[microsound] KIM's 5 Mixdown

[twonky yup <yup_twonky@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

NYTIMES
June 16, 2005
Mixtape Crackdown Sends a Mixed Message

By KELEFA SANNEH
Late on the night of May 13, a hip-hop promoter named Justo Faison died in a 
car crash in Virginia. And last week, on June 8, the East Village record and 
video shop Mondo Kim's was raided by the New York Police Department. What do 
these two stories have in common? Here's a hint: it's cheap, popular and 
illegal.

Faison was the industry's most energetic promoter of hip-hop mixtapes, the 
unlicensed compilations (almost always on CD, despite the name) of 
unreleased new songs, current hits, never-to-be-released freestyles and 
unofficial remixes. To keep (or get) hard-core listeners excited, rappers 
are expected to maintain a mixtape presence by supplying DJ's with tracks 
and also by collaborating with them to release "hosted by" mixtapes. Thanks 
to Faison, the mixtape world even had its own annual ceremony: he created 
and produced the yearly Mixtape Awards, a fittingly raucous celebration; 
this year's attendees included Sean Combs, who won a lifetime achievement 
award, and the Game.

In the days after Faison's death, rappers and DJ's paid their respects, 
tribute rhymes started circulating online and a fund was started to help pay 
for his burial and to aid his family. Contributions have come in from many 
leading hip-hop record labels including Atlantic, TVT, Tommy Boy and 
Interscope.

While artists and record labels were celebrating Faison's life and work, the 
Recording Industry Association of America was finding another way to pay 
tribute to the popularity of mixtapes. On May 12, the day before Faison 
died, it announced a crackdown on stores that sold "pirated CD's," a term 
that refers to "mixed tapes and compilation CD's featuring one or more 
artists," among other products. (The association's taxonomy of piracy 
defines "counterfeit recordings" as illegal knockoffs of existing commercial 
CD's, and "bootleg recordings" as illegal recordings of live performances or 
broadcasts.)

In last week's raid officers confiscated hundreds of CD's, seemingly 
concentrating on the shop's well-stocked section of hip-hop mixtapes. Five 
employees were arrested and spent the night in jail. All five were charged 
with failure to disclose origin of a recording in the second degree and 
trademark counterfeiting in the third degree.

After the raid, Brad Buckles, the recording association's executive vice 
president for anti-piracy, released a statement saying that the Police 
Department's "steadfast commitment to the fight against piracy has stamped 
out yet another significant illegal operation." It continued, "Retailers who 
are making money on the backs of musicians and record companies by selling 
pirated CD's should know that this is absolutely no way to conduct a 
business." Reached by telephone yesterday, Mr. Buckles confirmed that an 
association representative was present during the raid.

Note that phrase "musicians and record companies." In its war against 
illegal music distribution, the association has often treated these two 
groups as one and the same, arguing that piracy-happy fans are hurting the 
artists they love. But when it comes to hip-hop mixtapes, it is in a 
trickier position: the artists themselves often help produce the same 
mixtapes that the association is trying to squelch, and shrewd record labels 
long ago figured out that mixtapes can help drive sales of conventional 
CD's.

So while record labels donate money to honor a man who helped promote 
mixtapes, the trade group representing the labels cracks down on those who 
sell them. And who goes to jail? Well, suffice it to say that the police 
haven't arrested any of the major-label record executives who profit from 
the hype generated by mixtapes.

The raid on Mondo Kim's (the East Village location of the Kim's Video chain) 
was by no means the first of its kind. The recording association has been 
campaigning against mixtapes for a decade; the organization's 1995 year-end 
report warned of "the growing popularity of illicit DJ mixes in CD format." 
The Kim's 5 (has someone printed T-shirts yet?) are probably lucky that they 
work in a record store frequented by music-industry types (and, yes, the 
occasional newspaper reporter). When some shop in the Bronx is raided, those 
hapless clerks can expect far less press coverage.

Oddly enough, two people charged in the Kim's case are fairly well-known 
musicians. One employee arrested was Chuck Bettis, a familiar figure in the 
experimental-music scene and a veteran of the cult postpunk bands the 
Meta-Matics and All Scars. Another was Craig Willingham, known as I-Sound, 
whose discography includes "Music Is a Hungry Ghost" (City Slang), a 
collaboration with the German electronic group To Rococo Rot.

The Kim's case highlights the strange position of hip-hop mixtapes, which 
have been making a bumpy journey toward the mainstream. There was a time 
when mixtape fans had little choice but to hit the streets in search of 
fly-by-night salesmen and out-of-the-way stalls. But when an artist as 
popular as 50 Cent is releasing new material directly (and sometimes 
exclusively) to mixtapes, and when hip-hop crews like the Diplomats are 
supplementing their underground mixtapes with official (that is, licensed 
and legal) mixtapes, then the boundary between street and store gets harder 
to maintain.

Nowadays, hip-hop fans across the country can buy mixtapes online, although 
perhaps it is only a matter of time before those Web sites, too, are raided. 
Meanwhile, some record shops are trying to find creative ways to keep the 
police and the recording association at bay. After the Kim's raid, perhaps 
more retailers will follow the lead of one hip-hop shop (which shall remain 
nameless), where mixtapes are on display but not, strictly speaking, on 
sale. To get one, you have to buy a CD holder, priced at $7.99 but worth a 
small fraction of that; with every purchase, you get a "free" mixtape.



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