Yet again, another excellent blog has fallen foul of some American’s with a taste for blood and litigation, and not a bloody clue about how to go about promoting music in this day and age.

This time, the casualty is Jason over at The Pop Cop, who came a cropper relating to tracks that he posted over two years ago. You can read the appalling story here.

It is unbelievable that mp3 blogs that are supporting up and coming bands and an industry that has much to blame for its’ own suffering should persecute those who are supporting bands by posting one or two mp3s. As a record company owner -and a tiny one at that -I’m ecstatic whenever someone writes about music that I have put out, and I’m proud to include Jason in that. It’s not even a request for an mp3 to be removed -every blogger has that disclaimer up, but that three years of Jason’s intellectual property has been removed. Pretty disgusting.

What I am really chuffed about is that lots of the blogging community in Scotland have come together and are blogging about this and supporting Jason. People including Jock’n’Roll, Aye Tunes, and Peenko to name but three, What is really needed is some kind of ‘Go stuff the DMCA-they are a bunch of money-grabbing ****s who don’t know shit about music’ organisation, but that may have to wait another day.

It seems some people still do not realise that mp3 blogs are keeping the music biz aliove, and that established acts need them just as much as new acts -one PR guy has been trying to arrange for me to do an interview with none other than Jim Kerr (yes, frontman of Simple Minds) for several weeks. VENCEREMOS!

Join the Facebook group and support Jason.

Crass -‘Do they Owe Us A Living?’

*deep breath*

It’s been a hellish few days.

But I’ve been very touched by the support I’ve received from readers, friends, fellow bloggers and family. Most particularly my long-suffering wife.

I’m still trying to work out the future. But I wanted to say thanks (and watch this space).

In the words of Vigo from Ghostbusters 2 (above):

‘Death is but a door, time is but a window. I’ll be back.’

Crass -‘Do They Owe Us A Living?’ mp3

Ex Lion Tamer -‘Life Support Machine.’ mp3

There are very few artists who have managed to have questions asked about them in the House of Commons, in fact I believe that the list is just John Lennon, UB40, the Sex Pistols and Crass. The latter ended up being enquired about because of their single ‘How does it feel to be the mother of a thousand dead?’ an attack on Thatcher and the Falklands War.

I can’t post it here – I don’t have it, and it’s not on emusic or iTunes either (can anyone help?!?!).

But I did track down this single, which deals with some of those who were offended by the aforementioned single, this one is ‘Sheep Farming In The Falklands.’

Crass -‘Sheep Farming In the Falklands.’ mp3

This was inspired because I picked up their debut LP, The Feeding Of the 5,000 today, with the wonderful’Do they Owe Us A Living?’ A fantastic riposte at the end of the working week…

Crass -‘Do They Owe Us A Living?’ mp3

Official website
Crass @ Wikipedia