A WALK FROM THE PARK?

Interesting new approach at getting out of a contract from the Linkin Park boys: they're seeking to cut free from their label on the grounds that Warners forthcoming floatation will 'enrich investors at the expense of their artists. Which, yes, is true - but Linkin Park signed to the label when it was part of Time Warner, so it's not like they joined a co-operative only to see it being sold out to capitalism. Presumably when the Park joined the Time Warner organisation, they weren't expecting to see all profits going off to help sick dolphins and refloat broken donkeys, did they?

Of course, with a new album about to be delivered, this has little to do with Linkin Park worrying about artist's rights, and is more down to old-fashioned greed, as even their own statement makes clear:

"The new owners of the Warner Music Group will be reaping a windfall of $1.4 billion from their $2.6 billion purchase a mere 18 months ago if their planned IPO moves forward. Linkin Park, their biggest act, will get nothing."

Erm... actually, you'll get the royalties and other payments you've already agreed in your contract, surely? And while we're no fans of Edgar Bronfman, since he and his mates did put two and a half billion into buying the basketcase major label (a label so short of talent Linkin Park accounted for between three and ten per cent of its total sales) and Linkin Park, erm, didn't, we're not quite sure why the band think they have a moral right to any of the returns from that investment.

If they were suggesting turning Warners into a Co-Op, so all the bands on the label got an equal share of that billion-odd profit, we'd be stood behind them, cheering them on. But complaining that something is unfair and should be made equally unfair, but in a different way? That's Tory talk, surely?

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