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Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

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Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#61

Post by shakezula »

quacked wrote: post #12
shakezula wrote: post #4

I used to work in the music industry professionally, on the ground level doing booking and management. This trend has been happening slowly for nearly a decade but it’s finally here. Rap and Hip Hop figured out a long time before most other genres that rapid small releases was a far better way to keep hype and sales up. Before Spotify was a thing, the shift was happening with YouTube but it wasn’t as predominant. Now…

> The music isn’t your product, the music is your marketing. The shows, the merch, your influence - that’s your product. Man, that's depressing.

It’s not tho! It means tighter release cycles which means a tighter feedback loop which means bands can find their sound faster and grow their backing faster.

Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#62

Post by the_af »

pier25 wrote: post #44

Obviously the guy knows nothing about creativity and art. It takes time to grow as a person and cultivate new ideas. It may not be possible to do that if you don't get in and out of whatever it is you're doing. Imagine telling Hemingway he has to release a new blog post every week instead of a book every couple of years.

   "What's he going to record a song about?"
   "Nothing."
   "Spotify'll kill him."
   "I guess they will."
   "He must have got mixed up in something with the music industry."
   "I guess so," said Nick.
   "It's a hell of a thing."
   "It's an awful thing," Nick said.
   They did not say anything. George reached down for his mobile phone and wiped the screen.
   "I wonder what he did?" Nick said.
   "Failed to write enough songs fast enough to generate user engagement. That's what Spotify will kill them for."
   "I'm going to cancel my Spotify subscription," Nick said.
   "Yes," said George. "That's a good thing to do."
   "I can't stand to think about him waiting in the recording room and knowing he's going to get it. It's too damned awful."
   "Well," said George, "you better not think about it."
(with apologies to Hemingway!)

Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#63

Post by drchopchop »

Alupis wrote: post #21
unnamed76ri wrote: post #9

Artists to Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer afford to make $0.00174927 per stream.

Let's be honest. The amount Spotify/Pandora/et al pay the majority of musicians per stream is far more than they'd make selling CD's. The overwhelming majority of music is unknown, has few fans, and will never "go platinum" nor sell out stadiums - ie, most musicians are not Taylor Swift. For all those artists... access to millions of potential listeners from around the world is an amazing advancement. The number of a…

No way. How can music simultaneously be "unknown, has few fans" but also benefit from "access to millions of potential listeners"? If they get millions of listens they aren't exactly unknown anymore.

One CD sold at a gig for $10 is equal to about 2,000 Spotify plays. A t-shirt sale is double that. A mid-level band can play to 200 people a night and do $1000 daily in merch, easy (and I've personally done it). Sure, if people discover the band via Spotify, that brings them to shows, so there is the discoverability aspect - but the compensation is not remotely comparable.

Spotify profits off of the market value of streaming music having dropped to practically nothing (due to practically infinite supply), and their pay rates are terrible as a result.

Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#64

Post by kd913 »

unnamed76ri wrote: post #9

Artists to Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer afford to make $0.00174927 per stream.

Shouldn't they be aiming at basically Google, Amazon and Apple here for undercutting Spotify?

Spotify has to price match against those giants who subsidize their respective services with other profitable aspects of the business.

Spotify themselves for the most part having been losing money/matching even.

What can Spotify do? They raise the cost of premium, they lose marketshare and that would be a death spiral no?

Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#65

Post by guyzero »

52-6F-62 wrote: post #46
oconnor663 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it could be depressing if we think of "your product" as "the most important part of what you do". But we could also think of it as "the thing that you need to make money from". If the music itself isn't the thing that you need to make money from, then instead of charging a bunch for it, now you want to spread it as widely as possible as cheaply as possible. That's a good thing!

Not if you’re coerced into having to produce a piece of music every month/couple of months to keep the machine running. That’s just producing a commodity. Some groups have got it together and are able to fund years of quiet work before releases, but no matter how much I enjoy creating I would hate to be so bound as outlined above.

I am reminded of the story about ceramics students being told that half would be graded on quantity and half would be graded on the quality of a single piece of work.

https://excellentjourney.net/2015/03/04/art-fear-the-ceramic...

It turns out that the students who were just churning out pots ended up making the pots that were ultimately better.

I think there's probably something to be said for constantly creating.

Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#66

Post by Alupis »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #54
Alupis wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's be honest. The amount Spotify/Pandora/et al pay the majority of musicians per stream is far more than they'd make selling CD's. The overwhelming majority of music is unknown, has few fans, and will never "go platinum" nor sell out stadiums - ie, most musicians are not Taylor Swift. For all those artists... access to millions of potential listeners from around the world is an amazing advancement. The number of a…

Just speaking for my own band: we have had tens of thousands of streams on Spotify, yet we have made over 4x more revenue from music sales on BandCamp than we have on all streaming services combined.

That's great! I wish more bands had this level of success.

BandCamp is more-or-less an "indie" place to find music. People have to be "into" it to go there and find music.

Spotify and Pandora are far lower barriers for every-day people. Just put on some station you've created from your favorite band, and eventually it'll start playing new bands you've never heard and might love. It's amazing.

Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#67

Post by chesterarthur »

pier25 wrote: post #44

Obviously the guy knows nothing about creativity and art. It takes time to grow as a person and cultivate new ideas. It may not be possible to do that if you don't get in and out of whatever it is you're doing. Imagine telling Hemingway he has to release a new blog post every week instead of a book every couple of years.

Isn't that how Dickens wrote at least one classic novel? The history of creative endeavors if rife with short deadlines.

Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#68

Post by 52-6F-62 »

chesterarthur wrote: post #58
52-6F-62 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not if you’re coerced into having to produce a piece of music every month/couple of months to keep the machine running. That’s just producing a commodity. Some groups have got it together and are able to fund years of quiet work before releases, but no matter how much I enjoy creating I would hate to be so bound as outlined above.

A lot of creative endeavors run on this timeline. It's just a shorter cycle and it's not new.

You’re right. It’s not new. Not for pop music anyway.

I’d argue that it’s worse, though. Shorter cycles are even less healthy.

And just because it’s been done before(-ish) and other endeavours run in this timeline doesn’t make it good or beneficial to anything but those who aspire to only make money off of it.

The fact is, good music doesn’t require business to be good music. And the business doesn’t necessarily require the music to be good—it just requires that it directly or indirectly generates revenue. From the perspective of commerce the rest is incidental.

Encouraging the commercial perspective over something more balanced is a net negative for culture and society. At least I think so.

Re: Spotify CEO: musicians can no longer release music only “once every 3-4 years”

#69

Post by danmaz74 »

tyingq wrote: post #3

That's a strange stance. I assume there are a fair number of listeners that don't care to listen to anything new. Is there some business benefit to Spotify by artificially forcing churn?

I'm similar, but I wonder how many people stream often enough minor artists or minor songs from the past. Maybe keeping the engagement up is the only way for non-unforgettable artists to make enough money to make a living?
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