<![CDATA[Gawker: lars ulrich]]> http://tags.gawker.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/gawker.com.png <![CDATA[Gawker: lars ulrich]]> http://gawker.com/tag/larsulrich http://gawker.com/tag/larsulrich <![CDATA[Metallica Drummer and His Basquiat Save Christie's]]> The art world is suffering from diminished expectations for the obvious reasons. At last night's Christie's auction, their much-vaunted Francis Bacon work "Study for Self-Portrait"—estimated to go for $40 mil—didn't sell. In fact, nobody even bid, the NYT reported. It was like an Ebay auction from hell! (Last May, a Bacon sold for a $86 mil.) Thank goodness for Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich and his precious Basquiat. His painting, Untitled (Boxer) sold for $13.5 million to a mysterious phone bidder. The New York Observer pointed out last week that Ulrich wanted to sell it for between $12 and $16 mil and didn't even ask for a guarantee; the painting was "bought in 1999 for just a couple million dollars." Oh, and Lehman CEO Dick Fuld didn't get as much as he wanted for the sale of his drawings collection. Tough luck—try Ebay.

http://www.abcnews.go.com/Business/Economy/story?id=6242240&page=1

]]> http://gawker.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5085942&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Metallica stops punishing fans on YouTube]]> Metallica and its label, Atlantic Records, have changed their tune — instead of heavy legal metal, it's more light copyright jazz. The band, which for many years playd for their RIAA puppet masters by speaking out against illegal file sharing, has now embraced the promotional power of fans infringing on music publishing rights held by the songwriters by performing classic Metallica tunes on YouTube. The clips chosen by the band and their marketing minions for the new MetallicaTV channel are not clearly fair use, since as cute as an eight year old faithfully reproducing the guitar solo from opus "One" is, note-for-note re-recordings are not typically considered satire or commentary. Ironically enough, the band is giving in where it probably should have taken a stand in the first place.

Traditionally, bands playing covers of songs written by other bands had to pay a royalty to music publisher organizations like ASCAP and BMI. The irony is that under traditional recording contracts, bands didn't make much from album sales, but touring and (to a lesser degree) publishing rights. So toeing the record industry party line on illegal file sharing, while giving in to the abuse of the band's publishing and public performance rights, actually makes the least economic sense for musicians in terms of the old music business.

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