The only objection I have with this article is the implied notion that record labels going out of business because they are no longer needed would be a bad thing. Not that I like the idea of TikTok being their de facto successor, but the music industry has a dark history of abusing young artists in various ways that it has never really faced up to.
Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
91–100 of 198 posts
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe it's wishful thinking, but I don't believe this will happen, and unless I'm mistaken, there's absolutely 0 evidence for it. People are usually attached to the artist when it comes to music. You buy a Bowie album because it has his name on it. You learn about them, look forward to their future work, maybe go see them live, etc. Will computers replace EDM and elevator music? I don't know, maybe, who cares?
The next generations will follow pseudo-Bowie, because David Bowie is for old people. edit: I'm imagining what they would say. I'm not here to offend Bowie fans.
> because David Bowie is for old people
until it's new again, because young people of today are going to become old too and their kids are going to think tik tok hits are old, but will remember when their grandparents took them for a walk in the park listening to David Bowie.
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#93Interestingly, labels playing games about releasing albums is an old trick for various old reasons too. https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2010/apr/15/arti... https://www.buzzfeed.com/azafar/what-happens-when-your-favor... for a couple old references A change in negotiation power seems like a good evolution of the industry for anyone but record industry execs. But this "record industry is committing suicide"…
Its only dragging on because record labels have some of these mega mainstream artists by the balls. As contracts die, as we see more independents rise to the top mainstream record labels will die. It's just going to be slow like cable companies. Inevitable but undoubtedly.
maybe
but also independent labels have much less negotiating power and human power to check for infringements or unauthorized reproduction, let alone legal authority.
All in all a good deal for them it's peanuts for a mainstream label.
(I have co-founded a small independent label)
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#94Earlier quoted context omitted.
The only way to break ground is to promote the music of others that "magically" trends on TikTok non-stop. I joined because I wanted to figure out how it worked and luckily I have been able to mostly resist the addictiveness of it by manipulating search on YouTube to find the content deeply buried on that platform. As a label runner myself. it quickly becomes apparent that TikTok is gamified, and it really only cares…
> any music, even total drivel, played repetitively to people simply ends up selling. I think there is a magic here that is under appreciated. The reality is that music often takes a few listens to appreciate, or perhaps the right mood/moment to really connect. indeed it seems to me that we learn to like that which we are exposed to, irrespective of whether someone with "taste" thinks it is drivel. Seems like a featu…
Drivel, meaning there is other stuff out there that even YOU may find to be better, but you will never hear it because of the platform and ITS priorities.
A feature for the platform and a select few artists, but not a feature for the listener.
Elitism isn’t the issue here. Limited access outside of funnels is
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#95I don’t get why artists even use record labels anymore. Is there something that Facebook/YouTube/iTunes etc doesn’t provide?
Yes, a team of professional composers who call themselves "producers" who will "make suggestions" for how to change your songs from having potential, to being actually high quality music.
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#96Earlier quoted context omitted.
The only way to break ground is to promote the music of others that "magically" trends on TikTok non-stop. I joined because I wanted to figure out how it worked and luckily I have been able to mostly resist the addictiveness of it by manipulating search on YouTube to find the content deeply buried on that platform. As a label runner myself. it quickly becomes apparent that TikTok is gamified, and it really only cares…
> any music, even total drivel, played repetitively to people simply ends up selling. I think there is a magic here that is under appreciated. The reality is that music often takes a few listens to appreciate, or perhaps the right mood/moment to really connect. indeed it seems to me that we learn to like that which we are exposed to, irrespective of whether someone with "taste" thinks it is drivel. Seems like a featu…
People should use critical thinking skills to make deliberate choices about the content they consume
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not committing suicide - it's just fighting over the rights to the tide pool where the water receded entirely unaware of the tsunami barreling towards them. When the software world can convincingly create new songs that sound like the hit songs people like, but sufficiently different to dodge copyright law, then it's game over. We don't blink an eye at efforts to do things like complete one of Beethoven's sympho…
Maybe it's wishful thinking, but I don't believe this will happen, and unless I'm mistaken, there's absolutely 0 evidence for it. People are usually attached to the artist when it comes to music. You buy a Bowie album because it has his name on it. You learn about them, look forward to their future work, maybe go see them live, etc. Will computers replace EDM and elevator music? I don't know, maybe, who cares?
Nobody under 40 is buying any albums, at least not enough to matter. Physical music media is skewed towards the pre-Napster demographic. Bandcamp is nice but no one's getting rich off of it.
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#98Earlier quoted context omitted.
Obviously you underestimate the ability of teen demographics to become obsessive and form a long-term fandom. See K-pop.
K-pop industry is literally a star factory K-pop, like pop is only popular because it’s forcefully shoved down your throat by marketeers who’s goal is to recoup the investments for the hit factory obsessive teens is merely the result of marketing efforts this is what happens when capitalism takes over culture
A crap product isn't an inevitable result of capitalism and is not limited to capitalism. Plenty of independent artists work within the capitalist system. They tend to be more working class than *stars* though.
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#99Being a musician and audio engineer right now for 30 years, I see all this and I simply shake my head. I've long given up the hopes of monetary success for my music. One thing that remains is the energy exchange between an artist and the audience in a live setting. If you love music and you are not an emotional robot you know what I am talking about. Software can't replicate that and the artistry in the performer knows how to heighten and transmit content in that moment. This act of creating and adapting to the feedback and pushing energy back and forth is the only reason I'm still playing music. Computers don't do that. Tik tok doesn't do that in 30 seconds. Pop music has been reduced to the equivalent of taking a shit and a lot of people don't know it.
Re: Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok
#100Even though TikTok is a new platform the phenomena this article describe isn't new. It can also be attributed to other publisher industries than music, i.e. book publishing. Imagine you where a startup and you go to a VC. The VC tells you that they want to invest. However, they want full ownership of your IP, they want their investment money repaid by taking 100% of your startup's earnings before the company can use…
>But artists, writers and other creative producers of their own content have had to live with these kind of terms since forever. The reason has been that the publishers control the market.
People accept these terms but others do not. Independent artists and collectives exist. Publishers control the fame and stardom market. They do not control the entire creative market.