Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

ifpi.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 192 posts

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#61

Post by bryans »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #47
bryans wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I have tons of evidence for this, and for why all of your claims have no foundation. Allow me to provide one example of the hundreds that I personally know of or worked with (which is a tiny fraction of the numbers finding success independently). In late 2020, a band called Sub-Radio had a couple thousand followers on each social media platform and around ~15k monthly listeners on Spotify, and this was after man…

Is it possible this method was doable for them without the backing of bigger money because it's sort of novel? If everyone starts live streaming reddit and tiktok, what will make certain groups stand out versus others? I would guess there would be an opportunity for paid promotion, maybe by Reddit or TikTok themselves.

That's an argument which could be made for any market or industry. There are obviously a finite amount of people in the world, and those people have a finite amount of time to find and listen to music, so there is always competition and certain artists are going to stand out among others -- that's the nature of human preference. But that doesn't automatically mean a few are successful and everyone else fails. It's a spectrum of success which, as it turns out, is directly proportional to the effort invested toward getting better and producing more attractive content.

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#62

Post by bryans »

conradfr wrote: post #60
bryans wrote: post #15

The self-congratulatory nature of the article and quotes actually betray a self-reassurance, because in reality, record labels are rapidly becoming irrelevant. They're scrambling to figure out how they fit into the TikTok era, where artists no longer require years of financial incubation to succeed. The music industry is growing because independent musicians are finally figuring out how to navigate it without any nee…

There's great labels still, like Sargent House. Social platforms and digitalization can helped being truly independent but there's still non-music work that a label would do for you that you now have to manage. And even if the stories about the struggling musicians becoming rock stars has always been embellished, it seems nowadays most of the current ones had financial security before pursuing their music career beca…

> Social platforms and digitalization can helped being truly independent but there's still non-music work that a label would do for you that you now have to manage.

Except that is rapidly becoming untrue, which is the entire point. Self-management in the music industry is actually quite simple if you have the tools and knowledge, and both of those are now widely available to everyone.

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#63

Post by mr_mitm »

gentleman11 wrote: post #53
ProfessorLayton wrote: post #2

I am having a hell of a time adjusting to a streaming-focused music world. On one hand, I love having access to pretty much all the music I want, and have discovered a lot of new artists (through no help of the apps themselves, however). On the other hand, having my library randomly switch on me with songs disappearing, album covers swapping out or renamed is driving me NUTS. Not to mention the general buggyness that…

Where can you buy (drm free) music these days? After google play shut down, I haven’t known where to go

Amazon has MP3 downloads, at least where I live. Last time I bought a CD there, the corresponding MP3 download was included.

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#64

Post by CharlesW »

xmprt wrote: post #57
basisword wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any evidence of this? People have been saying labels are irrelevant for a decade or two at least now. It's never true. To succeed you need to get noticed and for that you need a marketing budget and the labels provide that. Artists can get much further than before but going viral on TikTok is not a viable career strategy for most artists.

I think that while it's been "technically" possible to have an audience without labels for at least a decade, it's been incredibly difficult because of all the barriers to entry that labels have put on the industry. YouTube has Vevo. Labels have deals with companies like Spotify and Apple that indie artists can't make. Your options have either been to fight and more than likely fail (or succeed with one viral song an…

> Labels have deals with companies like Spotify and Apple that indie artists can't make.

You don't need a label to distribute your music on major music services. https://www.tunecore.com/

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#65

Post by zuminator »

oh_sigh wrote: post #39
BaseballPhysics wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. Listen to any smaller artist and they'll tell you streaming services are only good for exposure and the real money is in ticket sales, swag, and physical and digital sales to buying customers.

This seems like a problem associated with how money is apportioned out by the streaming services. As I understand it, they basically throw all the user money into a big pot, and throw all the streams into a big pot, and then apportion it out that way. However, the problem with that is, if I don't listen to Taylor Swift at all, why is a portion of my subscription fee going to her? If, say, $10 per month of the money I…

Money is fungible. If you do $5 worth of streaming OBX's music, they'll get $5. Whether that gets transferred directly from your personal Spotify account into theirs, or initially put into a "big pot" and then the same amount is given to them, what does it matter? Maybe I'm misunderstanding your issue?

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#66

Post by CharlesW »

mikepurvis wrote: post #50
basisword wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any evidence of this? People have been saying labels are irrelevant for a decade or two at least now. It's never true. To succeed you need to get noticed and for that you need a marketing budget and the labels provide that. Artists can get much further than before but going viral on TikTok is not a viable career strategy for most artists.

Tessa Violet is example of an artist who has blown up on TikTok and I believe has parlay that into real world success in terms of shows, merch, etc. First 2 Eleven is a YouTube cover band who I believe are still fully independent and On the streaming side, musicians like Danielle Allard are killing it, though sometimes in a scenario like this it's unclear if it's even the goal of the person to "go mainstream" vs just…

> Tessa Violet is example of an artist who has blown up on TikTok and I believe has parlay that into real world success in terms of shows, merch, etc.

I've not heard of the others, but Tessa is on a label, T∆G Music, which has a global distribution deal with a subsidiary of Sony. She launched her career on the Make Music label as well.

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#67

Post by karmasimida »

basisword wrote: post #20
bryans wrote: post #15

The self-congratulatory nature of the article and quotes actually betray a self-reassurance, because in reality, record labels are rapidly becoming irrelevant. They're scrambling to figure out how they fit into the TikTok era, where artists no longer require years of financial incubation to succeed. The music industry is growing because independent musicians are finally figuring out how to navigate it without any nee…

Do you have any evidence of this? People have been saying labels are irrelevant for a decade or two at least now. It's never true. To succeed you need to get noticed and for that you need a marketing budget and the labels provide that. Artists can get much further than before but going viral on TikTok is not a viable career strategy for most artists.

Most artists don't have a career.

How many self sustained artists in the music industry are there, comparing against the self-claimed ones?

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#68

Post by mjr00 »

CharlesW wrote: post #64
xmprt wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that while it's been "technically" possible to have an audience without labels for at least a decade, it's been incredibly difficult because of all the barriers to entry that labels have put on the industry. YouTube has Vevo. Labels have deals with companies like Spotify and Apple that indie artists can't make. Your options have either been to fight and more than likely fail (or succeed with one viral song an…

> Labels have deals with companies like Spotify and Apple that indie artists can't make. You don't need a label to distribute your music on major music services. https://www.tunecore.com/

Yep. I'm a verified artist on YouTube, TikTok, Bilibili, Spotify, etc. and all it took was a $15/year Distrokid subscription.

That being said, the real challenge for independent artists is getting "blessed by the algorithm," so to speak, where they actually start showing up in Song Radio and Discover Weekly algorithmic playlists. I'm not keen on the details of the Spotify algorithm, but I imagine labels do help with this, and being on the same label as a popular artist would increase your chances of showing up on that artists' song radio.

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#69

Post by nicd »

CharlesW wrote: post #64
xmprt wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that while it's been "technically" possible to have an audience without labels for at least a decade, it's been incredibly difficult because of all the barriers to entry that labels have put on the industry. YouTube has Vevo. Labels have deals with companies like Spotify and Apple that indie artists can't make. Your options have either been to fight and more than likely fail (or succeed with one viral song an…

> Labels have deals with companies like Spotify and Apple that indie artists can't make. You don't need a label to distribute your music on major music services. https://www.tunecore.com/

You're right that getting music onto DSPs has been commoditized.

Parent may have been referring to promotional deals (getting onto official Spotify playlists, Discover Weekly, etc) or special royalty rates. The major labels have tons of leverage, and they definitely cut deals that entry-level artists don't have access to.

Re: Global music market grew by 18.5% in 2021, driven by paid subscription streaming

#70

Post by bryans »

basisword wrote: post #51
bryans wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I have tons of evidence for this, and for why all of your claims have no foundation. Allow me to provide one example of the hundreds that I personally know of or worked with (which is a tiny fraction of the numbers finding success independently). In late 2020, a band called Sub-Radio had a couple thousand followers on each social media platform and around ~15k monthly listeners on Spotify, and this was after man…

How long does that work for though and for how many artists? If you get on a new platform early you can find success, but once the platform becomes swamped with content it's impossible to stand out without creativity, luck...and funding. Unless you're lucky enough to find the next platform. Additionally - 15k monthly listeners on Spotify is a pretty great starting point. Most indie artists, regardless of quality, wil…

I think you're maybe putting too much emphasis on the platforms, particularly on them being a single opportunity that goes away at some point. Every platform, regardless of whether it's a specific function like Spotify or a content hub like YouTube, is a separate venue representing a series of opportunities, not a singular event. If you need evidence of that, you can find countless new YouTube channels finding success in the same markets which have been "saturated" for years -- some since the beginning of the platform.

And specifically to your emphasis on needing funding, that's just not the case anymore. Everything is cheap. You can live stream from your phone in 480p with a $20 ring light, and fans of the content will still throw money at you. It happens all day long on Twitch.

> Additionally - 15k monthly listeners on Spotify is a pretty great starting point. Most indie artists, regardless of quality, will struggle ever even reach that without a lot of outside help (or luck).

Again though, that was after almost a decade of gigs and touring and marketing. All it took was opening their eyes to those series of opportunities that platforms provide, and then applying all of their effort toward those instead of pursuing the traditionally prescribed music industry path.

Post reply on HN