Are 360 Deals the Answer for the Music Industry?

Posted on 29. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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No – probably not. What is a 360 deal? It is basically an arrangement where one entity facilitates every aspect of their artists’ business – including marketing, pr, distribution, merchandise and live performances – and takes a cut from each of these revenue streams. Madonna was the first to sign a deal like this with [...]

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Mates of State’s Diaper Run

Posted on 28. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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I have been following the husband and wife pair Mates Of State since I first saw them at the (now defunct) Fireside Bowl in Chicago. They were opening up for Appleseed Cast. It was a strange pairing - both bands hail from Lawrence, KS but that’s about where the similarities end. So when the first riff growled out of [...]

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Pirate Bay Founders Sentanced and Fined $3.6 Million

Posted on 17. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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Twitter was on fire about Pirate Bay today. Rightly so, I guess – this case was a pretty big deal in the file-sharing world. The four founders of the Swedish BitTorrent file-sharing site were sentenced to 1 year in prison and ordered to pay a $3.6 million. There has already been PLENTY of media coverage of the verdict, though, so I thought [...]

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5 Steps to Building an Online Following and Turning it into Gigs

Posted on 16. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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I’ve been talking a lot lately about a band’s first gig. The first gig can be one of the most difficult milestones in a band’s career if they don’t already know a few of the right people. It’s a vicious cycle: you have no following because venues won’t book you, venues won’t book you because [...]

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Bands Finding that the New Music Business is Not What They Signed Up For

Posted on 15. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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There are huge opportunities out there for independent artists to find an audience and build a successful career thanks to free digital distribution, but it isn’t without a catch. Because things have changed so much, many artists are entering the music business without any clear idea what the career they’ve chosen actually looks like. The [...]

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Why Bands Need to Completely Change the Way They Think

Posted on 12. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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For decades the economy of the music industry revolved around the Album. Record labels built their empires on them. Artists’ careers could be measured in release dates. Fans would often wait for years for their favorite band’s latest masterpiece. Touring was also seen primarily as a way of supporting the release of a band’s latest [...]

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Bands Offer to Pay Fans to Download New Album

Posted on 10. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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Those who believe that free downloads have devalued music are going to love this: In an effort to stand out from the flood of free music pouring onto the Internet these days, indie band Officer Roseland recently offered to pay fans $1 to download their new album Stimulus Package. At MyStimulusPackage.org, fans can either take [...]

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Latest Rock ‘Supergroup’ Boasts Unlikely Lineup

Posted on 10. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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New band Tinted Windows I first found heard about this via Windy City Rock, a great Chicago music blog, and I had to mention it here because, frankly, I think it’s pretty amusing. Former members of the Smashing Pumpkins, Fountains of Wayne, Cheap Trick and Hanson (yes, Hanson) have teamed up to form the rock ‘Supergroup’ [...]

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British Musician Wants Free Publicity – and to Get Paid for It

Posted on 07. Apr, 2009 by refe.

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It seems that yet again the music industry lobbyists want to have their cake and eat it too – they want someone to drum up free publicity for their work, and to cough up a fee for the privilege. Last week I wrote about Google’s decision to block music videos on YouTube in the UK [...]