Otep Slams Music Pirates

Metal outfit Otep have blasted the music piracy nature of the industry, saying that it's almost impossible for bands to survive.

In a recent interview, frontwoman Otep Shamaya didn't shy away from letting loose on an industry she says has been “cannibalised.”

“Most of our fans – dedicated fans, our real fans – they do buy the albums, and we're very grateful for that,” Shamaya offers. “I think there were some people who agreed with it, and some people who disagreed with it, and maybe I was attacking them, but I have to defend art, I have to defend writers. We play with local bands every single night and I look at those bands and wonder what kind of future they have, because the music industry has changed so much. A lot of these bands aren't going to have what they deserve out of music. It's just not going to happen to them because of what has happened to the music industry.

“Fans aren't all to blame – the music industry, the record companies are culpable in this as well. They didn't invent iTunes. Apple invented iTunes. The record companies fought that. The music industry itself has been so cannibalised by everyone, and there are those of us in the underground bands who have been in the underground our entire career, who love the arts so much that we go down with the ship even when it's burning, you know?”

Shamaya continued, comparing piracy to someone walking into an art gallery and stealing a painting off the wall.

“People that defend pirating... whoever said art was supposed to be free? Whoever said that music should ever be free? Picasso certainly didn't, Jimi Hendrix certainly didn't, Kurt Cobain didn't, Rage Against The Machine – they still sold their records. System of A Down, they sold their records. The reality of making music is that a label invests in studio time, in rehearsal time, they pay producers, equipment people and technicians to come in and make sure we get the right sound. This is all very minimised now. This is how it used to be. That investment has to be paid back, and that investment isn't paid back through touring, but now labels are taking a percentage of merch sales on tour, and that used to be bands' livelihoods. That's how they made a living. Most bands now have to work second jobs to just support their music. I would suggest to anyone who says that it's not affecting the music industry – what is it that you love? What is it that you adore? What is it that you have worked so hard on? What if I just walked in and stole it from you? What if a painter painted something and put it on the wall, and someone just walked into the gallery and walked out with it? You'd call that a theft.”

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