May 5, 2009 One team, one dream...
Can a team of 25+ world class like genre artists coupled with big brands like Lays or Doritos end a social travesty and possibly change the future the music industry?
I have blogged here at MTT on the power of private concerts (posts at end of blog) and have spent thousands of hours working towards this model. In advance I look forward to and value extremely each and everyone's comments to make this model better until it is as perfect as possible prior to the official roll out. Below is the model of which I will explain at a very high level and get into more detail once I get feedback;
Bruce Warilla posted about the power of coming together as one team and that inspiration played a pivotal roll in this model. The power of private concerts can be found in my previous posts on MTT so I won't get into how they bond artist to fan better then any other medium. The model;
Step 1: Bring 25+ like genre musicians together and form a team in its truest sense all in one location on the internet where they will share their entire 'art' and total content for FREE to their 1,000 'true fans' that has been discussed many times before along with the other 24,000 that combined build one team. The scale of 25 artists will significantly cut down on total costs by leveraging that scale to get better prices all along the touring 'supply chain'. This community would at first be limited to 25,000 fans that will take part in the mission and become one loyal community to both the artists and participate in ending the travesty of 1.7mm homeless children in America.
Step 2: The 25,000 fans would join as one and put on 'fan driven private concerts' 12-15 times per year per artist along with total 'team' events of 3-5 bands/artists in larger events all done through a turn key booking site called Live Music Machine. The concerts will be official 'Red Cup' concerts with toolkits, similar to Oxjam, for the 'lead fan' to easily put on a private concert in a number of 'spaces/venues' throughout their community.
Step 3: The Red Cup artists would play an intimate concert filled with many different entertainment aspects such as video to educate the fans of child homelessness along with constant personalized artist give away's and other newly thought of ways to make these concerts the most engaging, entertaining and inspiring. Fan video, pictures would be posted all of which will be holding a classic 'Red Cup' to symbolize the team all of which would have a 'One team, One team' bracelet as their ticket to get in for FREE. A large Red Cup would be passed around for donations in which the fans would have already connected with many people in their community to get donations for the cause . In the 5 Red Cup concerts I was apart of to prove out this concept we raised over $50,000 which in certain states is 'matched'.
Step 4: The money raised at Red Cup concerts would go directly to 'Project Equip' which is a newly developed 'vaccine' developed by Interfaith Housing Coalition to end child homelessness by lifting up fragile families before they fall into the doom loop of homelessness. With $2,000 to cover the tragic life event (job loss, illness etc) that is catapulting them to homelessness coupled with a 'circle' of people (3-5) to surround and support the family they are put back on track and the team will effectively end 'situational homelessness' and give every child, every night a home and a hope.
Step 5: Here's where the model gets interesting for artists. We will then bring in 3-5 large corporate partners to be apart of the team and give the artists a corporate 'sponsorship' match of the money raised by the Red Cup artists to enable the emerging world class artists to sustain a life making and promoting their music. The proof of concept suggests that each artists could make between $30-$50k per year if they work hard with their fans and take full ownership over their career and truly work as one team with one dream. The artist would retain 100% ownership over merchandise, CD, and other potential revenue streams.
The revenue opportunities online are endless with the potential to charge a donation 'membership' fee to the fans to have access to the inner circle of the team along with all of the FREE content and personalized merchandise.
One team of artists, sponsors and fans ending the greatest 'hidden travesty' all while enabling artists to make a career of making and playing music.
Andy Malloy
Previous posts on the power of fan driven private concerts for context;
3. http://www.musicthinktank.com/blog/fan-driven-private-concerts-the-next-big-thing.html
Reader Comments (7)
I think this is an excellent idea and one that I'm looking forward to seeing discussed, but my initial thought on applying it to my own sphere is that it is very likely that 25 "like genre" musicians will already have significant crossover in their 1000 "true fans" - these fans, by their very nature and your own definition, will already be "true" to many of the team artists, and the likelihood of a fan only knowing one of the artists (especially in the same genre) seems quite low.
Everything else seems bang on though, and requires more brain chewing before further comment - thanks for publishing your thinking so far!
EK, great points and will build the cross over into my financial modeling and really appreciate the enthusiasm over the model. Looking forward to hearing more thoughts from you
Andy Malloy
So this is the future of music, huh? Putting on photo-op charity events with a feel-good backstory and shopping it out to major brands? In the interest of feedback, I'm clearly in a cynical enough place to play Satan's Attorney, so let's go:
1. 25+ is ambitious and probably insane. If your goal is a lean, mean operation, that's already 2x bigger than it has to be. ESPECIALLY in genres like rock, where each act has 3-5 members and vastly more overhead than more DIY genres like electronic and hip hop music.
2. Where is the head of the octopus and how is that person getting paid?
3. I'm guessing you assume most initial overhead costs will be assumed by the artists themselves, no? You're actively seeking artists with an existing reputation, fanbase, and touring operation, so they'll individually be covering the infrastructure needs for personnel and equipment. Which leads to my next question --
4. Where does the gap money come from? After the artists commit to this, after the first round of Red Cup gigs.....and before the video footage is cut with the strings music in the background and ready for broadcast, before the Frito-Lay check arrives, where is THAT money coming from?
5. Is your $30-$50k per year figure based on "Artists" meaning music acts, bands? Or individual cuts? Is your model aimed more towards celeb "singers" and folk "singer-songwriters" in terms of getting the numbers to work?
Thanks for the questions Justin...below are my answers and would love to hear more from you.
1. I didn't get into detail on what the model would look like in execution so let me clarify- It would be 25+ singer songwriters that are already doing private/house concerts who have a ton of potential and drive to live a life of making music and have a fan base that is growing.
2. The head of the octopus would come from my connection in the corporate world who see value in being apart of a social movement and want to get their name and products in front of people who would value them as more then just a company selling products.
3+4. The singer songwriters I've talked to about the model see a huge benefit in being able to share band members and all the costs that they currently incure with any type of touring. By coming together as one they will in essence co-op costs and the fans, which has proven out with my artist Jon Robert, would be the lead drivers of the community and set up the events similar to oxjam.org. The artist would not incur anymore costs then they currently have but be able to have a greater reach of fans that would take ownership over the private concerts. I haven't thought through the fact that alot of fans would have cross over favorite artis, but will build small and let it grow as the model takes form.
5. The payment to the artists would be a direct dollar for dollar match of what they raise for the preventative homeless children model and be paid directly to the artist once the private concert is finished and the money from the community is collected. In my proof of concept the amount of money that people give, that is fully tax refundable, was roughly 10,000 dollars per show. Even if its a quarter of that the artist would be making significantly more then normal touring and be playing and growing a fan base of true fans that not only love their music but also get to know them better through a much greater interaction with the artist before and after the concert.
I look forward to your reply to the answers to your questions...
Thanks
Andy Malloy
Thanks for the answers, Andy, I am grateful for your attitude, it's refreshing.
In light of your details: is it reasonable to say that outside the singer-songwriter genre, and without your unique connections, this model would be extremely difficult to replicate?
Probably Justin....once I get it going I think it might make sense for any solo artists but will learn more as I go.
Andy
Andy,
I think it is a great concept and would love to test it out in our community asap if possible. I agree with Justin about it being hard for different genres to do it but I am all about doing the unthinkable ... I have a large number of hip hop and r&b artists who have good crowds. If you could send me the info in my email once you are ready to give it a try the Indy underground scene would love to test drive.