This guy literally wrote an angry letter to a kid about how he shouldn't have illegally downloaded his music
Musicians you cant stand
Jason Cruz
Daniel Lewis
link?
Owen Hill
Yeah, he's a cunt, shit music and worse live.
Noah Nguyen
youtube.com
based phil
Asher Jackson
Guy's an absolute twat.
Adam Cook
pretty reasonable tbqh. doesn't come off as angry at all.
Luke Scott
>If a high schooler doesn’t have the money then the high schooler just temporarily has fewer albums to listen to.
if you don't have money then you don't deserve to listen to music. well said, phil!
Jose Cox
I hate his le whispery vocals, music for lonely teenagers crap. But i'm considering wasting hard drive space to pirate his music
David Davis
No he didn't, user. He was merely speaking on an issue brought up by the person. He wasn't angry at the kid. It's a pretty reasonable response desu.
Asher Lopez
guy who spent possibly months of work to create something doesnt wasnt people stealing it? yeah what a piece of shit.
Cameron Myers
...
Jason Campbell
Pop artists of the turn of the century twenty first century who believe they are better than Robyn.
Why can't Grimes be the next Robyn w/ built in Royksopp?
John Morales
Kid was stealing. He deserved it.
Ian Rogers
True.
But like he said, times change. I wouldn't have ever listened to the vast majority of music I've heard in my life and then discovered other music I liked if I had paid for all of it. I would have never listened to The Glow Pt 2 if I had never pirated it and then decided I needed to buy it myself.
I see Phil's point for sure and I definitely think he's right about the necessity of supporting artists.
But at the same time, dude should probably be cognizant of the fact that he *probably* owes his career to piracy (to a degree) and be glad that people want to listen to his music in the first place.
Nathan Collins
LOL okay, lets make it so no one pirated your music ever phil, lets seee how much of a career you'd have, how many people would have even heard you.
Eli Foster
peopl arent entitled to music, and while, yes, to a degee, phil probably owes his career to piracy, it doesnt change the fact the piracy is inherently wrong
Jose Lee
>On Oct 29, 2015, at 5:11 PM, Phil Elverum wrote
That letter was written nine months after his daughter was born and five months after Geneviève was diagnosed with cancer. I'm sure his medical bills were through the roof, and his album sales were probably his biggest income since he was on hiatus from touring. The letter isn't even that angry though, especially considering how much he needed money at the time.
Ian Brown
personally, i'm appreciative of anyone that enjoys my art, whether they've paid for it or not, but i totally agree with the sentiment of what he's saying.
why should you be entitled to help yourself to somebody's work?
to make an album that's even half decent takes quite a lot of time, effort and money. most artists don't even come close to breaking even with sales; at best you're probably just reimbursing them.
Oliver Sanchez
basically this
he seems like a total sweetheart too. whether you like his music or not, i don't think there's any good reason to have contempt towards him. especially with what he's fucking going through now. i feel so bad for him.
Ian Nguyen
I don't really see what's wrong with that letter. It's not even that angry. He's just frustrated that someone buying his music is the exception to the rule because as a successful independent artist people need to buy his music so he can survive or else he has to get another job and quit making the music that he makes.
The music industry as it currently stands is completely at odds with our economic system. Music distribution has essentially become communist in that most underground music is made and distributed for free so everyone can have it. This is obviously a double edged sword because while people like Phil can reach a larger audience because of piracy, he also probably isn't going to making any money from that audience unless they come to his shows or buy merch.
Justin Wood
What happened to him was horrible, and I'm a somewhat big fan, but he's always been slightly annoying and fripp-y about piracy and streaming. He would go on twitter rants about how streaming is bad, etc until a bit later he decided to put all his albums on spotify. The whole don't smoke/get off the internet is a little ironic when he used to be on twitter 24/7 and drew webcomics of people smoking and stuff. He comes off as a bit preachy and hypocritical, but it's hard to be mad at him with his current situation and the fact that his music is still pretty damn good, I'm sure he's probably a genuine guy.
Cameron Hill
>don't smoke
what are you referencing here?
Zachary Martinez
On one of the Song Island albums he has two songs called Don't Smoke and Get Off the Interent.
youtube.com
youtube.com
Landon White
The final Microphones single, released in 2007