Ooooo…tonewood.
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There’s more good music being made and distributed right now than there ever has been in history. It makes the '60s and '70s look like a parched desert in comparison. You just need to go beyond the major labels.
4AD’s been churning out great stuff for decades. Pelagic, Deathwish, a bunch of other small labels are really rich ground for fantastic acts. And the number of people self producing is staggering.
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Sorry, just blame it on the rain.
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Ooh a print copy, nice!
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…OK
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And Megadeth
Yes that’s right. It’s out there now.
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Let me give you a secret; I, V, vi, IV
Write a song with that progression and you got a winner.
Most pop/country songs use that progression.
Too repetitive for my tastes. But I love me some Abba. Or Beatles. Or Olivia Rodrigo. Or Billie
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Without the demographics in your favor and the marketing to tell the majority what to like, you could have written the greatest song ever and it won’t make it out of the studio (if you can even afford to get in one with the right producer). And in the slight chance its that great and grabs someone’s attention,who has the the ability to launch the artist, the music will be replicated so heavily that eventually the artist will be pushed back into obscurity if they don’t play ball.
When it comes to music, keep exploring and enjoy (listening or playing) what appeals to you without prejudice, after all its all about what makes you happy and you don’t ever have to justify that.
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My very first concert was the Dead (with John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers, It’s A Beautiful Day, and Quicksilver Messenger Service). A total mind-f*c#er.
Saw them many, many times after that when Jerry was alive.
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That’s less true than it has been. Billie Eilish recorded music at home with her brother and uploaded it to the net, and she had a hit single before she even thought about a record company.
One of the great things about the interweb is it’s much easier to get your music out there without a record company.
Lindsay Sterling is another. Record companies didn’t want a dancing violin player. So she made YouTube videos. Shows what the execs know.
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@Wombat-metal Those stories are all really nice to read about in best sellers, watch in award winning documentaries, pushed on the news and popularized on podcasts., but there is a difference between what we have been told and the truth.
I started in broadcasting when I was only in my teens because I loved music. It didn’t take long to learn that it has nothing to do with what we love and everything to do with the capital it can generate, at any expense.
If there are any A&R people in here maybe they can chime in. LOL because they always tell the truth.
There are always some exceptions but whatever shows promise, for the most part, will be gobbled up. The corporations that own the record companies have a lot more play (whether through ownership or partnership) in a majority of platforms, than anyone will admit.
I personally separate the music from the who, what, where, why and how. I have been disappointed more times then I care to count and it has ruined a lot of music that I would probably still enjoy if I took it for what it meant to me without the hype.
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Well aware of how it works, but Radio isn’t what it used to be. Kids are sharing Spotify links and TikTok. Bands no longer make fortunes off record sales.
Streaming is the name of the game. And merch.
The Hu is another band that achieved international success through YouTube.
Voice of Bahprat is an all girl Indonesian band that just finished a European tour because of streaming.
Linda Linda’s streamed from the LA public library last year, now they are playing big gigs like Summer Sonic.
Brave new world my friend.
Babymetal opened the stage for Iron Maiden before they had a record contract. Anyone can stream and go viral. It was about 15 months later they got signed. As the record company exec said, after two successful world tours and an indie album in the Hot 200, they couldn’t figure out the demographic, but they felt like they couldn’t pass.
They founded their own label, Fox Records, and hit the Billboard hot 200, #1 Metal, and #1 world music without a record deal and distribution in the US.
Times they are a changing
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@Wombat-metal Radio has been dead for almost 2 decades hence my departure in the mid 2000s. Like most in any field you migrate to other areas in which corporations are willing to fund and explore. Multimedia production companied where on the rise to cover all angles of revenue and that in turn led to mergers of major players. The jump is necessary in this do or die industry.
Musicians and the those involved in production make the majority of their money off royalties and even that sizzled out when conglomerates clamped down on expenditures in an effort to maximize profits. Contracts were created that stipulated exactly what everyone involved will make from beginning to end no matter how big a project got. Streaming is one of those avenues that killed income for so many.
Charts are deceiving and most of it is forecasted long before names even appear on them. There once was a day independents made a splash and there were some exciting appearances on the independent rankings. Those days were extinguished at the turn of the millennium. Independents are not so independent when they are now underwritten by various financers.
With the internet, the floodgates were opened to fabricate anything in as little time necessary to catch fire and run wild. Again another reason marketing is such a well paid sector. These days algorithms dictate the trends that make people believe they are sharing and making popular.
It is not really a new world and the times haven’t really changed. It is all about prosperity and the revenue is being siphoned straight to the top faster then ever.
Again I know there could be exceptions but I have not seen any that would make a large enough impact to even make a dent in the machine.
Now in all honesty I have left the circles I worked in a few years back. I still am friends with a few key players at the mid tier and I can now only relay what they tell me. Maybe things have changed but I highly doubt it when the end game is always the same.
One of the reasons I joined Bassbuzz was to explore what made me indulge in music in the first place. Besides the personal factor, which is a given, I adore how it brings people together, specifically us at ground level.
@Wombat-metal Please don’t take my words as some sort of argument. I really do enjoy your posts and appreciate a lot of what you share. You even introduced me to some new artists I would have not discovered otherwise. I just saw things differently through my experiences.
Sorry to the rest of you because this doesn’t exactly fit “A little music related fun”, it is quite the opposite.
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Well I don’t know about you boys @SubsonicRob and @Wombat-metal but my YouTube videos are getting tens of hits. So, as Colin Hay eloquently put it
Any minute now, my ship is coming in
I’ll keep checking the horizon
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