Upsample with Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff

After we rage against Spotify Wrapped and follow up on our previous episodes, Carson unpacks three recent stories related by the theme of AI blowback: a maximally high-effort and human album, an anti-AI revival of Vine, and a platform that might get enshittified by its buyer.

(0:00) Intro

(4:11) Does Will do year-end lists?

(5:57) Canada Music Fund $16 million top-up update

(7:42) Side Door correction & updates

(11:38) AI blowback?

(16:59) Lux by Rosalía

(31:34) Jack Dorsey-backed DiVine: bring back Vine?

(53:50) Spotify acquires WhoSampled

(1:03:41) Recommendations

Recs: Will - listen to Strays by Way Ahead Trio, Carson - listen to What of Our Nature by Haley Heynderickx & Max García Conover

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.

We discuss the story of the Canadian live show platform "where every space is a venue" called Side Door, from the company's founding to its coming end, as announced on Nov. 4.

Correction: at about 53 minutes, we say Arlene invested out of Dragon's Den, and we later say that Side Door didn't raise again afterward. Per Simpson's comment on the YouTube version of this episode (Nov. 25), it fell through like many of those DD offers do, but Side Door did raise once more afterward: "Arlene did not actually invest...that's a long story, but just to say Dragon's Den is entertainment first. We did get further investment after this from BDC instead."

(0:00) The World Series, the Grey Cup, & JP Saxe sang the anthem

(3:28) Side Door Access is winding down on Dec. 31

(10:53) Act I: founding to pandemic

(32:08) Act II: covid momentum

(55:13) Act III: end of the runway

(1:04:01) Aftermath & discussion

(1:17:59) Outro & recommendations

Recommendations:

Will – Check out the New Feeling Co-Op of Canadian music journalists

Carson – listen to Bach: Sonatas and Partitas, Vol. 2 by Chris Thile

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.

Carson declines to jinx the Jays. Then it's time to lock in for one of our most theoretical conversations yet, in response to the Never Post podcast episode titled "A.I. and New American Fascism". Will chases it with a Canadian story about the possible non-renewal of a $16 million boost to federal music funding.

Correction: at pretty much the very end, I say Universal is the majority shareholder in NTS. They're not; they're merely the largest shareholder.

Scheduling note: the next Upsample will drop three weeks from now instead of two.

(4:07) Never Post episode overview

(14:18) Walter Benjamin

(21:13) Sora, OpenAI, and agitslop machines

(28:32) Hackers, free marketeers, and their fascist fear-monsters

(36:01) A CD with Aura - because you can't see it on the audio pod, it's Brighton Train by Madeleine Elkins (with Will on bass and Kevin Romain on drums) and it's out now!

(38:49) How does PragerU fit into this?!

(44:56) Activism around the Canada Music Fund and Budget 2025

(54:19) Will goes full Ezra

(58:24) Recommendations: Will - listen to radio show Self Soothe by Margeaux on NTS, Carson - listen to album Nested in Tangles by Hannah Frances

Canada Music Fund links:

1. Letter/advocacy page
2. Details of the fund
3. Roots Music Canada piece by Heather Kitching

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.

Madelyn Read (musician, songwriter, and BC Co-Op Association Community Engagement & Education Manager) is our first-ever guest!

• (01:07) Introducing Madelyn and her work
• (05:26) VSO musicians strike update (it's over)
• (10:33) How Madelyn set up her Europe tour in 2024
• (21:54) Talking about streaming
• (26:44) Leaving Spotify
• (31:14) Madelyn's nuanced disagreement with us
• (32:45) Madelyn and Will's history at the Ampled co-op
• (37:26) The Subvert co-op as a Bandcamp competitor
• (42:29) Madelyn enables Sports Upsample!
• (45:26) What happened at the end of Ampled
• (50:23) Co-op considerations for Subvert's future
• (55:04) Recommendations

Links:

• Madelyn wrote about streaming, on her website
• Subvert: "Q3 Transparency Report"
• Subvert features update

Recs:

• Madelyn - listen to Wild and Clear and Blue by I’m With Her, Chandler by Wyatt C. Louis, Good Buddy by Fontine.
• Carson - listen to Getting Killed by Geese.
• Will - read Chokepoint Capitalism (2022) by Rebecca Giblin & Cory Doctorow

FIND US:

Madelyn

• Bandcamp: https://madelynread.bandcamp.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/madelynread/

Will

• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/
• Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/
• Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Update from later today: VSO musicians have begun their strike.

After Will vents about the Canadian Football League controversy, we discuss a potential strike by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra (VSO) musicians (4:32), purported salary discrepancies (17:52), and we catch a brief response by the VSO in real time while recording (23:22).

We jumped the usual schedule to talk about this news, so the next episode of Upsample will drop three weeks from now.

• VSO musicians' strike announcement video
• Daily Hive story which includes response from the VSO
• 1999 CBC story about Toronto and Montreal

Recs: Will - watch, listen to, read anything made between 1941 and 1956, inspired by Ted Gioia "Is Mid-20th Century American Culture Getting Erased?"

Carson - listen to Bleeds by Wednesday

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.

We begin by jinxing the Jays. Then we get into the KARRA story “I invested $100,000 to create my album & Spotify deleted it” & part 2 (2:24), are labels bad if they just use DistroKid? (19:49) and is this gonna make us all leave finally? (35:31) 

Recs: Carson - listen to God's Gonna Give You a Million Dollars by Shallowater, Will - watch Pablo Torre Finds Out⁩ 

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.

Be careful out there or you'll get yelled at by shirtless dudes in Pontiacs! Will has a music library app now on his desktop, and Carson needs a new website (02:10), Bandcamp launches Clubs (08:38), EVEN is a hip-hop-coded post-Bandcamp platform (25:35), we check out the familiar mission of another challenger called Ampwall (31:12), and some people really hate Stripe (46:19).

• Bandcamp Clubs: https://bandcamp.com/about_clubs
• EVEN: https://get.even.biz/
• Ampwall: https://ampwall.com/

Recs: Carson - The Bear season 4, Will - TANG! by Steph Wall

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.

(0:00) Will LOVES that you don't read his emails

(1:52) Subvert turned down $200K and want to launch with no fees

(18:15) "AI Music Night" in Texas

(27:26) We need skills to make the platform internet suck less

(38:28) Which tech move is Will going to make first?

(48:19) JP Saxe's tour got canceled

(1:05:18) Recommendations

Subvert 0% Platform Fees links:

• Changelog link
• Blog post

AI Music Night links:

• Rubber Gloves Rehearsal Studio venue in Denton, Texas announces "AI Music Night"
• Cancels later the same day after viral backlash

JP Saxe tour situation links:

• First video
• Follow-up video
• Variety coverage
• Saxe writes to Variety
• His Substack
• "Why Some Artists are Rethinking Touring" on Chartmetric's blog by Sonia Chien
• Will's 2022 article about Cadence Weapon's tour losses

Recs: Will - album Different Strokes for Different Folks by Charlie Hunter & Ella Feingold, Carson - album Baby by Dijon

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.

We have closure on The Velvet Sundown! Then we get into the very creative ticket pricing, or lack thereof, at Bumbershoot in Seattle and the Guelph Jazz Festival in Ontario (11:43), and a Vancouver city council motion that put several of our favourite ideas on the table, but didn't pass (27:42).

Recs: Carson - Tyler Childers album Snipe Hunter, Will - Brighde Chaimbeul album Sunwise

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.

After clearing the WeTransfer air, we get into subvert.fm, a collectively owned music commerce platform in development. The Subvert team calls the platform a direct alternative to Bandcamp. We discuss the concept of Subvert and who founded it (11:17), Bandcamp controversies: being sold twice and union drama (15:08), Carson vs. Will on enshittification (29:46), Subvert's structure and current status (38:04), and how we feel about it + are we signing up as artists? (49:46)

Recs: Will - podcast episode All One Song :: Jeff Parker on “The Needle and the Damage Done” by Aquarium Drunkard, Carson - album Swag by Justin Bieber

FIND US:

Will

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@williamchernoff/

-Rhythm Changes: https://www.rhythmchanges.ca/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/williamchernoff/

Carson

-YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ctworow/

-Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ctworow.bsky.social/

-Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ctworow/

Hosted by Carson Tworow & Will Chernoff. Edited and mixed by Will Chernoff. A Chernoff Music podcast. Theme music by Carson Tworow.