July 6th, 2008
Although I’m not keeping my label going with new releases anymore, I still sell back catalog and manage a few MySpace pages. I was checking through my emails, filtering out the spam comments and saw this email from Tom regarding a beta program for artists:
” We are happy to announce that artists can now buy ad space on MySpace. We call the program Find Your Fans. Find Your Fans On MySpace is a quicker, easier and smarter way to promote yourself, your band or your brand on MySpace. Find Your Fans is a user-friendly tool for you to use to advertise your band, brand or yourself on MySpace. You can target specific types of MySpace users you want to reach. Simply create your ad, tell us who should see it, how long you want to run it and how much you’re willing to spend. That’s it!
We’ll display your ad all throughout the MySpace site to the users you’ve chosen, putting your message in front of millions of potential customers and driving traffic to your profile until your campaign’s reached its spending limit or the expiration date set by you, whichever comes first.
When are you charged? Only if someone clicks on your ad — not when your ad is displayed.”
For musicians, this cost-per-click is probably a better investment than Google Adwords, as MySpace is such a specific destination for music discovery. It also has the effect of stealing the thunder from all the spammers. I’m actually surprised they didn’t do it sooner, but I imagine that now that they are in bed with the majors on MySpace music there’s some kind revenue kicker back to the labels.
I also see this as a watershed moment for the perceived value of music to social networks- it’s not just a one way street as some would have you believe. If MySpace is developing an entire revenue source by selling the ads on artist pages, it means they are aware the music drives page views, recorded music and artists fan bases have a value, and the audience they bring contributes to their bottom line.
“For fans of …” has always been a crucial pillar of music marketing, and it really makes sense for artists and social networks to put a tollbooth on it, and re-compensate those artists for those smaller ones drafting behind their brand name. My only beef with this is that if there’s a product sold on an artist page on the basis of that artists popularity, unsigned and indie artists should also participate in revenue generated by their pages as incremental revenues are important to every strata of label/ artist, not just those who occupy the Billboard charts.
Written by Bill Wilson | 1 Comment
March 23rd, 2008
But I thought I’d post this comment here, relating to this post at Techcrunch where Michael Arrington comments:
“Recorded music is nothing but marketing material to drive awareness of an artist. Websites that bring that music to listeners are doing artists a favor. In fact, they’re doing them a favor that they should (and will) be paid for. Young artists and songwriters in particular benefit from these services - Until a few years ago they had almost no way to break into the mainstream without getting a label to promote them. Now those walls are being torn down, and Bragg has the audacity to complain about it.”
My reply to this is that one word comes to mind when I hear all of the web2.0 types talk about the next generation of music and how artists and labels should not expect to be compensated for recorded music.
Carpetbagger.
Yes. The old fatcats at the top of the music biz totally f’d it up with Napster. That’s ancient news. But they also screwed it up with terrestrial radio and MTV- building huge conglomerates on “promotional” music. To be fair, the biz was making enough money selling discs for it not to matter.
But it does now. We’re wise to Bullsh!t2.0, where some small team of founders and initial investors make millions in funding from selling to Newscorp, Yahoo, Google or CBS. Don’t blame the artists and labels for adapting to the new playing field. Music helps these companies acquire customers who have a lifetime value. So they need to shut up and pay.
These guys are still just as greedy as they claim Doug Morris and Edgar Bronfman are, the just hide behind the popular mantra that music should be free. Free to the consumer? Sure. Free to those who make a windfall? No way.
I suggest anyone in a band or from a label read the post and leave a comment on it.
Written by Bill Wilson | 13 Comments
November 28th, 2007
- SUCIDAL TENDENCIES SUICIDAL TENDENCIES
- SET YOUR GOALS MUTINY
- WHOLE WHEAT BREAD PUNK LIFE
- BLACK KEYS THE BIG COME UP
- RX BANDITS AND THE BATTLE BEGUN
- ALKALINE TRIO ALKALINE TRIO
- CHIODOS HEARTLESS CONTROL
- ALKALINE TRIO MAYBE I’LL CATCH FIRE
- ALKALINE TRIO GODDAMNIT
- VARIOUS ARTISTS SKA IS DEAD
Written by Virgil Dickerson | No Comments
November 28th, 2007
- BROOKS*GARTH ULTIMATE HITS
- EAGLES LONG ROAD OUT OF EDEN
- MANNHEIM STEAMROLLER CHRISTMAS SONG
- COOK*DANE ROUGH AROUND THE EDGES-LIVE
- VARIOUS STOCKINGS BY THE FIRE
- HAIRSPRAY SOUNDTRACK
- HAIRSPRAY (COLL ED) SOUNDTRACK
- PRESLEY*ELVIS HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS
- MANNHEIM STEAMROLLER CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS
- LITTLE BIG TOWN PLACE TO LAND
(more…)
Written by Virgil Dickerson | 6 Comments
November 25th, 2007
- BROOKS*GARTH ULTIMATE HITS
- EAGLES LONG ROAD OUT OF EDEN
- COOK*DANE ROUGH AROUND THE EDGESLIVE
- MANNHEIM STEAMROLLER CHRISTMAS SONG
- VARIOUS STOCKINGS BY THE FIRE
- BONE THUGS-N-HARMONY T.H.U.G.S
- LITTLE BIG TOWN PLACE TO LAND
- HAIRSPRAY SOUNDTRACK
- OSMOND*MARIE MAGIC OF CHRISTMAS
- GRAY*DAVID GREATEST HITS
(more…)
Written by Virgil Dickerson | 8 Comments
November 21st, 2007
I Celebrate Their Entire Catalog 14 song digital sampler [Click to download the entire sampler] AND SHARE THE LINK WITH YOUR FRIENDS AS IT CAN BE DOWNLOADED AN UNLIMITED NUMBER OF TIMES
The RIAA would have you believe that file-sharing and sites like Yousendit are label’s worst enemies. I do admit that for a small label like Suburban Home, it has made it more difficult for us to get fans to legally purchase our music, but in the end, I do think that file-sharing can help expose our music to new people. Today’s music fan has embraced all of the many ways to share and try out new music and there is no changing those habits. If we hope to be releasing new music years from now, it is only natural that we adapt to the many changes that are happening.
Just yesterday, we sent out the entire full album download of the Playing Favorites’ “I Remember When I Was Pretty” to every single person who pre-ordered the vinyl or the CD. Will people share it with others? No doubt they will. Will this help or hurt our sales of the album? Honestly, i don’t know. I do know that it is doubtful that I can sell any fewer copies and lately with Suburban Home, I view my relationship with the fans of our bands more like a friendship than a label / customer relationship. I trust my friends to download the album, enjoy it, and if they share it, hopefully they will tell those friends to consider buying the album if they do in fact like what they hear.
With that said, today, I am excited to share with you the latest Suburban Home Records’ sampler, “I Celebrate Their Entire Catalog“. The sampler features 14 tracks from current and upcoming albums and some of the things you will be stoked to see are 2 currently unreleased tracks from Drag the River’s upcoming album, a track from Scott Reynolds and the Steaming Beast, a demo from LaGrecia, a track from our latest signing, Jr. Juggernaut, and a live recording from Jon Snodgrass (the track listing is at the end of this post). The sampler was actually pressed as a CD which will accompany the first pressing of the Playing Favorites’ debut album, but we want the entire world to hear what we have been up to as I firmly believe we are putting out the best music of our 12 year history.
If you like what we do and what we are about, I encourage you to forward the YouSendIt link to anyone and everyone you know. Just copy and paste this url: http://download.yousendit.com/7399CB6878C37021. Post it in your blog, send it out in a Myspace bulletin, burn it onto CDs and give them to your friends, hell text it to your Grandma. We want everyone and anyone to download the sampler.
I am having a blast doing Suburban Home and love that I can try new things like this without having to deal with a bunch of suits. Suburban Home is independently owned and we are damn proud of that fact. You are not likely to see a major label do anything like this, because they have their heads firmly stuck up their collective asses.
(more…)
Written by Virgil Dickerson | 3 Comments
November 20th, 2007
I am really excited to share with you an interview Ronen Kaufman did with me for his podcast, Issue Oriented. You may have heard me sing his praises in the past as it is absolutely the best podcast going on in independent music. The fact that he thought enough of me to have him on his show is an absolute honor. In the interview we discuss Suburban Home, Vinyl Collective, IndieHQ, our Drunk Dial Hotline, and a little bit of this and that. You can download or stream the episode from IssueOriented.com or by subscribing through Itunes or a million other ways. Thanks Ronen, I truly appreciate it. Read the press release below.
(more…)
Written by Virgil Dickerson | 1 Comment
November 15th, 2007
- EAGLES LONG ROAD OUT OF EDEN
- BROOKS*GARTH ULTIMATE HITS
- LITTLE BIG TOWN PLACE TO LAND
- MANNHEIM STEAMROLLER CHRISTMAS SONG
- VARIOUS STOCKINGS BY THE FIRE
- BUFFETT*JIMMY LIVE IN ANGUILLA
- SIGUR ROS HVARF/HEIM
- PUSCIFER V IS FOR VAGINA
- HAIRSPRAY SOUNDTRACK
- YOAKAM*DWIGHT DWIGHT SINGS BUCK
(more…)
Written by Virgil Dickerson | 22 Comments
November 15th, 2007
- IMPALED THE LAST GASP
- SUCIDAL TENDENCIES SUICIDAL TENDENCIES
- SET YOUR GOALS MUTINY
- WHOLE WHEAT BREAD PUNK LIFE
- AUGUST BURNS RED LOOKS FRAGILE AFTER ALL
- BLACK KEYS MOAN
- RX BANDITS AND THE BATTLE BEGUN
- SET YOUR GOALS RESET
- LEFTOVER CRACK FUCK WORLD TRADE
- CHIODOS HEARTLESS CONTROL
Written by Virgil Dickerson | 5 Comments
November 7th, 2007
1. WHOLE WHEAT BREAD PUNK LIFE (What’s up with this?)
2. SUICIDAL TENDENCIES SUICIDAL TENDENCIES
3. BLACK KEYS THE BIG COME UP
4. SET YOUR GOALS MUTINY
5. ALKALINE TRIO ALKALINE TRIO
6. RX BANDITS AND THE BATTLE BEGUN
7. ALKALINE TRIO GODDAMNIT
8. ANTI-FLAG DIE FOR THE GOVERNMENT
9. VARIOUS ARTISTS PLEA FOR PEACE VOL. 2
10.VARIOUS ARTISTS SKA IS DEAD
Written by Virgil Dickerson | 39 Comments
Previous Articles
