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Why (not) pay for music?

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Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#41

Post by hukl »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #31
hukl wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lets say you pay 10$ for Spotify and you only listen to my music for a whole month then Rihanna, Lady Gaga and Beyonce will get 99.999999% of your 10$. Its because all the money, be it advertisement or subscriptions is thrown in a huge bucket and divided by play count. It will take you a looooong loooong time to get even one single dollar out of this model.

>> "Its because all the money, be it advertisement or subscriptions is thrown in a huge bucket and divided by play count." Source? Also, that's still not a reason not to be on it. Lots of people use Spotify and if your music isn't available on it they either won't listen at all (you lose) or will download it illegally (you lose).

In this case people from indie and major labels. You have to trust me there but it might be even in their terms and conditions. On the web you will also find plenty of artists complaining about that model.

Furthermore you can't just be on Spotify. You need a middleman to be allowed in the labels domain. Like I said, most streaming services are controlled by the labels. Now there are some cheap proxy companies that will publish you on Spotify and sure, you can do that but in the beginning of your journey - which I was referring to - you don't need to bother. It just won't give you anything. Later its surely nice to be there but even then you won't get anything out of it money wise.

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#42

Post by hukl »

Vaskerville wrote: post #30
hukl wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and no. First of all there are no real indie labels. If a label gets successful enough a major label will come by and make it a sub division. Even the labels with the best intentions need to get their money back at some point the market for them is the same as for everybody. If you are in the right niche at the right time there are of course exceptions - but well these are exceptions

Do you know anybody running indie labels? I do. You are only talking about major labels and "mainstream" music in your article. But, it's hurting EVERYBODY. Some of the reactions here are silly. If you love an artist buy their record, tell your friends, go see them in concert. Blaming labels (big or small) as a justification for illegal downloading is [ insert descriptor of your choice ]. Supporting your favorite art…

Yes I know people from indie labels and as I have stated earlier - there are no true indie labels which surprised me as well when I found out. The successful ones usually belong to another major label.

I don't encourage illegal downloads, quite the opposite. But the labels deserve blame as well as artists who are sitting on their faces, waiting for the labels to figure it out somehow. In the book »Appetite for Self-Destruction« its described pretty extensively how that is unlikely to happen.

To resolve the dilemma we need a revolution, coming from the artists and the consumers and I hope I inspire some people to wake up, use their brain and make things better without the labels.

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#43

Post by hukl »

SamWhited wrote: post #2

> Compared to the analog world, where it would take ages to copy hundreds of Tapes or CDs I think you mean the `physical' world. CDs aren't a part of the analog world; they're digital. Analog has to do with the signal type, not the medium.

Oh yes - thank you :)

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#44

Post by fumar »

Sprint wrote: post #37
fumar wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do think there is a "negative" connotation to free music. Free does not mean bad, or less good, than expensive music, when it comes to art. As a musician, it is significantly harder to produce an entire album by oneself. But, thats the great part of releasing something into the world, its all mine. No one else's imagination touched what I wanted to create. Set Up::: I use a synthesizer, a midi keyboard, and an APC…

Your definition of free is not the same as mine. I mean music that is freely licensed so everyone can share it as they like. Creative Commons licenses are the great standard here. Your music requires at least giving you/Bandcamp an e-mail address (a personal gripe of mine and instant tab closer) and says "all rights reserved".

Requiring email, instant tap closer, huh? I never had any feedback regarding this. Bandcamp was just an easy place to share. I just changed the setting.

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#45

Post by hukl »

dshibarshin wrote: post #24

Why not? Because I'm able to find all of the music I'm looking for on Soundcloud. Plus it's a great platform to discover new talent.

And they fail horribly to enable artists to make money. Soundcloud, sadly - is just a fancy and mostly free data store for audio files. So yeah - you nailed it pretty much :)

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#46

Post by _pmf_ »

> For over a decade now the music industry is struggling.

And that's where I stopped reading (which is unfortunate, because this is also where I started reading).

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#47

Post by dmbjr »

Sprint wrote: post #21

I am pretty much saturated with free music from the many netlabels and happy "amateur" musicians who release music because they make music for music's sake, not money. If somebody wants recommendations, name a genre and I will see if I can drop some links. There is a lot of negative prejudice against free music which is a real shame.

Could you share your favorite free extreme metal?

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#48

Post by k-mcgrady »

hukl wrote: post #41
k-mcgrady wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> "Its because all the money, be it advertisement or subscriptions is thrown in a huge bucket and divided by play count." Source? Also, that's still not a reason not to be on it. Lots of people use Spotify and if your music isn't available on it they either won't listen at all (you lose) or will download it illegally (you lose).

In this case people from indie and major labels. You have to trust me there but it might be even in their terms and conditions. On the web you will also find plenty of artists complaining about that model. Furthermore you can't just be on Spotify. You need a middleman to be allowed in the labels domain. Like I said, most streaming services are controlled by the labels. Now there are some cheap proxy companies that wi…

I still respectfully disagree about Spotify :) With CDBaby you can pay $50 and be on all online retailers including paid and free streaming services. With so many services out there (and so many people choosing to use different ones) I think it's best to be on them all or you risk people not being able to listen to you.

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#49

Post by Sprint »

dmbjr wrote: post #47
Sprint wrote: post #21

I am pretty much saturated with free music from the many netlabels and happy "amateur" musicians who release music because they make music for music's sake, not money. If somebody wants recommendations, name a genre and I will see if I can drop some links. There is a lot of negative prejudice against free music which is a real shame.

Could you share your favorite free extreme metal?

I don't know what "extreme metal" is nor have I found a Metal netlabel yet but the site with the worst redesign strategy in the free music world has some great ones. Might not be the style(s) you are into.

http://www.jamendo.com/list/a41418/whispers http://www.jamendo.com/list/a37727/the-awakening http://www.jamendo.com/list/a27926/darkshine http://www.jamendo.com/list/a42180/coma-circle-lp http://www.jamendo.com/list/a76571/angelic-asylum http://www.jamendo.com/list/a43370/anno-domini-mmix

Re: Why (not) pay for music?

#50

Post by tomjen3 »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #14
tomjen3 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So get on kickstarter, use the money to pay to rent a recording studio and for an audio engineer to fix the recordings. Pay 50 bucks to get on CdBaby. Assuming 10k to rent the studio and pay the sound guy then you need a thousand true fans to pay 10 bucks and that should be doable.

Exactly that's what I would recommend. The only catch is what if you're just starting out and don't have 1000 fans?

Work harder and figure out who the gatekeepers are, then get on reddit and/or youtube. Grow your subscribers to 10k and that should be enough to get 10% to back you with money.

I am not saying it is easy, but given that you have spent years learning to play, you should be able to spend a couple months to get noticed.

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