What are some alternative revenue models for music artists nowadays?

Tangerine

Tangerine

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Hello, Smogon, and I'm going to hope that you music buffs will be able to help me out here ;)

For one of my projects, I want to study the alternative revenue models that music artists use nowadays rather than simply sell your music. I think there were a few artists that found creative ways to raise revenue (I remember there being an artist that had various different things to sell from downloads to CDs to CDs + "premium stuff" etc)

So I'm wondering if you guys could lead me to artists that got creative, ie, found a way to make a living, even if they allow their music to be downloaded and such.

Thanks!
 
IDK all the specs but I heard Rock Band will have a feature that let's you put songs you make onto the game. From there it can be downloaded from the internet and you can make a profit...unless your music sucks.
 
well big name bands like Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead can afford to do the "pay to download" model, more specifically "pay whatever you want" model, because they have massive dedicated fanbases.

Nine Inch Nails took things a bit further by offering different "packages", from your basic V0 download to FLAC, to limited edition pressings and whatnot.

however, this model won't work for independent artists in the same way, meaning they'll still have to have second jobs and probably won't make much if anything from such a set up.

i know there are several indie labels doing a "pay for download" sort of thing, but the problem with that is, for me at least, i'm NOT going to pay for a digital file. never.

i want a physical copy complete with artwork et cetera. i'm a collector, give me something worth collecting.
 
Yeah, it's easy to understand that some people demand CDs - but the idea is that CDs are a "dwindling" market - most people buy their music so they can listen to it on private, regardless of platform.

Could you give the names of the indie labels that are doing the "pay for download" thing?
 
nobody is going to pay for music on the internet if they can get it for free

free is cheaper than cheap, so people won't

surveys show that about 20% of people that download would buy music. 80% would not get any music, if for some reason, all possibility of illegal downloading would be removed.

in other words, collecting will remain a niche market (as far as CDs go, they will probably be phased out; vinyl is more epic for collecting apparently although I personally buy CDs, not vinyl); as for artists, their revenue will have to come from live shows and merchandising. label sales will continue to drop.
 
Quote Unquote Records is a completely donation-based record label that allows all the music of their signed bands to be downloaded for free without obligation to donate. I have seen a few of their artists in shows, and although they sometimes offer merchandise like vinyls, CDs, T-shirts, etc., they mostly all play relatively low-price concerts (under $10) and usually offer to spray paint a T-shirt for you after the show if you bring a blank one with you.

Most of the artists are pretty good musicians and it's pretty interesting how they run their music careers off a small, but very dedicated fanbase (which are usually the only ones likely to donate).
 
Altmer said:
nobody is going to pay for music on the internet if they can get it for free

free is cheaper than cheap, so people won't

surveys show that about 20% of people that download would buy music. 80% would not get any music, if for some reason, all possibility of illegal downloading would be removed.

in other words, collecting will remain a niche market (as far as CDs go, they will probably be phased out; vinyl is more epic for collecting apparently although I personally buy CDs, not vinyl); as for artists, their revenue will have to come from live shows and merchandising. label sales will continue to drop.
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I would like a link to the survey, please.
 
Hey, look, I can help Tangerine with something.

Talking to a lot of bands, the main sources of revenue for them are merchandise and live shows. It's cool to wear shirts with your favorite band on them, and people like to do so. Stylish tees make HUGE profits. Some bands don't even sell their CDs at concerts, just T-shirts.

Live shows are a big deal to bands. At WRPI, we give away lots of concert tickets. Bands and venue owners alike love this, as it promotes ticket sales. Even a few extra ticket sales makes up for the loss of the dozen or so seats given away.

There's really no reason for a modern indie band to sign on a record label unless they're looking for mass appeal.
 
Tangerine said:
Could you give the names of the indie labels that are doing the "pay for download" thing?
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sorry i can't think of any off the top of my head, it's the sort of thing i read in passing and go "huh", and then move on.

have you read the article Courtney Love wrote years ago about paying for music? it's pretty excellent.
 
as altmer and chris said, touring and merchandise is where most of the band's revenue comes in as actual album sales are decreasing. a lot of bands are forgoing alliance with a major record label (or a record label at all) and professional advertising and are instead turning to grassroots promotion, most of which takes place on the multitudinous music websites/blogs out there.

a lot of bands (cymbals eat guitars and, recently, grizzly bear spring to mind) are even going as far as to produce their albums themselves which, though it doesn't add to the album's revenue, is probably cheaper than having it professionally produced.

this is an interesting topic and admittedly i don't know much although it is something that i should have a vested interest in. i will follow this topic for sure and also do some research on my own to see if i can be of more help.
 
Okay, so while touring and merchandise works for well established artists, are there stories of how "less known" bands made it through their days? You would need an audience before you can pull off tourning/merchandise etc, obviously.

Finally, what are some of the things that the recording industry is trying to do (i assume that if they're intelligent they would be looking into alternative sources of revenue also)? I heard something about producing more music that can be used for advertisements, so if someone can get me a source or something on that that would be cool.
 
a lot of metal bands self-produce

they hire engineers but they self-produce to avoid outside interference of record labels, I recall Dream Theater for one
 
This is actually an interesting issue for me from a legal/business angle. I honestly cannot understand why the big media companies are trying to fight this still, because the fact is they've already lost, just like the filmmakers did when VCRs were released.

Now, a lot of what they say is rhetoric (It clearly is NOT unprofitable to be a recording artist, otherwise Sony BMG and their ilk would not still be in business and signing up these people), and there's no legal prerogative that the law should protect a company's high profit margins when a new "product" came out, but there has to be a model that's stable to make profit.

What I find particularly ironic is that if they hadn't fought against mp3 format and digital music sales in the first place, they probably wouldn't be so "bad" off. If they'd have jumped on the bandwagon at the beginning and started selling their songs over the internet at a dollar apiece, not only would they have made a killing against their competition early on, but they'd suffer less from piracy because most people would not move from a dollar apiece to free if it took them more effort to search. A dollar price would be the norm, and it wouldn't be a huge gain to find something free. Now, though, piracy has proliferated so much that free is the norm, and stepping up a dollar isn't worth it.
 
virtually unknown artists can use methods of free digital distribution like netlabels. it's all about getting your name out there, and i really doubt most obscure-as-fuck bands care that they aren't making any money from their music anyway.
 
G80 said:
virtually unknown artists can use methods of free digital distribution like netlabels. it's all about getting your name out there, and i really doubt most obscure-as-fuck bands care that they aren't making any money from their music anyway.
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Sure, there has definitely been patterns of that.

But are there any "concrete examples" of the phenomenon? Artist names and such?

I don't think the goal is to "get signed", however...
 
check out soulseek, lots of artists who want to get their music out there use it. there are also some links to other netlabels on their forum.
 
ps don't let this die, this question intrigues me as well and there has to be someone here who follow the music industry enough to give concrete examples of people who have made it without signing onto a record label
 
Jumpman16 said:
ps don't let this die, this question intrigues me as well and there has to be someone here who follow the music industry enough to give concrete examples of people who have made it without signing onto a record label
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Well, it depends on how you define "making it". There are numerous acts not known on a national or international basis who make enough money to live comfortably. Cover bands, mostly.

Notable unsigned bands include Nine Inch Nails, though they started off signed. I don't know much about unsigned music otherwise, sadly. :/
 
I think part of the issue with this request is that regardless of all the piracy in the world there is still a hell of a lot of money to be made from CDs. Live performance has and will always be a musicians bread and butter, depending on the size of your band, if you're playing a sold out show a week at any shitty bar you are probably making more than enough to get by..

But at the point where you decide to release an album, if you are any good there will still be a hell of a lot of demand for CD copies. And just printing a million CDs and distributing them to all parts of the globe really requires some form of record label involvement.

So most of the good examples like say, Arctic Monkeys, dont work that well because they eventually end up using a label anyway..

Have a nice day.
 
Are you guys sure about indie musicians being unable to follow the Radiohead model of "Pay What You Want"? I know two indie game developers recently tried it out to great success although this was after about a year of selling their game at $19.99. Not music, but I think there are certain parallels there. Both the games had no DRM whatsoever so even at $19.99 it was easy as hell to pirate.
 
It was kind of mentioned earlier in the thread but glossed over, but quoteunquote records (http://quoteunquoterecords.com) is a 100% donations based indie record label which houses like 10 bands.

I've spoken to the guy behind it all, Jeff Rosenstock (at a really small Bomb the Music Industry! show), and the way he explained it was - even when he was in a band that was signed and he sold his music (The Arrogant Sons of Bitches), he never really saw a cent of it, and all the money ended up going to the label and production and recording costs, so basically, he figured if he wasn't going to be getting any substantial money from his music, labels shouldn't be getting any either. With that in mind, he started Bomb the Music Industry!, which is a band that records all of it's music for under $50, releases all of its music for free, and will come to any venue they're invited to as long as you will pay for their gas money. His donation based thing caught on with a couple of other DIY bands, and it's just grown since then.

So it's not exactly relevant, because he is not really in the money making business but more in the music distribution business. His number one goal is getting music out there for people to listen to, which I think is pretty interesting and admirable.
 
Well you have to start small and can't expect to sell merchandise when your band isn't even know. First you make a few songs, put them on CD and hand them around at parties/raves/friends for free. Yes free. Yes people still use CD's. You basically rely on word of mouth to spread your music, and possibly perform a few gigs to make some small cash. Once you get a decent fanbase you might want to find someone who can spread your stuff around well (you know record companies). The internet helps too for spreading your music around.

After your music spreads around and you have a nice fanbase then you can start selling merchandise/crap (if your band is good). Make a site and give special priveleges to people who pay to for your crap. For instance you could make some kind of "V.I.P. list" people could sign up for where they get the latest music from you as well as early announcements for any gigs or concerts you are doing. After that you can try making CDs and selling them for cash :D Itunes helps.

A perfect example of this could be this band called The Devil Wears Prada.
http://www.tdwpband.com/

You can sign up for a membership and they give you access to music, tour locations, first chance to buy tickets, blogs, merchandise, and other crap like that. A few years ago they weren't known at all but they started small and built up from there. Now they found some Indie record company that helps publish smaller bands like The Devil Wears Prada.

If your band is shit then your going to have a hard time though
 
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