Antony & The Johnsons tell fans to stop illegal downloads

Singer says it will stop him making a new album

3 hours ago
Antony Hegarty from Antony & the Johnsons has pleaded with fans to stop illegally downloading his music.

The singer was posted his complaint on Just One Star, a fansite dedicated to him.

In a post, the singer wrote: "Now I have one favour to ask you. Please stop recording my concerts and trading them, it makes me feel terrible.

"I feel like the thing I have to offer an audience is the live experience. But for them to record my concerts sort of feel like I am being stolen from. It's kind of like inviting people over for dinner and before they leave they go into your fridge and clear you out, take everything you have, on their way out the door."

The singer went onto the say pirating had affected his progress on his new album, the follow up to 2005's 'I Am A Bird Now'.

"This year I was hoping to develop ideas for the new album and some live concerts, but at this rate I am feeling discouraged because of the bootlegging," he explained. "So do me a favour...be my fan and my friend and don't record my shows."

Hegarty will appear on the new Bjork album 'Volta' which is released on May 7.

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tosser.
has he considered that not everyone has the chance to make it to his concerts and might not be able to afford it?
bootlegs & downloading allow people to share music & can expose people to stuff they would never have heard otherwise.

I hope his fans do stop dowloading, bootlegging, and well, attending his concerts or buying his music at all.

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"We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard-working, very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation," she told the crowd.

it's not really antony. it's kind of like inviting people over for dinner and them taking photographs of what was on offer and then showing them to friends if anything.

perhaps if you weren't such a fucking dick and banned smoking in all venues I would give a toss you turd. incidently, you were also one of the worst live preformers I've ever seen.

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Would you like a cigarette? They're quite exellent.

Fans tell Antony & The Johnsons to go fuck themselves?

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you'll go to hell for what your dirty mind is thinking

it should be said that I actually really like his music though. but if the next one is about the pain of illegal bootlegging rather than abusive love and confused sexual identity I doubt I'll bother.

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Would you like a cigarette? They're quite exellent.

I do find his request a bit annoying for some reason. I mean, I can understand not wanting people to download legal tracks possibly, but no bootlegging? Most musicians are okay with it unless the bootlegs are sold illegally. Most artists understand that concerts aren't affordable for all music fans...

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Here's a spoiler for you: Chinese Democracy is shit

Guy sounds like a bit of a dick, I guess he mustn't be happy with all the money he earned from the album clogging up middle class coffee tables after the mercury prize.

I wish there were less fuckwit artists who were so obsessed with the sanctity of their own work. A gig should always be a 2-way process. Without audience, no band, y'know? If he's not prepared to give a little back to his fans, why should he get to take so much from them in terms of the cashflow they generate for him?

He aint makin it big time, not big enough to solely live off his music career and retire off it. He's gonna penny pinch every dollar he can get his paws on so I can understand and which ever way you put it, its always gonna sound cunty.

Awww someone call the wahhhhbulance....!

Bootlegging and trading have been around for years, if you don't want your live stuff traded then don't play live. Even if you have people searched at the door, they'll still get their stuff in. That whole 'having friends over and then having them clean you out' sob story is bullshit too; it's a public performance jack ass.

whiney jerk.

They've had an album that some critics fawned over. They're not exactly an institution. I think they're banking on more loyalty than they've earned.

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Time is the distance that you can't return by miles.

I escaped somehow. Let's go

actualy [sic] I have quite a blessed life if I'm honest. I have many people to love, hate few and have few money problem's [sic].... What more does a person need? Oh yeah and I have some kind of humbleness unlike you of course ^_^ ~ CarefulCarpenter

well isn't someone a sensitive wee petal.
i like antony & the johnsons but the dude sounds like a fkn cock.

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to be fair, last time i saw antony he played quite a few new songs. if somebody records them all and puts them up on the internet then nobody is going to buy an album for them. it makes sense. i can see how it gets him down.

if people are going to steal your music then being a musician is no longer a financially viable career choice.

it's amazing how aggressive/passive-aggressive you all are about this. maybe he really does feel terrible about being bootlegged. he's allowed to ask isn't he? it's not like pirating music is a right. or rude to suggest otherwise.

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INSPIRATION. LIBIDO. APPETITE.
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Still doesn't make sense. If you don't want people to hear your new songs...then don't play them live. Plus, if those songs have yet to be recorded then odds are that they will sound totally different when they're released on a CD. One of my favorite bands starts testing new songs out live before they're released, it's cool to hear the progress the song makes. Just because I own the song on a bootleg doesn't mean I wont buy the album.

The guy's more likely to lose album sales due to his shit attitude than his fans recordings.

Also, there's a huge difference between leaking or giving away a bands studio album that cost thousands to make, and fans trading tapes of a show. The fans paid their way into the show, they paid for their own equipment, and the artist was paid by the venue to perform, no money is ever exchanged. The only person who loses money is the taper who buys their own gear. People enjoy live recordings, it offers a different take on a song, and if you're a big enough fan to take the time to track down a bootleg then you probably own the cd already.

where did he say he's worried about album sales? he said being bootlegged makes him feel terrible because the one thing he has to give is the live experience. that doesn't make him Lars Ulrich. he isn't crying revolution against the tradition of bootlegging everywhere. he said it bothers him. and MAY infact stop performing. just goes to show how people think they're entitled to everything. music is depersonalized to the point of, "my IPOD is hungry, and i'm going to be a cunt to prove it".

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INSPIRATION. LIBIDO. APPETITE.
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It is one thing to sanctify music, it is another to sanctify yourself. He spoke of bootlegging as if it was stealing away from something essential from his person. He is treading on very, very fragile ground if he thinks that people will care enough about him to take that kind of lip. He is not David Bowie. Hell, he isn't even Kurt Cobain. There is no need for him to play theasshole card because in all honesty, if the music world was to lose him, everyone would live, including his fans. YES, people are entitled to expect many things. Bootlegging is a true sign of a music fan and if he has his head too far up his arse to stop feeling like a raped saint, then he deserves the unnecessary grief.

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"We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit, and in these wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard-working, very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation," she told the crowd.

Quit whining.

If you don't like his additude towards bootlegging, don't go to his shows. Go see somebody else who doesn't have a problem with it.

If you're able to get away with it, well you get away with it.

But why should the guy be expected to bend over to accomodate you or give his blessing? You pay to see him play music and that's it.
If you don't think it's worth it, don't pay and don't go.

I hate fans who get the impression that because they're fans, an artist owes them more than they pay for.

Or that everybody is entitled to hear an artist's music and the artist should be fine with that.
If you can't afford Gucci boots, you go without. It should be the same with music.