2 MusicWeek 13.04.12 NEWS EDITORIAL
You can’t sin them all
IT WAS THE MOMENT SHE BEGAN AIR-HUMPING her gusset up and down the neck of the plastic keytar that it hit me. You’ve got to feel for Rihanna. In another era, she’d be Mary
Whitehouse’s diamond-knickered boogy woman; a fizzing sex-punk of titillation, Satan-sent to hypnotise The Youth and traumatise their Cath Kidson-clad progenitors. But these days, it just ain’t that easy. Shall we get the obvious, weirdly unspoken secret out of the
way? Her target fanbase aren’t so much ‘tricky to offend’ as ‘Two Girls One Cup veterans’. This, remember, is the 3G era, when internet muck is only ever a finger stroke away. (A particularly intriguing one, if teenage hormones are charging around your system and there are disgusted playground “OMG!”s to be won.) Watching RiRi writhe, thrust and gyrate her way around her
Viagra’d-up Benny Hill set at the O2 last year (pink cannons!), it struck me just how easy Madonna had it in the Eighties. All it took to outrage parents back then – and subsequently
draw a flock of scandal-hungry teens, cash in hand - was a little stroke of Black Jesus in a video. Pah! Google ‘stroke Black Jesus video’ in 2012 and… well, just don’t, okay?
“The music industry should grow up and accept
that tacky porn can’t shock and sell like it used to. But the Government has lost its mind if it thinks online age ratings will work.”
There is a tidal wave of filth, bizarro human antics and
disgusting freakishness available to view RIGHT NOW, as you read this, at the bus stop (probably). Your ethics, your imagination and the law are your only censors. Shouldn’t this fact be a telltale trigger for the music industry –
and, yes, the ‘celeb media’ - to grow up and accept porn can’t shock and sell like it used to? Or perhaps to ask why Adele’s team has never needed to seedily glue together art and smut in the hope of snaring a quick, demeaning buck? Surely it’s time to separate genius and grot once and for all.
Reg Bailey and I have that opinion in common. (Although, admittedly, I’m not adverse to people enjoying either separately. Knock yourselves out. So to speak.) Where Mothers’ Union chief Reg and I differ is on age ratings for
online music videos; a concept about as divisive as the Christian charity’s favourite Holy text. Apparently, the PM is ‘disappointed’ in the music industry’s response to such recommendations. Well guess what? I’m appalled Call Me Dave is being taken in by them. You’d think someone so close to Google (ho ho) would recognise that attempting to age-gate the internet is a fool’s errand - not to mention expensive, artistically damaging and wholly ineffective. Would an age classification stop kids seeing or sharing
inappropriate material? Of course not. Would it deter teens – or alert their folks – any more than the BPI’s parental advisory scheme already does? Nope. The biggest threat to the sanctity of the next generation may
well be what youngsters are choosing to type into Firefox. But the reality is, that can’t be successfully censored by anyone – except possibly their parents and, ultimately, their own brains. Tim Ingham, Editor
Do you have views on this column? Feel free to comment by emailing
tim.ingham@
intentmedia.co.uk CHILDREN'S BRAND BRANCHING OUT INTERNATIONALLY
Moshi Monsters eyes global domination
LABELS BY TINA HART
P
arents of the world, brace yourselves: the team behind the Moshi Monsters music
phenomenon is readying an assault on the US market and other global territories. Debut album Music Rox!,
distributed via Sony, sold 24,954 copies in its debut week, claiming the No.4 spot on Sunday’s UK Official Albums Chart. It was only outsold by Nicki
Minaj, Labrinth and Adele: no mean feat when you consider that the children's brand had little to no radio and TV airplay. Moshi Monsters’ head of
music, Jason Perry, said: “The record’s out in different digital formats in about 30 territories but the major release will be in the States and Australia this summer and beyond. “We’re having meetings with Sony about other international
possibilities because there’s been a really good reaction. It’s been surprising in a lot of the territories. The phone keeps on ringing.” The absence of UK radio
promotion was rendered less important by strong retail support. Perry revealed that a recent
promotional tour of Tesco stores drew “600 kids a day to do a meet and greet”. He added: “Most of [our album sales] will be physical. Retail have been amazingly supportive and Sony have done a great job getting it out there.”
As for other plans, Perry said
parent Mind Candy’s Moshi TV was “bubbling away nicely”. He added: “There’s big plans
to grow that this year, with music being a big part of it.” A related tour is also in development. With regards to further new
music, he revealed: “We’re working on the next record already, whatever that may be -
an album, a series of EPs, a bunch of singles, we’re collecting as many songs as we can. “There’s a character called
Blingo the Fox, he’s this rapper the kids are going crazy about, so we’ve written three songs for him. That’s really exciting, just jumping on feedback from the fans via YouTube, the magazine and the community, and making music based around that. “Everybody in the company
and outside the company is astounded by the success of the record. It’s been such an exciting thing to be part of for everyone.”
Record industry baffled by backlash
The record trade has been left stumped by comments suggesting it has responded poorly to recommendations surrounding explicit promotional videos. Reg Bailey, author of
Government-commissioned report Let Children Be Children, said this week: “Many of the industries mentioned have responded positively. I cannot say that has been the case with music videos.” He once again called for music
videos to adopt BBFC-style age ratings. According to The Telegraph, Prime Minister David Cameron is believed to have shared Bailey’s “disappointment”. As Music Week reported last
month, there is widespread resistance amongst labels to the prospect of age classifications. However, the industry broadly supports an extension of the BPI’s existing online and physical Parental Advisory scheme.
content. He said that he was encouraged by the steps taken. “The Parental Advisory
“We are surprised by Reg
Bailey’s comments,” BPI chief executive Geoff Taylor told Music Week. “We met with him and explained the work BPI has done to update the Parental Advisory scheme for the digital age. We’ve shown him how it applies online and how labels and most digital services are implementing it, and that we’re working towards filters that would allow parents to block videos flagged as containing explicit
approach has a number of advantages, not least consistency with the approach on US websites that are popular with UK consumers. We will continue to work with Reg and with Government to ensure that music on digital services is labelled where necessary to inform consumers and protect young people, while resisting any pressure towards the censorship of music”. AIM chief Alison Wenham
added: “AIM’s board has discussed this, and concluded that in the online and mobile world - and without any sensible measures to combat piracy - the pursuit of the music industry for video classification is absurd. The industry already has measures in place, and making video classification a statutory obligation is unnecessary.”
www.musicweek.com
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