Post #155210 by tikibars on Wed, Apr 27, 2005 9:52 AM

Wal Mart on Best Buy sell more CDs than all other record stores combined.

Fact.

They have a LOT of pull with the big labels.

Most major label artists these days who have material on their recordings that may be seen as objectionable are required in their contracts to spend some studio time assembling 'clean' versions of their records for sale at Wal Mart and Best Buy.

This practice is scary and loathsome for all the reasons stated in above posts, but at least the artist, in many cases, is given the latitude to make the cuts themselves - whether this means obscuring objectionable words with sound effects, or cutting a section out of a song entirely, or leaving the whole song off of the CD.

Now, if the objectionable song is the 'hit', their options are more limited - they have to include it, so they must alter it. Filler songs may be lost altogether, however.

Artist, producer, and record label will make these choices together... if the artist is lucky.

Now, movies... yup, it's happening there too.

Freakin miserable.