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Yesterday on his Facebook page DJ Cutman revealed that they have been working on a project recently to do with Minecraft – a remix of Starbomb’s tune Minecraft is For Everyone.
The reveal came in the form of a post that read “I’ve got this big Starbomb remix just about finished with NO IDEA what to do for artwork! It’s about #Minecraft… WHAT DO” to which followers responded with suggestions for what they could do for the cover art for the mix. Eventually a prototype cover was posted to the post which I’ve included below.
Starbomb of course are the comedy band formed between the members of Ninja Sex Party, Leigh Daniel Avidan and Brian Wecht, as well as flash animator Arin “Egoraptor” Hanson; who write and perform songs about various video games and video gaming related subjects with animated videos. No word yet if they’re aware of this remix.
Keep tuned to Sanitarium.FM and hopefully you can hear this track and many others in the near future!
Spotify’s payout structure has been one of the hottest debates in the music industry since the company announced that a song’s rights holder receives “between $0.006 and $0.0084 per stream in royalties” last winter. Taylor Swift’s recent decision to not release her new album, “1989”, on the music streaming service raised a few eyebrows, but when she subsequently removed all of her back catalog, it caused massive outcry from both the public and the industry. But people seem torn on whether to praise her for taking a stand on what musicians should be paid for their work, or whether they should condemn her for not embracing the current state of the music industry and making her music available to everyone.
There are two important things to remember before passing judgment of Ms. Swift: The first being that Spotify’s estimate of their payout per stream is, by their own admission, “highly flawed”. They actually use a more complex formula that creates far greater variation in their payout than can be accurately predicted on a “per Stream” basis. This could mean more money for an artist, or less, depending on a number of other factors than simply the number of times people listened to a certain song.
The second thing to remember is that Taylor Swift is already the second richest woman in music. She made $64,000,000 last year and this new album is the only album so far this year to go platinum. In fact, it has the highest first week sales of any album in 12 years. She can afford to take chances like this. She’s already made a tremendous amount of money off of the album, and it’s only been out for 11 days.
What these things add up to is that, financially speaking, this is a little more complex than it appears at first glance. Swift is already in a position to do whatever she wants with her music because people will buy it regardless of how she sells it. The Spotify payout is a drop in the bucket for her, and she can easily do without it, without risking a great deal. And while Spotify is often demonized for it’s low pay to musicians, it is a necessity of a company that has lost $200 million dollars since it’s founding, due to incredibly high operating costs.
But I don’t think that the most important thing about this story is the money. I think that more people should be paying attention to the fact that, for better or worse, Taylor Swift is taking a risk and trying something different. The music industry is in a transitional period right now, and it’s hurting both the financial and artistic integrity of everyone involved. What is remarkable to me is how content the major players seem to be to continue on with an industry that seems held together with bubblegum and toothpicks. What makes Swift’s decision so admirable to me is that she is in a position, both socially and financially, to take shots like this, and actually does.
Granted, her particular strategy might not be the most effective. She seems to be trying a philosophy from a different time, when consumers actually purchased whole albums, and they didn’t expect to get their media for free online. Album sales fell nearly 15% in the first half of this year, while on demand streams were up 42%. Streaming is how people get their music now. It is a fact of the industry. I applaud Taylor Swift for actually trying something. I just wish it was something new.
Regardless, it is very nice to see one of the most recognizable people in music actually taking action on the current state of affairs. She has the money and influence to exact real change in a failing business, and I really hope she keeps up the pressure and brings others along. As people are so fond of saying, “The first step to solving a problem is admitting you have one”. Ms. Swift just told everyone we have a problem. Now we need to figure out how to solve it.
Have an opinion on it? Leave a comment below to join the discussion.
For those of you who follow Mojang a bit closer than your casual Minecraft player, you might remember that Mojang is an indie games developer. That means, even if you’ve got a hit on your hands and continue to support it, you still need to invest some time in developing some new properties.
Mojang or more precisely Notch was working on another game besides Minecraft. 0x10c was to be a game to follow on Minecraft’s footsteps, to hopefully gain some spotlight from its older brother and gain its own slightly different audience. At least that was the plan. Development stalled some time around early 2013 and in August of that same year Notch confirmed that the game project was dead in the water. However it seems that some elements of that game had been finished.
C418, better known as the composer of the tunes you hear in Minecraft, has released two tracks through Twitter to his Bandcamp for players to listen to. They’re short but they’re not bad. The low bitrate sound is intentional too, as C418 wanted that to be the identifier for the game. Little music, lots of drone.
I think now is a good time to release the 0x10c music. You can pay for it if you want. https://t.co/aFfAm8qIqK
Talking about Notch’s recent departure from Mojang, C418 echoed what had been said by Notch then, adding that he couldn’t have taken the strain any longer without snapping.
“Do you know that feeling that you have had a great day, but then some guy on twitter that you don’t even know tells you you’re the worst thing that ever happened to this planet? … That feeling also happens with Markus, except it’s amplified times two million.”
He has said though that he is going to continue to work with Mojang on Minecraft for as long as possible.
Coming upto the stations 7th b’day, we’ve been doing some upgrades in the back room (well, Crimsonshade has) and we’re proud to announce our new high quality stream!
From today, if you tune in through the website, nothing changes, you get our typical low quality (awful sounding) stream.
However, if you click the tune in buttons on the website to download the new updated file, you’ll get the brand new, high quality stream.
Hey Guys! Thay here! Found another awesome deal for the lover of Music and Video Games: The Be Mine 12 Bundle over on Groupees.
These bundles are always good places to come across games and music you may not have heard of before. I’ve found some awesome hidden gems in the past in these bundles. You never know what you may find.
This bundle happens to contain a mix of video games and music. The games include: Sang-Froid-Tales of Werewolves, which is an action and strategy about two feuding brothers who have to put aside their differences to save their sister;Half Minute Hero, a hypersonic RPG action game where you only have 30 seconds to save the world; Ilamentia, a first-person action puzzler featuring 72 brain teasing rooms; Luminosity, an arcade score attack game with an old school style; and many more.
The music in this bundle is an interesting mix, including two albums by Brave Wave Productions called World 1-2, which features renowned game composers alongside the remixers that pay them tribute. It features original music by the composers of the games Journey, Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden, and Silent Hill as well as music from celebrated remixers. The bundle also includes some music by Japanese musicians Matryoshka, a group that mixes a variety of music and sounds with melancholic female vocals; and Chuck G. & The Napkins, a Japanese Soul/R&B band which combines R&B with J-Pop for a unique sound.
So if you want a nice mix of music and games for a cheap price, check out the Be Mine 12 Bundle on Groupees. The deal ends in a week so be quick ;).
You can find the Be Mine 12 Game & Music Bundle here.
