Vince Power: Hop Farm Fest relied on hope

You'll recall Vince Power, regarded as one of the most competent music festival impresarios despite the odd problem here and there, and despite the Phoenix Festival. Oh, and having to pull Hop Farm Fest last year. And those years when Leeds ended in fire.

Still, he's been running festivals for years, so at least he knows what he's doing, right?

What's that, Kent Messenger?

The founder of the Hop Farm Music Festival has been banned from playing music in public after it was revealed events were hosted without a licence.

That's quite a big oversight. Especially for someone who has been running festivals back when it was possible to do one without a sodding ferris wheel and silent disco.

But just an oversight, yes? Embarrassing but maybe an envelope unposted?

However, at the court it was claimed Power infringed copyright at The Hop Farm Festival at the events in 2009

Well, that was the second year. Maybe the assumption was that last year's licence was still valid?

2010

Okay. Two small oversights.

2011

Uh.

and 2012.

Well, that looks a bit systemic. You kind-of hope that Power had actually gone to all the trouble of getting a licence last year, and it turned out to be such a complex process he had no time to do anything else.

Still, I'm sure that Power was able to clear up why he ran a festival for four years without a licence for playing music. Right?

PRS claimed that Power was the “guiding will and mind” of the companies and authorised or directed the alleged acts of infringement.

But when they took legal moves against him he failed to file a defence to the action with the result that PRS was this week given judgment against him by Mr Justice Birss at London’s High Court.

There's a secondary question here: if a barber shop in Golders Green switches on the radio without a PRS licence, they're being swarmed over by the royalties company in seconds. How the hell did a festival run by a large company manage to get away without having a PRS licence for so long?

[Thanks to @RichardButton04 for the tip]

MIDEM: PRS think music made Apple

Remember how music was before Apple came along with the iPod and iTunes, and started to create a workable digital download market?

If you're too young to recall, imagine a headless chicken desperately trying to pull its own legs off so that it could hit anyone trying to buy an egg off it.

Music isn't particularly grateful for Apple's part in sorting out the mess and creating a world where people will pay for something they could get for free. Not at all, actually, as PRS CEO Robert Ashcroft appears to be moaning that Apple treats music bad:

Apple has more cash in the bank than the record industry has ever made in annual revenue, according to Robert Ashcroft, CEO of PRS for music, speaking on a panel about innovation within the music industry at Midem. "I would like to say that the music industry contributed a little bit of that to Apple."

Well, up to a point - although nobody really buys some Universal stuff from Apple, or downloads a bunch of PRS-regulated files. If anyone involved in Music deserves a bit of thanks from Apple, it'd be the artists.

Although, I suppose, you could argue that the industry's failure to sort out its own digital offering over more-or-less the decade it had the field open to itself is something Apple should be grateful for.

Welsh music might vanish from the BBC

Well... not quite, but over 300 Welsh Language artists who have decided that PRS wasn't working well for them have set up their own rights agency, Eos. As the Cardiff City Hall clock chimes in the New Year, the PRS deal ends and broadcasters will have to make deals with the new group.

Trouble is, although S4C have just come to an agreement, the BBC has yet to sign anything. Which means, in the short-term at least, there could be a big hole in Welsh music on TV and radio.

Digital music worth more than pub and club jukeboxes

A small step towards digital music sustainability, as PRS announces that the royalties from digital streams is now worth more than royalties from pubs and clubs.

This might be a sign that digital music has become an increasingly robust business.

Or might be a reflection that there are 4,500 fewer pubs in business than 2008.

PRS take falls; blames "piracy"

For the first time in its history, PRS has taken in less money than for the year before:

PRS for Music, the organisation that represents 75,000 songwriters, composers and music publishers in the UK, blamed digital piracy and a fall in high street sales for a 1% year-on-year decline in total royalties, down £7m to £611.2m in 2010. Royalties from recorded media fell 8.8% to £117.2m, only partially offset by an increase in income from overseas and from commercial radio in Britain.

Really? They're blaming piracy? That's the best they can do?

Record sales have been falling for ages, and "piracy" has been part of the environment for the whole of the century, so isn't that "normal operating conditions"?

Robert Ashcroft, chief executive of PRS, which represents artists such as Jessie J, Adele and Florence and the Machine star Florence Welch, said: "The loss of high street outlets, the slowdown in physical music sales as well as the challenges capturing the full value of music usage online has meant that for the first time we have seen royalties collected dip.

"Previously, any reduction from falling physical sales had been offset by our strong performance in music licensing both in the UK and internationally. In 2010 slower growth at home and abroad failed to fully mitigate the decline."

Yes, The Guardian really does try to spice up Robert Ashcroft by mentioning that PRS "represents artists such as Jessie J, Adele and Florence and the Machine star Florence Welch" - a very, very cherry-picked trio from a very, very long list.

But there is some good news:

While overall revenue fell £7m year on year, PRS for Music said the actual amount paid out to its members was down by only £0.8m due to reduced administration costs and improved efficiency within the organisation.

That makes it sound like PRS found six million pounds of efficiency, which sounds like a lot of inefficiency that's been burning through artists' money right there.

And there's still more to cut, judging by the continued outpouring of pointless surveys being churned out by PRS:

Latest research from PRS for Music has revealed the top 5 favourite songs, as voted by the Public, to be played at street parties* being held to celebrate the forthcoming Royal Wedding. Also revealed are the top 5 most popular songs for the happy couple’s first dance.

Dancing In The Streets, in case you're interested. Dave and Mick, not the proper one. The "survey" has all the stench of participants being presented with a predetermined list to choose from.

Commenting, Guy Fletcher, Chairman PRS for Music, said: “There are some great suggestions in this chart to help people plan their own Street Party celebrations for the Royal Wedding. As to the first dance, I’m sure Kate and William will chose a song that is special to both of them. Any writer will hope their song is chosen as it will undoubtedly receive both an airplay and sales boost.”

To be fair, without an expert from PRS, who ever would have guessed that the couple would choose a song special to them for the first dance? Why, without this survey I'd have assumed that Kate and Will would have merely installed a jukebox, hitting it, Fonzie-style, in order to randomly select a first dance.

Still, perhaps the survey can be excused because PRS is going to make some money from the licences sold, right?

PRS for Music, the organisation which licences the public use of music, has announced it will make no charge for music licences for certain small community events, including street parties, to encourage celebrations for the Royal Wedding taking place on April 29th.

The policy which will come into effect between 22nd April 2011 and 6th May hopes to help communities all across the UK enjoy the benefits of music to celebrate the forthcoming nuptials of Prince William and Kate Middleton.

Actually, that's a nice gesture from an organisation that usually tries to force you to buy a licence for humming on a crowded bus, but how sickening that it's not a move they're taking to encourage people to enjoy music, but to fawn over two very rich people having a bunfight. If you're running a small community event on May 7th, perhaps to raise funds to fix a church spire or to try and plug some of the many gaps in public provision being opened up by the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, you're out of luck. Pay up, people.

PPL not exactly trumpeting the good news

An email from Paul W points out that, bar the odd mention on Today, a bit in DeHavilland subscriber's area, there wasn't much made about PPL's supposed 50% in royalties raised.

Odd - when there's pain in the music industry, there's press releases all over the place. This is pretty good news, and yet hardly a word.

There was a feature on BBC News' business programme just after 6.30pm, though, when it became clear that the headline rise of 50% in royalty take actually refers to overseas royalties.

That's confirmed by the actual press release - available as a PDF, like it's 1997, bless them.

Part of this is down to a change in the US tax regime - PPL is now allowed to take US royalties without tax being withheld in America.

It turns out, then, that by doing their job more effectively, PPL is having a better positive effect on its members' incomes than their sister organisation PRS manage through whining and bitching. While PRS hassles mechanics because people in waiting rooms can hear Radio 2 through the door, PPL seem to be focusing on making more effective collections of the cash that's there. It's a bit of a shame the news has been buried.

PRS spend more of artists' money on pointless survey

PRS For Music have shown once again their dedication to ensuring the royalties they collect don't get pissed away before reaching their members by commissioning another poll calculating the "hardest working artist".

It's a heartbreaking list:

1. Peter Andre
2. Status Quo
3. JLS
4. Westlife
5. Rod Stewart

It's based on how many dates they played during 2010 and the number of braying idiots who went along, but also forms a handy chart which could be used to argue persuasively that music should probably be switched off now as it's all too horrible to contemplate.

PRS also produced a chart for bands playing smaller venues, which implies that playing a theatre rather than an arena requires less hard work somehow. The top three:

1. Example
2. Ellie Goulding
3. Tinie Tempah

From this, you can ascertain that people who hold down day jobs, play three gigs over a weekend and rehearse every evening aren't considered to be hard working at all by the PRS, but I'm guessing that nearly all hard-working artists would rather the money spent on producing the chart would have been given to the people who actually earned it.

Wales considers UDI from PRS; PRS looks worried

Welsh artists and labels are showing signs of increasing discontent with the UK-wide PRS organisation. The Welsh Music Foundation has held a conference to discuss the feasibility of constructing a Wales-only royalty collection agency, mainly irked by the BBC's National Regional stations paying royalty rates on a par with local radio stations rather than the UK-wide networks.

Naturally, the PRS aren't happy with the idea and suggest that a breakaway Welsh-only organisation could be a terrible idea:

"We are a well-oiled machine, and we have all the things in place to administer on behalf of all a members in Wales," said John Hywel Morris from PRS.

"We have over 2,000 PRS members in Wales - it's a very small fraction of people who have turned up here voicing their concerns.

"Yes, they are concerns that we take seriously. We've been in discussions with them for the last three years, and I speak to a lot of the people who have been hit.

"And we have been working to better reflect what the usage of Welsh language music is in general."

If the PRS is really convinced that only "a very small fraction" of people suggest breaking away, they could hold an event in Wales to demonstrate the depth of support for the current system, then? That'd be a useful exercise.

You can understand the fear, though - if Welsh artists quit, it'd only be a matter of time before the Scottish and Northern Irish explored their own options, and the very existence of the PRS would be thrown into question.

Perhaps, though, the PRS having taken three years of discussion to get absolutely nowhere indicates why it's time for someone else to have a go.

Everything the PRS does is for the artists, even having a yabba-dabba-do time

PRS collect all the money they can, and give it all to the artists, right?

PRS for Music and MCPS pay money collected to their writer, composer and music publisher members. Both organisations are ‘not for profit’ and only deduct a small administration/commission fee to cover operating costs.

Yes. They just deduct a small admin or commission fee, to cover operating costs. And who could begrudge them that?

A small commission, covering the costs of office space, collecting the money, contacting people with licence problems.

Oh... and creating totally spurious surveys:

Latest research undertaken by PRS for Music, reveals that The Flintstones’ theme tune is the most recognisable of kids’ television programmes, according to UK adults.

The survey of 2,000 adults across the UK, also show that Baa Baa Black Sheep is the nursery rhyme we remember most from our childhood, while up to 28% of females and 23% of males listen to music to make themselves feel younger.

Are you one of those artists who the PRS are so worried about not getting much money? Aren't you delighted that they're spending the little bit you do get finding out these things?

Why have you done this, PRS?

Commenting on the results, Ellis Rich, chairman of PRS, said: “Many of us find our first love for music as children through singing nursery rhymes and humming along to our favourite theme tunes on television. It is a truly wonderful sensation when the recollection of music can bring back those nostalgic emotions of how music made us feel as children; emotions and memories which continue to live on inside so many adults, still to this day”.

This seems to have an awful lot to do with getting the name of Ellis Rich (seriously? Rich?) into the papers, and nothing whatsoever to do with collecting and distributing royalties. It's not even a made-up survey worth making-up, to be honest.

Festival prices: "ooh, they'll have to go up, they will"

Thanks to Mark B who sent me a link to this story, which predicts a possible rise in gig prices as PRS demand more, and George Osborne pretends he has no choice but to hike VAT:

Melvin Benn, who runs the Reading, Leeds and Latitude festivals, described it as "blatant money-grabbing".

With VAT also rising by 2.5%, Mr Benn, who runs Festival Republic, said the cost of an average festival ticket would go up by about £10.

Given how the festivals Benn are involved with have been hiking prices, Benn should know a blatant money grab when he sees it.

In 2008, a ticket to Leeds cost £145.

In 2010, the same ticket cost £180.

It's strange that a man who thinks nothing of slapping an extra £35 on a ticket over two years suddenly gets outraged for his customers at the prospect of another tenner going on.

That's not say the PRS demands are entirely fair - they're talking about an increase in the percentage take they get from the ticket price:

PRS For Music's Debbie Mulloy said: "It's been over 20 years since we last reviewed this tariff and it's part of a general review of all our tariffs.

"This is one sector where there have been massive amounts of change and we felt a good review was required to make sure everything was still fair and reasonable."

The rate would not necessarily increase, she said. "There's no foregone conclusion here. It's not as simple as saying we want the rate to be higher. There are a number of things we have to assess."

As Mark B pointed out in his email:

No doubt the possibility of reducing the tariff will also be considered

The PRS is suggesting it might charge larger festivals more than smaller festivals, but doesn't entirely explain why. If you're getting 3% of ticket prices, then you already get more for a larger festival than a small one.

If the suggestion is that the percentage rate should be higher for a bigger event, the moral justification for that is far from clear. In fact, morally, you could argue that PRS get a lower percentage cut than they do from ticket sales at smaller events.

If you look at an afternoon-in-a-park type affair, the main attraction is music. If you look at Glastonbury, many people go for attractions other than the music. And if the work of the PRS members is less crucial to bringing in the punters, then surely their share of the ticket take should go down?

PRS might regret having opened this particular Pandorica.

PRS grudgingly admit digital sales offsets decline in physical revenues

Great news from the PRS - although the amount of money coming in from royalties on physical sales is still in decline, the loss was more than made up by more cash coming from online sales. That must be cheering everyone up at the PRS:

Announcing the figures, PRS for Music chief executive Robert Ashcroft said: “2009 was the first year in which the growth in revenues from the legal digital market compensated for the decline in revenues from traditional CDs and DVDs, though we remain cautious as to whether this represents a true turning point”.

Turning to look out the window, Ashcroft then said 'yeah, it's nice and sunny today, but it wouldn't surprise me if it dropped really cold at the end of the week and kills off all the plants."

Mablethorpe Cafe outsmarts PRS

The Busy Bee Cafe in Mablethorpe has got so tired of the PRS demanding a £1000 licence to have the radio on that they've dumped their tranny in favour of a Florida based podcast which uses rights-free music instead. It's a cash-conscious move - the PRS are probably hoping that it doesn't start a trend, or anything.

PRS got greedy

After yesterday's story where the PRS grudgingly admitted demanding a licence for a shopworker who sang might be a little over-the-top, a bigger slap has come to the PRS from the Copyright Tribunal.

The tribunal has judged that hikes in royalty rates charged to shops in 2005 were excessive:

The 2005 increases resulted in some retailers suffering a doubling of costs overnight. One fashion retailer’s bill rose from £176,000 to £408,000 per year and a tile chain’s from £25,000 to £73,000.

The ruling should save retailers £5m a year and lead to the return of £20m to shops, restaurants and other affected businesses.

The PRS is going to appeal against this decision - and unsurprisingly so, as the need to scrabble together twenty million quid in a hurry could prove something of a difficulty.

Where would the PRS get that cash from? The fair thing to do would be to demand repayment from the artists who got too much in the first place - but that would seem to be costly and a bureaucratic nightmare - not to mention one which would cause a problem if Madonna decided she didn't want to hand the money back. Would PRS be able to sue her?

Dipping into the current revenues would seem to be simpler - but why should, say, La Roux or Little Boots, who weren't operating back when the PRS got greedy, have to see a dip in their royalty pay-out because Boyzone and Mika were getting too much in previous years?

Either way, it's hard to see that the current management of the PRS could claim they're operating solely in their artists' best interests. No wonder they're appealing.

[Thanks to Peter D]

PRS backtracks on singing shop assistant

Damn right that the PRS should be apologising to a shopworker who they hassled for a licence because she was singing while she worked:

She told the BBC news website: "I would start to sing to myself when I was stacking the shelves just to keep me happy because it was very quiet without the radio.

"When I heard that the PRS said I would be prosecuted for not having a performance licence, I thought it was a joke and started laughing.

"I was then told I could be fined thousands of pounds. But I couldn't stop myself singing.

"They would need to put a plaster over my mouth to get me to stop, I can't help it."

The trouble is, the PRS line seems to be in response to the outcry, not because it was capable of seeing this sort of thing as being a result of its central policy, and paying its "inspectors" a bonus if they do well. I guess we should be thankful that at least this time they've backed down rather than grimly pushing ahead (as with the woman who was told she needed a licence to play the radio to her horses).

This organisation, though, is being treated as a serious player in shaping copyright for the 21st century - and it takes a public outcry before it admits that you don't need to pay a licence to hum while you work. Are they really a credible voice?

Gordon in the morning: You don't listen to N-Dubz for the sense of musical history

Sweet joy for Gordon Smart today, as he finds someone with even less of a steady grip on popular culture than he has:

N-DUBZ star TULISA CONTOSTAVLOS proves she's got soul but she's no fan of THE KILLERS.

The singer confessed she had no idea the sample for the brilliant new War Child track which she features on was from All These Things That I've Done by the US outfit.

She confessed that. And asked for three other charges of not being able to tell U2 from Radiohead to be taken into consideration.

Tulisa and the rest of the Young Soul Rebelswill perform the song, I Got Soul, for the first time at Wednesday's MOBOs in Glasgow.

Ah, yes, Music of Black Origin - N-Dubz singing a song based around a Brandon Flowers piece. There's a celebration.

Still, it must be exciting for Glasgow, this week preparing to hold an event that it's pumped cash into to help shift the idea of Glasgow from being a crumbling, old-fashioned, bypassed city into something new and modern and a little multicultural. Isn't that right, Gordon?

I'll be there tapping my foot, drinking Irn-Bru and eating Tunnock's Tea Cakes.

Oh.

I suppose the good people of Glasgow can take comfort that he didn't mention hot battered confectionery. Although there's still time.

Elsewhere, Gordon manages to spin a lead article from the somewhat humdrum news that Kate Moss is now a member of the PRS.

YouTube, PRS sue for peace

Here come the songs again. PRS and YouTube have struck a deal - terms "undisclosed", so I'm betting they'll be leaked online by teatime - which will see YouTube paying for music, and thus videos returning to the UK site.

A spokesman for PRS for Music, formerly known as the Performing Rights Society, said: "It is a lump sum deal which seems to work for YouTube's business model and offers recompense for our 60,000 members. We can be friends again."

A spokesman for YouTube said the "tens of thousands" of videos which had disappeared "will come back over the next few days".

Given that YouTube hadn't exactly seen a dip in popularity since it threw off the videos into the face of an aghast PRS, it's likely that Google has moved less than the PRS would have done.

They're chucking a "lump sum" at the rights agency to cover everything from last January "and lasting until 2012". That doesn't sound very much like giving an increased per-play rate from where I'm sitting, which was what PRS had been demanding.

EMI reject new PRS streaming rate

Uh-oh - more trouble as the music industry tries to pretend that infinite supply won't drive down prices. EMI publishing have refused to accept the hard-won new PRS rate for online streaming, and so henceforward will opt out of having PRS collect their royalty earnings for them.

"We are not currently satisfied that the new rates - in particular the minima - proposed by PRS for Music for streaming services are appropriate", said EMI Music Publishing's general counsel for Europe Antony Bebawi.

Quite how EMI hopes to get any value from collecting its own royalties isn't clear - even at the old rate of 0.22p a stream, without the bulk processing power of a central clearing house it's arguable that EMI will wind up with even less than at the new PRS minimum rate of 0.085p by the time they've added on their administration costs.

It's also absurd because EMI are behaving as if the PRS organisation are the sort to have accepted a crappy deal. Given that at the start of negotiations the PRS were every bit as gung-ho and unrealistic as EMI are being now, you might think that someone might have worked out that 0.085p is all there is on the table.

PRS comes to terms with the new world

They're trying to sound upbeat about it, but clearly, the new online music rate accepted by PRS is an acceptance that their insane, overvalued pitch has been totally routed:

Royalty collector PRS For Music has bowed to websites' pleas for smaller charges, more than halving its on-demand streaming music rate from £0.0022 to £0.00085 per track, effective July 1 and lasting for three years.

So, the blustering about demanding larger shares of money (albeit money that isn't there) has blown away, and the rights agency have had to accept that online music for personal listening simply isn't worth very much at all.

The spokesperson 6Music News was talking to yesterday even had the cheek to applaud the agreement they'd signed because it meant they could help with the development of new music platforms and services. Despite the PRS having been very, very clear back at the start of negotiations that they didn't believe musicians and songwriters should be subsidising the development of new music services by accepting lower rates.

The same spokesperson said that they'd only entered into the negotiations because it was what their members wanted. If that was true, you wonder why it was only after the talks had started going badly that they suddenly launched that website "debate" to try and get the rank-and-file behind them. And if the members had really wanted an uneconomic and unrealistic doubling of the rate, then PRS have done a bloody awful job of bringing those wishes to pass, haven't they?

Either way, were I a member of the PRS, I'd be looking carefully into how I could actually ensure my wishes were represented by the management.

Darkness at 3AM: PRS join in the Eurovision fun

The 3AM Girls have a small piece this morning about Bucks Fizz:

Making Your Mind Up still has loads of, er, Fizz. With this year's Eurovision looming, the 1981 entry by Bucks Fizz is revealed as the most played track in the contest's history by the Performing Right Society.

More often than Waterloo? Really? You might wonder at the state of record keeping that came up with that nugget, but more to the point, you might also wonder why the PRS is spending money skimmed off songwriters' royalties on filling up gossip columns with meaningless fact-nuggets.

The long tail: Can't tell the bottom from the top

More, I'm afraid, on that PRS survey. Music Ally has seen it, and focuses on a more interesting point:

A new filesharing study claims to refute the “Long Tail” theory made famous by Chris Anderson, arguing that (at least in the p2p world) downloading patterns strongly resemble those in the world of mainstream hits.

“Consumers are still driven to seek the same music in legal and illegal markets”, explains the report, from Eric Garland, CEO of p2p analyst BigChampagne, and Will Page, chief economist at UK collecting society PRS For Music. “The most swapped files were also the most downloaded on legal music sites, indicating that what’s popular is popular”, continues the report, which claims that filesharing actually demonstrates “a very hit-heavy, skinny tail profile.”

Says Garland: “We are yet to see a big hit or wildly popular release in the pirate market that was not also a top seller in the licensed market.”

Right. Although - as Music Ally also points out - "the long tail" was about digital in general, and had nothing specific to do with piracy.

And you're rejecting to suggestion that there would be a long tail of downloads by pointing to the fat head of real-world downloads? Isn't that trying to disprove the existence of the sea by pointing firmly at the beach?