Smashing the Music Industry

Billy Corgan, Smashing Pumpkins frontman, believes that the music business model is outdated and takes advantage of artists. Corgan said, “The music business is mostly run by feckless idiots who do not subscribe to the normal tenets of capitalism which when they do, the business tends to work out well and stars tend to rise to the top, everybody benefits, but it is still a parochial business. It is run by thiefdoms way behind the times technologically.”

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Joel Brandenstein and DieLochis: recordJet Passengers are Permanent Fixtures in the Charts

What do Joel Brandenstein and DieLochis have in common? Quite a bit, actually. Both acts are recordJet passengers, both have gained popularity through YouTube, and both are successful in the charts!

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Capital City Derby: Brokenmusic And RecordJet Announce Collaboration

The digital music distributor recordJet and the young Berlin-based technology start-up brokenmusic have announced a joint collaboration. brokenmusic focuses on music and audio production services, while digital distributor recordJet offers bands and musicians the opportunity to sell their music digitally and physically worldwide. “As a Berlin-based start-up, we are particularly proud that a successful, young company like recordJet has placed their trust in us for a joint cooperation. Our work together will mainly focus on the combination of our services”, said Valéry Döhler, founder and managing director of brokenmusic.

“We were very confident in the idea of brokenmusic, because it stops right where recordJet starts. From production to sales, it covers the precise competencies that are needed before distribution. By combining our strengths, we’ll be able to offer our passengers production services together with a professional partner”, commented Jorin Zschiesche, Captain of recordJet, on the young collaboration.

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A 5-Year Upward Climb – Digital Music Distributor recordJet Celebrates Its Anniversary

The young, Berlin-based digital distributor is not so young anymore. The 1st of November 2013 marks the start-up’s 5-year anniversary. While nowadays firmly rooted in the capital, recordJet was founded in 2008 in Dresden with the goal of offering musicians and bands a fair opportunity to sell their music digitally worldwide. “Back then, recordJet was formed due to lack of alternatives”, said Jorin Zschiesche, Captain of recordJet. “We wanted to sell our own musical project online and weren’t satisfied with other distributors’ offers – too high shares, loss of rights, restricted freedom, long-term contracts, lack of transparency. So what could be better than doing it yourself?”

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New Artist Problem: Music Never Heard

Author’s Note: In this discussion of music distribution I mention my own RRadio Music and “Intro to Indie Artists” programs. There are other options to consider.

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I received another email this morning from a company claiming to pitch music to “hundreds” of industry insiders. I’m guessing they got my name from RRadio Music and believe I’m in need of help with sending out songs because of the hundreds of artists listed there; that’s not the problem for me or the artists.

By anyone’s measure there is no lack of new songs. There’s also a huge increase in the numbers of songs submitted to online radio stations and music services. Both of these are important facts.

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MondoTunes, CDBaby, TuneCore, and ReverbNation: How They Measure Up

If you wanted to sell music around the world twenty years ago, you needed to get picked up by a major label. That meant demo tapes, postal services, and constant performing on tours. That was all a ton of fun, but extremely hard work and very expensive, besides. That’s where music distribution online comes in.

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Relationships Are The New Distribution

Social Media superhero Chris Brogan recently wrote a post on the basics – the 4 P’s of marketing(product, price, place, and promotion) and talked about how many people don’t spend enough time on their Product, and try to make up for it in Promotion. If that doesn’t work they try competing on Price. But rarely is much time spent thinking about Place.

This got me thinking about how music is marketed, and how absolutely right he is. A lot of indie musicians tend to spend the majority of their time on Product and Promotion, with Price usually being the standard $0.99 per track. The common mistake is in thinking that Place, which is your distribution, is taken care of once you’ve gotten your music up on iTunes or Bandcamp.

I think we need to start thinking of distribution as more than just where people download or buy your music from, and maybe shuffle a few P’s around in the process.

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Reverse Piracy: Pirate Your Own Music

Believe it or not, free and paid downloads can co-exist. To make it work you must have an appetite for innovation and a fearless entrepreneurial spirit. Why not revolutionize music e-commerce by placing a “Buy” button side-by-side with a “Download” button for your entire catalog of music on your website? Yes—every single song and every single album.

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