I'm baffled by the attention given to the recent arrest of a Hamilton man charged with bootlegging (Toronto Star story here). Here, bootlegging = live concert recordings sold without permission of the artist =! alcohol trafficking or rock remixes of Jay-Z (at least not this time). From the derogatory language directed at this incident, you'd think we were dealing with a brutal, heinous crime. You'd think he was a sex offender or something.

Jann Arden takes the concert experience WAAAAYYY too seriously. Writing about the Orb earlier in the week, I largely dismissed the role of poor sound quality negatively affecting the listener's perception of a gig's "specialness". And last year (in reference to a 1994 Depeche Mode concert), I wrote how memories can be tarnished by hearing inferior gigs (*not* inferior sound quality) months or years after the fact. The best recording quality in the world wouldn't have cleared up Dave Gahan's heroin-ravaged croak.

The article goes to length to explain what a bootleg is, and how they are recorded. I suppose in the year 2004 there are people unaware of these details that I take for granted. All the talk about internet piracy must have turned the spotlight away from bootleggers to the point that their trade must be re-explained to the next generation. But the anti-filesharing tone still permeates many paragraphs in the article. It depicts bootlegs as yet another of the myriad ways that starving artists and record companies are losing money. Hmmm ... unless you're Pearl Jam (and give official releases to all your concerts) then you're not losing any money on bootlegs, you're just not gaining money on them. Oh wait, if fans are buying the bootlegs then they might want to stick with their dicey recording instead of the superior sound, pictures, and scores of extras on the similarly-priced DVD. Or so the story goes.

This is one case where the jam bands have got it all figured out. They encourage bootlegging, they have no problem with people openly making soundboard recordings of their shows and distributing them via tape or the internet. Somebody should tell Jann Arden that fans get increasingly excited and devoted to their fave bands when they get to hear more of their music. Sharing concert tapes and stories with similarly-minded fans makes concert-going MORE special, not the opposite.

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I recently heard cover versions (that were new to me) by Lush and Xiu Xiu, which prompted the following three-way battles:

1. "Ceremony" : New Order vs Galaxie 500 vs Xiu Xiu. G500 covers are fantastic. Their version exhibits their trademark largo approach to tempos, stretching the drama out over six reverb-drenched minutes. Xiu Xiu's is more or less identical to NO's original, with little of the crackle and sudden noise blasts that are so common with XX. The dominating force is Jamie Stewart's delivery -- he sings it a full octave higher, which actually puts the higher notes out of his range. So of course he just screams those notes at the top of his lungs, leading to several blood-curdling moments (whether you view those words as complimentary will depend on how you take to Stewart's voice in general. One could claim that his off-key straining and wailing wrecks the song, but then you'd have to claim that about most of his band's output).

Unfortunately for the copyists, "Ceremony" is one of the top three songs NO ever did. They rule. NO > G500 > XX.

2. "Outdoor Miner" : Wire vs Lush vs Flying Saucer Attack. Wire's original is arguably the closest they got to a conventional two-minute pop single. It stands apart from the ambience and general strangeness on "Chairs Missing". Lush drenched the song in a few more wads of guitar and their immediately recognisable dual-female lead vocals. Such a production could have only been made between 1990-1995, during the extremely short lifetime of grrl group semi-shoegaze. FSA's effort adds even more guitar -- it's a blistering attack of treble, even for him -- and buries the vocals deep beneath all that chaos. This was the first version I heard, and I hold a big mushy soft spot for it in my heart because it's one of my favourite singles of the 90's. Many a morning was spent blowing my brains into consciousness with this song (the rest of the e.p. is damned good as well). And I'm also a big softie for Lush's harmonies, so ... FSA > Lush > Wire.