Chant with Nature

What a good idea- ever popular Gregorian Chants sublimely blended with relaxing sounds from nature. Our new release "Nature's Chant" has soared into our top 5 best sellers and is one of our most popular ever new releases.

 

Click here to listen to an mp3 sample

 

What could be more relaxing?

I don't know about you but I love the ocean - the sound, the smell and just the serene motion of the waves. Imagine the experience and for good measure add a gentle piano solo and you have our new Piano by the Sea album, the latest addition to our Nature and Music series. Relax and enjoy the experience.

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Apollo to iPod

It's 40 years since apollo 11 landed on the moon, or not if you're a conspiracy theorist.

How little progress man has made in space since then and despite our perceived advances in technology our iPods and HDTVs, 12 megapixel cameras and DVD recorders are just advancements of technologies that were around 40 years ago.

Think it's cool to download music from the Internet? Kids were downloading music from FM to tape and cassette recorders decades ago. Back then we were better at recycling, returning empty bottles for refunds. Products were built to last, built in obsolescence was yet to come.

So before you celebrate our wonderful achievements consider that in some ways we were as well off and into the bargain were better custodians of our planet in the past. And if that makes you nostalgic then take a trip back in time here.

Passion

Two of my greatest passions in life are Tennis and Music. Last weekend Roger Federer became the greatest tennis player of all time winning the Wimbledon Championship for the 6th time at the same time as winning his 15th Grandslam, breaking the previous record set by Pete Sampras.

My appreciation of great tennis is similar to my appreciation of great music. I have a liking for very diverse styles of music and always get excited when a new album is released by a favourite artist or group. I believe that a band or an artist is only as good as their last album, which brings me nicely to Global Journey's new releases. We are only as good as the latest titles we release and have we got some superb new albums being launched next month.

In striving to become the world's best producer of great quality Relaxation / Lifestyle & World Music, we are very excited about our next lot of new releases. I believe these new titles are all going to create a lot of excitement and become big sellers for sometime to come. So, keep an eye on our site over the next few weeks for the following exciting new titles: Gregorian Chant, Piano by the Sea, Classical Thunder, Ancestors, World Voices.

Where are my free mp3s?

Judging from the number of searches and website enquiries a lot of people have heard about our free mp3 giveaway. Among the more popular search terms for this blog is "Global Journey free mp3s". So let's not beat about the bush, I know why you're here and this is what you're looking for: http://www.global-journey.com/free/

If that whets your appetite then you can download more at emusic and most other download sites.

Revenge of the animals?

Did you catch Swine flu? No me neither. How about Bird flu? No? Mad Cow disease? Come on you must have caught some animal inspired pandemic? Perhaps it's all an attempt by the planet's wildlife to wreak revenge for the destruction we have visited upon them over the millenia. If that's the case then it's been a spectacular failure.

There are ways that we can enjoy our wildlife apart from eating them and without locking them up. You can literally live in harmony with them by relaxing to the sounds of whales, wolves and other nature sounds. Personally I find it the ultimate stress buster.

Celebrating ten years

We're delighted to be celebrating ten years of Global Journey music. We'll be splashing out on special offers and promotions over the rest of the year, so join us in enjoying our special year.

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Piracy - right or wrong?

The pirates have been caught and sentenced, pending appeal naturally. We're not talking about the seafaring pirates off Somalia though. This time it's a bunch of Swedes involved in the act of piracy. According to Wikipedia "Piracy is a war-like act committed by a nonstate actor, especially robbery or criminal violence committed at sea, on a river, or sometimes on shore". Well sorry guys but if you're going to get involved in illegal file sharing and hope to get away with it then perhaps you should have chosen a less incriminating name?

The “Pirate Bay” founders have been sentenced to a year in jail and a £2.5m fine. The appeal result will be interesting and there is clearly some support from the illegal downloaders who seem to believe that it is their right to download copyright material. Some view it as "sticking it to the man". Although certain downloaders believe that they are only hurting big industry and fat cat artists such as Madonna and Robbie the reality is that the huge majority of composers, performers, music labels and producers are talented artists who are not top of, or concerned with, pop charts.

The majority of people in the music business manage to make a living, certainly not a fortune but enough for it to serve as a career. The rise of illegal downloading has hit smaller musicians and music labels hard. Legitimate sites such as iTunes and eMusic are just as easy to use but the ubiquity of pirate downloading sites means that some feel that if there are so many doing it it must be OK. Of course it isn't and as I said at the beginning the clue is in the name. If you prefer not to be involved with pirates and care about the musicians, big or small, then legitimate CDs or downloads are your fair options.

Is the Internet world about to change? The Recording Industry Association of America RIAA is working with ISPs to act against pirate downloaders. Will this work? Already AT&T and Comcast amongst other US ISPs have written to persistent offenders and there's talk of a “three strikes and you're out” system where pirate downloaders and sharers will be disconnected.

In the UK letters have been sent to offenders and some recipients have responded welcoming the advice as they had not known about the illegal activity, most likely by their kids. Virgin Media owns 50% of the UK's fibre optic network and currently provides the highest download speeds of 50Mbps with plans to shortly offer up to 150Mbps. This kind of download speed is a real draw for downloaders. However Neil Berkett, Chief Executive of Virgin Media explained that they already throttle the bandwidth of certain users over a daily limit. They are also examine the nature of the data that users download. Mr Berkett says that Virgin has an obligation to manage the data and protecting the holders of intellectual property rights.

So perhaps a generation of kids who have grown up with “free” music will suddenly find that their world has changed. Just as the kids who used to copy from cassette to cassette in the 1970s lost their “free“ music when the CD came along (before writeable CDs arrived) perhaps today's kids are in for the same shock.

Up till now iTunes, eMusic et al have led the field when it comes to legal downloading but all that may be about to change. Enter Spotify, a simple concept that replaces the need to download or even pay for music. Touted to replace radio and your music collection Spotify allows you to stream music to your PC and put together playlists. The basic version will stick a few ads into the playlists but not too many and certainly less than radio. Premium versions remove the ads altogether.

Many people will still want to “own” their music and will continue to buy CDs. In my case I prefer this concept and although most of the music I listen to has been ripped, it has not been to low quality mp3s but to high quality lossless wma files at the highest bitrate. This is practically indistinguishable to the original CD and streets ahead of old fashioned 128mbs mp3s. You can't buy downloads of that quality online yet so even for ripped music you're better off with a CD and you have a backup of your purchase.

PRS Again

You can rely on the PRS to let down the music business. With musicians struggling just as much as everyone else in the credit crunch PRS have failed again to see reality.

Their latest failure to engineer a deal with YouTube is regrettable. PRS say they argue the case of the songwriters but once again fail to disclose which artists would be covered by a new deal with YouTube.

One reason that PRS won't disclose who will benefit from a new deal with YouTube is that apart from the PRS fat cats earning £400,000 a year the main beneficiaries will be the multi-millionaire artists whose videos will be most played on YouTube while the smaller musicians will see little.

Unfortunately all PRS will succeed in doing, in their aggressive approach with YouTube, is further drive people to piracy sending them to illegitimate video and music websites.

Interesting CD Gift Sets

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We've been thinking about how to make more interesting gift products and collectibles. CDs can be any price these days so when you give one as a gift it may not visually reflect the amount you spent. So, we've taken some of our most popular CDs and made them into sets. We started with a couple of 6 CD sets and have now expanded the range to twelve. Selling for £14.95 / €19.95 / $19.95 they represent great value for money and have been very successful since they went live on the website last week.

Save the music

We can save children, whales, birds even the world but can we save the music? Today's compressed music stored in low quality mp3 files is a reflection of how our music standards have slipped. Grab it now pirated downloads have much to answer for in this decline.

Try a test. Take some quality music, such as a classical CD album and rip it to mp3, then play it on your mp3 player. Now listen to the original CD on a reasonable quality CD player and you will see how modern music delivery methods and players rip the heart and soul out of your music. Only one quarter of the original album remains after you rip an album. Where did the rest go? Three quarters of the original soundtrack was ripped out having been deemed by your PC to be inconsequential. Your ears tell a different story.

Is it environmentally friendly to download music?

As always the answer is complex. CDs are manufactured and therefore like any other physical product use resources. However music downloads bear their own overhead being stored on huge energy intensive server farms all over the globe.

Farms are environmentally costly to build, house, cool and maintain. Downloads use energy as the data is shunted from the server farm to your PC and don't forget that your PC is a resource hungry device too.

All in all there may not be that much difference between the environmental cost of the CD compared to downloads but at least with the CD you have a long lasting high quality backup of your music.

How often do you listen to music?

According to some sources listening to music is an activity that most of us do more than any other, apart from sleeping. How often do you listen to music? Have you added up all the occasions when you listen to music in a typical day? Do you wake up to music, listen to it while commuting, at work, working out or for relaxation? It's not something that we consciously think about but how much would you miss music if it were no longer there?

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Pirate sharing films are throttling Hollywood

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The Times reports that 'Pirate-sharing films are throttling Hollywood'. Some people feel that new movies and music cost too much, whether for downloads or for physical CDs and DVDs. Whatever the format we are all entitled to object to the price but stealing the product is not a valid form of objection.

I may desire a movie and feel that it is too expensive and that the Producers are ripping me off so feel justified in downloading it illegally. However if I see an iPod in a store and reckon that it's too much money I wouldn't just take it for free.

Many people need to be rewarded for their work in bringing the content to the consumer; Composers, Artists, Actors, Producers, Directors, Graphic Designers, Distributors and so on. Rarely does the work go directly from the artist to the consumer. The bulk of the material we view and hear has involved dozens, perhaps hundreds of people. So there is just as much loss and injustice when a download theft takes place as when a physical theft does.

Update: Pirate bay Founders Walk the Plank over Free Downloads

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Music: What is compression and why does it matter?

Lately there has been quite a furore about the use of compression in music. I have been asked many times to explain what compression is and why anyone should care.

Very simply compression is a process applied to a music track. Once the music has been recorded many Producers decide to compress the music to boost quieter sections of the track nearer to the louder ones. This makes the overall volume (some might say noise!) of the track louder.

"Why do this"? you may ask. Well compression, applied sensibly, can be positive and some music stations, Classic FM for example, compress the music they play as they broadcast it so that people listening in noisier environments can still hear the very quiet parts of the music. For Classical music this can be good if you are driving or working in an office or warehouse where there is a lot of background noise. The purist however will turn to BBC3 safe in the knowledge that the channel does not compress their music and they can hear it as originally recorded.

We do not apply compression to our music and you can be sure that when you buy a Global Journey album that you are hearing it as it was played.

The Performing Rights Society (PRS)

The Performing Rights Society (PRS) are up to their old tricks again, calling small businesses with menaces and demanding payment for playing the radio as it is “providing entertainment”. Royalties should be paid to composers and songwriters and we should all accept and agree with this. However should we pay the composers and songwriters twice? After all when you listen to the music the radio station has already paid PRS for the performance, so why should you and everyone else where the radio can be heard by more than one person at a time? If you listen to CDs or legal downloads then the royalty has been paid in the purchase price of the disk or download.

 

PRS paid its top fat cat a salary of £425,000 in 2007, so before you think that perhaps the small time musician is entitled to a second bite of the cherry remember that much of the money collected goes to PRS salaries and admin costs.

 

If you have a small business and want to avoid paying PRS then you have options. Either play the radio for personal use only, ensuring that no-one else can hear it, or play PRS free music. Older classical music or music from companies such as Global Journey (the company I work for) sell music that it not registered with PRS. Play their music, even as in-store music for entertainment and you're in the clear. Don't forget that if you've got music on hold PRS will seek you out for that too, so change your hold music to royalty free music too!

Midem, the world's largest Music Fair was held in Cannes last week and in advance of it a report from the IFPI has disclosed that 95% of downloads are unauthorised with no payments to artists and producers. That figure may or may not surprise you but what should do is the fact from the same report that music purchases reached an all time high last year – up 10.5% in the US.

Non “digital” album sales are still 85% of the market in the US but considerably higher in other countries revealing that people still prefer buying albums on CD. Downloading is far more popular in the US than other countries and in the UK download sales of albums are still below 8% and lower still in France and Germany.

Although downloads are by far the most popular way to buy singles the opposite applies to albums. The death of the humble CD has been greatly exaggerated.

Bob Bruce
Global Journey

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