Syracuse Ska Forum

I heard from the organizers of SXSW today that Steel Pulse was forced to cancel their show in Austin last spring or they would be removed from Sirrus Radio programming. This is because one of the stages is run by XM (is that correct?) and if you have signed to be played on Sirrus, you will never be allowed to play on a stage sponsored by XM. Vice versa also. I find this incredibly ridiculous and it seems like it should be against the law. Steel Pulses tickets and visas were all ready to go and they were told by Sirrus they would be dropped immediately if they played.

Wow. I can't even articulate how f*ck up the music industry is these days.







'Course, I say "these days" like it wasn't before. But it always has been...

Steel Pulse is so damn good too.

The process of recording live shows in a certain manner, used pretty universally with big name acts, was patented by Clearchannel a while back, so now you have to get licensing rights from them whenever you want to use this specific process...I wish to christ I could remember the specifics.

Normally, I would launch into a rant/sermon about the power of open-source technologies...

...but it's too bloody late in the day.