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Radiohead's Ed O'Brien: 'Piracy isn't killing music'

Guitarist speaks out about the current state of the music industry

January 23, 2010 | 14 Comments
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Radiohead's Ed O'Brien has hit out at claims that piracy is killing the music industry.

Expressing his thoughts on the situation the guitarist explained that, while pirates might not purchase music, they are still putting money into the industry.

"I have a problem when people in the industry say 'it's killing the industry, it's the thing that's ripping us apart'," O'Brien said in a video message for the Midem music conference. "I don't actually believe it is... [Pirates] might not buy an album, but they're spending their money buying concert tickets, a T-shirt, whatever."

In the video, O'Brien also outlined ways the industry could remedy the problem.

"It's an analogue business model in a digital era," he explained. "The business model has to change. You've got to licence out more music – have more Spotifys, more websites selling more music. You've got to make it slightly cheaper to get music in order to compete with the peer-to-peers."

He added: "I find it staggering that the industry seems to be really dragging its heels on this – this is stuff that you could do in one week. Move quicker!"

Meanwhile, Radiohead have announced that they will play a one-off gig for Oxfam's Haiti earthquake emergency response appeal this weekend (January 24).

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Comments (14)

ddirt80

Jan 23, 2010

I truly look forward to hearing Lilly Allen's devestating riposte, inherently ripping apart all that Ed O'Brien stands for.

shityourlegoff

Jan 25, 2010

Greatest of respect for Radiohead, but it's all very well commenting on the state of the industry when you've already made millions, have a career spanning two decades, and will always, always sell millions of records and tour the world playing to packed houses no matter what happens. Radiohead, brilliant as they are, were fortunate enough to 'come through' at a time when record labels were still willing to invest in a band's career instead of endlessly chasing copycat one hit wonders. I think the band themselves would admit that their first album was nowhere near as good as their later ones. The point is that they were allowed to have a bit of a flop, and then found their feet and with their label still backing them, went on to make some truly amazing music. Jimi from the Doves said it best in an interview last year. "Now, you don't get the chance to be shit first and then get good, like we did". The pressure is on for immediate hits and if you don't deliver, you're dropped like a bag of old cat shit. Muddying the waters is the fact that most bands these days are fucking terrible anyway, which makes it harder to claim that labels should support them through the shit years, because there's a very good chance that all they will ever produce is shit. However it does seem to have swung too far in the wrong direction. Even the bands that are massively hyped tend to be fucking rubbish - the Killers, Kings of Leon, N Dubz for fuck's sake! Where's the originality, the quality?So Ed, I appreciate the sentiment but I'd also like to hear the opinion of someone who isn't a multi millionaire, firmly established musician whose every whim is happily catered for. 'Giving away' In Rainbows was a great publicity idea and everything but it only worked for you because as a band you could easily afford to do it. Most small bands, even good ones, can expect never to come close to breaking even, let one making a living.

ellietreagust

Jan 25, 2010

I agree with Mr O'Brien, there are plenty of ways for bands to make money aside from record sales. And given that Lily Allen has "taken a step back" from the file-sharing argument because it's "time for other bands to stand up for it", which either means she doesn't believe in it anymore, or knows she's wrong or can't be bothered, then I don't think we're going to be hearing much from her anyway. That, coupled with the fact she's a terrible musician and Radiohead are incredible, I don't think she has much to stand on here anymore...

rob3fish

Jan 25, 2010

it true: Piracy isn't killing music.the Music Industry is killing music, with a never ending series of bad decisions.album prices of 7.99Â£ (or 9.79â‚¬) never will lure encourage listeners to buy music. charging hair stylists for playing the radio at work is totally pathetic. it's a perfect business school case study for how to fuck up an industry.

honcho

Jan 25, 2010

word of the day toilet paper, eh?

rockstar94

Jan 25, 2010

haha yeahhhh........Ed O' Brien is so right, i always buy the records i want legally but some people cant always afford to do this and the thing is fans of the bands are paying for tickets and merchandise

youhavenomail

Jan 25, 2010

I'm glad O'Brien thinks this way coz I haven't sent a single penny Radiohead's way since Amnesiac. I managed to enjoy In Rainbows for free. Hail To The Thief, not so much.Here's to no one buying the next Radiohead album and O'Brien not being remotely upset about it! (Yay!)

randomgirl666

Jan 25, 2010

I remember reading an article that said 2009 was the best year for singles sales ever, which really makes a mockery of the idea that piracy is killing music.

theyelenanator

Jan 25, 2010

He's right, in a way. Musicians don't even make that much money off of individual album sales. Most of their yearly earnings come from concert sales, fan materials, etc. Record labels are the ones profiting from album sales, more than anything since they very well leave most of the per-album revenue for themselves.

Del Train

Jan 25, 2010

It is quite unbelievable. Artist development is dead and this guy says piracy has no impact. What a empty head. It was Creep and the OK Computer album that got you recognized. Your band was nurtured by labels. The only thing that separates our livelyhoods from slavery is property rights!Piracy has destroyed more lives than the Iraq war! Noe that's a statement

ALargeFriendlyBear

Jan 25, 2010

Yet another easy-for-them-to-say crowd-pleasing statement from one of the few artists in music that can afford to be blase about their music being stolen. No doubt Radiohead can live off t-shirts and tickets from now, but it would be nice for other artists to at least have the option to make some money from recorded music, something Ed has decided they should give away. Radiohead have every right to give away their music for free if they like, but no right to insist that everyone else does.Ed says "Pirates are spending their money on" other things but as usual that's just his opinion, with absolutely no back-up, when all the actual hard evidence says that in music, as in all walks of life, people who steal do not then compensate by buying loads of other stuff.Spotify is great but it's ad-supported and the more of those services there are, the more supply of advertising space exceeds demand and the cheaper the ad-space gets, meaning the overall money made and distributed to artists won't rise. And the premium subscription? Most people I know that download p2p are put off by even paying the small subscription for SPotify. Ed's arguments are working - as far as they are concerned its their right to help themselves and outrangeous to have to pay even a few quid a month for Spotify.Its lovely that we can all clap ourselves on the back and say stealing's ok in this case just because a few big artists aren't fussed about it, but when music becomes a completely impossible option for most bands in ten years time because they can't make any money out of it we'll all be whinging about the good old days

shityourlegoff

Jan 25, 2010

With the possible exception of 'alargefriendlybear', most of the comments on here seem to be from braindead idiots who steal music because they seem to believe that the music business hates them personally. One or two people have even managed, staggeringly, to shoehorn in totally unconnected references to Iraq. Remarkably stupid. Why do people feel the need to splutter about how they steal music 'becos the music bisness is greeeDY an CHarge 2 much 4 recordzz!"? Why can't they just admit that they do it BECAUSE THEY CAN. It's like that advert at the cinema - 'you wouldn't steal a car, so why steal a film'? I think you'll find that people would happily steal cars and everything else if there was no realistic chance of ever being caught, like with downloading music. One other thing that people don't seem to understand. Touring and selling merchandise requires a HUGE amount of cash to be found upfront. Going on tour is REALLY FUCKING EXPENSIVE for most bands. Shelling out a couple of grand on T-shirts and vinyl in the hope that you sell some of it, equally so. So the argument that 'bands make money from touring and merch' applies yet again only to established bands with a label and cash behind them. Try arranging a tour (not a tour of shit, toilet venues) without financial support and see how much money you'll be expected to shell out in advance. Fucking loads. This isn't the answer for 99% of bands.

shityourlegsoff

Jan 26, 2010

I've had a think and i've changed my mind completely............this is the answer for 99% of bands and i love sniffing my mums knickers!

nicnaks99

Jan 26, 2010

I think â€œAlargefriendlybearâ€ has explained how I feel on the matter perfectly â€“ totally agree!I also agree with â€œshityourlegoffâ€™sâ€ comment about bands being dropped after a shit first album. I think it is a real shame that there are good bands that are unfortunate to be in this position at the moment. Record companies are not giving bands like this a chance.They are all being dropped if they donâ€™t score a hit and It definitely was not that bad 10 years ago.I can list a fair amount of good bands that were dropped by the labels for this reason EVEN though they had a single that did wellSo noâ€¦piracy ISNâ€™T helping Ed Oâ€™Brien!You know what they sayâ€¦.Fat Cheques to big music company chiefs first, good music second.