2023 Subscription Post...

'Blind Beggar'

Ralph Hedley (1848–1913)

Laing Art Gallery

No, this is not a premonition of my good self on an early Monday morning in August post Rebellion. I am now marking the twelfth year of posting stuff on Aural Sculptors. This year could become the busiest of those twelve years with 116 posts so far in 2023 and we are still in July. The purpose of the site is two fold really. From a purely selfish standpoint it gives me a platform to post bits and pieces (be it music or contemporary music press articles) that relate to the music that I have been listening to since 1979 or thereabouts. On the other hand it goes someway to countering those people who seek to make some easy money from grabbing files from the internet, knocking up a cover (and that's easy) and listing their 'labours' on an auction site. Whilst I appreciate that not everyone has the equipment or capability to download files and burn CDs etc, many have and it pains me to see on Stranglers' fan sites when someone has purchased CDs at a significant cost when a simple search will show that so many are available for nothing. 

Looking at a couple of recent posts I can see that for example the 'Anarchy Tour' recording featuring the Pistols, Buzzcocks and The Clash got no fewer than 285 downloads, whilst closer to home I was very exited in June to post something of a rarity in the form of the second 1978 appearance of The Stranglers in Glasgow, a post that has so far been downloaded 225 times. Given the fact that the site is being visited on average about 1000 times a day and given the extent of the downloads, whilst it pains me, I have over the years asked for some contributions towards the running of the site. To recap, this entails an annual subscription to the current (and happily very reliable) file hosting site 'We Transfer'. The annual fee of £202 has just been paid meaning that the site is good to go for another year until July 2024. 

As always, no pressure, this has never been a 'toys out of the pram' moment. My thanks as always go to the people out there who record stuff and are willing to share, bootleg collectors who are likewise willing to share material to keep the site engaging and relevant and also to anyone who takes the time to respond/comment on posts. On the last point I do understand that commenting on Blogger based sites isn't the easiest so it is appreciated when people do take the time to comment... it makes a change  from receiving post comments from the generic Viagra peddlers!

Should you be inclined to make a contribution, there is a PayPal donation button on the right hand panel of the site (you will need to scroll down a bit). And just to say once again, this site does not make any kind of profit, that's not the idea behind Aural Sculptors at all!

All the best, enjoy the weekend and say hi if you see me in that Blackpool.

Cheers,

Adrian.