Quote:
Originally Posted by smoothmoniker
What you're ranting against is how the industry worked 10 years ago.
Labels are becoming irrelevant. Every year, more and more of my work is for artists who have bailed on the traditional label structure, and who are making a living doing music that they own instead. They may release an album, or more commonly these days they record one or two songs at a time and release them online. They get placements on TV or film, those are the big chunks of money, the rest comes from merch and concerts.
10 years ago, anytime I talked to a younger artist, they all asked the same thing, "How do I get signed?"
Now, none of them ask that. They don't care. They all ask, "How can I make a living doing this"? If you can appreciate the significance in how different that question is, you can start to appreciate how much the industry has changed.
I think that's a really, really good thing. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE playing on big budget label albums, where everything is completely 1st class. But almost always, the music is unbearable. I love much more being in the room with an artist who is really, truly and artist, and where I get to become part of their thing for a little while, and make truly good music. Music I can be proud of.
|
I was actually wondering about that as I read the thread. Back in 1989-1993 I worked in the music industry, for a label and then a recording studio, and my cousin (who is a musician) made two records, one for Polygram and one with RCA. The musicians didn't really make very much money, unless they made it to a certain level, even after being signed to a label. In fact, some of them ended up owing money to the label if the sales didn't pay for all the promotion and recording bills, which happened a lot. Most of them made money from touring, not from record sales. Until they made it past a certain level that is.
So I'm glad the industry has been turned on it's head. That needed to happen. The thing that was so great about the 50s, 60s and 70s and the music that was created, is the industry didn't have as much control over the artists as they have today (or 10-15 years ago), creatively I mean. Everything has become so homogenized, because of the business end of it. The one area where I would say that isn't really true, is in the jam band arena.