Members sventvkg Posted January 21, 2011 Members Share Posted January 21, 2011 Discuss: http://www.pittsburghcitypaper.ws/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A90137 "Theoretically, an unlimited number of people can own digital copies of Coulton's music. But the Times suggested two potential constraints on his fame: Not everyone is as web-savvy as his fans, and there's only so much of Coulton to go around. Each day, the Times reported, "Coulton wakes up, gets coffee, cracks open his PowerBook and hunkers down for up to six hours of nonstop and frequently exhausting communion with his virtual crowd." By the way, he mentions my friend from Alaska that i alluded to in the other thread Her name is Marian Call . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted January 21, 2011 Moderators Share Posted January 21, 2011 But, ultimately, he is a niche artist:"I'm writing songs that speak to nerds a lot of the time," he says. "And I'm also talking to people in places where nerds talk. And I'm also selling music in a format that nerds like." The result is "a kind of synergy that happens between the content and the delivery." And I'm not saying that is wrong, and I admire his diligence and support his right to succeed...he has a career, and that definitely is worthwhile. But that may not work for people who don't write for a niche audience. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members U&I Posted January 21, 2011 Members Share Posted January 21, 2011 Good points Daddy Mack. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members AVisme Posted January 21, 2011 Members Share Posted January 21, 2011 Yes, I believe opening lines of communication with your fan base and interacting with them is the way of the future. Fans thrive on that connection and will reward artists who make the effort. I was actually thinking about this earlier today, in relation to the problem of drops in album sales. I was wondering if this type of communication could be linked to buying the artist's album? You get a secret code included with the CD that gets you into a special club on their website, which would allow you into periodic web chats with them, special merchandise, first dibs or deals on concert tickets, etc. The potential perks one could offer are limitless. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted January 21, 2011 Moderators Share Posted January 21, 2011 but are these 'perks' truly value added? Not all fans want to be that involved...some really want to just hear the music Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members AVisme Posted January 21, 2011 Members Share Posted January 21, 2011 Yes, there will always be those who just want to steal the music, and that goes back to before the internet (actually stealing from a store). But I think these perks, along with bringing the price of CDs down, would lure more people back into buying. Young people are the ones most guilty of illegal downloading, and they're the ones most susceptible to this type of marketing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted January 21, 2011 Moderators Share Posted January 21, 2011 Not just stealing from the store...even making copies and giving them to your friends is the same since it cuts into the revenue stream. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members AVisme Posted January 21, 2011 Members Share Posted January 21, 2011 Yes, I forgot about tape trading back in the day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members flatfinger Posted January 21, 2011 Members Share Posted January 21, 2011 There is also the phenomena of the "Super pirate" that is someone who acts like a distribution hub, and gives copies out to many as a friendship facilitation. I forget where I read that term , but the author was pointing out that people who have some discomfort level about free music ( traces of a conscience!) often have a buddy who does the dirty work for them. I was doing some reading about how were supposed to use social networking to get bums in the seats at our shows............. It was interesting in that you were supposed to act like your at a party or something an socialize and be all chatty as opposed to just pimping about the music.... ( Quote : you must follow exactly the same practices as you would at a party. You would’t just stand up on a table in the middle of a room full of people and shout, “come to my show!” or, “buy my music!” ) So I'm supposed to be on the PC several hours a day " generating interesting discussions and interactions" Am I a Musician or " The hostess with the most-est : Can't I be the brooding , mysterious muso instead !!!!!!!! . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members AVisme Posted January 21, 2011 Members Share Posted January 21, 2011 I was doing some reading about how were supposed to use social networking to get bums in the seats at our shows............. It was interesting in that you were supposed to act like your at a party or something an socialize and be all chatty as opposed to just pimping about the music.... ( Quote : you must follow exactly the same practices as you would at a party. You would’t just stand up on a table in the middle of a room full of people and shout, “come to my show!” or, “buy my music!” ) So I'm supposed to be on the PC several hours a day " generating interesting discussions and interactions" Am I a Musician or " The hostess with the most-est : Can't I be the brooding , mysterious muso instead !!!!!!!! I've seen this phenomenon at work on Twitter. Fans appreciate and praise musicians who are friendly and actually respond to them. They don't like the ones who are just promoting their record or shows. They want content, not commercials. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members flatfinger Posted January 22, 2011 Members Share Posted January 22, 2011 I've seen this phenomenon at work on Twitter. Fans appreciate and praise musicians who are friendly and actually respond to them. They don't like the ones who are just promoting their record or shows. They want content, not commercials. Thats fine and dandy I suppose ; But I guess I'd cut someone some slack and get by without knowing what they had for breakfast if they'd just concentrate on giving some grooves that knock my freekin socks off !!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted January 22, 2011 Moderators Share Posted January 22, 2011 So, once again it becomes less about the music and more about the schmooze? Then all we have achieved is we have moved out the decision-making middlemen (record execs) and now we schmooze large scale with everybody via the net...that has to be fairly time consuming, not like the old school occasional cocktail/release party; when do you have time to write and record? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members AVisme Posted January 22, 2011 Members Share Posted January 22, 2011 So, once again it becomes less about the music and more about the schmooze? Then all we have achieved is we have moved out the decision-making middlemen (record execs) and now we schmooze large scale with everybody via the net...that has to be fairly time consuming, not like the old school occasional cocktail/release party; when do you have time to write and record? I suppose during that time when rock stars would usually drink/drug/fornicate themselves into a stupor. Or during the time they saved not going into rehab. On a serious note, tweeting here or there doesn't take a whole lot of time. Musicians have a lot of down time when they're not doing anything, especially if they're on tour. The 6 hours a day that Coulton is doing is not necessary IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members flatfinger Posted January 22, 2011 Members Share Posted January 22, 2011 So, once again it becomes less about the music and more about the schmooze? Then all we have achieved is we have moved out the decision-making middlemen (record execs) and now we schmooze large scale with everybody via the net...that has to be fairly time consuming, not like the old school occasional cocktail/release party; when do you have time to write and record? Ya, I read an editorial somewhere and the guy was old school so he said whatever happened to the artist being a bit of an enigma ( oh , the mystery!) . It's interesting that now we have 500 channels and the web we have a sudden need for more "content"; .... Now we need to know what our hero had for breakfast !!!! It does seem that celebrity is a bit more of a bitch now. We like to set them up than knock them down , but , In between that we'd also like to what they do every other hour of the live long day !!!! MARVELOUS That's what you get when your a FAME MONSTER !!( Plus you get to wear some neat threads .) Oh , and then on occassion , when time permits , you do that music thing ( POORLY !) ..............Hand me some loops and beats please!! That theory stuff ??? NO time for any of that "craft" Krapp .... ; I've got to rub elbows with my peebs !! PRIORITIES.... TANGENT OVER Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members flatfinger Posted January 22, 2011 Members Share Posted January 22, 2011 Musicians have a lot of down time when they're not doing anything, especially if they're on tour. The 6 hours a day that Coulton is doing is not necessary IMO. You have a point there; Since there is no revenue stream from selling songs due to pirates , being permantly on tour is the solution offered up by the average " musician coaching" gurus of the day!. I read one of theses clowns where he was saying that he thought all the stars in the future would have advanced studios in the tour bus in order to record ( Since they never stop touring!!). I thought at the time that isn't someone who has ever really been a man in a suitcase .... I mean to suggest that you take the " Rolling studio" with you and Write all your songs on the road . That's the kind of thing that did allot of past stars in ; Their manager( who never is a road warrior HIMSELF!!) keeping them booked so much that they do drink and party themselves to death . Allot of people said that's what happened to Hendrix . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members HKSblade1 Posted January 23, 2011 Members Share Posted January 23, 2011 Yes, I forgot about tape trading back in the day. I hear this crap too all the time. Fact is, tape trading was not anywhere near as prevalent as with computers, high speed internet. Tape sharing was still a physical form, required better quality medium, a good system to create any duplicates etc. The fact is it was still a time consuming process and had costs. Digital pirating really has no costs to anyone except the artist being pirated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members AVisme Posted January 23, 2011 Members Share Posted January 23, 2011 I hear this crap too all the time. Fact is, tape trading was not anywhere near as prevalent as with computers, high speed internet.Tape sharing was still a physical form, required better quality medium, a good system to create any duplicates etc. The fact is it was still a time consuming process and had costs. Digital pirating really has no costs to anyone except the artist being pirated.Yes, no one is saying the problem was as bad back then as it is today. The point I was making is that there have always been people who want something for nothing and will steal it no matter what. What I'm proposing is adding something that can't be stolen, as well as lowering the cost for those people who want to do the right thing, and would if the price were lower. I believe there is a tipping point for peoples' integrity. The more you charge, the more perceived unfairness of the price of your item, the more justified they feel in stealing it. Adding to this is that "everyone else is doing it", so one kind of feels like a chump paying for something that everyone else is getting for free. Lowering the price back into the range where people will pay for it, because they want to support the artist, is part of the answer IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members AstralFeedbackM Posted January 25, 2011 Members Share Posted January 25, 2011 The problem is that all the artist/record company's are greedy! Look at what Radio Head did with "In Rainbows". Put your whole album up for downloads, and let the fans pick the price, it's released all around the world at the same time so you should have very few, if not no leaks. Not all bands are this famous, but things like this can be done. I get that you have to make money as a band/artist, but to be honest most bands just break even with recording the album to record sales. If company's weren't charging out the ass for recording cost, duplication, artwork, and promo. Most bands (unless you have a great contract) Get around $1 per record sold, $.03-$.05 a single. So if you sell a half million records your band will only see a half million dollars. Whats that, your a four piece, so you only take home $125000 for this action. Oh by the way your record company gave you that advance for a million dollars for your recording and promo cost. So it looks like your now owe them a half million. The music biz needs to find a better way to go about doing business. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted January 25, 2011 Moderators Share Posted January 25, 2011 sorry, we hve beaten that model to death already...if they were an unknown band and tried that, they would have never made a nickel. The old model is failing, the real question is where do we go from here? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members trmckenz Posted January 25, 2011 Members Share Posted January 25, 2011 bands need to be self-sustainable...an entrepreneurial venture. high start up costs. outsource the work you dont want to do (if you can afford to do so). this gives the band full creative control of the music, brand, etc. treat the band as advertising... and you've gotta spend money to make money in that department. but with this model it fits well into the internet business scheme. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Matximus Posted January 25, 2011 Members Share Posted January 25, 2011 I think the simple fact of the matter is the barrier to entry in the field of professional music has gotten higher. The nature of the talent entering the field is drastically changing too - there's only going to be room for entreprenuarial types like this dude. Musical chops and talent will always will be integral part of the success equation. But you can be talented as {censored}, musicwise, and all you'll be is a talented-ass janitor or substitute teacher if you're not equally gifted with a healthy sense and drive for business. Consumers will not exchange money for recorded music anymore. That happened once. It's over. Big companies aren't going to take the risk of spending a lot of money to field, develop, and market new talent. The pool of money to be made in music has gotten smaller and shallower. Because nobody is interested in discovering you. Nobody is interesting in paying you for music. Successfully coping with this reality and overcoming it requires much, much more than just the ability to write and perform original music at a remarkable, engaging level. This guy evidently has a skill-set that goes beyond ha ha funny songs. Good for him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members richardmac Posted January 25, 2011 Members Share Posted January 25, 2011 bands need to be self-sustainable...an entrepreneurial venture. high start up costs. outsource the work you dont want to do (if you can afford to do so). this gives the band full creative control of the music, brand, etc. treat the band as advertising... and you've gotta spend money to make money in that department. but with this model it fits well into the internet business scheme. THAT is exactly correct. An artist or act right now that wants to make money has to act like a small business and try to get as many revenue streams as possible. So digital sales, CD sales at gigs, gigs themselves, music publishing (placement on TV and in movies,) merchandise, every possible stream needs to be explored because you can't count on music sales any more. So to do all that you need to operate like a startup, and either keep costs insanely low or find some sucker willing to put money into your business. I personally believe that we will see a huge increase in the number of individual artists doing this and fewer bands, because this model is definitely easier for a single person or a duo. You're working with a much smaller pot of money. We've talked about this before. If you can order 1,000 CD's, you can pay about a buck each. So selling them all means $9,000 for the individual person, or $1,800 for each member of a 5 person band. In simpler math you have to sell 5 times as many of everything to make it worth everyone's while. If you want a case study of how this works, look at Jonatha Brooke. She has been around forever, and you've heard a few of her songs in hotel lobbies without realizing it. Never had a big hit. Been on a few different labels. When the record business collapsed and she got dropped by her label, she learned and mastered the rules of the new music biz. So when you see her in a small venue for $20 with 100 people in the audience, she's playing solo. But when she appears on Letterman, she's got a band. She scales her show up or down depending on the amount of money and/or the importance of the gig. A band can't do that. Jonatha has had her music placed in Disney movies, so that's another income stream. There are two ways to look at Jonatha Brooke. One is to see how sad the situation is - She is an extremely talented songwriter and a great artist, and if the music business had not changed might have had a shot at pretty big money. And now she's doing this new music business model, going all over and playing to 100 people in small venues and hawking her CD's at gigs the same way I do, trying to establish as many revenue streams as possible so she can keep making a living as a musician, and she's making a middle class living like the rest of us but without the benefits and retirement package. Or you could say that she's an extremely resourceful person who understands the new model and is living life on her own terms and doing what she loves. But THIS is the likely lifestyle of the new artist. I'm not going to say that it's good or bad, but I will say that the bar has been raised - in the past, being a fantastic songwriter was enough. Now you have to be a fantastic songwriter AND a great businessperson. If you want to try to make a living. If you do it for fun, then you can do whatever you want. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members flatfinger Posted January 25, 2011 Members Share Posted January 25, 2011 I think the simple fact of the matter is the barrier to entry in the field of professional music has gotten higher. The nature of the talent entering the field is drastically changing too - there's only going to be room for entrepreneurial types like this dude. Musical chops and talent will always will be integral part of the success equation. But you can be talented as {censored}, music wise, and all you'll be is a talented-ass janitor or substitute teacher if you're not equally gifted with a healthy sense and drive for business. Consumers will not exchange money for recorded music anymore. That happened once. It's over. Big companies aren't going to take the risk of spending a lot of money to field, develop, and market new talent. The pool of money to be made in music has gotten smaller and shallower. Because nobody is interested in discovering you. Nobody is interesting in paying you for music. Successfully coping with this reality and overcoming it requires much, much more than just the ability to write and perform original music at a remarkable, engaging level. This guy evidently has a skill-set that goes beyond ha ha funny songs. Good for him. Well there should probably be a division of labor in here somewhere ..... I watched a PBS documentary on the building of the Panama Canal , An It was a phenomenal Achievement ( Over 5,000 men lost there lives during the construction !!) You know what , They had to find the best minds to administrate and organize such a daunting task . They found guys who were at the top of there Field in engineering ... Real genius superstars ; Cream of the crop . First guy Burns out after two years ....... Next candidate burns out after 3 ( couldn't of happened at a worse time either .... ( keeping in mind that the task kicked the Frenches ASSES for years before that) ..... So what did TEDDY R do ??????? He put a Military guy in charge and he saw it through the last 4!! ( But throwing in the towel was not an option for him !!!!) My point is that WE ARE NOT SUPERMEN!!!! Even the most talented only has so many hours in a day and so much vim and vigor ... Spread your self too thin and guess what ? the quality of the product produced ( or some aspect of it ) is going to suffer . IT"S INEVITABLE . The jack of all trades is THE MASTER OF NONE. Were going to get a greater quanity of lesser quality stuff ..... Progress???? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members flatfinger Posted January 25, 2011 Members Share Posted January 25, 2011 Musical chops and talent will always will be integral part of the success equation. But you can be talented as {censored}, music wise, and all you'll be is a talented-ass janitor or substitute teacher if you're not equally gifted with a healthy sense and drive for business. It's noteworthy that allot of the justifications for dancing all over the grave of the old system and "sticking it to the Majors" is/was that the old ecosystem had a legacy up exploiting the {censored} out of some percentage of talented musicians because they lacked business acumen........... Now you need to be a business , marketing and promotions expert , have a broad understanding of all kinds of new and evolving technologies IN ADDITION to being a skillful musician just to be able to make a blue collar living !!! YEAH !! Such an Improvement over the old school ways !!! Seems like a lesser situation for 100% of musicians ; (Carefull what you wish for ????) My excitment is besides myself:facepalm: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members richardmac Posted January 26, 2011 Members Share Posted January 26, 2011 Flatfinger, is your point just to say that the new music climate sucks compared to the old one? Because if that's your point... you're right. I agree completely - I've said a million times that Rush 2112 will never be made again. But we have to acknowledge that the new music biz has new rules and it is what it is. And artists now have to be good at all this other crap. It sucks but it's reality for anyone who wants to have any level of success in the new music biz. There's not enough money to divide up the labor until you reach a pretty high level. It sucks and it is what it is, and I think it's good to be very realistic in our discussions here. Bashing the current situation is a whole lot like going outside and yelling at the wind. The other option is to treat it like a hobby and just enjoy the process, but not make a living at it. And I think that's where a lot of us are. There ain't nothing written on a stone tablet anywhere that says that just because we love music we deserve to make a living at it. Society decides what you can make a living at and it doesn't care about "fair." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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