Who needs record companies?

[mikegee]

yea, in fact, from what i read in a recent thom yorke interview (i'm pretty sure it was CME), it looks like the next radiohead album may also be label-less, and that would be a huge payout $-wise for radiohead. big time payout $$$

[McLean]

Originally Posted by mikegee

well, i think, if you just post partial snippets of your songs, you can hook the listener into buying your complete cd and/or download, and then, you dont even have to worry about "record label royalties" because the buyer will be giving you the $ directly, for what they buying, circumventing the record label totally... that is, if you are selling your music independent of a record label. more $ for you, no money for the record label (yay!) mmm more $...

This is a good idea in theory. However, what about file sharing on the internet. All it takes is one person to buy your album and post it on the internet. Than it is still free for everyone to have. You do get paid, but only once for the $9.95 that you priced you CD for. Than what??????

[Nubus]

Originally Posted by McLean

This is a good idea in theory. However, what about file sharing on the internet. All it takes is one person to buy your album and post it on the internet. Than it is still free for everyone to have. You do get paid, but only once for the $9.95 that you priced you CD for. Than what??????

People whom otherwise wouldn't have heard your music come see your shows and buy your limited-edition tour casettes.

[Professor Riffs]

Originally Posted by Nubus

People whom otherwise wouldn't have heard your music come see your shows and buy your limited-edition tour casettes.

I think it's a safe bet to say that playing live makes a band or artist more money than recordings, period. And if you're not well known enough to make much money either way, then what do you care if somebody downloads your stuff? They check it out for free, dig it, and end up coming to your show and putting money in your pocket via cover charge or ticket sales. If you rock them hard enough, you can maybe even sell em a cd, shirt, and/or whatever else (in the case of one of my bands, you can sell them a Blasphemy Rock!). If they never downloaded your jams they'd have never walked through that bar door!

On a side note, it seems to me that, for small time and local scenesterizing bands, more albums are sold at a venue after a live performance than get sold at stores (or on websites, etc). At least, this seems to hold true for the bands I know personally, as well as for many bands I have been in. Dunno if that means anything but figured I'd toss it in there.

[smopo24]

Originally Posted by GearJunkie

mike's comments about labels being around but being on the internet, i'll agree with, because they need it for promotions. distribution on the internet is super easy. itunes, purevolume, you name it. it's not like you're gonna go to itunes and they'll be OUT of the album you wanna buy.

Labels are looking for a good MySpace presence though when they're signing a band. What it says to labels is "this band knows how to sell themselves, they know how to promote, and we're not going to have to work as hard on promotion and whatnot if they're already doing it." 90% of the time if i'm watching Letterman or Conan or god forbid, Leno, and I see a band I like, 9 times out of 10 I can go to "www.myspace.com/whateverthebandsnameis" and hear the song I just heard a second ago. Every band is on it. Bands that are recently signed usually have some intern setting up a MySpace account for the band before ink is dry on the contract, assuming the band doesn't already have a well working account already.

Bands that become a "featured artist" on a weekly basis on myspace get an average of 45000 plays A DAY. THAT is your gung-ho promotion, that is your print-ads in rollingstone. Who needs them when you get stuff like that. These 14-15-16 year old kids that troll myspace all day long and keep up on their bulletins are the ones that LIVE for stuff like this. Putting a bulletin up saying "we're gonna be on Letterman tonight" brings in big numbers, and with 3rd party companies making myspace "letter sending programs" can automatically find the people close to the city you're playing next, and send out an automated email saying "hey, i saw you live in pittsburg. tomorrow night we're playing x-bar and go on at 8 pm. hope to see you there." The promotion costs go down, the band can pull in their KEY MARKET and do exactly what they want to do.

MySpace is a huge thing for labels to look at, and I just wish it was able to treat the artists as well as they could be.

I couldn't agree more. MySpace is now the best promotion a band can have for nothing. It has been (besides YouTube) a huge part of new music being discovered in the last several years. Radio and TV are still king, but a lot of kids are actively searching on MySpace for their new favorite band.