Cancelled Distrokid before a new release- am I mad?

[Tomás Mulcahy]

Cancelled Distrokid and got a refund. Because streaming royalties are even worse than they used to be. Mainly after watching this Ben Jordan video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDfNRWs ... BennJordan

My plan now is to make a video for each track, for Youtube and Tik Tok. Release on Bandcamp and maybe SoundCloud.

What do people think? Am I mad?

[R_A]

I do not think that you are mad. Madness would be to keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result.

I currently think the best solution for digital releases is having a single distributor, who's ethos aligns with your own. For instance, my last album was only sold digitally by Cafe Oto: https://rb.gy/bpdqa

What is your plan for the video element?

[tea for two]

I was in a record shoppe nearby. Amongst the usual sections of records there was one section dedicated to a small local label which had records solely from that record label. So that those that dig that record label would gravitate towards their records.

Also when I think of Blue Note records, DiN Records, Warp records : they have had a style of music releases audience would gravitate towards.

So I think it makes sense to find a record label that matches as far as possible your music also caters to you as a musician : that doesn't drive you mad lol.

[Tomás Mulcahy]

I do not think that you are mad. Madness would be to keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result.

I currently think the best solution for digital releases is having a single distributor, who's ethos aligns with your own. For instance, my last album was only sold digitally by Cafe Oto: https://rb.gy/bpdqa

What is your plan for the video element?

Thank you that's encouraging. Lovely sounding stuff, very nice label presentation too.

I have 16 tracks, some are songs, some are electronic instrumental and some are modern classical. Maybe I should find labels for all three.

For the videos, I'm using a theme of space travel, the gritty realistic near future kind where things take a long time and are messy, and people learn about themselves and humanity along the way. I was inspired by Com Truise. He writes a story first, then composes the music as if it was for a film about the story. I really like his stuff, the narrative comes across in the feel rather than being in your face.

So I think it makes sense to find a record label that matches as far as possible your music also caters to you as a musician : that doesn't drive you mad lol.

Lol yes, that is the dream. Warp would be my ideal label. If only to have the album sleeve designed the same way as their earliest releases- plain colour and a big sticker.

[R_A]

For the videos, I'm using a theme of space travel, the gritty realistic near future kind where things take a long time and are messy, and people learn about themselves and humanity along the way. I was inspired by Com Truise. He writes a story first, then composes the music as if it was for a film about the story. I really like his stuff, the narrative comes across in the feel rather than being in your face.

Sounds great! Good luck with the release.

[Wonks]

So, sort of ‘Ground Control to Major Tomás’ then.

[James Perrett]

For someone who doesn't have a label behind them it makes perfect sense to not go with the big distributors. However, for those who have a label or a certain amount of publicity, people are going to expect to find you on the main music services so it makes sense to go with a distributor.

[amanise]

For someone who doesn't have a label behind them it makes perfect sense to not go with the big distributors. ...

I'm not sure I understand this bit - but then I only have experience with CD Baby. I went with them as they were about the only option for a middle aged bloke working out of his bedroom. At the time I started with them literally nobody else would touch you if you fitted that demographic (or at least - that's what it seemed like). So there was no other choice, for me. I stayed with them when it all turned to streaming and the distribution arrangements we now recognise through that. They don't check much - so your material never gets rejected. I've never enjoyed the support of any label. So I'm not sure what I'd have done otherwise?

[tea for two]

That's not too bad a name for a record label that has as its style melodic space explorative music : Ground Control to Major.
Lots are already familiar with the whole title / song, so hopefully lots would assume expect melodic space explorative music from such a label.
Would have to leave out Tom so as to not deal with lawyers.

[BigRedX]

I think it very much depends who your audience are (or who you would like them to be). If you have any pretence at being even remotely mainstream then you need to be on all the main streaming services otherwise there are people who will never be able to find and hear your music.

Bandcamp and Soundcloud are good at what they do, but they are still niche services and their audience is the modern equivalent of people who used to buy a weekly music paper and listen to John Peel.

Apart from once CD-only release on an indie label in Chicago everything I have done in the last 20 years has gone through either CD Baby or Catapult. The royalty payments may not be much, but IME on-line sales and royalties for most (completely) independent artists are negligible.

Here in the UK, by far the best way of getting your music heard, and maybe even make some money from doing so, is to get out there and play it live. Then sell the audience physical copies (on vinyl, CD, compact cassette etc.) immediately afterwards. While I still get plays and payments for everything I have released, only the music that is currently being gigged does anything significant in terms of downloads and streams.

[MarkOne]

I was really lucky, in that I signed up with AWAL not long after they launched, and they would pretty much take on anyone, on the “we take a cut of your download revenue” deal (we’re talking 2010, so this predates the big streaming services) So they still have no monthly fee and take a cut of my stream revenue. (But since that’s effectively zero, it remains effectively a free distribution platform for me)

Of course, then they got bought by Kolbolt, who subsequently got swallowed up by Sony music, and they are now extremely fussy about who they sign, and I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before some Sony intern gets the job of trawling through their repertoire to cull the dead wood (ie me)

[Drew Stephenson]

I used CD Baby for the last band release but my stuff I use Ditto. It's an annual fee for as many releases as you want and you get all the royalties.
Given my negligible presence in the music market this means that my payments (combined sales* and royalties) just about cover my annual fees.
So it's kind of free. Which makes it completely worth it because it gets my music onto every platform, and I can't be choosy about my audience.

* Excluding Bandcamp sales which remain the best return in terms of cash.

[Tomás Mulcahy]

Here in the UK, by far the best way of getting your music heard, and maybe even make some money from doing so, is to get out there and play it live.

This is true, but I am never going to do that. Did not enjoy the experience over twenty years ago. Really I am just putting it out there to feel like it's finished, to make space for new compositions. The whole lottery of trying to "make it" and do promo to get attention just makes me feel ill these days, and I personally have no need of it. I have friends who love touring, more power to them.

[BigRedX]

This is true, but I am never going to do that. Did not enjoy the experience over twenty years ago. Really I am just putting it out there to feel like it's finished, to make space for new compositions. The whole lottery of trying to "make it" and do promo to get attention just makes me feel ill these days, and I personally have no need of it. I have friends who love touring, more power to them.

That' fair enough. Do you already have an on-line following for your music?

IME with releasing music for non-gigging artists, is that even if the band was popular when it was originally writing and recording the music, unless I was also prepared to do a lot of promotion to go with the release, the number of people listening to the on-line versions since the music has been made available on-line is almost negligible, and from that PoV it makes little difference who I choose to do my digital distribution, as there will be very little in the way of royalties at any rate no matter how good or band they may be.

I've accepted that essentially for me, the majority of my back-catalogue is just "vanity publishing".

[ManFromGlass]

I’m in a similar boat as you and I would agree it’s partially vanity, but it’s also an archive of where you have been and where you are now, assuming you still are putting out tracks.
Occasionally I get nostalgic so I listen to old tracks and either go “what the heck was I thinking?” Or “I used to be so creative back then”.
I still haven’t chosen which site(s) to go with, but when I do that will give others the chance to say “What the heck was he thinking?” etc.
Win win.

[amanise]

hmmm.. I'm toying with the idea of an album release on Bandcamp - but it's something like £120.00 a year subs. So either someone is going to have to buy it for £120.00 every year (Mum?) or there's a magic album price somewhere in between which means people are not put off buying something they don't know, and I can get enough of them to make something above the £120.00. Every year. Who knows what that would be.

What I don't want is to be nailed to balancing promotional services costs against album sales, and be on a treadmill where I have to do the barffy promo to claw back money. Every year. Ugghh.

[James Perrett]

hmmm.. I'm toying with the idea of an album release on Bandcamp - but it's something like £120.00 a year subs.

As I understand it, you only pay that if you want their Pro package. I would guess that most small artists wouldn't use that option. Normally they just take a percentage of your sales.

[amanise]

hmmm.. I'm toying with the idea of an album release on Bandcamp - but it's something like £120.00 a year subs.

As I understand it, you only pay that if you want their Pro package. I would guess that most small artists wouldn't use that option. Normally they just take a percentage of your sales.

Aha! Thanks - I assumed that I would need the pro version to enable whatever payment processing engine it is they use. I wonder what the others do who use Bandcamp..

[Tomás Mulcahy]

Bandcamp is what I'm using (see sig).

Yes, Bandcamp can be used without their (rather expensive IMHO) pro option, and they take a very reasonable percentage of sales.

It's a good archive too, they've always had lossless and you get to do nice things like have different artwork for each track, and proper credits- a thing Spotify make a balls of.

FWIW I notice that whenever people share music they like, it's always a Youtube link. Because Spotify makes a balls of sharing as well- try doing it with the free/ ads version.

[amanise]

It's not as if £120.00 is a lot of money in the scheme of things - but you don't want to be throwing the stuff away - and it would be nice to make back a bob or two of what you've had to spend to make all this stuff. Pigs ready for taxi out to runway!

[Tomás Mulcahy]

Depends on how you look at it. €120 would get me another Canon EOS 550D which would improve my video production.

[RichardT]

The key thing is how you feel about promotion - and it sounds like you really don't enjoy it.

In which case there's really no benefit in releasing to the streaming services. Nothing will happen there without promotion of some kind, and even then, without stunning amounts of luck, nothing very much will happen.

[ManFromGlass]

Do people do give away promotions?
Like buy 1 and get a free keychain?
Or Pay double and get the 2nd copy free?

Sorry - I’m not stuck in that world yet so I still have a sense of humour about it.

[amanise]

The key thing is how you feel about promotion - and it sounds like you really don't enjoy it.

In which case there's really no benefit in releasing to the streaming services. Nothing will happen there without promotion of some kind, and even then, without stunning amounts of luck, nothing very much will happen.

Correct. I had a live concert promotion company some years ago - and it showed me how much I disliked promoting anything - even (once) big stars! Loved walking out to the mic and saying "Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen - would you please welcome...." but hated everything I had to do to get there. Didn't even get to play as support or anything because by the time the night came round I was too knackered to do anything else. And I'd spend every Christmas wondering if I'd gone bankrupt or not. I think it's one of those Marmite activities.

[sc1460]

The key thing is how you feel about promotion - and it sounds like you really don't enjoy it.

In which case there's really no benefit in releasing to the streaming services. Nothing will happen there without promotion of some kind, and even then, without stunning amounts of luck, nothing very much will happen.

Yup, that's true. Digital is not hugely different to days of analogue in terms of how to get yourself known; to make it bigger than the bedroom or the local pub you need heavy marketing or event/gig promotion; but digital distribution costs now lower than anytime in musical history...

From some website I forget which: How much does Spotify pay for 1 million streams from the UK? About $5,821.
(YouTube pays even less than Spotify from what I last read)

Ref digital distributors, Symphony and Ditto are now cheap, £19 PER YEAR, even tunecore is now < $50 per year, but you need to promote it like crazy. I know musicians spending 4 hours every/day simply posting their stuff across social media, where regular, consistent frequency of new content keeps the attention going. Social media encourages a higher frequency and shorter durations of activity....artists have to adjust to this, live and breathe it...there are artist that just use a laptop with Akai MPC s/w and a Roland SP404 + Rode Nt1, that's it, they post straight to Soundcloud etc, none of this "polish the sound for 3 months and discuss what pre, eq, compressor is needed before uploading", they have no idea about how music was made before 2001 why should they; then they tell everyone they know or don't know on social media about the new track...promote, promote, promote...glued to the mobile 24/7 watching the dashboard stream analytics.

We see the evolution of the social media musician....combine music skills with digital media skills

This one guy he's treating his uploads as adverts for his production skills.made an astonishing mixtape combining Sade + MFDOOM! Only 227K views, but if the right producer/label sees it, who knows...

https://soundcloud.com/seanh2k11/sadevi ... ull-stream

Always point to Ed Sheeran, maaaaan, he gigged up and down the land like a hungry-dog pulling sledges to the South Pole and back, hundreds of pub gigs every year before recognition arrived. It can be a brutal industry...
cheers
H