Every single day I check the music news, and seriously every single fucking day, there’s something new about Metallica. We mocked Mission: Metallica and their overblown, over-hyped marketing bullshit, and I for one am pretty sick of hearing about them. But I have to admit, they’re getting it right for a change. They’re staying on the radar by serving substance, not just ads. They’re keeping it coming, giving it all away. They’re engaging the fans head-on.

There are three (and only three) simple truths, beyond which things get complicated: Fans consume art ruthlessly. Corporations make money ruthlessly. Artists make art ruthlessly.

Everything beyond these three truths can be picked apart and debated as the game evolves. But anyone who forgets any of these three truths is a fool, and anyone who fights them is asking for a Darwinian lightning bolt to wipe their useless genes off the planet. Today’s Metallica news brought one such waste of DNA to my attention: Per Sundin, President of Universal Music Sweden.

A couple of weeks ago, I responded to an interview request from London-based Record Of The Day. They publish a digest of music industry news, in PDF format. These weekly newsletters go out to paid subscribers only- not casual jerkoffs, but industry insiders who have a tangible interest in the content. It was an email interview, so I considered it a perfect opportunity to voice my opinions on (and concern for) the music industry in a greater depth than I’ve done so far here, and be sure that it would make it into the ears of the people who might actually be able to do something constructive with the insight.

What I’m posting here today is the uncut version, as I delivered it. I find it interesting that a particularly damning paragraph- on how a certain major record distribution company dropped the ball- was cut from the published version. I put a little red box around it. There was a large amount of dead, blank space after my interview, so I can’t imagine it was to save paper.

I’m sure most of our visitors ask this question. It’s a little hard to tell right now, I know. It’s because we’re new, and honestly, we haven’t quite decided yet. For now, it’s just me and a couple smart, ballsy friends, writing about whatever inspires us. We’re trying to ask questions that haven’t been asked, and answer questions that haven’t been answered. We’re trying to do interviews with interesting people, and we’re trying to challenge things that we feel people shouldn’t take for granted.