In the interest of fairness, I must print this recent quote by Dave Mustaine about the internet. You see, some people have accused us of "being too hard on Dave," even though we really didn't have to do much, he's the one who claimed Obama staged shootings and other crazy assertions we've covered in depth.
Mustaine recently spoke to one of his endorsees, Seymour Duncan and when asked about how the internet changed the music industry, Mustaine gave pretty level headed response:
“I’m a purist and I don’t want to seem like I don’t care about young people and creativity and doing cool things. I gotta tell you there are certain things that the digital world has made so that very inferior players can get away with sounding like they are good.
The problem with that is not that the record doesn’t sound good and is enjoyable, it’s when you go to watch them live. They sound really fabulous on record because they are using Pro Tools, this whole digital world that cradles them, and the listener is thinking ‘wow these guys are really wonderful.’
The economy right now makes it hard to make ends meet and you go spend $40 or $50 for a ticket – if you’re taking a date then a hundred – and parking, gas, food, beverages, programs if they have them and any kind of merch or t-shirts. You’re looking at maybe $100 to $200, maybe even $300 if you’re taking somebody.
We are fortunate because we can back it up live and we have super-loyal fans. We have been blessed with being able to write catchy songs and be able to innovate a guitar style – that helps a little bit too. We have always tried to keep the price down with the tickets.
It’s the same approach with our merch, tickets, guitars any products that I stand behind we try and take that into consideration. I may have had a great life and I may have been overpaid and underworked but I am not punishing the fans and being a really hard-ass about stuff. So I try and pass that gratitude onto them by not gouging them with prices.
The good thing that I like about the internet is it makes it real easy to deliver your product to your fans at an affordable price. There is piracy and people who steal. They don’t realize it is intellectual material and it is the same thing as food. Giving something to get, that’s the deal – if you get something and the person doesn’t get anything in return that is either a gift or you are stealing it.
Myself, I think the dude who created Napster probably ruined hundreds of thousands of people’s lives because of that peer-to-peer file transferring, but if he hadn’t done it, there are plenty of smart people out there who would have. It’s human nature.”
