Recently, its come to my attention that a so called "artist" named Aron Lyrd has stolen one of my songs, changed the title, and is selling it on I-Tunes, and Amazon.com... I also found out that he is doing the same things with other bands such as: Band of Horses, Math and Physics Club and Belle and Sebastian (just to name a few)........Aron Lyrd has HUNDREDS of songs for sale on various websites and as far as I can tell, none of them belong to him.....
Ive been doing a bunch of research on this guy and it really is a strange tale.
Heres a basic rundown of the story.....
I joined a website called sonicbids.com because I wanted to submit an application to Bumbershoot. I was looking around the site, checking out other services they had to offer. I came across this company that helps artists submit their music to television and movie producers. I was interested so I started looking a little deeper. I noticed that at the bottom of their page, there are comments from artists that have submitted. For some reason or another, I noticed this guy, Aron Lyrd. His profile picture was him in a ninja suit with some nunchucks!
.......he just made me laugh for some reason. I had to check out his music...
so I click on the featured song "orange ambititon" on his E.P.K. (electronic press kit) and.....MY SONG CAME ON!!!
I thought my computer was fucking up or something...I tried again and again...it was my song "tangerine"...there was my wife and musical partner, Emily Madden's voice... Sasha Landis drumming away...my sisters voice singing back up.....my voice and piano...MY SONG written and recorded in my living room!! I was completely confused...
What are the chances of me finding out about this???? Its CRAZY! It really blows my mind that I even know this guy exists! The fact that I randomly clicked on some dipshit's profile and MY SONG started playing is almost unbelievable!
Check out his myspace page. I think the guy might be some kind of genius computer hacker. Theres just no way that he has gotten 35,000,000 song plays!
I kinda became a bit obsessed with the guy and started looking a bit deeper into what he does.
After listening to a bunch of samples of "his" songs and finding band of horses, The Searchers: LOVE POTION #9 (!!), The drifters, belle and sebastian, math and physics club, Hot Chip, Cat Power etc realized that Aron Lyrd had quite the scam going....Making fake albums with other peoples songs and selling them on I-tunes, Amazon, etc. The vast majority of the songs he is selling seem to be by unknown (to me at least) indie artists.....
Here is Aron's Amazon page where he sells mp3s that dont belong to him:
Heres a list of stolen music I've found. Im pretty sure that every single track he has for sale is not his. (he is offering multiple versions of my song with a different titles)
track 2: aron lyrd orange dreams= solvents "tangerine"
track 14: orange ambition= solvents "tangerine"
track 17: cold road, life node= band of horses "ghost in my house"
track 23: orange ambition= solvents "tangerine
track 33: "love potion # 9" !!!!!
track 44: whats the color of tangerine?= solvents "tangerine
track 21: gut feeling, low ceiling= the drifters!!!(not sure of the name)
track 46: life worn, heart scorn=band of horses (not sure of the name
Heres his "album" on i tunes where he is selling our song:
The whole thing is pretty fucked up. This guy is STEALING SOUND RECORDINGS and selling them as if they were his. Its upsetting on many levels. It makes me wonder how many of these pricks are out there doing shit like this. It also REALLY bums me out on Amazon and I-tunes. They obviously dont give a fuck about what they are selling...
(Aron's cover for the single he stole from me)
