What has the singers Janet Jackson, Yellowfella, and King Sunny Ade all have in common? Answer - .79pence.
Have you ever wondered how long a song has to be in order for it to be described as a song? According to itunes as short or as long as it wants to be. Read on...
All their tracks available in the digital retail itunes store(UK) sells for 79pence regardless of the length. I was taken aback when I saw the length of some of Janet Jackson’s songs which were literally tracks that lasted only seconds. Don’t believe me? Go ahead take a look. Track 19 Bathroom Break (Interlude) lasts 40secs, Track 18 Spinin (Interlude) lasts 7 seconds and there is more wait for it Track 102 Memory (Interlude) lasts only 4 seconds.
Yellowfella and King Sunny Ade are both Nigerian artists, yes they have that in common, but that’s not what am getting at, the pricing system does not allow artists to have a say, itunes charges what it likes per album or song.
I just happened to be browsing itunes a few days ago looking up one of my favourite musicians King Sunny Ade. I purchased several songs I know his songs can last as long as 10 minutes if not longer, as is typical of many Nigerian artists, however some of his songs seemed abridged. It would not make any sense to an artist to sell a song that last 10 minutes for 79pence whereas another artist was selling a song that lasted 40 seconds for the same amount of money. Or does it matter?
Yellowfella on the other hand has a typical time length for the average song 4minutes 47 seconds for his songs Promise and Glory. Comparing Janet Jackson and Yellowfella in terms of popularity is also interesting, Yellowfella is new on the music scene yet, I noticed this week that one of his songs streamed 65 last week and Janet Jackson had 39 streams. I got all this information from download.com.
Don’t get me wrong, I like Janet Jackson, Yellowfella and King Sunny Ade, it is the music business that can be baffling sometimes.
Yellowfella was voted best male solo artist 2007 for Nigeria in international Musicaid award, with his gospel song Promise. The lyrics of Promise are in Yoruba and English with some pidgin thrown in for good measure. Yellowfella is quoted as saying “I worked for three years on the song, I want it to give hope to people when they are in difficulties and to just have faith and keep believing in God. I am working on my new song for this year entry and also want to be nominated for best producer”.
He is based in Surulere, Lagos and can be found in the studios singing, writing and producing music. He produces all his own tracks, he has quite a few musical strings to his bow, and apart from the above talents he also plays the piano, guitar and drums.
His latest EP albums entitled Promise and Trust can be purchased from Amazon, itunes, emusic and Napster; his ringtones can be bought from groupietunes and phonesherpa. If your one of these people that like to try before you buy some of his tracks can streamed albums on download.com and last f.m radio station.
yellowfella@yellowfella.com
http://www.yellowfella.com/
Friday, 29 February 2008
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment