndahere wrote these tweets along with all the rest
@lyndahere @alanthomasdoyle Yes, you were awesome, that is. As always. Tonight White River Jct. will be Awesome Trifecta 12 January 2013
@lyndahere I love it when people get excited about your solo music. That’s almost as sweet as is gets. NYC show will be awesome, Alan @alanthomasdoyle 11 January 2013
@lyndahere 5.30 am airport shuttle = time to get a bit of sleep tonight. Great night tonight with the Alan Doyle Band. More shows alandoyle.ca/tour 11 January 2013
@lyndahere A gorgeous Dream of Home Alan Doyle Tupelo Music Hall, Londonderry NH on Youtube @alanthomasdoyle 11 January 2013
@lyndahere Gotta love a man who knows right where he belongs: Alan Doyle, Tupelo Music Hall, Londonderry on Youtube @alanthomasdoyle 11 January 2013
@lyndahere I love St. John’s but from what I am hearing and reading about current weather conditions, I don’t think I mind not loving her until Tuesday 11 January 2013
So what do some musicians and artists think about the bootlegging of their live shows? After a brief search of the Internet the opinions of musicians and artists recording their concerts are pretty diverse. Some don’t like it and make their opinions very clear. Others issue statements and develop policies. Others approve for a variety of reasons with some conditions on recording like for personal use only and no trading. Some bootleg their own concerts and release them to fans. But regardless of what the musicians or artists want most people like @lyndahere who buy tickets to concerts will always do exactly what they want with little respect for what the musicians and groups want and still call themselves fans.
In 2000, over 70 musicians and artists formed a coalition in the fight against all kinds of piracy. They included Canadians Bryan Adams, Barenaked Ladies and Alanis Morissette and Bon Jovi, Christina Aguilera, Faith Hill, Garth Brooks and Metallica. “AAP’s goal is to create public awareness, appreciation and understanding of the value of music and to advocate artists’ choice in determining how their music is presented, distributed and marketed online”. The initiative was also supported by various companies. The fight continues as British musicians and artists lead by Sir Elton John, Pete Townshend and Robert Plant wrote a letter to the British Prime Minister David Cameron to influence the government to implement the antipiracy focused Digital Economy Act 2010 that will assist in the fight against music piracy.
Action seems to be taken at venues as well as artists and musicians at various concerts. They are described in a bootlegger’s blog called “Starknakedtruth: Confessions of a Rock Concert Bootlegger”. Most alleged self-confessed bootleggers like so many started out with good intentions and to trade only but then get into selling. This bootlegger writes about the conflicts between his real job and his bootlegging business, developing tricks of the trade, running a website and customers, numerous conflicts with security and police, fights with other fans who reported him to the RIAA and band’s management, and problems of distribution through sites like EBay blocking the sale of some bootlegs. He talks about fans willing to take action or perhaps other bootleggers ratting out the opposition. “Janis’s lawyers 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 half dozen of such legal letters to comply to from various bands like Cheap Trick, Journey ect in their future”. Despite all the objections from the musicians and artists themselves, their security, fans and actions by EBay this person continued to bootleg and sell them.
In 2004 a Finnish man was prosecuted for spreading unauthorised recordings of Alanis Morissette concerts on the Internet. The man was found to have swapped over 1900 copies of unauthorised concerts recordings between 1999 and 2003 with other bootleggers through his website. He had not made illegal recordings himself. He was ordered to pay $21 756 in compensation to Morissette and others for copyright infringement. Alanis Morissette was of course at the for front of the Artists Against Piracy campaign established in 2000 as were many of the musicians and artists bootlegged by the author of Starknakedtruth blog.
The Dave Matthews Band is one band whose views on tapping live shows is well documented and is on their official site as they allow it at almost all of their performances. Their taping policy on their official webpage states “ We feel that each show is unique and want to offer our fans the opportunity to recreate the live experienced through the audio reproduction of our shows. At all taping authorised performances tapers can tape from any ticketed seating located in the venue. Also for many of these performances tapers are able are to purchase specially designated taper section, normally located immediately behind the soundboard…Taping is limited to audio-only, using microphones…We sincerely appreciate all of our fans so we ask you that you please be considerate of those around you by not obstructing anyone else’s of the performances…All recordings must be used for personal used or trading only…”.
The Dave Matthews Band unlike others recognises bootlegging is a major problem in the music industry. They recognised the contribution fans can make in the fight against bootlegged material “Those of you who have passed along information about commercialised recordings have been very instrumental in our fight against bootleggers. An equality important violation of the integrity of the music is the unauthorised commercial exploitation of the band now occurring on television and radio…And don’t forget the battle of the bootleggers is an ongoing one”. But despite their best intention, generosity and attempts to cooperate with their fans by allowing taping and trading there will always be those out to exploit. A search of the Dave Matthews Band on Youtube shows this in the number of hits of illegally copied pirated videos and bootlegged material. Despite the policy being displayed on their home webpage some fans remain ignorant and choose to ignore it.
To me the taping policy of Great Big Sea has been made perfectly clear via Twitter. That is they don’t mind people taping their shows for personal use but they don’t like their entire concerts being taped and posted on Youtube. This is evident in the fact the three primary members of Great Big Sea (Alan Doyle, Bob Hallett and Sean McCann) have never officially acknowledged or retweeted any of @lyndahere’s hundreds of videos she has sent them via Twitter in the last year or so. Alan Doyle has on occasions tweeted @lyndahere welcoming her presence at concerts but never acknowledged any of her videos. Links and retweets of her videos have on a very few rare occasions been provided by Russell Crowe, Scott Grimes and other friends of Alan Doyle such as Great Big Sea member Murray Foster and Alan Doyle Band member Kendal Carson. Nearly all Great Big Sea fans respect their unspoken taping policy and are more interested in creating memories for the moment listening and enjoying the music than creating memories for someone else to visit sometime in the future. But I could be wrong.
Bootleggers and those that view and make live recordings at concerts continually justify their activities with a range of arguments. Bootlegging is a hobby of music enthusiasts and they should be allowed to do free from legal threat. There is a thought that a fan base will increase if they are allowed to video and trade in bootlegged material following certain guidelines or rules and create a community of fans. However, it is clear in the case of Great Big Sea and Alan Doyle that the primary bootlegger @lyndahere is not interested in following other guidelines laid down for taping by the venues or tickets holders or those of the musicians and artists.
Bootleggers seemed more concerned about the fans their bootlegged videos on Youtube they may attract than the people who have already purchased tickets and are there at the concert. In the official and bootlegged videos of the Russell Crowe’s Indoor Garden Party in New York bootleggers have their cameras on in the front row and they are raising their cameras above the crowd obstructing someone’s views and shining a light in their face. There is clear evidence they piss off some performers such as Neil Young. “With the Internet there is no more privacy and not even the chance to express yourself in front of your audience in the intimacy of a concert that lets songs evolve. You cann’t do this because they immediately get it circulated”.
Bootleggers like @lyndahere believe live recordings help bring in new fans who will in turn go to concerts and buy CDs. While illegal live recordings are used as modes of word-of-mouth advertising to increase enthusiasm amongst fans the way social media can and create a community. Bootlegged recordings are also often the first material many fans see and as a consequence may be turned off because of the poor quality. Bootlegging can also work in reverse and piss people off who don’t agree with piracy, support the coalition of musicians and artists who don’t support piracy. Bootlegged recordings made by relatively unknown bands can be used as a cheap form of publicity without paying for the large overheads like labour to produce it, the license to record or the distribution. Where once there was a kind of code amongst bootleggers Youtube has changed that as money is now involved. In a country like America on the brink of an economic crisis, money for entertainment of any kind is limited. If a show is bootlegged in the way @lyndahere bootlegs more and more people are going to watch it on Youtube. Rather than spend $30 on a ticket to show they can pay for Internet usage for a whole month. They are very unlikely to buy a CD if they can access it for free.
References
“Artists speak out against piracy” www.musicunited.org viewed 10 January 2013
“Artists Against Piracy” Launches Nation Media Campaign www.interentnews.com/ec-news/articles viewed on 10 January 2013
“Finn ordered to pay Alanis Morissette for Internet bootleg spreading” www.murmurs.com viewed 10 January 2013
Rolling Stone 2012 “Elton John, Pete Townshend and Robert Plant Sign Anti-Piracy Letter to British Prime Minister” 25 July 2012 www.rollingstone.com/music/news viewed 10 January 2013
“Starknakedtruth; Confessions of A Rock Concert Bootlegger” 9 October 2012 www.startnakedtruth.blogspot.com viewed 10 January 2013
On her Twitter page @lyndahere wrote these tweets along with all the rest
@lyndahere @alanthomasdoyle Yes, you were awesome, that is. As always. Tonight White River Jct. will be Awesome Trifecta 12 January 2013
@lyndahere I love it when people get excited about your solo music. That’s almost as sweet as is gets. NYC show will be awesome, Alan @alanthomasdoyle 11 January 2013
@lyndahere 5.30 am airport shuttle = time to get a bit of sleep tonight. Great night tonight with the Alan Doyle Band. More shows alandoyle.ca/tour 11 January 2013
@lyndahere A gorgeous Dream of Home Alan Doyle Tupelo Music Hall, Londonderry NH on Youtube @alanthomasdoyle 11 January 2013
@lyndahere Gotta love a man who knows right where he belongs: Alan Doyle, Tupelo Music Hall, Londonderry on Youtube @alanthomasdoyle 11 January 2013
@lyndahere I love St. John’s but from what I am hearing and reading about current weather conditions, I don’t think I mind not loving her until Tuesday 11 January 2013
So what do some musicians and artists think about the bootlegging of their live shows? After a brief search of the Internet the opinions of musicians and artists recording their concerts are pretty diverse. Some don’t like it and make their opinions very clear. Others issue statements and develop policies. Others approve for a variety of reasons with some conditions on recording like for personal use only and no trading. Some bootleg their own concerts and release them to fans. But regardless of what the musicians or artists want most people like @lyndahere who buy tickets to concerts will always do exactly what they want with little respect for what the musicians and groups want and still call themselves fans.
In 2000, over 70 musicians and artists formed a coalition in the fight against all kinds of piracy. They included Canadians Bryan Adams, Barenaked Ladies and Alanis Morissette and Bon Jovi, Christina Aguilera, Faith Hill, Garth Brooks and Metallica. “AAP’s goal is to create public awareness, appreciation and understanding of the value of music and to advocate artists’ choice in determining how their music is presented, distributed and marketed online”. The initiative was also supported by various companies. The fight continues as British musicians and artists lead by Sir Elton John, Pete Townshend and Robert Plant wrote a letter to the British Prime Minister David Cameron to influence the government to implement the antipiracy focused Digital Economy Act 2010 that will assist in the fight against music piracy.
Action seems to be taken at venues as well as artists and musicians at various concerts. They are described in a bootlegger’s blog called “Starknakedtruth: Confessions of a Rock Concert Bootlegger”. Most alleged self-confessed bootleggers like so many started out with good intentions and to trade only but then get into selling. This bootlegger writes about the conflicts between his real job and his bootlegging business, developing tricks of the trade, running a website and customers, numerous conflicts with security and police, fights with other fans who reported him to the RIAA and band’s management, and problems of distribution through sites like EBay blocking the sale of some bootlegs. He talks about fans willing to take action or perhaps other bootleggers ratting out the opposition. “Janis’s lawyers 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 half dozen of such legal letters to comply to from various bands like Cheap Trick, Journey ect in their future”. Despite all the objections from the musicians and artists themselves, their security, fans and actions by EBay this person continued to bootleg and sell them.
In 2004 a Finnish man was prosecuted for spreading unauthorised recordings of Alanis Morissette concerts on the Internet. The man was found to have swapped over 1900 copies of unauthorised concerts recordings between 1999 and 2003 with other bootleggers through his website. He had not made illegal recordings himself. He was ordered to pay $21 756 in compensation to Morissette and others for copyright infringement. Alanis Morissette was of course at the for front of the Artists Against Piracy campaign established in 2000 as were many of the musicians and artists bootlegged by the author of Starknakedtruth blog.
The Dave Matthews Band is one band whose views on tapping live shows is well documented and is on their official site as they allow it at almost all of their performances. Their taping policy on their official webpage states “ We feel that each show is unique and want to offer our fans the opportunity to recreate the live experienced through the audio reproduction of our shows. At all taping authorised performances tapers can tape from any ticketed seating located in the venue. Also for many of these performances tapers are able are to purchase specially designated taper section, normally located immediately behind the soundboard…Taping is limited to audio-only, using microphones…We sincerely appreciate all of our fans so we ask you that you please be considerate of those around you by not obstructing anyone else’s of the performances…All recordings must be used for personal used or trading only…”.
The Dave Matthews Band unlike others recognises bootlegging is a major problem in the music industry. They recognised the contribution fans can make in the fight against bootlegged material “Those of you who have passed along information about commercialised recordings have been very instrumental in our fight against bootleggers. An equality important violation of the integrity of the music is the unauthorised commercial exploitation of the band now occurring on television and radio…And don’t forget the battle of the bootleggers is an ongoing one”. But despite their best intention, generosity and attempts to cooperate with their fans by allowing taping and trading there will always be those out to exploit. A search of the Dave Matthews Band on Youtube shows this in the number of hits of illegally copied pirated videos and bootlegged material. Despite the policy being displayed on their home webpage some fans remain ignorant and choose to ignore it.
To me the taping policy of Great Big Sea has been made perfectly clear via Twitter. That is they don’t mind people taping their shows for personal use but they don’t like their entire concerts being taped and posted on Youtube. This is evident in the fact the three primary members of Great Big Sea (Alan Doyle, Bob Hallett and Sean McCann) have never officially acknowledged or retweeted any of @lyndahere’s hundreds of videos she has sent them via Twitter in the last year or so. Alan Doyle has on occasions tweeted @lyndahere welcoming her presence at concerts but never acknowledged any of her videos. Links and retweets of her videos have on a very few rare occasions been provided by Russell Crowe, Scott Grimes and other friends of Alan Doyle such as Great Big Sea member Murray Foster and Alan Doyle Band member Kendal Carson. Nearly all Great Big Sea fans respect their unspoken taping policy and are more interested in creating memories for the moment listening and enjoying the music than creating memories for someone else to visit sometime in the future. But I could be wrong.
Bootleggers and those that view and make live recordings at concerts continually justify their activities with a range of arguments. Bootlegging is a hobby of music enthusiasts and they should be allowed to do free from legal threat. There is a thought that a fan base will increase if they are allowed to video and trade in bootlegged material following certain guidelines or rules and create a community of fans. However, it is clear in the case of Great Big Sea and Alan Doyle that the primary bootlegger @lyndahere is not interested in following other guidelines laid down for taping by the venues or tickets holders or those of the musicians and artists.
Bootleggers seemed more concerned about the fans their bootlegged videos on Youtube they may attract than the people who have already purchased tickets and are there at the concert. In the official and bootlegged videos of the Russell Crowe’s Indoor Garden Party in New York bootleggers have their cameras on in the front row and they are raising their cameras above the crowd obstructing someone’s views and shining a light in their face. There is clear evidence they piss off some performers such as Neil Young. “With the Internet there is no more privacy and not even the chance to express yourself in front of your audience in the intimacy of a concert that lets songs evolve. You cann’t do this because they immediately get it circulated”.
Bootleggers like @lyndahere believe live recordings help bring in new fans who will in turn go to concerts and buy CDs. While illegal live recordings are used as modes of word-of-mouth advertising to increase enthusiasm amongst fans the way social media can and create a community. Bootlegged recordings are also often the first material many fans see and as a consequence may be turned off because of the poor quality. Bootlegging can also work in reverse and piss people off who don’t agree with piracy, support the coalition of musicians and artists who don’t support piracy. Bootlegged recordings made by relatively unknown bands can be used as a cheap form of publicity without paying for the large overheads like labour to produce it, the license to record or the distribution. Where once there was a kind of code amongst bootleggers Youtube has changed that as money is now involved. In a country like America on the brink of an economic crisis, money for entertainment of any kind is limited. If a show is bootlegged in the way @lyndahere bootlegs more and more people are going to watch it on Youtube. Rather than spend $30 on a ticket to show they can pay for Internet usage for a whole month. They are very unlikely to buy a CD if they can access it for free.
References
“Artists speak out against piracy” www.musicunited.org viewed 10 January 2013
“Artists Against Piracy” Launches Nation Media Campaign www.interentnews.com/ec-news/articles viewed on 10 January 2013
“Finn ordered to pay Alanis Morissette for Internet bootleg spreading” www.murmurs.com viewed 10 January 2013
Rolling Stone 2012 “Elton John, Pete Townshend and Robert Plant Sign Anti-Piracy Letter to British Prime Minister” 25 July 2012 www.rollingstone.com/music/news viewed 10 January 2013
“Starknakedtruth; Confessions of A Rock Concert Bootlegger” 9 October 2012 www.startnakedtruth.blogspot.com viewed 10 January 2013
