Australian Road Crew Association withdraws music from Russia in protest
The Australian Road Crew Association (ARCA) has removed their musical recordings from the Russian Federation.
This is a protest against the invasion of Ukraine and the needless death, trauma and massive refugee problem that ensues.
He also issued a challenge to the rest of the Australian music industry to follow suit.
ARCA has notified the distributor of its in-house label Black Box Records to remove from sale, download or streaming its entire catalog of artist recordings.
This includes all such distributions by Yandex, Spotify, Apple iTunes, Sarl, vKontakte (VK), Sberbank, Boom, YouTube Music, Google Play Music and others.
ARCA co-founder Ian Peel said: “ARCA crews are a family.
“We celebrate our freedoms and what we fought so hard for.
“Although we have no idea how much Ukraine is really suffering, we feel for its people and want to take a stand.
“We roadies don’t take advantage of the cops; we do not tolerate it on a personal, local or national level.
ARCA’s hit Desk Tape series – live tapes made at concerts by their sound engineer directly from the sound room – has released 22 live tapes of major players worldwide.
These have included Crowded House, Australian Crawl, Neil Finn, Men At Work, Models, Tim Finn & The Escapade Band, Jo Jo Zep & The Falcons, Redgum, Russell Morris & The Rubes, Jimmy and The Boys, Captain Matchbox TMG , The Party Boys, Dutch Tilders, V. Spy V. Spy, Dave Tice and The Headhunters, Wendy Mathews, TISM, Doug Parkinson & The Southern Star Band and American guitarists Vince Gill and Albert Lee.
More major artists have joined green light releases throughout 2022 and 2023.
So far, these tapes have raised over $70,000 for Support Act’s Roadies Fund.
These are used to provide financial, health, mental health, counseling, legal advice and documentation, medical appointments and, inevitably, funeral costs for roadies and crew in crisis. , now and in the future.
Bill McDonough of Australian Crawl said: “There is so much more that can be done to support the people of Ukraine. The global entertainment industry can take a stand and remove ALL copyrights to the Russian Federation immediately. Although he denies the Russian public, many of whom may not support what happened, he will send a message about how most other countries view the horrific invasion of Ukraine by their leader Mr. Putin, an act of war on the continent not seen since the invasion of Poland more than half a century ago.
ARCA’s sanctions will make an important comment considering the large numbers for some of its streaming players.
Yandex is Russia’s biggest tech company – its services are like Google, eBay and Uber rolled into one – and Yandex Music has 20 million users and 3.3 million premium subscribers.
VK, “Russia’s Facebook”, has more than 500 million accounts worldwide.
SberZvuk is a loyalty program run by one of Russia’s largest banks.
Spotify had 320 million Russian active users and 144 million subscribers, as of October 2021.
Russia is Apple Music’s fifth largest market.
With such numbers at stake, ARCA calls on all Australian artists, labels and publishers to also withdraw supply, licensing or other agreements with the Russian Federation.
This includes The National Music Publishing LLC, Sony Music Entertainment Russia, Warner/Chappell Music Russia, Universal Music and Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd.
ARCA’s Ian Peel said: “We don’t have any weapons, but we want to support the Ukrainian people in any way we can, protest, help to survive, whatever.
“We are all people trying to live a pure and free life on this planet. Stand with them!
For the list of Desk Tape series recordings on Black Box, see
Black Box Records – ARCA (australianroadcrew.com.au)