James F!A#$%^ Friedman Talks to PSFK

James F!@#$%^ Friedman is a New York City-based DJ who also co-owns and runs the independent record label Throne of Blood with members of The Rapture. Friedman talked to PSFK about the changes he’s seeing in his industry and what’s turning him on now.

What are you doing right now? What’s new and how are you reacting to the changes happening in the music industry?

Well, for our small, niche-oriented label, the business hasn’t transformed to the degree that it has for traditional labels. We specialize in vinyl records for DJs and there is some evidence to suggest that while CD sales continue to slump, vinyl sales are actually picking up a bit. However, in the dance music world, digital technologies such as Rane’s Serato Scratch Live are becoming hugely popular, so one new thing we’re rolling out in the coming months is a digital distribution strategy which will see our releases come out simultaneously on vinyl and in digital download shops ranging from iTunes down to much smaller, specialist shops such as the one run by Turntable Lab.

We hear a lot about technology changes - but what’s changing in terms of genre and mood in music? Is there anything cultural that’s driving this change?

This is a pretty tough question to answer since there is so much variety out there to begin with. While pop music continues to struggle to find a place in the Long Tail world, I’m seeing things get very reductionist. Hip Hop is at the forefront of this. Songs based on simple dances are huge right now (see Soulja Boy Tellem’s “Crank That”), as are beats built to sound good as cell phone ringtones (”This is Why I’m Hot” by MIMS). Its marketing impacting the creative process of music making and personally, I find it rather offputting.

For me, the trend I’m keeping an eye on is the ongoing embrace of psychedelic styles and sounds all across the musical spectrum. There is a huge body of freaky folk music that has shaken off the Peter Paul and Mary connotations of the genre on the one hand, legions of bearded, longhaired heavy rockers revisiting the druggy rock of the 70’s (Dead Meadow, Wooden Shjips, Dungen and many many more), and even dance music artists are getting into the act reviving not just the songs and styles big in the 70s in places like Goa and Ibiza, but digging back and unearthing super obscure “beardo disco” jams from the 70s. Folks like Prins Thomas, DJ Harvey, Lindstrom, UK’s A Mountain of One, and Sweden’s The Studio are all playing in really rich musical space suspended between modern sounds of house music and obscure older sounds including the arty extremes of disco, psych rock, progressive rock, tropicalia, afrobeat, and krautrock. I think the principle cultural phenomenon uniting these disparate but likeminded musical trends is the accelerating cycles of technology that dominate our lives. People are looking back to a time when the world wasn’t so connected, to an era when innovation was wholly novel and new. That period stands in such sharp contrast to the present, where innovation seems to be all about refining whats come before, or finding a new and interesting tweak. I can’t think of the last time I heard or saw something that literally had no cultural precedent.

What/who are a few of the artists/musicians/companies/people that are embracing the changes in the industry and promoting innovation and creativity?

Well this is tough one as well. I think Radiohead and NIN are using the fame they built through the old system to their advantages now in unique and interesting ways. Radiohead sold 1.2 million downloads of their latest album via their own website. Even if the average price paid was just 2GBP, that’s a pretty nice payout for one day’s work! As far as companies go, I’m not sure there’s anybody I’d site as being terrifically adventurous. I’d say in general that the indie labels have been much smarter and more nimble about adapting to the changing marketplace for music than the majors. Of the majors, I think Interscope has been very savvy getting so many of their artists’s music placed into Apple spots (Feist, Wolfmother, Beck, and the list goes on and on). As far as people I consider to be really smart and insightful about the music industry, they are pretty few and far between. Here are a few of my faves though: Adam Shore at Vice, Kris Chen at XL, Kris Gillespie at Domino. Guys like these three have a comprehensive understanding of the full musical landscape, from the old way of doing business to the new. They LOVE music without regard to what is cool or of the moment. They are encyclopedic, smart, engaged and hugely invested personally in finding viable ways to help artists make and sustain careers.

Thanks, James!

Throne Of Blood Music