Some may think I'm a conspiracy theorist but I do reckon we'll end up with just one company owning the entire lot which in turn will get swallowed up by Google sometime over the next twenty years. The way Google keep silently expanding and making tons of money, all the while trashing all copyright laws that stand in their way is disturbing.

Google have done absolutely NOTHING to stop music piracy. Go to Blogger and there's tons of music blogs rampantly giving away everything. Google's DMCA system is a disgrace and is deliberately as long winded and awkward as possible. Oh... they might take two weeks before they even look at your DMCA and that's several thousand more possible sales lost... and all the while, Google keep raking in the revenue from ads.

Yet, youtube (owned by google), smacked a friend of mine. He uploaded a 90 minute aircheck of Atlantic 252. Within 2 weeks it was taken down under protest from Sony and Universal! This is garbage. As if a crackly lo-fi longwave radio station aircheck would in any way affect their sales.

The biz continues to kill itself. The death started with the end of the 45 rpm single. Until the 80s you could go out and buy the latest 45 and if you liked it buy the lp. That got replaced with those crappy cassette singles. Now-a-days, I have no idea what a single is.

And the reissues are over-priced vanity items. Its almost as if they are designed to be NOT played.

If they got back to the beauty of a vinyl record, and bins well stocked in stores, it would not suffer the way it is now

Amy

Biffbampow, you've hit the nail on the head! Universal(MCA) seems hell-bent on owning the recording(mechanical) and sheet music rights to everything ever recorded, even if it means gulping down BMG, Sony, Warner, Festival(Australia) and any other company they can get their ever-so-greedy hands on, then Google will just gulp the lot down in one byte...er.. bite! But seriously, this needs to be stopped, even if draconian measures are brought in to do so. As for marketing music. the internet SHOULD PLAY ABSOLUTELY NO PART WHATSOEVER! Music should be sold exclusively by the good old "bricks & mortar" shop in the high street, whether its on CD or vinyl, or even cassettes(let's face it, the mini-disc system, while useful in community radio stations for corporate sponsorship spots or station promo's and identification spots, never really "took off" as a medium for music distribution, did it?). At least that way, gainful employment could be offered to those who have a passion for music in any genre.

What weather we're having eh?

Let's face it... 90% of John Lennon's solo work is awful.

(My opinion... but I thik a lot of people would agree if they could overcome their Beatles loyalties)

I think we want it to be great, because it came from him... but I'd have to say that outside of The Beatles, George Harrison & Paul McCartney solo work (& Wings) are far more likely to make it onto the turntable with greater frequency than John Lennon's work. (Acknowledgements of course to Ringo).
And you can pick up pretty much mint, and virtually un-played copies of all this very cheap in charity stores (Which is saying something in itself).

You playing mind games, Marmie?

Lennon had his moments but if you could pick the most outstanding tracks of his career, they'd amount to a 45rpm EP at most.

Nothing compared to the Beatles, but then, who can compare to them?

Years ago, I heard a Lennon interview where he said that on the last few albums it was like each member was doing solo material and the rest of the band was his back up band, so, if those that are distraught over The Beatles' break-up want more Beatles albums, all they have to do is take a few songs from each of their solo albums and compile their own "new Beatles" albums. So, I at least got as far as doing that on paper, starting with the first one to release a solo, then the next, etc. (George, John, Paul, Ringo), and, keeping all the songs in the original order they appeared on the solo albums, and making each set last the length of an album, it made an interesting prospective!! So far, I have never gotten around to actually compiling such albums, but, maybe someday.
Album 1/A
1. Microbes
2. Two Virgins (Part 1)
3. The Lovely Linda
4. Sentimental Journey
5. Red Lady Too
1/B
1. Two Virgins (Part Two)
2. That Would Be Something
3. Night And Day
4. Tabla And Pakavaj
2/A
1. Cambridge 1969
2/B
1. Valentine Day
2. Whispering Grass (Don't Tell The Trees)
3. In The Park
4. No Bed For Beatle John
5. Every Night
6. Bye Bye Blackbird
7. Drilling A Home
8. Baby's Heartbeat

Etc..

Album 1/A
1. Microbes
2. Two Virgins (Part 1)
3. The Lovely Linda
4. Sentimental Journey
5. Red Lady Too
1/B
1. Two Virgins (Part Two)
2. That Would Be Something
3. Night And Day
4. Tabla And Pakavaj
2/A
1. Cambridge 1969
2/B
1. Valentine Day
2. Whispering Grass (Don't Tell The Trees)
3. In The Park
4. No Bed For Beatle John
5. Every Night
6. Bye Bye Blackbird
7. Drilling A Home
8. Baby's Heartbeat

Etc..

There was a pretty standard formula for Beatles albums. It wasn't absolute in every case, but usually applies - and that's two George tracks, one Ringo vocal, and the rest between John and Paul. So if I were compiling an imaginary Beatles album, that's what I'd do, to make it more 'real'.

The Beatles wouldn't have had to split up if they released these two albums, their career would have been killed stone dead! I can just imagine Macca giving over one side of a Beatles album to "Cambridge 1969".