I consider myself a musician. I’m not a professional, as in, I do not make music as my profession. I always (since high school, at least) have had a desire to somehow make money with my favorite hobbies, music and recording. I also tend to think that it is much easier to make money in music than if i had a hobby of say, gardening. of course, the money would be small, but it would be something. I think back to Dad and his former Apple computer repair company. It’s not like he paid any bills with it, but he helped out folks and bought some toys.
Radiohead, the avant-garde rock band, (also known as the the frightening noise-making mumblers, if your name is Desiree), released their latest album In Rainbows on oct. 10, just 2 days ago. It’s not really a big deal, except the reason it made news headlines is because of the way they released it: the only place you can get it is off of their website as a download, and the customer chooses how much they want to pay for it. Since there is no “label” or distribution costs, all of the profit goes directly to Radiohead. This decision is a wild departure from any standard business model of music sales, and all the editorials written about the subject have come to the conclusion that it’s brilliant, even if it’s a gimmick and it only works for Radiohead because they’re… Radiohead. I bought it yesterday, offering 4 british pounds, which is about 8 bucks. also, the website is set up to where you “add album to cart”, and “check out”, like a regular online store, with just the added step of typing in the payment amount. So when you get to that step, you kinda feel sheepish if you just leave it blank. It’s not like you’re guilted into paying, it’s kind of letting the customer realize that he is getting a product of wholly subjective value. Since i like Radiohead, I do in fact value their music, and the album is worth something to me. it’s a very unique feeling for a customer… individually choosing the value of the goods, and not by market supply/demand laws, because the physical product is information. I pretty much agree that Radiohead is one of the only bands who could turn this into one of their best-selling albums of all time.
Just by chance today, i found out about TuneCore, and i saw how easy it would be to distribute my music in a money-making fashion. They put your songs on iTunes for you, and you make 100% of the profits. Every song download is a dollar in your pocket! This suddenly got me interested in selling music, since it would be so mindlessly easy to do. I started researching the songwriter royalties, since my most recent music was written by Dad and friend Kevin Smith, and plans are in the works for me & JB to record an upcoming album of Dad’s old folk songs. But the more i thought about it, the more questions i had.
Right now, you can download all of MY original compositions and recordings for free off of my website, because it’s mine and i said so. For some things, like the Newtons’ tracks, Nic Vascocu’s song (from way back when), or Jon Breaux’s original compositions (w/ lyrics), i cut out a short 1-minute clip to post, in order to protect the original creator’s product in case he wanted to sell it later on. If i decided to sell my own stuff, i’d have to take down the full-length versions from my website. That’s a problem for me. I never wanted people to have to pay to enjoy something i made. but, naturally, if i made money, then it would be great! Some artists have websites where you can download their albums for free, and then donate whatever you want into a “tip jar” paypal account. This might be one way to do it for me, but i’m pretty sure the little “donate” button would get 0.0 clicks per year on my website, effectively nullifying the reason to put it on there in the first place. what about the Radiohead way? Radiohead has a fanbase already. people know and like them, as a band. They will get paid because they have proven that their material is worth paying for. This method would never work for me.
Assuming i do record and release the aforementioned album of Dad’s folk songs, we will have to decide in which way we would want to distribute it:
Free for download from DavidComeaux.com is option A.
Paid download from iTunes is option B.
Optional paid download from DavidComeaux.com is an iffy option C.
Traditional CD distribution is option D.
Option “D” might be option “Dad” because he always seems to hint that his buddy Kenny Thibedeaux would hook us up with some local traditional-style distributors. But even if we did option D, i’d push for a digital distribution method as well, probably option B. But seeing as this music is really just a bunch of folk songs, more personal memento and charm rather than profitable musical genius, perhaps the only way we should go would be option A!
Now that i’ve confused you with all kinds of options and letters and lettered options, the next question is, would I do the same thing for my music? Assuming that in the future, i will have written and recorded enough of my own music to constitute an album or EP of some kind, would I want to sell it instead of offer it freely to the masses? Like i mentioned before, the precedent i have set is that i give my music away, and anyone who wants to enjoy it can do so for free with an internet connection. Besides, as a self-critic, i am highly skeptical that there is even a viable market for my musical doodlings. The most i would get would be my close friends and family who want to “help the cause”. The larger public isn’t interested in my music, i’m no star, i’ve never been on “American Idol”. Marketing, selling my music as a product, is something that i am wholly uninterested in. As a result, my personal music will probably remain free for the rest of my life, unless i make friends with someone with experience in marketing who believes that they can sell my music.
And there you have it. from start to finish:
i make music.
i want to make money from my music.
it would be easy to put my music up for sale.
do i want to put my music up for sale?
is this the kind of music that i would put up for sale?
why would i sell my music if i want everyone to enjoy it?
do people enjoy my music enough to buy it?
i shouldn’t sell something that nobody wants to buy.
The Radiohead idea is pretty awesome - I didn’t know about that till you mentioned it. As for your own music, I’m sure there are some folks out there who would pay to listen. Just be sure you serve me some steamin’ hot MP3’s cause I don’t do the iTunes store…
This is an interesting topic - hard to really some up all of my thoughts and reactions to this post in one little comment blurb.
As to your own music, I think you should continue to offer up whatever you want on this site, free of charge - it is a great way for people to hear the music you are working on and get the inside story (via the blog) about how things got recorded, why these certain tunes, and all that other interesting information. I think the real strength of releasing music online on a personal website (besides the availability) is the close connection those outside the music-making process can have with the musicians as they release the ‘finished product’ so to speak. That’s a connection that I don’t see very much of with big label bands, even those with a blog, like Radiohead. After all, those bands need to maintain a kind of image - the music you put out here is more of an obvious extension of, well, you. And if people are here reading this site already, then the music is just one more intriguing part of the total package, if that makes any sense.
As, to the money making thing - I have basically two thoughts:
1) A large majority of people still treasure having a physical artifact. Also, ‘releasing an album’ via CD or vinyl is a way of indicating that you are serious enough about your music to place it out on the market to compete with all the other music available. I think even a small, high-quality, limited run of CD’s would be certainly worth while if you had a batch of music ready to put out, which leads me to point two….
2) Releasing an ‘album’ is totally different from putting up a group of songs to download. Some might disagree, but the standard for albums was really set back in the late 60’s and early 70’s - albums have a kind of thematic cohesiveness and come with a set of expectations from listeners (liner notes, album art that somehow relates to the music, credits, composition rights, etc.). These days, the format of the album seems to be on some shaky ground - digital downloading is changing people’s expectations of music, I think. So perhaps the larger question to ask is, “Should I be putting out my music in a format that is fast becoming obsolete?” The itunes method is a kind of next step in moving away from the album format, but as Matt notes, that is only going to reach people who use digital music stores. Having said all that, I think a proper CD is still the way to make a serious move towards making money off your music, even if it’s only in a limited way.
At any rate, we are being bombarded with so much music these days that sometimes I just want to stop listening completely. The way to grab people’s attention in this ocean of sound is to either have a big label and lots of promotion behind you, or to connect directly with your listeners both with and outside of the music making process. You’ve been doing the latter of those two with this site for quite some time now, and I hope that never ends, regardless of how ‘commercial’ you wish to be with the music you make.
Finally, you should bear in mind (and now I’m stating the obvious) that most small-time, independent musicians make the majority of their profits from playing shows, not from selling CDs. The most effective way to make some cash from your efforts here would be to polish up your arrangements, get a band together, and take your show offline and on to the road. Of course, that’s a seperate issue entirely, but one worth thinking about.
As an addendum to the previous comment: Lots of music released amongst fringe musicians these days is done by a kind of cottage-industry - someone requests a CD, the musician makes them one and sends it to them. If you’re ‘fan base’ is small (say >400 people per album) this has some obvious advantages: no middle men, direct distribution, near pure profit, and each copy of the CD is unique and could be personalized to the sender.
Guitarist, improviser, and all-around crazy man, Eugene Chadbourne has been doing this for years, often-times including some home recordings, outtakes, or other ‘bonus’ features in his mail-order albums. You won’t make a living doing this, and things will have a kind of home-made charm, but nonetheless its proved a viable option for some artists, especially those releasing multiple types of these ‘albums’ per year…
re: jon
This is the reason i just love posting my music on this blog for free. I love being able to hear the story, read the lyrics, and enjoy the music all at once. i’d even like to do youtube style videos of the performances.
re: jon
I’d be all about making some CD’s if it weren’t for one, small, inconsequential thing: money. to sell cd’s, you have to buy cd’s. Top quality duplication and silkscreening costs way too much for a hobby budget. My hobby budget has to compete with the grocery budget and the credit card bills. I don’t think it’s going to win out very often. And that is, in so many words, the reply to point 1: I am clearly not serious enough about my music to put it out there to compete with all other music available.
I already declared that i am absolutely uninterested in the whole advert, promo, headline-making, radio-playing, indie showtimey flashy gigging musician-on-the-road deal.
What I want to do, and i suppose i’ll have to settle with the inevitable non-profitability of the whole idea, is to just sell what i already love to create, without the overhead and investment of actually “entering” a.k.a. “competing” in the music business. The cheapest way to do that would be online. Unfortunately for Matt Smith, digital music stores are highly lucrative. I know, i know; DRM is evil.
i think the point is, i’m going to keep my music for free on my website.
A quick clarification: we don’t take any of your money, it’s true! But that doesn’t mean you get $0.99 when someone buys a song of yours off iTunes. iTunes themselves keeps a chunk, just like any store will. Of what remains, TuneCore takes no piece–you get it all. Other stores take an ADDITIONAL percentage, but TuneCore does not. So you know: when one of your songs sells in the iTunes U.S. store, TuneCore will pay you $0.70, and that’s the very best wholesale price there is.
Thanks for the kind words! Holler if you have any questions.
–Peter
peter@tuneocre.com
That is fantastic. Thank you for the clarification and the attention, Peter.
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