Major Scales and Bass...Part Three

Ok so we went over the formula of the major scale and the circle of fifths.  Did you learn anything?  Were you able to apply it to your bass.  If you are looking for some patterns here is one...




Notice the how the red is the root of the scale.  The fingers of your left hand are 1 thru 4 or index to pinkey.  notice that each finger is assigned a fret.  Start on the red 2 and play the notes in order going up.  So it would be 2,4 then 1,2,4 of the next string (which is the A string) then 1,3,4 of the nest string (which is the D string).  Notice that it keeps going on the next string which is the G string. 
As you learn the fingering of the major scale on your bass you will find that there is patterns that you can follow.  If you move the root of the major scale from the 5th fret to the 12th fret and play the same fingering you will have a major scale.  It is the same every where you play it on your bass.  Next post I am going to start teaching you how to spell out chords.  For example, what notes make up a C chord?  They are C, E, G.  This is important when you are reading charts and writing bass lines.  See ya next time.  Happy New Year....

Major Scales and Bass...Part Two

Major scales and bass...So lets review... what is the formula of the major scale?  W-W-H-W-W-W-H....so if you start on a C you would play this notes...C D E F G A B and back to C.  Then we went over a few other major scales.  Remember, whatever note you start on if you apply the formula you will know what notes to play for that key.  So lets go over the keys that have the sharps in them...

C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C
G-A-B-C-D-E-F#-G              1 sharp  F#
D-E-F#-G-A-B-C#-D            2 sharps F#, C#
A-B-C#-D-E-F#-G#-A          3 sharps F#, C#, G#
E-F#-G#-A-B-C#-D#-E        4 sharps F#, C#, G#, D#
B-C#-D#-E-F#-G#-A#-B      5 sharps F#, C#, G#, D#, A#
F#-G#-A#-B-C#-D#-E#-F#  6 sharps F#, C#, G#, D#, A#, E#,

Theoretically you could continue on with more scales.  I want you to notice something...Notice as I go from C major scale to G major scale then to Dand then to A to E to B there is a intervalic relationship.  From C to G is a fifth.  From G to D is a fifth.  From D to A is a fifth, so on and so on.  Each time you go up a fifth you add a sharp.  Also notice that there is a order of sharps that develops as you go up a fifth.  The order is F,C, G, D, A, E, B.  This is the sharp side of the "circle of fifths", which is another phrase for key signatures. 


 Now lets look at the flat side. 

F-G-A-Bb-C-D-E-F                1 flat Bb
Bb-C-D-Eb-F-G-A-Bb            2 flats Bb, Eb
Eb-F-G-Ab-Bb-C-D-Eb          3 flats Bb, Eb, Ab
Ab-Bb-C-Db-Eb-F-G-Ab        4 flats Bb, Eb, Ab, Db
Db-Eb-F-Gb-Ab-Bb-C-Db      5 flats Bb, Eb, Ab, Db, Gb
Gb-Ab-Bb-Cb-Db-Eb-F-Gb    6 flats Bb, Eb, Ab, Db, Gb, Cb

You might have noticed that there is a order of flats as well.  B, E, A, D, G, C, F

This will complete the "circle of fifths".  I highly recommend that all musicians study the key signatures and learn them inside and out.  Knowing the key signatures is the foundation for so many things in music.  For a bass player it will teach you how to build chords quickly and help you understand other scales you will learn. 

 
                                                                         

Major Scales and Bass.... Part One....

So lets talk about major scales.  Major scales on bass is essential and are the foundation of music.  So if you know your major scales and the theory of the major scales you will be able to construct some very tasty basslines with good melody as well.  If you can play a major scale on your bass that is great start.  Having the theory of what yo are playing is money in the bank.  I am going to try to give you a basic knowledge of a major scale, so here we go.
A major scale has seven scale tones, eight if you count the octave.  Lets look at a C major scale.

C     D     E -  F     G     A     B  - C
1     2      3     4      5      6     7     8 (OR 1)

There are two natural half steps in music.  They are E to F and B to C.  So with that in mind lets look at the whole steps and the half steps to the major scale using C major as our example.


C     D     E -  F     G     A     B  - C                              
1     2      3     4      5      6     7     8 (OR 1)

  W    W    H    W    W    W    H                           W=WHOLE STEP     H=HALF STEP

This is the formula to the major scale.  Know this inside and out.  Let me repeat that... know the formula to a major scale inside and out.  So know if we start on different note we can use the formula to tell use what notes are in the scale.  Let try this starting on G... See if you can figure it out... start on G and go up a whole step then go up another whole step.  Go up a half step then whole step, whole step, whole step, and half step.  You should have came up with this...

G      A     B     C     D     E     F#     G

So the G major scale would have one sharp in the scale... F#.  Lets try this by starting on D....

D     E     F#    G    A      B     C#     D

This is how key signatures came about.  When you start on any note in music and apply the major scale formula you will know what notes are either sharp (#) or flat (b).  Try this with these notes...

C
G
D
A        THESE ARE ALL THE KEY SIGNATURES WITH SHARPS IN THEM
E
B
F#

F
Bb
Eb      THESE ARE ALL THE KEY SIGNATURES WITH THE FLATS IN THEM
Ab
Db
Gb

Give this a try and I will post the answers on my next post which will be Dec 1st.  Also know that the pattern  that you play on your bass will be the same everywhere on your bass.  Does not matter what fret you start on the pattern is the same...  Peace out til next time...

How to Start Grooving....

        So your guitar player says "hey man lets jam... here is a riff in E".  You listen to the riff but have no idea what to play.  Have you ever been in that situation?  I know I have.  Or maybe the worship leader at your church wants to go into a impromtute jam and extend the song or break it down and go into a ambient worship moment.  How do you come up with something to play while in the moment.  Maybe you are in the studio and the producer wants you to play something different than what you worked on all week.  These are situations all bass players will face at some time or another.
        So how can you get into a groove with a band if they start to improv a riff?  Thats a great question so lets break this concept down.  First off remember you need to get back to one, or the downbeat.  Everyone depends on that downbeat to hold a improv together.  If you do not know the minor pentatonic scales you need to learn then inside and out.  Minor pentatonic scales can be a foundation for you to create a groove on the fly.  If you do not know the major scales you need to learn them inside and out.  Major scales will give you tools to be melodic.  This is important for bass players that play at their church. 
        Once you learn the open E minor pentatonic scale make open E your downbeat.  Here is the scale:

                E (OPEN E)  G    A   B   D   E (octave E 7th fret A string)   G   A   B   D   E
  Fingers:  open               1    1    3   1    3                                             1    1   3    1   3

This is in a open position and is a good place to start.  make open E your downbeat of one and play around with it.  Notice how many notes are played on the 5th and 7th frets.  This is what I call the "Box".  Groove in the box and get to open E for your downbeat. 
         Closed position minor pentatonic scale is needed as well.  Start this scale on the minor 7th scale degree.  For example, if you want to play a G minor pentatonic start on the F two frets down.  So the pattern would be this:

              F     G (this is your root of the scale)     Bb     C     D     F     G (octave)     Bb     C
Fingers:  1      4                                                  1        1      4     1      4                   1       4

So G is the root of the scale even though you start on the F.  Just like the open box scale having several notes on the 5th and 7th frets the closed position has a similar pattern.  In this particular position look at how many notes you can play on the 3rd and 5th frets. Same concept as the open box... make G your downbeat and groove in the box.  you will get the hang of it.  The closed box scale position you can move anywhere on the neck.  For example, if some one says lets do a jam in A...where would you groove your box?  G would be the first note of the scale and A would be the root and your box would be on the 5th and 7th frets.  What about C?  C would be the root and your box would be the 8th and 10th frets.  Give it a try and email me with any questions.
      Here is a live video of me playing a song I wrote called Neurosis... it uses the Open box scale in E and A throughout the song.  Now also remember this not the only scale to use to create grooves and improv grooves with.  Next time I will talk about how to create a groove using these scales.  Peace out !

What Makes Up A Groove...

What makes up a groove?  Have you ever thought about that?  Your listening to your favorite bass player and you say “man...John Paul Jones is grooving”.  John Paul Jones is one of my favorite.  Maybe yours is James Jamerson, Rocco Prestia, Victor Wooten or whoever.  Well if you have ever noticed that a bass player is grooving what is usually the next thing you do... for me it is the tapping of the foot or the head moving to the groove.  Then you start noticing the accents of the groove and before you know it you are drawn in to jam with that song all the way through.  

It does not matter how many notes you play but rather what you do with the notes that you play.  This is key to creating a groove.  You do not have to fill every space with a lick or always follow drum rolls to the next phrase.  Bass players have a tendency to over play and walk all over the vocals and get out of sync with the band.  Busy bass lines work if they are done correctly.  Listen to the song “Can You See The Real Me” by The Who.  This is one of the greatest bass lines ever played but it is also very busy.  Why does it work?  Listen to the interaction between the bass and vocals.  It is like they trade licks throughout the song.  The guitar jams but stays out of the way of the bass.  It all works well because the bass takes all the solos.  The choruses the bass goes to pedal tone of sorts and allows the song to breath.  It is quite the masterful bass line.  I am sure John Entwistle enjoyed playing this one live.  He incorporates all the mechanics for grooving.  The choke, playing on the upbeat and dead notes or some call them, ghost notes.  

Dead notes is really the major key to creating the groove.  Dead notes are played by choking the note and then plucking that string to create a thud type sound.  Just go to youtube and type “dead note bass” in the search box and you will find a lot of videos to give you a better understanding of what I am talking about.  Once you do this I challenge you to take a simple groove that you have written or one from someone else and as you play it add some dead notes and see how it helps the groove and solidifies the pocket a little better.  It might even change the groove a little bit.  That’s okay...sometimes changing up the groove is a good thing.  As you expound on a groove you will find that after a while you become more confident.  Creating the pocket starts with being confident with groove.  Dead notes is one way to help make this happen.

No Pocket....No Groove....

There is no groove without a pocket....

Lets think about this for a moment. What is the pocket and what is the groove? As a bass player I know that it is essential that I stay in the pocket. You ever play with a drummer and you just could not feel the groove. It is like you we out of sync with one another. That is being out of the pocket. Where there is no pocket there is no groove.

The pocket gives you that feeling of direction. Lets expound on giving the band a feeling of direction. Bass players are quiet leaders for the band. If the bass is unsure or lacks confidence it is very noticeable and can lead to a dysfunctional rhythm section. For example, if the bass player is playing behind the beat and the drummer is trying to push the beat it will feel like the band is dragging. This will usually cause the singer to turn around and do that circular motion with their hand to say “speed up band you are dragging”. No pocket there. You see where ever the downbeat is supposed to be that is where the drummers kick and bass are supposed to be. Fundamentals man... get to the downbeat of one. This is where bass players are supposed to start when developing basics. Feel one and get there. No matter what play that downbeat to hold the whole band together. It does not matter what style of music you play. Downbeat of one is king. Listen to jazz bass players like Charles Mingus or Rufus Reid. If you are a rock or classic rock bass player then listen to John Paul Jones. He was my hugest influence and he is the one I learned about pocket and groove.

Bass players also give direction for the band by letting everyone know where they are going in the song. You ever listen to a song where the bass starts walking up and you know as a listener that there is a change coming up. Typically it would be like a chorus would come next or a solo of some sort. Notes that are walking up or down going to the next chord give everyone direction. This is crucial as well. Country and blues bass players live off of this. Any bass player who walks bas line lives off of this. Anytime there is a direction of walking up or walking down it is screaming “hello we are about to change to something”. So the next time you listen to a bass player see if you can hear what I am talking about. Find some other bass players to listen to to help you get some ideas of what you can do to create direction for the band you are in.

Anti-Piracy (Part Five)

      Songwriting is where it is at in the music industry, but if piracy continues there will be less and less songwriters in the business which means not as much fresh music.  These reasons alone are enough to pass the PROTECT-IP bill.  The writing on the wall is evident.  There is no gray area as to why the music industry is suffering.  If the record labels did not have to depend on their top 15 percent to support the business then there would be a wider variety of music.  The record labels cannot find new talent and develop the new talent when they are losing money to pirates.  Artist need to be developed and seasoned over time and this does require that the record label takes a loss on the investment into new talent.  It is just how it works.  If copyright infringement was brought under control then there would be more money to develop new talent.  This means that there would be job creation and retention in the music industry.  Recording engineers would be able to stay busy recording and songwriters would get more publishing deals which would lead to fresh music.  This would make the consumer happy and he or she would buy more legal downloads.

       The independent artist would also have a chance at profiting with their business.  As the independent artist looks at the music industry right now it does not look good to pursue anything.  The independent artist does not have a name for themselves so it would be next to impossible to tour and sell merchandise.  Putting songs up on MySpace or Facebook is not going to do much for aspiring artist.  Finding someone to financially back them is what all artist need.  Again, record labels cannot become that financial backer if the record labels themselves are broke because pirates sell the music illegally.

       Copyright infringement has stolen billions and billions of dollars from the film, music and software industries.  Why would anyone be opposed to the PROTECT-IP bill or anyone of the others that have been passed over the years?  Songwriters and musicians have sued each other for illegally using their song.  Vanilla Ice comes to mind, MC Hammer stealing “Super Freak”.  Why not just own up to it and pay the royalties.  That is the right thing to do.  Anyone can record any song if they pay the royalties.  You can use up to 8 seconds of someone else’s song and put it into your song.  George Clinton did this a lot.  He would sample other songs and record those samples into his and then sell those songs and make money.  There are laws that say you can record and use other people’s songs.  The artist needs to stay within the law.  When a download is sold everyone involved gets a cut of the money.  It is usually 50/50 split.  Pirates would be better off following the law and making the money rather than create huge losses for industries that depend on royalties and sales of merchandise.

       I believe if you do the crime you should do the time.  Film companies are suffering astronomical losses because of a society that wants to watch movies for free instead of paying for them.  People’s lives are at steak with all of this piracy going on.  Even if you are not a creative type of person and you just enjoy the music and movies you should support these bills help get them passed into law.  If everyone was to be held accountable in this arena then there would be probably a lot of people in jail and a healthier film and music industry.  Piracy is like a cancer that won’t go away.  The PROTECT-IP bill would help level the playing field and give these industries some breathing room and time to regroup.

        I take this personal because I am an aspiring artist who is trying to make a name for myself and create a livable income doing it.  Record labels are not as willing to invest into artist like me because I will be a lot of work in the beginning not making them a dime. The social media sites are ways for people to hear your music but they will normally stream your music and not buy it.  It seems you have to give everything away for free to get people to notice you.  For people like me maybe if I was to let pirates distribute my music I would reach a bigger fan base.  It is not worth the consequences of fines and jail time.  Besides the law is the law and no matter what you should follow the law.  Copyright infringement laws need to be set in place to protect intellectual property, period.  As a society we need creative people to create and give them all opportunities to succeed.  Musicians, film makers, inventors, software writers and so on.  If people start becoming disinterested in these professions then we will see a stagnant world with thieves winning and honest people losing out.  Why should we let thieves run rampant when there is a solution, or at least a way of combating this huge problem of pirates on the internet?

Anti-Piracy (Part Four)

       The music industry is hugely affected by pirating as well.  Record labels can barely stay afloat.  Everyone thinks they have all this money because of huge artist selling millions of records or legitimate downloads.  The truth is, only fifteen percent of record labels top artist support the whole business.  The other eighty five percent is bands that incur a loss or just get the bills paid.  They call these bands developing new artists.  Where do the pirates go to when stealing songs to sell?  The top fifteen percent is what is attacked by pirates.  These are the songs that are played on the radio and what people want to buy.  According to the website www.timmygotsoul.com the list of the 10 most illegally downloaded song, album and video has all big sellers in the music industry.  For example, Brittney Spears song Telephone was the number one illegally downloaded track of 2010 followed by Lady Gaga, Christie Aguilera, and Katy Perry.  The number one illegally downloaded video was by Brittney Spears with the same top four of illegally downloaded song.  Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber were in the top 10 as well of both categories. There is a staggering stat that came out of Britain December of 2010.   There were 1.2 billion songs downloaded illegally last year.  The projected legal download sale for 2010 was 370 million.  That is an 870 million difference in sales of legal and illegal download sales.  That is a lot of revenue that is lost and cannot be made up anywhere by the record companies.  It was reported that the Black Eyed Peas sold over one million downloads last year and Lady Gaga sold over 250,000 downloads and the rest of the bands made up the difference.

      This poses a huge problem for the aspiring artist wanting to make a living in the music industry.  This would include songwriters, producers, publishers, singers and musicians.  It is a ripple effect.  When songwriters receive low royalty checks because of piracy everyone is affected.  Producers usually work on a point system which gives them a percentage of sales which is more lucrative than a hourly rate.  Obviously if songs are not being bought legally by consumers then producers and songwriters suffer financial loss.  When that happens then the musicians and singers wages are driven down to record and perform.  Twenty years ago musicians could make 500.00 a day recording.  Now they would be lucky to make 100.00 a day.  Road musicians are not nearly paid as well as they used to be too.  If the top of the record label is suffering financial loss it will trickle down and affect everyone involved.  Artist now depend on ticket sales and merchandise sales when they tour.  That is why ticket sales are so high.  One way or another, consumers will pick up the tab of pirating.

      I support the legislation to protect creative people and companies from copyright infringement.  I support the PROTECT-IP bill that is in Washington right now.  Intellectual property should not be pirated at all.  Let’s look at the facts.  In the music industry there has been yearly losses in the billions.  What once was a vibrant industry has become very fragile.  The state that it is in right now I would not be surprised if there is more increases of song downloads and merchandise prices will be on the rise.  There are a few bands that embrace the illegal downloads of their songs.  The band Dream Theater does not care if they make a dime off of downloads or cd sales.  They have decided that they will market their tours and make their money there.  I guess if you cannot beat them you might as well join them.

      

Anti-Piracy Laws (Part Three)

          The bill that former President George W. Bush signed in 2008 called the PRO-IP Act was designed to have greater efforts to control the pirating that has been running rampant.  There was another bill that was put together since then called the COICO which has been intensely criticized because of its vague definitions of what is considered a infringement website or what they called a rogue website.  There is another bill that is waiting to be signed into law today called the Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property, otherwise known as PROTECT-IP.  This bill is a rewrite of the COICO.  It is more specific of the websites that would be considered illegal.  This bill would have a huge impact on illegal copyrights all around the world.  They would be able to go after the foreign websites that sell or allow you to stream movies for free that they stole.

       According to the Creative America coalition there are two millions jobs in the film and TV sector that could be affected by ongoing piracy.  They claim that 140,000 jobs have been lost as an effect of piracy of film and TV shows. Billions of dollars are lost each year due to illegal sales of stolen IP in the TV and film world.  According to the Institute if Policy Innovation the film industry lost 20 billion dollars in 2005 to illegal downloads of movies and TV shows.  If this was to happen every year imagine the affect it will have year in and year out.  This means that there will be less money to make new movies.  This will create more job loss and affect the pensions of those who have already retired from the film business.  The unions of the film business like AFTRA totally support the PROTECT-IP bill that is sitting in Washington right now.  The film industry would benefit so much from this bill.  They would be able to stop foreign websites from providing movies that are copyrighting.  

             According to the RIAA the music industry loses 4.2 billion dollars to piracy each year.  There are three types of people who lose out because of the piracy.  First, is the consumer loses out.  Those who are downloading music illegally drive up the cost of legitimate product that a honest consumer will have to pay.  That is why CD’s are so expensive.  Also, have you ever wondered why ticket sales of your favorite artist are so extraordinarily high?  It is because of illegal downloads and revenue being lost because of that.  Artists have to make it up somehow.  To go along with that retailers are having hard time convincing consumers to pay more money for the same product.  We always gravitate to the lowest price as a society.  If consumers can find the music online and save a few bucks why not.  The problem with that is, if retailers cannot compete with online sales of illegal downloads than what will happen?   Well, jobs will be lost because retailers cannot justify more employees.

Anti-Piracy Laws (Part Two)

Lime Wire has also been the center of attention being accused of copyright infringement.  The RIAA has been successful in shutting down the official site of Lime Wire.  Eight music publishers have also filed suit charging there was pervasive online infringement of copyrights.  A statement from the publishers stated they will seek "equitable relief and damages" from LimeWire for the alleged copyright infringement. Copyright statutes provide for statutory damages of up to $150,000 per violation.”  Lime Wire was supposed to make it harder to share files between users.  Lime Wire did not make it harder for its users to share files with one another by putting up technical barriers.  The music publishers believe that this would have deterred users from illegally sharing files of music.  Alternatives to Lime Wire have come out of the wood works.  It is like a cancer that never dies.

Churches have had to figure out how to get around the copyright laws.  Churches usually have to make copies of songs to give to their musicians to learn new music.  Also, they like to show videos that are copyrighted.  So what they do is pay a fee each year to the Christian Copyright Licensing, International (CCLI) and Christian Video Licensing International (CVLI).  Each one of these gives them permission to copy music and play videos without breaking the law.  It is like blanket coverage.  Some business has to be careful they do not cross the lines, like churches.  As long as they use it for congregational purposes they will not be fined.  But I must say the contemporary Christian music market does suffer because you know the worship team members put the songs on their computers for their own personal pleasure.  Almost all churches burn CDs to hand out to their teams.  With 170,000 churches paying the license fee each year that can add up to a lot of free downloads that can potentially be illegally downloaded to personal computers.

Pirating software has become a huge problem as well.  There are many torrent sites that have become very popular.  Try before you buy is what these consumers say.  Torrent sites give allow you to download a software program illegally for free or a fee.  Someone I went to school with had over 15,000 dollars of illegal software on his computer.  All the software was from torrent sites and was the latest software.  This can be expensive for software companies.  The company Steinberg found a good way to combat this problem.  They encourage you to register your software.  When you do with your product key a red flag goes up and they customer service rep gets all of your information and then you have police showing up at your door.  Other software makers do the same.  These companies also allow you to have a 30 day trail of their product.  Legally you can keep getting 30 day trials by signing up with different email addresses.

Anti-Piracy Laws (Part One)

Anti-Piracy Laws       

On October 13^th 2008 former President George W. Bush signed a bill called PRO-IP Act that gave greater protection to intellectual property (IP).  Intellectual property is the creative ideas and finished products that come from the mind of an individual.  Software, movies and music are examples of intellectual property.  Intellectual property comes in three forms; they are trademarks, patents, and copyrights.  Unfortunately, there has to be laws to protect the creativity of an individual.  Since the internet there has been an explosion of copyright infringement.  The black market or torrent websites have been profiting on the backs of creative people working hard to produce songs, movies and writing quality software programs.  There are also people who have ten thousand dollars of software on their computer and they did not pay a dime.  In the long run who is it who really gets the short end of the stick?  It is the honest consumer who does. 

            There are some opinions that anti-piracy laws need to be completely overturned.  Brandon Lee in the article, “Record Industry is becoming obsolete”, says “Progress should be the overturning of federal anti-piracy laws so that popular culture can be available to all people regardless of method of obtainment”.  There are opinions that with all of the technology and websites that are out there everything should be free to the public.  Specifically, digital music and movies.  This is partially coming from the fact that Citibank owns EMI records which are one of the biggest if no the biggest record company in the world.  If you remember the bank bailouts Citibank was one of the many banks bailed out by American taxpayers.  Therefore, American taxpayers own EMI records and should be able to download music for free.  This is a logical prospective from opponents of PROP-IP bill.

            Just recently Google chairman Eric Schmidt has vowed to fight against the bills like PROTECT IP, which want the pirate websites to be shut down.  Google’s concern is the government will have too much control and will shut down sites that have a freedom of expression rather than just piracy.  Google at one time was allowing torrent sites to advertise with AdSense, which is their advertising program.  So you could say that Google was profiting off of these pirate sites.  Google reminds us of the restrictions of freedom of speech that China has and thinks that these laws would restrict Americans freedom of speech.  The government promises to only target pirate sites.  Again it will be at the discretion of the government to decide what they think is criminal. 

            One of the biggest backers of anti-piracy laws is the Recording Industry Association of America, otherwise known as RIAA.  Over the years there has been a decrease in CD sales and The RIAA believes that illegal downloading of digital music is the cause of that decrease.  When Napster started in 1999 it was the first music sharing system on the internet where users could download music from computer to computer.  The reason why Napster was conceived was music consumers were tired of paying for a twelve to sixteen song CD and only getting two maybe three good songs for their money and the other songs were used to fill space on the CD.  Napster users could select what song or songs they wanted and share the music with each other and not pay for it.  This was considered infringement and violated copyright laws.  You cannot reproduce a work and then take the work into your possession without paying for it.  In 2001 the music industry filed a copyright infringement suit against Napster and shut it down after they were liable for copyright infringement.  That is why nowadays there are so many ways you can pay for your downloads from places like ITunes, Tune Core and others. 

            In RIAA’s attempt to stop pirates by trying to bully normal citizens with lawsuits they have left a bad taste in the mouth of music lover’s world-wide.  The RIAA and the music industry are trying combat pirates but in all reality they are not losing money only to pirates.  The industry has changed so much with only very few songs being played on the radio and there are way too many new releases that are coming out all the time.