[ejdrapes]

Found this on a newsgroup...don't have a source for it...

[freedom9]

Good tunes

[Morose Musician]

Thanks for posting it. It is an interesting article. Tom Petty addresses so many issues that it's hard to respond to just one.

CD prices are indeed too high for a lot of teenaged kids' budgets.

Despite my efforts to educate my middle school students about copyright laws, virtually all of my kids regularly download song files from the internet and burn the digital recordings onto CDs.

When they have a choice between spending seventeen dollars or virtually nothing for the music they want, they do what makes sense to them.

They do not yet have the foresight to figure out the eventual consequences of the wholesale disregard for intellectual property rights.

I hope the recording industry, as Tom suggested, will try pricing albums more reasonably so the temptation to download and burn will be less enticing.

[Dallas]

Screw Tom Petty......he's a freakin liberal.

[PatrioticAmerican]

Petty may be a liberal, but his statements here are very good.

[B Knotts]

You know, I saw a billboard in New York I wish I had photographed. It was for the TNN network. It said three words against a patriotic background of red, white and blue - BIGGER, YOUNGER, RICHER.

FWIW, I'm guessing this was targeted at advertisers, after Viacom/MTV Networks took over TNN and ruined it, changing it from the only major channel for rural Americans, into some weird pseudo-yuppie channel.

[Reaganwuzthebest]

Hey Petty was cool as a Traveling Wilbury, so we better handle him with care, even if he's a flaming liberal.

[Fester Chugabrew]

As the owner of a small record label dedicated to brass, jazz, and blues music I'd like to know - given the current market - what really is a fair price for a CD?

I don't want to cheapen it. Good recorded music has an inherent value. For the price of a decent dinner one can enjoy a good recording for years and years. While the costs for pressing a CD are very low, the price for promoting a CD is very high. And the sweat and passion that goes into it . . . well . . . it's worth something.

So how do we set the price? $8.95? Really? Is that the key?

[giznort]

In this world of pissant sucky music, one of my few pleasures is listening to Mr. Tom Petty's music. I was saddened to see the photogs of him with Gore. But then again, I had my photog take with Dale Earnhardt without his permission. Maybe Algore horned in for a photo op with Tom! Maybe Tom told him "don't come around here no more".

[TLBSHOW]

BUMP

and don't forget the beatles/traveling wilburys concert in London next month. With Clapton!

[wku man]

I gotta agree with him, especially about the radio industry. It is a disgusting mockery of what it once was, thanks largely to the Telecom Act of '95, which created the Cheap Channel juggernaut.

As far as CD and concert prices are concerned, well, the industry will charge whatever people will pay. I refuse to pay more than $25 for a concert ticket, so obviously I haven't been to a show in a long time. I refuse to pay more than $10 for a CD (and love paying $2-3 for a used record!), so I peruse the racks at the used record stores all the time, or haunt the half-price listings at e-Bay. Sorry, Tom, but as long as the people are willing to bend over and take it in the shorts, the industry is only gonna charge more and more.

As far as his societal observations go, I'm in full agreement.

What disappoints me most about TP is that he was an Alwhore supporter. I've never liked Bon-Jovi, so that didn't bother me a bit, but Tom Petty and I go way back.

Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!

[My Favorite Headache]

Not really a Petty fan. I dig some of his material. I notice him and his band have been out on the road at the same time as Rush. Which is another band suffering from the same issues he speaks of, yet still pack the house.

[gc4nra]

Click here for a real Rock and Roll patriot http://www.tnugent.com/

[Hildy]

When money replaces God, this is what happens.

[SamAdams76]

I basically agree with Petty and find it near impossible to listen to FM radio. At least my car has a CD player and I can burn my own CD's to listen to.

There is one radio station here in Boston however that is an exception, and it is a reminder of how FM radio used to be. It is WMBR 88.1 out of MIT and you can pick up a live feed here. I listen to the station hour after hour and have been turned on to some excellent music.

If you pick up the live feed, don't judge the station on what you hear at the current time. They are currently playing punk music but will start the "Bats in the Belfry" show at 6PM (which is a goth show that starts with ancient music and then plays two hours of goth rock.) Just about every type of music is heard here. Bluegrass, Celtic, Blues, Jazz, old style country, Cajun, Mexican, you name it, they play it at some point during the programming week.

[oceanperch]

So what are the lyrics to his song that was banned.
BTW Tom Petty brings back some very nice memories of romance when I was a young adult. Sweeeet.

[FITZ]

Only a complete greedhead would charge $150 for a concert ticket

Many of the singers today aren't going to have long-lived careers, maybe they know it, they have to get rich quick because without talent they're not going to be around more than a few years.

[TheEditor]

I'm a Petty fan from way back -- I ran my copy of Damn the Torpedoes into the ground back in high school.

Didn't Tom get so angry over rising album prices that he put his fist thru a wall and take himself out of commission for a few months back in '80 or '81?

[I_Love_My_Husband]

alt.gossip.celebrities

Had no idea you lurked there too. You need to get into fights with Linda C., sara, and the rest of the liberals there and support Ron....and syvyn...