From Now On Metallica Signs The Paycheck

Modern technology isn't just a brilliant display of life made easier but barely a day passes that we aren't reading about how the digital age continues to slam the door on many careers once labeled safe and secure. Churches from Texas to Carolina no longer need sacred ground to ring out their rhythms; research continues to show followers don't require physical figures standing in pulpits but rather reach out centers focused on making a connection. Radio is no different. While several friends, coworkers and I crave and deliver a "Live" performance there's a continuing rise in something I still believe is spectacular quality control...the passion to know how to perform on a stage without there being an audience. Without a doubt there's no better jolt of electricity than popping open the microphone and instantly meeting a new set of ears or reacquainting the performance with someone that's been with you 400 beer can years down the loaded trail. But through digital technology...radio shows have evolved into brilliant shades of quality and quantity without sacrificing the unperfected curves Radio has always delivered. Doctors offices are coupled so closely that being in a room with the patient looks more like a page from the cartoon The Jettson's than a heartless detachment. Bring on the "Music Maker's!" Shooting fire and explosions isn't the real reason why I love Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley of KISS. I'm more in tune with their contagious addiction to sticking to the original idea. Record labels bend, reshape and manipulate nearly everything you've attached yourself to except for KISS. It's gonna be owned and operated by their inventors. Now there's word that Metallica has launched a new record label, Blackened Recordings in conjunction with the band taking ownership of all their master recordings, including music and videos, as part of a contract provision Metallica negotiated with Warner Bros. in 1994. RollingStone Magazine reports that the move means the end of the band's 28-year relationship with the label. "It's always been about control for us as a band," drummer Lars Ulrich said in a statement. "Forming Blackened Recordings is the ultimate in independence, giving us 100 percent control and putting us in the driver's seat of our own creative destiny." Metallica will release Quebec Magnetic, a live DVD taken from two 2009 World Magnetic shows in Quebec City, on December 10th.