Music industry exposed and how it caused its destruction.

The biggest change to me is how the roles of tours and releasing recordings have flipped. Fleetwood Mac toured so you would go to the store and buy their records/tapes/CDs. Taylor Swift releases recordings so you will stream them and then be motivated to come see her tour. Of course, she can create enough “critical mass” to where she can earn decent money streaming since she streams in the billions. Very few others are in such rarified air. Streaming in the millions doesn’t pay much.

The evolution of the music industry mirrors how wealth has been extracted and concentrated in to the hands of very a few in society as a whole. The rest of “us” have less and while the few of “them” take more and more. And that’s “life” folks.

I'll look at the Video tonight.
But I agree about the sediments.
Chris

I think the argument is that success has shrunk to a smaller group than ever before. And that argument is correct. No album sales, less artists, less artists less cuts, less cuts less songwriters, less songwriters and artists less musicians, less musicians less studios, less studios less quality…it’s an ecosystem that has been gut-punched. When I first started, there were many songeriters that had made a career out of just having album cuts - no singles. But in say 2006, you get cuts on Rascall Flats, Keith Urban, George Strait, et al…you could make a hell of a living without having a single. Depended on your deal as to whether mechanicals were recouping your draw (most were at the time) but if you had songs on all three of those albums - you’re looking at like 6 million records plus sold. I don’t even know what mechanical rate is now, but at the time it was $.0925 per record sold. That’s $92,500 in mechanicals per record to be split with the co-writer and publisher. That would be worth $555k for 6 million records. Now split that in half because you co-wrote them all - $277.5k. Let’s say you’d been there for 3 years and they advanced you $50k per year…You would be “in the hole” $150k. So, once that $150k is recouped, you get the rest. So, your take home would have been $127.5k. And that was if you could trust the accounting department.

Unfortunately, with streaming, there are no mechanicals anymore. Actually, I think streaming might be considered mechanical now at some formula…but just like performance royalties with streaming, the amount paid is an order of magnitude lower. It’s untenable to make a living as a songwriter except for a small circle.

Tours were the only source of net income prior to the late '60s and albums. The rise of the iPod wiped out what hadn't been destroyed by the crap packaging of CDs.

I just wonder if the medium is coming to an end…like 20 years soon. I always thought that once people saw that movies on dvd cost only a little more than audio only cds, music started losing value in consumer’s minds. Guess it didn’t help that The Cartel (Labels) were charging like $25/cd. 30 years ago. So people felt anger towards the industry.
Anyway - I just think consumers will look at audio only as low tech…and everything is trending multimedia. I could be wrong, though.

Back then, even the shittiest label had to invest money back into music. Now streaming turns a big part of the profits to computer companies that don't give a rat's arse about musicicans. So what happenes if you bleed and bleed? Have a guess. I try to explain that to people that tell me streaming is soo good. Well, watch the path you're following, it might not lead to a place you wanted to be.

At least musicians will go back to making music for the right reasons - cause they love it.
The people (musicians, engineers, producers) chasing the charts / hits / success etc are doomed.
This is a good thing IMO

Even though I have worked with many successful artists, most of my work is done with people who love to make music, they don't expect to make a living from it. The ones that do often teach music as a job - others have a completely unrelated job for income.

They tour, do great gigs locally and internationally, record great music, make some merch, and have enough fans to cover expenses, and have a great time making albums and performing, and if all goes well, have some cash left over to inject into the next album.

Success is viewed through a realistic lens.

People do LOVE engaging music as a foreground experience where they aren't doing anything else. They just don't get that experience very often today.

It could be streaming related.

Hmmm. A lot of thoughts percolating. This will be a mess, so apologies ahead of time.

I remember the head of FX, John Landgraf, talking about how 20% of TV consumption is active, meaning something the user seeks out or picks a program specifically, and 80% is passive AKA watching "whatever's on." As a 90s kid that was very excited about the internet's potential, the aggregation and monopolization that has occurred has made it apparent to me that we're at the mercy of a faceless mass choosing convenience above significance. Sometimes that includes any of us. I know I absolutely appreciate shopping via Amazon vs. pissing away a few hours at the grocery store or Home Depot. To me, for meaningless things, that's progress. And I guess I accept that people who don't obsess over music view it that way too. Ironically, Jeff Bezos recently said efficiency and invention are at odds with each other. And he's dead on. The mainstream is just not going to take risks, they want certainty. And they have metrics to know where to put their money. Young, ITB-made, plastic stuff that is simple enough for a global audience to grasp. Go to Southeast Asia and you're gonna hear that two note Ed Sheeran song a million times. Even a singer like Adele could probably make more interesting records than she does, but her balladeering is starkly unadorned because it needs to be as un-specific as possible in presenting what is usually a timeless sentiment. These are business decisions.

I'd take issue with the notion that there are virtually no new classic albums, but my guess is that, in aggregate, this place is not inclined towards the genres where I think those classics have been made. Moreover, making music is a beautiful thing. But making money on music has always been a tall order. And frankly, I'll probably catch some heat for this, but I love seeing AI take out the middling graphic designers / artists in the visual realm and I don't mind that it's coming for that tier of musician as well. It's not that I don't think they shouldn't make art. Creation is one of the greatest, most freeing things we do. It's just that getting paid requires you to offer something competitive and the middle is a lot of noise for both the audience and the ones operating at a higher level. So if you want a better paycheck, get better at what you do - world class if you can. Pino Palladino will always work. Chris Dave will always work. Blake Mills, Flying Lotus, Greg Kurstin, etc. They earned that. None of them are accidents. And if there are unknown guys on their level, they're likely missing a big piece of the puzzle somewhere, whether it's the energy to network/share, playing on sub-optimal records, bad health or whatever.

In this time, the best thing you can do is be authentic to yourself and uncompromising in your vision - and execute it all as well as you can. If you win, whatever that means, you did it on your terms. If not, you knew the odds were crazy anyway. Taylor Swift's billion dollar tour should've been 20 $50 million tours in a healthier environment. Or maybe 20 $150 million tours. Who knows. But talking about Taylor Swift is like discussing McDonald's when opening your nice restaurant. The intent is different from the get-go - I don't know why people let it consume them so much. It's not for you. These days you want to serve your fans well and make it seem like they matter to you. And the best result is to make those faceless masses feel like they're missing something, that some secret in your work is not being revealed to them. Leverage tribalism for your own benefit. Your fans are your tribe, do right by them and execute at higher and higher levels for yourself and them. I sort of like that the next Led Zeppelin has to put more effort into maintaining a connection with their fans as opposed to pissing away time in the countryside mansion. Personally, I find it more honorable and less transactional.

There are people who are millionaires simply because they have a beautiful face, nice curves, etc. and shake their ass on IG all the way to a 2.5M dollar, Toll Brothers cookie cutter house. I'm sorry but you can cry all you want but that's the lizard brain taking over and it's always been that way. We are just getting a front row seat to the mechanics of that process now across a number of domains, including news, sports, food, etc. How many grown 40+ men are subsidizing the lifestyles of young formerly desperate women everywhere? The simp economy is massive, even bigger than my cynical mind could ever imagine. And the same thing happens with hooky brainless pop. It's like being mad that an owl eats a mouse when we are confronted with the reality of passivity and addiction.

Bob if you wouldn't mind...
Any further thoughts?
Thanks.Chris