It's been a week where my faith in music has been shaken to it's very foundations by three of the biggest names in rock - two of which are the people who I freely admit to be obcessed with.

First there was the Grateful Dead who for 40 years have allowed their fans to record and trade their concerts - this was a shrewd move on the part of the band because it kept the fans coming back show after show, year after year. The band had an area set aside for tapers at their shows and even gave out patches from the sound board.

These tapes were then traded amongst fans and as such very few bootlegs albums circulated - why buy a bootleg when you get get a tape for nothing. The rules were simple - no official releases were to be traded and no money should change hands. There is even an argument to suggest that the internet expanded because Deadheads wanted to trade tapes!! As technology advances and changed; tape trading gave way to CD trading and then to downloading. There was a site called the Live music archive which held over 2000 recordings of the Grateful Dead as well as other bands.

A few months ago the Dead (or what is left of the organisation) introduced it's download series and started selling some of it's recordings from it's huge vault via it's on line store. These were available in either lossy mp3 format or lossless Flac format. You paid your money and you downloaded the show. Also they released a 10 CD box set of the four shows in 1969 which were recorded for their Live/Dead album - it was limited to 10,000 copies and sold out in less than a few weeks (Luckily I got one).

Last week however the band announced that they were stopping the downloading of soundboard recordings from the Live music archive and henceforth audience recordings would only be available in mp3 streaming format. This has sent the usually loyal legion of deadheads into a petulant frenzy. There is much finger pointing at the surviving members of the band and even two of their wives. There is talk of boycotting future CD releases, T-shirt and merchandise sales and even concert ticket sales.

There seems to be the general opinion that the reason that the soundboards have been pulled is because the band intend to increase their download releases and hence start to charge for them instead of having them freely available - hence going back on an unspoken pact with their fans. No statement has yet been released by the band although one is expected soon.

The second shock came after I recieved a copy of Bob Dylan's show at the Brixton Academy on 21st November. He was dreadful and for the first time I couldn't listen to the show. I know he has been erratic of recent years but I thought this was dire. I'm glad I didn't waste my money going to the shows. It's been two years since I've seen him and boy has he slid downhill in that time.

In my opinion the Neverending tour he has been on for the last 18 or so years has finally reached rock bottom. Dylan mumbles the lyrics, sings tunes at odds with the backing and has this awful habbit of singing up at the end of a line. The band has lost most of the good memebers and now is only workaday at best. It's time he took a good long look at himself and changed direction like he used to on a regular basis.

I don't care what he does - sing backed by peruvian noseflutes, get a DJ and do the songs in a hip hop style, gargle the songs on a uni-cycle - anything that would lift him out of the rut he is so surely in backed by a god awful band, plodding through the songs with no feeling

Boots of Spanish leather and Visions of Johanna were so dire as to almost reduce me to tears. The only high points I heard (I didn't listen to the whole thing) were the fiddle break on It's alright Ma and the Clash cover London Calling which was only just over a minutes worth.

The final straw was the Rolling Stones announcing their UK dates for next year, they are playing the new Wembley Stadium on 20th August next year as well as dates in Glasgow(25), Sheffield(27)and Cardiff(29). Tickets for these shows are priced £150, £90 and £60!

They are on sale now but before you dash off to buy one you can only do so in the first instance if you hold an American Express card. The band have a tie up with Amex - very rock and roll!! No doubt corporate hospitality deals are also available. At those prices you can probably expect to be in an audience full of merchant bankers (pun intened).

I saw the Stones about 25 years ago and I thought they were past it then - if i could see them at Brixton like Mr Zimmerman then I might think about it but I ain't paying £150 to sit in a Stadium and watch a bunch of 60 year olds pretend they're still 18 - no way.

Anyway it would seem that the stars of yesteryear seem to see their fanbase, most of which are aged betwen 40 and 60, as a cash cow to be milked at every opportunity but the way I see it is summed up by a headline from the NME in about 1978...

Take this God and stuff it!!