It's Not A Memo...
From the original Analog Industries archive. Some links and images from that era no longer resolve.
For the last couple months, I’ve been trying to codify all my various thoughts about the shape the music industry is beginning to take now. Last night I sat down to write a post for this site on this very subject, and 4,400 words and four hours later I realized that I’d written what I will take extreme pains to point out is not a manifesto. More of a mission statement, really.
Since it is so long (much too long to post on this site as a single entry, and this blog doesn’t have a multi-page post mechanism) I’ve rendered the whole thing as a PDF, which you can find here. I look forward to your comments and criticisms.
48 comments
Pretty much nailed it.
Oh, and the first time I heard your stuff, back when I was in high school, my reaction was 'Fuck it. If this guy can do this and get a deal with WaxTrax, I am buying a god damn synthesizer'. Pretty much all downhill from there.
Chris, this is great. Thank you for sharing.
Thanks, super read. Both well reasoned and well written.
Had to log in after long years of lurking just to say: this is important. This means something. Thanks.
Well done sir.
I found myself gesturing at my screen and loudly exclaiming "Yes! Exactly!" several times while reading this. I think you've done a masterful job of articulating a vague idea that many people (myself included) have had on this topic, but never been able to fully form. Thank you.
indeed a good read. is ok to link to the PDF and not to AI or will i lose rep points? just trying to make it as convenient as possible ;)
Thanks, Chris. After reading your piece I feel I now must make good on my constant threats of finishing these damned tracks for a proper release. I sure could use some of these "rep credits" you are talking about.
I'll be the first (only?) to voice any dissent, I suppose. I agree with a lot of what you say, but there's also a couple of misleading bits that I think warrant correction or at least discussion.
First, there's some places we agree completely. Most importantly is the subject of the value of music as experience. That is a point that is overlooked by all too many artists.
You're also absolutely right about musicians overvaluing their music. As a long time promoter of independent bands, I know all too well that many bands think they're worth a $500 guarantee even if they can't draw in 100 kids through the door at $2 a head.
Where I don't think you've got it right is on boiling it down to the value of bits and bytes, and essentially saying that the idea of paying for music is dead. You seem to make some assumptions that (in my opinion) derail some of your argument.
The suggestion that Napster was created "because they could" and with intent to destroy the music industry isn't really accurate. It's entirely possible that one or a few of the people involved in developing filesharing software were "bent on destruction", but as a whole - most people involved in it (from building the infrastructure to the actual participation in filesharing) had no thoughts whatsoever of changing the music industry.
The bottom line, as is being shown not just anecdotally but more importantly empirically is that people are more than happy to pay their favorite artists for their music -- however, inconvenience outweighs that willingness to pay.
People don't pirate music because they don't value it. They pirate it because:
1) We listen on phones, ipods and computers now anyway. CDs have no value to anyone but those of us (yep, me!) collectors who love having something tangible connected to the music, as well as album art, etc.
2) Since we're listening digitally, it's actually LESS convenient to have a CD. We have to do work to rip that CD just so we can tote the digital files around.
3) Let's reiterate number 2 -- I've downloaded albums I own physical copies of because that will take me less time than digging out the CD, popping it in my drive, ripping it and ID3 tagging the files.
4) The digital age of wanting free music is no different from how it was in the 80's and 90's. We consumed music for free ALL THE TIME. It was called MTV and FM radio and mix tapes, and you know what? Piracy didn't stop CD sales. Hearing music on the radio increased CD sales -- so much in fact that Payola was a "thing".
It's ALWAYS been this way. We listen to loads of music in the background and we buy the shit that's worth it.
Only difference is we lived in this weird ass technological era of transition where it was far more convenient to download the shit than it was to go out and buy the CD. Not only that, but it all came at the time when CD prices got jacked back up. The days of $9.99 CDs at Best Buy had come to an end.
We also live in a time where other forms of entertainment compete far more effectively with music for our attention. Video games have moved leaps and bounds ahead in terms of % of our time spent, as has browsing the internet. In the 80's, 90's and early 2000's for those without broadband, music was only pitted against movies and books, for the most part. Now there's way more out there. This does inherently make music worth a bit less, but not valueless.
I am digressing -- to bring it back to my point: Where I disagree with you is in abandoning the concept that music can and will be purchased by people, and in thinking that piracy in any way started out of some actual desire to bring down the music industry. Nobody but insiders knew enough about the industry back then to give a shit. Fanning and others just wanted to tinker with technology and make things easier on themselves. That's it.
The other thing to keep in mind is that the people who spoke to you at shows aren't even the main audience for buying music. They're the rabid audience, not the main audience. For the main audience, music isn't such a big part of their lives that they define themselves by it. It's just something they consume. These people aren't pirating it because they don't feel it has worth. They're pirating it because it's just not a form of entertainment they've ever taken that seriously, and it's the most convenient way of acquiring it.
Even today, we're still in a period where paying for music is either a pain in the ass or not worth the hassle due to idiotic DRM restrictions (yeah, I really want to buy digital downloads that stop working if I change operating systems or if the company that provided them to me goes out of business some day.. no thank you)
You're right about a lot of things here, but abandoning the idea that you can and should get paid for your work is to join the very people you're saying have missed the boat.
Sure, when Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead did it, everyone said "well, people bought their digital downloads directly because of the massive reputations they had, nobody else could pull that shit off!"...
But then some not-so-huge stars started doing it, and doing well at it. You've also got people in comedy doing it. Louis CK is hardly on Radiohead's level, and look at what he did. Jim Gaffigan followed suit and did quite well.
You're not wrong to focus on giving people experiences, and you're not wrong to give reputation some consideration. You're not even wrong to say "well, screw it, a number of people are going to hear my stuff and keep a copy of it but never give me a dime and I should figure out how bet to embrace that"..
but I do disagree strongly with the notion that music can't be sold anymore. It can. It's happening all the time, and you have more power than you've ever had in your life to do it. It's cheaper to make, you don't need anyone's help to distribute it, and you don't have to risk much to get started.
The musicians who succeed the most will be the ones who agree with you that they need to get their music out there to as many people as possible even if it's for free, and that they need to give people emotional experiences to make their music worthwhile, etc... but they will use all of these things, in concert with the power they have to make and distribute that music on their own, and they will sell it.
iTunes is selling a metric shit ton of music, as are other services like Google Play, etc. The idea of paying for music isn't dead. What's different is the sheer number of participants in the system due to the lower barrier to entry.
Musicians who figure out how to get noticed above the noise will still sell music.
I think I address your point about the old guard pretty succinctly in section three, if only in passing. In fact, I actually use the same closing sentence that you did, almost word for word. That's not what this is about, though. There is no reason someone can't do all the normal shit everyone is doing with TuneCore and Bandcamp. More power to you. Rock on, rock out. I do it myself.
Regarding your comments about the Napster boys, sorry, but that dog don't hunt. They knew exactly what they were doing, and while I exaggerated the "why" of it, I only did so mildly. It's difficult to exaggerate it, in all honesty. The early emails are a matter of public record as a result of the various court cases (cases, I'll note, they lost largely because of those emails.) I know several people that were in with that company from the get-go, and I myself was fairly involved with it, as a "sanctioned" content provider.
I'm only offering an alternative, one that already exists. Perhaps I'm the first one to say it out loud, but simply making art for art's sake, and not wondering how you'll be remunerated at the end of the day isn't such a bad thing. It is, in fact, worthy. But all I really want is for people that have top 10 hits under their belt to shut the fuck up with the whining already.
-CR
If I can make a recommendation, CR? Risk your Rep Credits a bit more often to remind people about when you make something. I know you're still sitting on a pile of vinyl and prints that we haven't heard anything about since the week after they were released. ;) I know you've always been wary of the "fan tax", but really, the fan wants to give you the money that they aren't giving to the other artists that they are downloading for free. Louis CK reminds us every week when his show is about to air. Not because he's a dick, but because he knows people have a bunch of other things fighting for their resources and need a little reminder.
Rep Credits looks to dove-tail nicely with what I've been saying for a while. Selling art at the "still has a day job" level is very much about the direct relationship between artist and consumer. I have no relationship with Kanye, he's doing very well, I feel no need to pay him. Maybe I'll go to a concert some day. On the other hand I know my small contribution directly effects the next Jhonen Vasquez project and I have met him on a couple of occasions with good result, so I pay him every chance I get.
I make a conscious decision to pay particular artists because I value their specific output, not because the end product has any particular value in a monetary sense. Maybe the decision isn't conscious for most, but I would suggest that there is closely related reasoning as to why people pay $10 for a Mark Teppo book, but then pirate the $10 Nicki Minaj album.
Chris - I like what you have written, but then I would. I pay the bills by making software. I make music and sometimes visual art as a means of relaxing and interacting with interesting people.
Despite that, claiming that music isn't worth any money feels a bit like late 19th century scientists claiming that physics was Pretty Much Done. Everyone agreed, until Einstein proved them to be wrong.
The confluence of a bunch of different aspects of information technology is changing everything it touches. Before 1990, things were made of stuff, and stuff cost money. Not long after 1990, Open Source Software became A Thing and rapidly reshaped the software development world. This was largely because copying software doesn't really cost anything, and some nerds were totally OK with letting everyone else copy their software. Software development didn't die, far from it.
By the late '90s, the same zero-cost-to-copy wave hit music. The extra decade was required because you can fit a nice Unix system into 20 MB (~1993), but you need about 1 GB of cheap storage for an interesting music collection (~1998).
It took widespread adoption of the internet to hit periodicals (early first decade of the 2000s), and eReaders to take out the publishing industry (beginning of the second decade of the 2000s). This time it wasn't about storage as much as it was about timely transmission of content.
Software development is a fast-moving world. Most of the tools I used in 1999 are totally irrelevant in 2012. Yet much of the music gear that I own and use was made in the mid-'90s or earlier. I'm not shocked that a new business model for music hasn't emerged yet. But I will be surprised if something new hasn't evolved a decade from now.
I like the idea of separating the making of music from the making of money. There is an art to making music, and another art to making money from music. It isn't clear how the latter will play out, but I'm not ready to bet that it is dead. Just resting.
Great read... Thinking about it, a fair proportion of the artist I have discovered in recent years have all done quite a bit of rep credit work. Either daily blogs of interesting stuff/experiments or youtube channels with the same.
The rest of the artist I listen to, almost do the opposite (eg. Boards of Canada, Burial, Autechre, Aphex Twin). They actively avoid tending their reputation gardens. Or maybe their gardens are just intentionally wild?
Anyway, I prefer walking in a forest than in a garden. Ok I'll stop dragging the metaphor through the bush (Damn did it again :)
Your best friend gives you a CD of music he made. Do you give him $10 bucks for it? I'm guessing not. Does that mean you think his music is worthless? No, not at all. It just means that the value you see in your friend's work can't easily be expressed monetarily.
Good read and a ditto response above as well. By and large, I don't think there is as much disagreement as there is seeing things from slightly different relationships with the music industry (different realities, different choices made), and with that of the entertainment industry as a whole. It is without question now a massive consumer of music, having made up for a lot of the loss in sales (or, actually, licenses to the use of music sold - you own the plastic not the content) to the general public. Many valid and well formulated points made here, and in good spirit, the way I see it. However, as someone who exclusively makes a living from making music, I find myself on both sides of the fence. I could not tolerate not taking the time to make serious amounts of music every year for which art for art's sake is the only driving force, and commercial considerations are irrelevant. At the same time, ALL I want to do is make music, so I cannot see it just from that side. In many ways, I think the 'music industry' is going through a massive transformation, and many old school record label ways of doing business was/still is certainly highly questionable, if not outright wrong, and the RIAA... well, but I don't believe in a world were everybody is supposed to share their music for free and try to live off of the sale of merchandise, corporate sponsorship, live revenue, trust funds, nothing, other jobs or whatever. But, that's not how I interpret what you are saying either CR and I agree with your last paragraph above. It's a choice, what you want to try to do in life as it relates to your music, and I think there's still a strong case for both 'art for art's sake' and for 'making a living with it', and for any combo of the two, like it has been for a very long time and will continue to be into the future, regardless of what's happening these days. It might all look and work differently, but the core dynamics of it really haven't changed that much and neither has people's actual relationship with music (alone), whatever time they spend having one, time spent that, as honestbleeps points out, is ever more challenged by other entertainment industry options... BUT, most of these also contain music, and mostly PAID for music at that... So maybe the whole idea of how people make music, how producing it is paid for, how income is generated from it and how people are enjoying it is constantly changing these days, but the business of music is still very much alive and well for those who are willing and able to partake. But, what the future holds no one knows, and there are many other potential scenarios waiting in line that could severely impact other, so far constantly growing, income streams from music... When TV dies or gets absorbed into a web page, a lot of recording artists both large and small, might see a whole other massive drop in their income streams...
interesting read, expecially the part in which you point out that the value of the recorded music is pretty much tied to the value of the physical media itself. No physical media? No value. All right, that's true.
What have changed is pretty much that. Artists were signed by people whose job was selling pieces of pressed vunil with pretty covers on it. The more, the merrier anyone would be. The artist would have had the chance to continue to get in touch with their emotional issues and those of the people who heard their music because the people selling plastic would benefit them with a good percentage of the sellings. What we are talking about here? Plastics or emotions?
I'm not so in the industry to tell that, but I suspect itunes works only for they sell ipods or the suchs. So the paradigm is shifted from selling plastics to selling digital devices. That's it, and if you think about it, nothing has chnaged in the business model.
So, what then? I suspect we talk too much about art here. I would not say that people writing music in this business model are strictly artists, I'd rather say that they are people exploting a business model to their needs. So, what's the loss? The loss is that a good artist could get cought in this model and be brought to a larger audience than he would have ever have the chance to meet directly.
Let's think about Hendrix if there had not been vynils and videos... would have he still being a legend? I guess pretty much yes, by word of mouth. Probably very little people would have had the chance to listen to purple haze directly, but I guess the reverb of him playomg those songs would have spread all over nonetheless. "I remember once seeing this guy who was playing with such intensity I was mesmerized".
So we lost a business model, or at least, music is just a part of what makes a physical thing exciting to buy... other things are internet connections, apps and social media.
Good artists will always give a fuck about all of that, they will create out of necessity, not greed. But it's true that in the long run, an artist needs recognition in order not to go crazy. But who can claim himslef of herself to be an artist? I bet no one. It soooo easy nowadays to fake it that the statement almost makes no sense anymore.
So I propose one thing. The revolution may come from makong the people all arpund you happy with your creations... and when I think about it I think of neighborhoods, friends, collegues and anything like those. Girlfriends. Do not connect to those who are faraway across the ocean through a computer network. Connect with those around you more intensely... chances are that if you manage to do that, you're prolly an artists.
Make people around you fell good with what you do, do not make art.
@honestbleeps ..."but I do disagree strongly with the notion that music can't be sold anymore.".. .. "iTunes is selling a metric shit ton of music"
Here in the UK Rihanna has made the news because her album is number one, but with the lowest sales ever.
9,578 copies! For number one in the home of The Beatles!
The old industry model is dying on it's arse.
CR, I think your "mission statement" is both fun to read and spot on... The sense of entitlement that so many musicians demonstrate, at all income levels, is very unappealing.
Realising that what we do is, in a practical sense, worthless whilst bearing the possibility of being transcendental is a good lesson for us all.
As Sam Goldwyn said "the harder I work, the luckier I get." Truer now than ever before, I would say.
obviously a typo in the final sentence.
Make people around you feel good with what you do, do not make art.
What I think about it's a Bansky type of music making. Which is not busking tho. ;)
cheers, p.
As Chris notes at the end of his mission statement, I jabbed him a bit to keep him on point, and my jabbing mainly consisted of blathering about the separation between art and commerce. As a professional writer myself, I go through the same mental peregrinations about my audiences' perceived value of my work, and frankly, it becomes a distraction. In some ways, the 80/20 rule applies. 80% of your audience will happily pay for product because they understand the way the cycle works. The other 20% will noisily protest that art is free because storage/media/information is free, which is utter bullshit. Everything has a cost; most of that cost is invisible, which is quite different than free. I wonder whether chasing that 20% is worth your time.
Darklordjames makes a good point. In fact, I'm going to pull it out and quote it: "I make a conscious decision to pay particular artists because I value their specific output, not because the end product has any particular value in a monetary sense." I throw money at the Positron Machine whenever I can--admittedly it's nothing more than a couple of overpriced coffees at Starbucks--because I value the creative output. "Textural" from the other day was a nice treat. It probably wasn't on CR's mind that he was doing it to generate revenue; he was doing it because he could. I like to think he had the time and mental freedom to do that because I and many others have been contributing to the cause.
Chasing and building an audience is a long-term activity. The mission statement seems to me to be saying: "Build the sort of reputation garden that will bear an overabundance of fruit during the lifetime you expect to be tending it."
This hot new is a strong comment on the shape of things a happenin' :
http://thewire.co.uk/articles/9580/
Well, it can't get me now. ; ) My statement is more in response to a "Hey Bro, it's art and you're a part of it, you should totally mix it for free because I can't" sentiment that I've been blindsided by as of late.
It's not new at all, it's just called "art" now.
i confess.. i've read a lot of things and had a lot of discussions with people over beers etc about the music industry and in the end nothing is any more or less clear than it's ever been.
i appreciate CR's perspective especially the "STFU already" undertones.
what i get out of all the various things i've read is just make the music/art and see what happens.
thinking about the money side of things and trying to make music is only going to infect your creative output with a bunch of shit that shouldn't be there.
adjust expectations. things will never be like they were.. they never are. life is short. spend your time wisely. if you really are an artist.. you'll do it. if it's a hobby then you'll do that too but you might eat a little better and have health insurance.
artists still do all the same things to try and survive. they suffer for their art. they live in shitty places, eat shitty food or no food.. they pour all that pain into their creations... and some of them actually "make it" by any standard and some times it's because of the internet that they have that success. but many of them obviously don't make it... but not because of file sharing or the internet. because they just don't connect.. aren't any good or don't have that 'right place right time' situation happen for them.
so it goes.
thanks for the words CR. thought provoking read.
To point out what I once considered beyond obvious - art is art as long as you pay the mix engineer. Maybe that's my 7 page minifesto ; )
Who's going to pay a mix engineer if the product is worthless? The waiter/music artist? Are films equally worthless? Will films be shot for no money in garages like music is made now?
I read yesterday that teens consume most of their music through YouTube. If only there were a TV station that broadcast music videos. But at least those artists are getting some income from Google ads, right?
@pierlu is absolutely correct. Banksy absolutely operates on a Rep Credit system. It was pointed out to me that in sociological circles, this Rep Credit thing I thought I invented has a name, "social capital," and is actually well-researched. If you have the ability to sift through mind-numbing lab-speak, this is an interesting read:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_capital
Wade, if I didn't think it'd send you in to a spiral of self-perpetuating depression, I'd say "you're pretty much fucked." But I do, so I won't. Suffice it to say that the art of studio recording is getting lost in the noise of the continual commercial release of what would, 15 years ago, be considered demos. It's up to you to fight that battle, though. I can only do like 8 things at a time.
-CR
I would state it another way: the market determines the value of things. If people no longer pay for music, then it has no value. Period. Of course, lots of people still do pay, but that appears to be a dying model. The market is in the process of deciding, and if you expect to make money solely by selling digital reproductions of your work, you're probably doing it wrong.
I'm not saying this is how it should be, but I believe it's how it is.
I like your take on it, CR, and I hope other artists read it.
Interesting read CR - nicely done! I know a few people who'd do well to read this a few times.
Nice read. It is also unfortunate that due to the lost value of music that there is less time and money going into quality recordings made by competent engineers in purpose built studios. More time/money being spent on what would only qualify as "preproduction" from bands operating as home studio hacks and the occasional artist that spends a couple bucks to have a real mix engineer "fix the $5 haircut." I love DIY, but there is a lot of it worse than sounding cheap, actually sounds a bit lazy to me... I firmly believe that a good song always prevails regardless of the medium and actual fidelity of the recording...but I am certainly let down by artists that sound like bedroom recordings...not that I blame them for being incapable of financially investing heavily enough in their record to go to a proper studio with real engineers. But I guess when kids are downloading their music from Youtube they probably would not appreciate the difference anyway!
I'm not trying to start "The Death Of The Studio" conversation, that's one we all had 12-15 years ago. In spite of Chris' chiding ; ) I'm not a "real" studio owner. I was recently 1/3 of what I can really only call an expensive construction project. I was the "ad" guy. The guy in charge of recording bands and artists gave us 8k for materials and walked out the door. He's not alone in doing so. I produce a few artists, and that's coming to an end as well. A natural progression.
As the entire process has gotten devalued, all the people I know who were good at the music side have moved on to other things. I agree, there's absolutely no room or need for a mix engineer, producer, etc.
Old Man Yells at Cloud.
Nice job on this CR although I wonder how many times artists will be able to go the Kickstarter well before fans get tired of paying: "I donated $100 and the album sucked."
Also note Kickstarter takes 5% of the funds raised and Amazon charges an additional 3-5%.
Regarding the hobbyest, I heard this joke a while ago that continually makes me laugh.
Prosumer comes from an abbreviation of Professional and Consumer. People always use the two words 'Pro' and 'Sumer' but they never combine the other two.
i hope i dont blow this conversation, but it seems to be in a dämmerung now anyway. ///
< what > happened to the nice little company formerly known as < audiodamage >? will there ever be another plugIn?
Hi Chris,
I should start by saying that I have written some similar music history for theTrichordist
( http://thetrichordist.wordpress.com/2012/06/27/a-brief-history-of-artists-control-of-their-product/ --this is mostly about the intrinsic value of art )
and while I do in fact play in a band (not Cracker) with Mr Lowery, I'm not here to defend him. We argue a lot. I do think that you misread something about his Emily White rant though: as I understood it, it was about the fact that the money still flows in her situation, just to big businesses, computer and telecom, not to the artists.
My reason for writing here, however, is that I have very little faith in your point. I do now and always have made music for the sake of making music that I think is good, I have spent all the money I have ever made on doing so. I don't think that "keep doing what you do, you'll get good and someone will notice" is at all accurate. What you're pointing to is believing in some sort of "cream rises" scenario, where in reality we get more "shit floats". I, for one, don't want to have all the music available to me made by those that were the best at selling themselves--music by hucksters isn't so interesting to me. I like a great deal of music made by the weirdos that couldn't be bothered to interact with their public and had to have it carried to the public by, say, record labels?
Music is expensive to make. How should people make it if it has no value once made? Beyond the studio owners and equipment buyers, it would cost a musician money to publicize - it's not like you can rely on word of mouth for a youtube video. So yeah, a lot of us work other jobs and use the money to pay to make music. And give it away. I do, have for 25+ years
(see http://music.jsegel.com/ ). Is it because I suck at music that I am broke? While I obviously can't objectively say, I kinda doubt it, I think there's a lot more to it than that.
And yes, Amanda Palmer and all. How many lottery losers are known for their loss? I don't buy this as a solution, and this is after using Kickstarter to fund (the finishing of) my last CD.
The music industry is indeed making money. It's just that it's not going to the people who spend money making music. As I mentioned before about Lowery's article, telecom companies are making major money from people moving music around, as are the hardware manufacturers (e.g. HTC buying MOG....?) The makers of instruments and studio gear (and software, yes, AD) are selling more than ever, counting on the same lottery-mindedness of people who may or may not make it through the first 5 years of "being a musician". Sites like Sonicbids or Reverbnation sell "opportunities" to be included in some show or licensing shit, it's all based on preying on the idea of the artist actually making money for their work while ostensibly being a showcase for them to gain these cred-points you are saying will serve as their currency. I think that's horrid.
I don't think accepting the devaluation of recorded music is a valid answer. I don't think that relying on "klout" or whatever is reasonable. It sounds way too much like espousing Rmoney's "Self-made man" idea of success.
(now I will yell at clouds:)
They used to teach Civics in high school in the US, where people were taught that, for example rights came with the responsibilities of citizenship. Then came the "me" generations in the 70s and 80s, and subsequently, with education waning, Civics became simply US History or Social Studies. The fact that we are discussing issues about whether or not art has actual value that can be translated to currency seems to me to be a problem of a world populace that has devalued anything that isn't immediate: knowledge, art, science, etc. And not only devalued it, objectified it in such a way as to make it "other", something that isn't them. We have a general populace who distrust intelligence, have been taught to do so. They think that rock music = rock stars, not working musicians. I puke whenever I see musicians represented in movies or TV! It reminds me of pulling up on a motorcycle and entering a cafe only to have people turn and look at me like I'm a Hells Angel simply due to lazy Hollywood scriptwriters presenting motorcyclists that way for 50+ years.
Education is a better answer. Education also teaches art appreciation and respect(and by that, I don't mean the freshman class survey course.)
Whew. Sorry for being so longwinded.
People can and do make money from music, all the time in fact. The thing Chris is saying is that it is hard and only going to get harder to make money simply by recording music and putting it out in the world. No amount of moral-high-ground hectoring is going to change that.
The thing with social capital in the case of music is that you might strike on a way to have the music boost the profile of a more reliable means of making money. Or as is often the case with musicians, multiple ways of making some money add up to a livable income. For instance, you might use some of your reputation to help sell plugins, like Chris, or synth modules, like Cevin Key is doing with Subconscious Communications, or teach economics for musicians, like David Lowery is doing, or teach financial planning to musicians like Duff McKagan is doing, or build guitar pedals or design drum kits or boost the profile of your live tour or give music lessons or start business to business music-for-hire services, and so on.
The idea of making the music you love, recording it, releasing it, and making a living from that sounds great, but was untenable most of the time when the market for music recordings was good. The market for music recordings isn't so good any more, and isn't likely to be so any time soon. So you have a choice, write hymns of moral-high-ground hectoring on cathedral/blogs bemoaning this state of affairs, or move on, figure out where to go next.
If we want to make music, we should do so for the love of it. If we want to then make money from that music, there's opportunity for that, but it isn't always going to be obvious how to do it. Sure most of the ways of making money from music are going to be supplemental/tangential and not income derived directly from the music, but such is the way of things. Many of us are simply going to have to make money in other fields like we already do to supplement the cost of making music. That's what I do, it isn't ideal, but I've made peace with it.
@Shamann:
Yes, obviously one must make peace with one's situation in life, or die trying. I mean, I've only been a fully "professional" musician for a couple years in a nearly 30 year "career" (whatever that means.) I've bartended, worked at record stores and bookstores, taught at colleges and even worked for Pandora for the past 3 years (til fired, essentially. for not being enough of a corporate assface. That's the music biz!)
Nonetheless, as you say, it isn't ideal. Does that mean we should give up on ideals? I really hope not!
We are certainly in some sort of transitional period in the history of art and music. The article I wrote (linked above) for Trichordist was about the history of a relatively brief period where composers of music had economic control of their lives. Something else is happening now, and I don't buy the "be an advertisement" paradigm... mostly cuz I don't want to be, I guess. And despite that, as unrealistic as I may sound, I would prefer to be paid, and paid for recorded music, an art which I feel is akin to sculpting in sound (as opposed to live performance... more like, I dunno, I'm losing this analogy.)
So yeah, I'll continue to talk about it. All of these sorts of arguments (such as Chris presented here) just sound like, as a friend said, "an elaborate myth that is only aimed at soothing the conscience of those who are trying to assuage their cognitive dissonance over the fact that they value music but don't want to honor social contracts."
For example, does speaking out on this subject actually lower earning potential? For Metallica, Lowery or The Edge?
You and the Trichordists can keep talking about it, I wouldn't want to interfere with that, but hammering on the subject is a fool's errand, tilting at windmills and such like.
Musicians have had it pretty good in terms of finding commerce that works with their art. Think of the poets, I'd be surprised if there is one left in this world who makes a living doing nothing but writing poetry. What is the value of good poetry? In the world of ideas, priceless, but in the world of things, effectively worthless.
We're in an interesting scenario, as musicians, inasmuch as the thing we love to do can also be made to seem a viable career.
I have an uncle that loves boats. He loves taking a sailboat out on the Columbia river. He loves it as much as I love making music. Bad luck for him that there's very little money to be made in riding around in a boat. In fact, boats are quite expensive. And unless he's very, very good at sailing a boat, (he's better than average, but not, you know, Captain Cook), has a good boat to sail, and a good place for sailing, chances are, he's going to have to stick to his day job.
I mean, seriously: making a living playing shows on stage is not a birthright. It's a reflection of skill. Get the fuck over yourself. (And I can say that because I've done it. If a banker said that to me, I'd fight 'em.) It is the rare artist that, through creativity alone, can see his way in the world without ever having to be a barrista.
My advice: learn to DJ dubstep.
-CR
Hey for what its worth KanCho was realized as a money maker with the video arcade game Boong-Ga Boong-Ga - check that one out out on wikipedia - especially the prize for high score!
geez, you guys. You sound like you're giving up too easily. Tilting at windmills is basically our whole lives, especially as musicians.
nobody is claiming they're "owed" anything here.
You gonna give up on civil rights issues, too, just cuz someone more powerful says to get the fuck over it? Just because it's more pragmatic to do so?
TechDirt has an article on your mission statement
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120815/15530420064/musician-chris-randall-music-has-no-monetary-value-connections-it-forms-are-priceless.shtml
I think you're onto something with the "reputation as currency" idea. I do want to quibble on a couple points, though.
"a high level of skill at their chosen method of expression"
I don't think anyone believes that Joey Santiago has a lot of chops. But that isn't what makes him cool in the first place.
"The barrier-to-entry to a career in the performing arts used to be years of practice to be even moderately good at any form of expression. Now it's as simple as downloading an app to your iPad, and following a couple tutorials on YouTube."
At the other end of the spectrum from Joey and players share his ethos/aesthetic, you have musicians whose performance is built on years of muscle memory and ear training. I can see how now it's a bit easier to transcribe--and a lot easier find material for transcription--but I don't see how youtube and Rebirth for the iPad is going to produce the next Maceo Parker.
Also:
Songs only act as emotional anchors in hindsight. At the time that your fans were hearing your music for the first time, future sentiment probably wasn't the driving factor. In my opinion--and the rest of this paragraph should be taken with the required grain of salt--when a person likes a song (ie when the song is working as intended), they fall into a shared moment with the artist. It may be the moment the artist intended, it may be a different moment, it may be somewhere in between. But in any case, the song becomes a little "wearable movie" that a person slips on and "watches." It changes who the listener is just a little bit--or maybe a lot--and it serves as a welcome intrusion into their lives. When the song is over, they go back to being who they were, mostly. So while I agree that anchor songs are priceless, I think it might be easier to assign value to songs as diversion. That said, I'm not claiming to know what that value is.
You're making the mistake of thinking that, to everyone, Maceo Parker has more meaning than Rebecca Black. Don't assume that your subjective opinion of music is the correct one, and everyone else's is stupid.
(That said, your subjective opinion of music is the correct one, and everyone else's is stupid.)
The number of people who know Maceo's music on its own is a direct result of James Brown and Prince saying his name over and over again. He is a sideman who would only be known to other musicians, for the most part otherwise (see also: Bernard Purdie, et al). So, bad example perhaps. I take your point, but you're falling in the trap of thinking that because something doesn't have objective skill, it "sucks." While I agree with you, that's a subjective point of view, and thus not quantifiable.
-CR
Fine. Substitute Stan Getz for Maceo Parker.
Either way, how does youtube or software make it significantly easier for someone to become proficient at an instrument?
And you read the first part of my post, right? The part where I mention Joey Santiago?
Also - there may have been factors outside of pure economics that affected how Robert Johnson and Muddy Waters were paid. Like entrenched racism.
I'm confused about the Joey Santiago thing, in that he wouldn't be at the top of my cool-but-unskilled list of guitar players. He may not be Chet Atkins when it comes to chops, but than most players aren't.
And I assumed it was meant that Youtube and software lower the barrier of entry, not make proficiency any easier.
On the commute home Aphex Twin came up in my shuffle. Also Gold Panda, Burial, Boards of Canada, et al. And I got to thinking of these acts that have made decent careers (more or less) in electronic music either in spite of or because of varying degrees of opaque or mysterious public personas. These are guys that aren't doing any of the expected leg work of getting their name in front of the public but are some of the top artists in the field. You won't see their Cubase sessions in Future Music, or endorsing whichever software, or doing YouTube studio tours, or maintaining active Twitter feeds, and maybe precisely this gives them a cache that all the leg work most artists do. So what has enabled their rise to the top of the game when there is no shortage of willfully obscure electronic artists casting about?
I'm not trying to make some case for the exception that proves the rule, or present a gotcha to your sound reasoning. I know other commentors have touched on this. I was just curious as to what phenomenon accounted for this. Even in a time when record sales were more of a going concern for mid-list artists, going under the radio was pretty hard to do. Now? Pretty near impossible, right?
I think there is a case to be made, in addendum to your piece, about Rep-by-proxy. Having Warp put out your shit is about as much as you could ask for not having to flog any of the usual channels most musicians avail themselves to. Or Stone's Throw or Ghostly International. Or having, say, Orbital take you on as an opener. But then, how does one get on that radar? Interesting aspect of this discussion.
It's also worth noting, on a completely different tip, and more to your point. The music that is blowing up big from the underground, these kids don't think twice about releasing free shit. How many albums did Odd Future post on its Tumblr before signing to Interscope? Die Antwoord's first album, free for all. Ditto Girl Talk. Has Skrillex even put out a commercial release yet? Azealia Banks is giving away her latest release -- a 'mix tape'. In fact, isn't the whole mix tape thing about rappers putting out albums they couldn't release commercially for the sole purpose of raising their profile? (Not really my wheelhouse.) This is the culture of kids putting out music, and seems to be working pretty well for them.
@puffer - aphex, autechre, boards of canada etc.. they got their starts 20+ years ago. built fan bases long before the internet was the tsunami of shit that it is today. back then you could hide in your room and make music.. meet someone and hand them a casette and blow their minds and then that person gets together with a friend and starts WARP records and cals you up to submit a track for Artificial Intelligence and the rest is history.
sure, there is still someone like burial who can make music, not go ont he internet and promote himself but still get his music to the right people and get signed to a label that knows wtf it is doing and sells a bunch of records via its internet presence and marketing machine etc. I almost put an S in machine.. fucking NI).. but for the most part, a person wanting to have some success in electronic music needs some kind of web foot print, needs to go out and network and play tons of shows and be good.. to make a living needs to be better than good.. because so many paths are quite worn and as is stated again and again.. any asshole with an ipad can make a techno record of shitty shit and stick it on the internet and try to suck a portion of internet traffic towards that shitty shit.
blah.. but back then, when aphex etc dropped a donk ont he listening public.. it was all new.. the music was new, the parties were new, the labels were new.. it was the underground thing that was happening.. swelling up to the surface.
oh, just go watch "24 hour party people" and laugh with steve coogan.
You're absolutely right. The thought did occur to me when I was mulling this over. I still think there is something to the notion of rep-by-proxy, that if one has an entity which already has cred to represent, the idea of being socially connected can be subverted. e.g. Burial is cool in part because he is mysterious, and Ghostly has the pull to slingshot his name into the greater consciousness. But, yeah, that age has largely passed.
Love 24 Hour Party People. Need to watch it again.
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