Posted on 08/12/2009 11:32:07 AM PDT by a fool in paradise
One lesson of this year's Lollapalooza, held this past weekend at Grant Park here, is a confirmation rather than something new: Recorded music drives fans to live shows. Thus, it can seem like the recording industry exists to support the concert business.
"The music business is upside down," said alt-country singer-songwriter Robert Earl Keen. "You don't tour to support your record. You put out a record to support a tour."
"Do you see people going record shopping? No," said Perry Farrell of Jane's Addiction. "Downloading free music. Yes. Going out for live music. Yes. I love recorded music, but the best bang for my buck is the night I go out..."
"Who went to the first Lollapalooza?" Mr. Farrell asked rhetorically. "People who have children now. So they come to see Lou Reed, Depeche Mode, us and Tool.
"I'm 50 now," he said. "I love going to festivals. I want to go out to hear what music people are making."
...There's a trap for artists in the rapid growth in the number of festivals. Lollapalooza, All Points West in Jersey City, N.J., Denver's Mile High Music Festival, the coming Austin City Limits Music Festival and others may be regional concerts, but they book like national events. Some bands feel they have to play every one to build an audience they might have found in the past with an album marketed well and wide by a major label.
"I like to do festivals in moderation," Mr. Bird said. "I don't want to become a band that writes music to fit that scene." Too many bands can overload a music lover. "At worst, it can feel like a musical mall," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
NO. Musicians always had to perform to make the money. The era of getting rich off of recordings was short lived. And the bands never really got the money that was collected in their names anyways.
PING
Festivals are fun. The thing I learned though is that it is best to stick with bands that play mostly faster paced music. It isn’t much fun to sit in Austin with several thousand other people in September and sweat to some slow paced music.
Musicians realize now more than before that record sales aren’t going to generate the revenue they used to (crappy recording contract aside), so they’re emphasizing touring as the main way to make money. And, of course, the record companies are asking for a cut.
CDs were over-inflated in pricing. They were cheaper to manufacture than cassettes yet they cost almost 2-to-1 in price points. The big companies were caught in a monopoly scheme to price fix. They negotiated out of court with the states that pursued the case.
On top of that, much of the money from the past 25 years came from re-selling the public “new” copies of the albums they already owned (whether it was the complete Beatles catalog on CD, throw out your old albums, don't you know? or the dance hits you owned on cassette).
That ship has sailed and won't be coming back.
When records came out (45 is celebrating 60 years this year), people adopted to a new format. Now we have 60 years of used product on the market (which also does not benefit the artists or the labels).
The industry never “served” so called alt-country artists anyway. Outside of Pacifica and other liberal commercial free radio, there wasn't much airplay of the genre. So you had to use alternative press to generate buzz. But it's always been required to actually play for audiences to make money and maybe to sell albums at shows.
Even the big box stores have been hesitant to carry artists that aren't signed to the major labels (Sony, Warner, etc).
Well, if you’re lucky enough to be collecting royalties on evergreen recordings, then you know records sales can pay the artist very well.
Send an auditor in and you will still find that no matter how much the label made, they still OWE money they didn’t pay to the artists.
Ruth Brown was among those who took Amet to task in the 1980s for not paying money owed on her Atlantic Recordings for decades.
Your songs may be hits, but you can still be famous and poor and even still own the works.
The industry is filled with crooks.
ASCAP is no different.
ASCAP and BMI have been called the music mafia for years now, and there is a reason why.
LOL.
Something the Grateful Dead knew by the early 70s. Their studio records were largely crap (American Beauty and Workingman’s Dead notable exceptions).
Interesting topic. Robert Earl Keen lives just a few miles from us. His tour page indicates a lot of touring throughout the US thru the end of the year. He has a major following in Texas but I don’t know how he is recieved in other areas. I’ve got two of his CD’s but they are from his earlier days.
http://www.robertearlkeen.com/index.php?page=welcome
And it's all free.
/shrug ... the Rolling Stones started this way back in the early 70's, when they began releasing a bunch of CRAP albums just so they could concert tour as an excuse ... nothing new here
And just in case any Stones fans here are offended by what I just said - I love the Stones in concert ... the three times I saw them (1975, 1982, 1989) were three of the BEST concerts that I ever been to (and I been to over 300, yes all the *big* acts too). It's just that the Stones records sucked after 1972 or so ... thats all
- MM
The record companies are a relic of the pre-internet era. A band can make a CD using equipment that costs $2000(not counting instruments) at the most and distribute it on the torrent networks as well as youtube. That being said I can’t mosh without a pit. \m/
Terry Jacks had a number one hit back in 1974 with "Seasons in the Sun" and on the basis of that one song, he can still fill up concert halls today at $40 a ticket.
It's just not the same when you dance at home to your records.
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