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EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

bbc.co.uk

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Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#81

Post by chrischen »

tptacek wrote: post #18

Apologies in advance for glibness, but, who cares? Record labels are irrelevant. The capital costs of producing and (more importantly) distributing popular music have fallen through the floor. The heavily-promoted music products people think of when they think of EMI or Warner are in large part contrivances that exist primarily to perpetuate EMI and Warner. The future barely even belongs to independent labels like Ma…

I don't think you can expect creatives like musicians to all of a sudden start focusing on the non-music creation aspects of their businesses. I think "business" people will still exist for creative musicians. Record labels dying might mean these business people will no longer exist in that form. It will simply shift from commoditizing the musicians into commoditizing the business people, which is how it should be. After all, who's more important, the artist or the people who manage and market the artist?

Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#82

Post by mortenjorck »

colomon wrote: post #80
ambertch wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you don't need to pay a dollar a song. You could also go to their concerts, buy their gear, go to their appearances, etc. This is how music industry works in Korea, where most all music is given away for free

The problem with this is it assumes you can reasonably get to their concerts. One of my favorite artists is playing a gig on his home ground next Wednesday. It's 1,500 miles away from me. To the best of my knowledge, it's been years since he last played within a thousand miles of my house. I haven't seen him perform since 2006. Also, I don't know about you, but the idea that you should support musicians by buying "ge…

It also assumes the musicians perform live. My music, for instance, doesn't lend itself well to live performance, so I don't.

Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#83

Post by minikomi »

colomon wrote: post #80
ambertch wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you don't need to pay a dollar a song. You could also go to their concerts, buy their gear, go to their appearances, etc. This is how music industry works in Korea, where most all music is given away for free

The problem with this is it assumes you can reasonably get to their concerts. One of my favorite artists is playing a gig on his home ground next Wednesday. It's 1,500 miles away from me. To the best of my knowledge, it's been years since he last played within a thousand miles of my house. I haven't seen him perform since 2006. Also, I don't know about you, but the idea that you should support musicians by buying "ge…

This is why I love bandcamp - pay as little or as much as you like is a great system. I, and others I know, have downloaded something for free, liked it, and gone back an given the artist money (along with a bunch of new sales through recommendations).

Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#84

Post by minikomi »

droz wrote: post #46

Record labels can be useful. For example, take Mo'Wax from back in the day. Under James Lavelle they cultivated an impressive collection of up and coming artists in the electronica scene. Finding similar artists became a breeze by browsing through their artist roster. Similar things can be said about Breakin' Bread and Metalheadz Problem is that record labels became to large and too broad. Their only real purpose to…

I think that netlabels have to start being as selective and driven as real labels.. Look at Jahtari, they have a good, clear "image" and are very consistent.

Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#86

Post by cageface »

brandall10 wrote: post #25
tejaswiy wrote: post #9

Does this mean we finally get Pink Floyd and the Beatles on Spotify?

Pink Floyd is on MOG. Not The Beatles though.

On rdio too, and they won't try to sleaze you into sharing every mouseclick on Facebook.

Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#87

Post by ethank »

wanorris wrote: post #64
kabir_h wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a bad idea, but there are two major drawbacks: 1) it's not that profitable. Companies that have tried some variant of this include tunecore and rcrdlbl but both dropped the bits that weren't profitable. 2) imagine startups are like bands; the founders will always do a better job making noise than a hired PR agency. Labels introduce politics and want to see success line their pockets, not the artist's. They w…

The "startups are like bands" analogy actually implies a different, more interesting model: what about a startup incubator for bands? Pick the most promising unsigned bands out of a set of applicants, and give them access to smart folks who have experience with being successful in the music industry along with other promising bands? Bands don't IPO or get bought out, but a deal for percentage of revenue might still b…

It's been tried. Hurley did this for a bit in Costa Mesa.

Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#88

Post by ethank »

mitjak wrote: post #53
mmatants wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually interpreted the title as having the exact opposite emotion - the frustration that there are only three oligarchs in this entire business now.

It was frustrating to me personally. Of the 4 sharks, EMI was the most forward thinking one, at least to a degree a major label can be. If commenters recall, they were the first to jump onboard with iTunes, and explore other digital delivery avenues. They also tended to sign promising artists that graduated from smaller labels. A lot of artists and fans considered EMI the "biggest indie label".

EMI has been a shell of its former self for years though. No real new signings, and only Coldplay. They had a progressive streak when they hired some digital natives, but they left out of frustration quickly.

Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#89

Post by statictype »

chrischen wrote: post #81
tptacek wrote: post #18

Apologies in advance for glibness, but, who cares? Record labels are irrelevant. The capital costs of producing and (more importantly) distributing popular music have fallen through the floor. The heavily-promoted music products people think of when they think of EMI or Warner are in large part contrivances that exist primarily to perpetuate EMI and Warner. The future barely even belongs to independent labels like Ma…

I don't think you can expect creatives like musicians to all of a sudden start focusing on the non-music creation aspects of their businesses. I think "business" people will still exist for creative musicians. Record labels dying might mean these business people will no longer exist in that form. It will simply shift from commoditizing the musicians into commoditizing the business people, which is how it should be. A…

I think his point was that new startups and markets will emerge to help artists with the business side of making music. (Promotion of music, concert/tour management, advertising etc...) They're already starting to appear.

So that may not be much of a lock-in for the big music labels.

Re: EMI music is sold to Universal. We're down to three major labels.

#90

Post by tptacek »

statictype wrote: post #89
chrischen wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you can expect creatives like musicians to all of a sudden start focusing on the non-music creation aspects of their businesses. I think "business" people will still exist for creative musicians. Record labels dying might mean these business people will no longer exist in that form. It will simply shift from commoditizing the musicians into commoditizing the business people, which is how it should be. A…

I think his point was that new startups and markets will emerge to help artists with the business side of making music. (Promotion of music, concert/tour management, advertising etc...) They're already starting to appear. So that may not be much of a lock-in for the big music labels.

I think you should take it as an axiom that if the major labels don't have anything viable that they can lock up, there won't be anything that they stay significant in.

So long as terrestrial radio matters, they can parlay their ownership of that channel into many other offerings.

But one by one, the things that major labels maintain structural advantages in are falling into irrelevance.

One day, and it won't be long from now, the last relevant thing that major labels own will fade into irrelevance. And then all the other things that major labels "do" will be "done" by lots of other companies, more agile companies, companies that focus on just those things. And that'll be the end of the major labels.

This isn't exactly insightful stuff, is it? I feel like you can pull case studies about it from the history of 20th century business.

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