February 28, 2006
View Comments | Post CommentThe new Built To Spill album, or "Who is Mike Jones?"
So I thought that I had downloaded a pre-release of the new Built To Spill album. And indeed, it does have all the songs, and seems to be mastered and complete. The songs are classic Built To Spill, and I really like it. Except for one peculiarity:
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At sporadic times but roughly every thirty seconds, the album features guest vocals by rapper Mike Jones, singing his trademark line, "Who is Mike Jones!"
World's worst mash-up, or world's best copy protection? For instance, listen to the opening strains of "Wherever You Go," the fifth track on the album. I've sampled the first seven seconds for your convenience.
Two theories have been proposed to explain the presence of the singularly ridiculous rapper. 1) The band, knowing that the pre-release would leak, included Mike Jones as the world's most successful and innovative form of copyright protection. Their goal of copyright protection, however, is somewhat problematic since they almost certainly took the Mike Jones sample without his permission, thereby violating his copyright. So, explanation the next. 2) Whatever release crew did the rip and distributed it onto and throughout the internet, included the sample as a joke. However, this is problematic because no release crew would want their releases tainted, and therefore lose their hacker cred.
Either way, the album is very good. I'm afraid I might grow fond of this version of the album and come to miss the sample. It's comforting knowing that, whatever problems there are in the world, every thirty seconds, Mike Jones will be there to ask who he is. I can't wait to sing the new songs in the shower, "Who is Mike Jones" and all. And at the shows, I can't wait to hear this guy singing the Mike Jones part at all the appropriate times.
Anyway, congrats to Warner Brothers on the first form of digital rights management that I've ever known to work. It allows listeners to try out the album (and cross-promotes another "artist"), but is too annoying to keep them from buying it. Now if only the album cost $5 (which is the ideal price point for a musical album, in my view), they'd sell two million of these.
Posted at February 28, 2006 1:48 PM | Comments (3)
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I have not had intercourse since May.
Posted by: Jake W. at February 28, 2006 6:04 PM
Actually, as with all american musical innovations, this DRM scheme was stolen from african american artists.
Hip hop has been doing this for a long time. When they would send out pre-release copies to radio stations and promoters and what not, they would talk over every track, usually in the form of an advertisement. It usually was some hype-man saying "Artist X, the new album, drops in your hood November 65th!" Sometimes the voiceover would be screwed and chopped, sometimes chopped and screwed. But the point is, nevertheless, that this has been around for a little while in underground hip hop, and its just another example of whites stealing all the best musical innovations.
Mike Jooooonnneesss!
Posted by: Chris Santoro at March 2, 2006 1:41 PM
i seem to have the same thing. one thing is i've always resisted the band 'built to spill' because it sounds like a hardcore band based on the name. maybe it was, and they like, grew up. so when i was passively background listening to it, i was like, 'this band isn't bad except that one idiot who like to rap sporatically like its limp bizkit or something'.
either way, it sounds like a good record but i'm annoyed by this. i think there should be a 'who is mike jones' cancellation filter. and not for just this, i think it would be great to pimp out a mike jones record with.
Posted by: judgemartiniz at October 30, 2006 9:36 AM
