A$hley MacI$$ac

Saw this article on chartattack and thought it was very interesting. Ashley MacIsaac posted an ebay auction for half of his own musical income over the rest of his life. The auction has since been removed due to an eBay terms of use violation, but I thought it was interesting to think about.

As I hope has been made clear throughout the course of this blog, most artists spend 50% of their professional time making music and the other 50% trying to figure out how to make money from doing it. Since most record deals screw the artist horrible in terms of CD sales (more on that in a later blog) merch is traditionally the way to do it. I’ve seen bands sell everything from the more traditional T-shirt and hoodie to bracelets, necklaces, shoelaces, shoes, and so on. I once even saw a band selling email addresses based on their domain name.

MacIsaac is definitely thinking outside the merch box, but it seems a little fishy to me. Either he’s in dire financial straits and he needs some cash fast or he just really wants others to share in his grand wealth.

My guess is the former.

Let’s not forget, this is the same Ashley MacIsaac that declared bankruptcy back in 2000, so you can be reasonably sure that he’s not super solvent to being with. And what does the fine print say on the eBay sale? Nothing is guaranteed. Not his $5,000-$15,000 per gig, not his royalties, not even the principle you put in. That is to say, whoever wins this bid wins the right to give Ashley MacIsaac their money and hope that they break even on the proposition. Doesn’t this sound like a record company’s job?

What Macisaac is really looking for here is someone to act as his record company without having a record company, which I can understand. It’s the lack of responsibility to the investor that turns me off. Record companies are set up as checks and balances, meaning that one artist can fail while another succeeds, so the company on a whole breaks even. Please don’t misconstrue that as saying record companies are fair or even helpful to the artists; that’s just how they are set up. MacIsaac wants some no-strings-attached cash that he doesn’t have to worry about paying back, and I think it’s ridiculous.

With MacIsaac’s history of “ironic statements” (accusing Asian women in his audience of spreading SARS, etc., etc.) there’s a chance that this is a goof and I’m playing into it. I’d say there’s a better chance of it NOT being a goof and MacIsaac labeling it as such when it fails, but that’s just my opinion (which is immunity from being told I’m wrong, or so Relient K says).

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IN OTHER NEWS!

Nope, nothing. My stupid palm pilot broke so now I have no idea when I’m playing shows in the next little while. I’ll let you know when I know.