Jono Bacon‘s Severed Fifth project released its debut album today.  I torrented it first chance I got and listened to the vorbis files on my stereo from my media centre.  I must say that Jono has delivered, as promised, a pounding metal album that instantly takes it’s place at the top of the heap in free as in freedom death metal.  The album is well on it’s way to being one of my favourites.

Not content just to thrash and scream for the length of an LP, Jono mixes it up with softer vocals in some songs, singing over growls, a hard guitar solo in The Lake, and even a more bluesy solo in another track.  A few tracks are also interjected with monologue snippets.

One song pauses near the beginning in that just-out-of-sync way that surprised my brother and I a lot when we first heard it, but is really enjoyable.  The guitars and vocals deliver that moshable experiance that makes metal concerts so much fun.

The album is also released under a truly free license: CC-BY-SA.  While I’m no fan of the ShareAlike clause, Jono’s willingness to step outside of the NC-SA/NC-ND non-free regime that too-often dominates “free” music is really refreshing.  I’m looking forward to the mixes, mashes, and hopefully videos that fans put out.

No review can be all-positive.  As great as this album is musically, there are a few small things that I would have appeciated.  For one, it may just be me, but the album seems to have less bass than I like.  My subwoofer barely moved.  This may be the vorbis compression or the mix, and it may even have been on purpose.  I’m still willing to chalk it up to my soundcard, but I do play other music and I get bass tones a lot better on much of my stuff.  I would also have appreciated lyrics with the release: I know Jono’s a busy guy and I appreciate that not everything can be done before release when you have a firm date.  I’m just saynig that I really like to do a second listen while reading along, and that just isn’t possible yet.

I was also personally not a huge fan of a few of the very pronounced “moth-er-fuck-er” uses in two of the songs, but that’s much more a matter of personal preference.  The lyrics are not so laced with profanity as to be outright offensive like some other artists may be.

Overall, a very good album.  We’ll see where the project goes next.

The free culture movement is a social movement that promotes the freedom to distribute and modify creative works, using the Internet as well as other media. Wikipedia

There are a number of things that get associated with the term “Free Culture” and a number of reasons people support them.  Let me start with what I do not support:

• I do not support the rampant piracy of music, or the triumph over the RIAA through possible loopholes.
• While current copyright laws and enforcement practices are counterproductive and unfair, I see this an a separate issue to Free Culture.
• I do not support Free Culture just because I believe in Freedom (although I do).
• I do not support “mix culture” that thrives on living just as close as they can to the Fair Dealings (/ Fair Use) lines just because they want to use the content without paying.

If these things, to me, are not Free Culture, then what is?

First, it’s been beaten to death but I must say it: libre is not gratis.  When I talk about Free Culture, I’m not talking about not paying for things.  A lot of Free Culture is available gratis, but also some is not: and I have been willing to pay / donate to even those that are available at no cost.

I support free culture because a harmonic culture is a strong culture. Let me expand on that.  Harmonics are those things which reinforce each other.  Musical melodies can be harmonic, and that is the most common context for the term.  A culture in which  The Backstreet Boys sing I Want it That Way is alright. Artists can create original works and distribute them. But a culture in which “Weird Al” Yankovic can then sing eBay reinforces itself.  Culture builds on culture.

Nothing new here, and many would point to the infringing mix culturists and say that’s what they’re trying to do.  But by mixing locked culture, often illigally they hurt the cause and their art form.  I support Free Culture not because I want to see more mixes, but because I want to see more things that can be mixed.  To me, that is free, no-strings-attached permission to build on your work.  If you make a song, I make a video.  You make a cartoon, I include it in a documentary.  It’s not the building on that is important, though, but having things to build on at all.

Some Free Culturists want to acheive this goal by making more lax copyright laws.  This is a fine goal, but is ultimately the wrong solution.  While having more Fair Dealings allowances and content entering the Public Domain faster gives us greater access to our culture – even more can be done by licensing works freely now.

The great benefit to this model is it helps artists who are creating work right now, not only to have a rich community to draw from, but also to market themselves at all.  In a traditional copyright model, everything hinges on expensive licenses, equiptment, and lawyers protecting it all.  If you open yourself up to unrelenting remixing, and business models that cut out the middle men (and this applies well outside of music) you can interact with the fans/consumers more directly and make as much or more money doing it.  All without selling your rights or giving someone else a chance to meddle in what you do best: being the artist.