And I'm not sure I have anything to add to the debate. Except this. Maybe it's a good thing.
As a musician with a band I have often been looked at with a skewed brow by my peers. How could I possibly put my band's songs up for download on my personal site? (http://allenlulu.com/Throttle_Back_Sparky.html) What about the lost revenue? (um....almost none) What about supporting other bands, blah blah...
I learned somehting very quickly being in Throttle back. The only way....wait, one of the only ways to make money in the music business is to tour. Tour and sell t-shirts. And sell our cds at shows. Oh. And tour. tour tour tour.
And get your song on the radio. But, pushing 40 with a daughter in the hospital and now another one and a mortgage, this was not possible. I'm not 22. I don't want to live in a van and fuck barflies (well...)
But, is there a way to make a dollar as a band? Forget making a living. Just ekeing out a little dinner cash? Unless you sell a song to an advertiser or get placed in some movies or tv shows, I really don't know.
But I also don't know how bad I feel about it.
I mean, I feel bad, but then again I don't. Let me explain.
The cost to make a CD. It's negligable. Let's say we paid good money for our producer. (One of the better rock prods in LA, btw). let's SAY we paid him....oh, I dunno, $1000 a song. That's a good rate. Doesn't take all that long to record and mix one song. So, $12000 for the mixing and the recording? Then let's SAY we paid for the artwork (the one that was licensed to us, for free, by the creators of The Pro comic book). I don't know, I know a couple of good artists....okay, I will commission Jana Christy to do our cover. (we decide to go Tegan and Sara Indie Pop for our next release, I guess). I think I can get her to do something nice for a grand. And then we press the CDs. We're only at $13000 for the album. (that cost us less than $1000, by the by).
The cost to us to press em was about $1 a pop with a thousand minimum. $1000. I am hard pressed to believe that the record companies pay anything more than twice the cost of CD manufacturing. I don't think reproduction can possibly cost them more than 25 cents per. And i'm probably over by half.
What are they going to press, 100,000? So, $25000. Plus the hard outlay? $40000 for the whole kit and caboodle not including shipping? What is that worth in retail dollars? at 15.99 about 1.6 million in retail sales. the performers get about a buck per sale and the store gets, let's say, $5. So, $10 of profit goes to the record company. A $960,000 profit on 100k sold.
As Queen once said "It's a rip off" (Flick of the Wrist, Sheer Heart Attack album, 1974)
Now, the $10 model that itunes offers is a weird little conundrum because, well, albums cost $9.99 in 1982. And the dollar was worth a lot LOT more back then. So, what does a record company do? They can scream inflation all they want, the bottom line is, people don't want to pay more than about a buck a song. Not in 1982, 1962, or 2007.
But you gotta market this shit, right? you gotta get people to know about it, to buy it. You gotta grease some hands, put it on the coffee racks, shove it down some TRLers throats. The price can't keep up with the times, but it doesn't need to because the cost to produce the product is smaller.
So, I don't feel bad for the record companies. Do I want them to crumble? Not really. I just want the model changed.
I put our album up on Soulseek and offered it over and over again. After a few months I noticed that there were more than a few people that had it but didn't get it from me. It had become just a little bit viral. Not enough to buy me a swimming pool, but enough to validate my work.
For a while I was going on and on about how MP3s changed one very vital aspect of the record company model: the reissue. We all HAD to replace our vinyl with CDs when that became the new delivery system for music. But the computer allows us to just rip em, so there's no need to get a new copy of Born to Run if you got it 20 years ago when it was issued. That's a big chunk of change the labels couldn't count on anymore.
And then there's the conundrum of p2p. People SAY that if they download something and like it, then they will buy it. But, that's just not true. Who wants to pay for the whore a week after they fucked her? "Oh, you know what? I liked having sex with you so much last month, that I keep dreaming about it and decided to pay your for it." Not gonna happen.
The bloggers are really the true revolution. I subscribe to about 30. If something catches my attention, I listen to the tune. If I like it, and I like what the writer has written (the review) I buy it. Well, I used to.
But, since I got Peel. (www.getpeel.com) I don't HAVE to read the post. I just stream the song and then if I like it, I download it and if I like it again (Mika, The Cat Empire, The Fratellis) I buy it. Trouble is, when I wanted The Fratellis, because someone had blogged it and I heard it, I couldn't find it because it hadn't been issued stateside yet. I was fortunate enough to go to Amoeba and pick it up as an import. And it was my soundtrack for the fall. But, what to do about the Hold Steady? So much of the album had been blogged that I found myself already owning it. (It's now in my BMG queue) How do I spend $18 bucks on something I already have? And, if I go to Amoeba, damn straight if I don't mak a beeline for the used section first. It's always more packed than any other part of the store.
What's the point of this?
Nothing. Except that we are on the cusp of a very big transition in the music world. And when it all shakes out, we may just have a new model. Don't be afraid. We'll all be fine. We might be listening to unsigned bands but, when all is said and done, writers write, actors act and musicians...um....muse. they have to. We will all benefit. It'll just be a little different.
So it goes.
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