The Murder Of Music, Think Before You Act Options

[Emir Hot]

My friend and an awesome neoclassical shredder Borislav Mitic has recently signed for Lion Music which is the metal label from Finland that also released my album.

Just before he released his new record he posted a very seirous story about "The Murder of Music" on the Lion Music's website. Some of other Lion Music artists (including me) also gave their input on this subject.

CHECK IT OUT HERE!

I would be interested to see comments on Borislav's text from GMC community.

[Pedja Simovic]

This is very interesting thread. It started with very serious accusation, the murder of music. For some styles and artists it is murder for other it it birth in a way. I agree to a lot of things you guys said about both sides. Internet today has changed the way music industry works drastically. Today you can via Youtube, Facebook, Myspace and Twitter get a massive following. You don't need the record companies to do internet marketing for you, anybody can do it, it comes down to how much time and effort are you willing to put into it. We then have our own websites to promote distribute and sell service that we offer. Here no record company or any 3rd party (maybe Paypal with exception takes cut from you. You can take all these internet marketing tools and lead them onto your website. That will result into massive traffic which will eventually lead to sales. Again it comes down to what you are selling ? If thats an album, you have to market it with songs on Youtube (videos do wonders) and do some useful tags. Publishing music articles and periodicals helps a lot. It all leads back where it needs to lead. Because of all this I can see why today many independent artist, perhaps even non professional musician can make a great living out of this situation. They mostly record things in their home, their costs are minimum and with proper marketing and decent product that could make great money. For guys like Emir and others who invested money into their album and project, this can be very bad. For one, once you sign the record deal with record company you are pretty much in their hands or your fate is in their hands. You can't market things on your own, you can't sell things independently or open network on your own to earn extra money, you are basically sitting there and waiting for them to give you report whats happening. I don't like this but I can certainly understand why Emir did it. When you live in UK with expenses the way they are you need to find a way to make a good living out of music you do. Record companies can definitely help in that area. In Serbia with 6 million people population things are much simpler. Here you can get people to come to your gigs via Facebook events and if you want whole country to know about you there are 3 main televisions that you should attend : RTS (national television), TV PINK (the most famous and watched program) and B92. These TV channels have massive following and I can tell you I have been to 2 out of 3 of these. They certainly mean a lot because then you get calls for radio shows and paper interviews as well as other TV shows. For Emir this is probably mission impossible in UK, instrumental guitar music or even metal type music with lyrics on BBC? I don't think so
All I am saying is things vary from country to country, from style to style and from situation to situation. Singer songwriter I am playing with Oliver Katic has gotten ultra famous through show called I got talent on TV Pink. He is now into semi finals all thanks to one performance with acoustic guitar of Frank Sinatra's standard My Way. After this happened he got so many calls from club owners to get him to perform in their place. He now does one gig in our town Nis on Tuesday, and around 3 other gigs in Belgrade, Novi Sad or some smaller place where they arrange concert for him. Needless to say he makes great money and he doesn't even have an album out yet! He performs rock and pop tunes and audience love it. Talk about taking advantage of situations that things around you offer...
I know for my first real album I will not sign a record deal unless that deal in advance gives me money to cover all the expenses (studio time + pro musicians) and on top of that extra money for at least a year of easy life This is why I will rather record it with pro musicians in studio that my friends owe and then distribute it online via my website, facebook myspace and all the rest. Of course on live gigs I will be selling albums as well. I strongly believe that culture of buying hard copy CD is behind us and that internet revolution has taken big lead over it. Now people can download your whole album on your website just by making one quick and easy payment. I would rather sell my album for 5$ on my site then have it in store for 15$ and not sell a single copy.
Sorry for the long message, hope it made sense

[Staffy]

[quote name='Pedja Simovic' date='Dec 12 2009, 02:25 PM' post='448853'
All I am saying is things vary from country to country, from style to style and from situation to situation.
I would rather sell my album for 5$ on my site then have it in store for 15$ and not sell a single copy.
[/quote]

This I will agree to 100% Pedja! But still its a matter of what You wanna get out of the music eg. Money vs. A good living, which may not be contradictional since if You have money, You will certainly have opportunities for a good living too.... On the other hand, with all opportunities in the music industry today, its quite easy to make a living out of it, its just a matter of the demands one have. For instance You can be teaching at GMC! Nah, what I really mean is that its hard to get some money out of Your OWN music but if You play for the audience instead, its another thing.... but then You're making violence on Your integrity as a musician, which is bad. Therefore I say that is a matter of balance: How much of Your soul are You willing to sell????