There are many positives to signing with a ‘good’ label. Notice that the emphasis here is on a ‘good’ label! A good label in our book is one that loves your music and is working with you because they want the world to hear it as much as they believe they can make a profit from their investment. A good label will also be extremely proactive is seeking out promotional and marketing opportunities for you and will have a huge contacts book to call upon when the time comes to release the record. In fact we would go as far as to say that the main reason to sign with a label in this current climate is because of the established contacts and relationships they have with the promotional and media outlets. If you are organised and entrepreneurial then you can quite easily as we will explain, record and distribute your own work, all you need is the capital and the time to do it . However when it comes to promotions and marketing those contacts and relationships can be essential and can make the difference between a successful release that thousands of people get to hear and one that just sinks and disappears without a trace.
As an example, when trying to get secure a spot like the ‘featured artist’ on the Myspace homepage for a day (something that generates millions of hits) a new musician releasing their debut release can only try and cold call email the site and hope for the best. The chances of it getting through the junk filter and being positively received are virtually nill. However, fictional cool indie label “A” has Johnny who works in the online promo department and has the head of Myspace’s music departments direct phone number. He gives him a call, gives him some free tickets to a show with some beer vouchers and the featured artist slot is in the bag – 2 million people see your picture and story online the next day. Good labels should open doors for you like this that would have otherwise remained firmly closed.
Links
More and more artists are now deciding to set up their own labels to distribute and market their work. A great article about this can be found on the SoundonSound website
The huge question to ask yourself when a label offers you a deal is “will this be worth it”? A good label should be bringing expert guidance, established contacts, established distribution channels, an established audience and financial muscle to the table and in return they will want a sometimes-sizable chunk of the profits from your work. If you record and distribute completely independently then you will see nearly 100% of the profits from your work but you may end up selling a fraction of what you could have done with a label’s team behind you.
There is no right answer to this; it is definitely a case by case basis so just be sure to examine all the options and of course get really good legal advice from a music industry lawyer who can help you understand if what they’re offering you is genuinely a good deal or not.
on Feb 12th, 2010 at 1:23 am
“fictional cool indie label “A” has Johnny who works in the online promo department and has the head of Myspace’s music departments direct phone number. He gives him a call, gives him some free tickets to a show with some beer vouchers and the featured artist slot is in the bag – 2 million people see your picture and story online the next day.”
And therein lies the nepotistic reason that the airwaves are filled with dross and decent music falls so sadly by the wayside.
One hopes with the passage of time and the expansion of the DIY community, ‘fictional’ scenarios like these can be circumnavigated without the need for good, bad or indifferent labels. Not that good labels are bad, far from it, but good music should always win out.
Sorry for the moan, it’s a pet peve of mine. Good articles as it goes.