My own answer to that is they are entitled to whatever the market will bear. I’m a musician so yeah, I’d love people to get paid, but you can’t wring blood from a turnip.
This is something that definitely gets lost in the shuffle. The Musicians’ Union kept being dishonest about this stuff. When streaming radio became a thing, they complained, and wanted rates high enough that anyone other than an internet equivalent of clear channel would be off the air (goodbye niche and independents) . Then when rates eventually got set (and thank goodness small timers were able to stay on the air), they went back and said “OMG, terrestrial radio gets to play music for free, unfair!” and pushed that side, ignoring that that had only been unfair for like a minute, and only unfair because they pushed their rent seeking onto internet radio by convincing people that internet radio was somehow fundamentally different (and then changed their tune to say they are the same…)
The bottom line is the game has been rigged to favor songwriters since forever, and I don’t know how I feel about that. Performers don’t have an ASCAP/BMI to bully people around, and while they do get (ETA: some) songwriters a lot of money they have serious issues of their own, so I don’t know that I want a performers’ equivalent.
If a business like Spotify can’t pay people for sharing their products, why are they in business in the first place? Markets are not magical things that just happen, some natural phenomenon of nature. They are made up of people making decisions and choices. Spotify (or whoever) has a choice about how they compensate people for the products they provide to spotify.
That’s a product of a bygone era when the songwriter and the performer were not one and the same. That shifted with the rise of rock music. Now, musicians are more than likely the people performing the music (not always, but even the most banal pop star with have co-writing credits on their music, even if it’s written by a team).
But again, both song writing and performing are actual work.
You are obviously not understanding how finance works. The companies lose money until they are sold. Then they still lose money… or go bankrupt. Which is less of a problem than one thinks, as some people are adept at making money on bankruptcy.
There’s a problem in comparing streaming rates vs. radio rates isn’t there? Streaming rates are per individual stream play (1 device per stream) while radio is per broadcast play ( many devices per play). So 10,000 people play a song nets an artist $64.00 on iTunes but 10,000 people listening to the radio station for that play gets an artist $0.12?
My favorite singer/band, Rasputina, has never been fond of streaming music. Most of their catalogue is streaming but the majority of the newer stuff you have to buy directly from them. Seeing these numbers it’s easy to see why. Sure you get less people finding and experiencing your music but the engagement with your core audience is probably stronger and you make enough money to make a decent living (i know Rasputina does well enough that she’s remained fiercely independent from record labels for quite some time with a tiny audience).
That was my thought as well. It always seems to be the labels getting the money and then begrudgingly sending the artist the cut. But everyone blames the streaming service or the radio station or the video channel and never seem to look at the middle man.
That’s a good point, actually. But I’d also say that the infrastructure cost of a streaming service is lower?
I don’t want to suggest that there are easy answers (because of course their isn’t). There are more opportunities for independent artists now, but there is more “competition” (except not really, because most people who seriously listen to music don’t just listen to one band, but many bands).
But I do think that most people (even now in the post-punk era where more people are talking about the political economy of making and selling music - hell, Amanda Palmer did a whole TED talk about it), are generally unaware of the economic realities of being a working musician. They still think that if you’re on the radio or have a hit song, that you’re rich like Madonna or Prince of the Beatles, which isn’t the case. Most people are far more dependent on album/song sales (and now streaming). I do think that some more effective method of compensating artists can be dreamed up. Again, I like the Band Camp and patreon models, in part because the artists can set their own compensation models. It still requires promoting one’s work, but it can be effective in find that 1000 True Fans that @headache noted above (look it up if you haven’t read it).
I’d say this is how she’s done well enough, honestly.
Also, I <3 Rasputina! I saw them open for the Cranes once a long ass time ago (in a smaller club that no longer is open to about 40 or so people) and they were pretty amazing live.
One thing that is seldom discussed is the fact that at around the same time that the price of recorded digital music files dropped to nothing, the price of creating digital music files dropped to nothing.
Sure, you can still check into a swanky boutique analog studio and record your album on the same desk that recorded “Slanted and Enchanted,” but that’s on you. At this point in the game, it makes the most sense to either produce cheap synth music in the box with quickly “repaired” vocals, or simply dump some live, off-the-board recordings from your shows straight into the marketplace. It may sound like ass, but ass is what people are willing to pay for. The market for audiophile recordings has always been exaggerated anyway.
What I think is the weirdest thing about the current digital music marketplace: Brand new song by popular band = $1.00 per MP3 file. Ultra rare, out-of-print, holy grail of the Discogs marketplace = $0.00 per MP3 file, if you know where to look.
I’ll point out that music business has been afraid of new technology since for ever. From pipe organs, to records, player pianos and now the internet. Musicians will adapt, but probably without the record companies.
If they are all losing money it seems to me it’s The Public that has decided it’s not going to pay enough. Seems to me the alternative isn’t that everybody gets paid decently, the alternative is back to free file sharing and iTunes.
Like you say, no easy solutions.
Preachin’ to the choir. But who decides who gets paid and how much? There has to be demand from people willing to pay enough. As wise people have said, “deserve’s got nothin’ to do with it”. I could spend a couple of hours playing reggae music on the bassoon, but even though that’s “work”, I don’t expect anyone would care to pay me for it.
Truth. People will always make music, no matter who is paying or if anyone is paying at all.
The radio has been considered to be ‘promotional’ since the time royalties have been collected, meaning that performers only get promotion and nothing more. As I said above, songwriters don’t get the same opportunities that performers get…so yes, it is ‘rigged’ to be fair to those of us that write. Me? I have bad arthritis in my right hand…one night of performance will take me out for three weeks even with a constant dose of cortisone injected into my wrists. To be honest, the only reason I did it as long as I did was because it put me in close proximity to the artists I was writing with for a couple of months to get their cadences and otherwise down and workshop things. Most don’t do this.
So it is rigged to songwriters. You fucking better believe it is. Otherwise it would be grossly unfair to the people that bring the intellectual work to the game. I don’t know why but on BoingBoing I see the folks that actually use their brain as opposed to their body get the short end of the stick quite a bit. Never understood this.
And you know how these artists could push this all back in their favor? WRITE THEIR OWN FUCKING SONGS. Even 50% credit on a song is better than nothing…be involved with the process. If the songs are being written for you, then you are an idiot if you aren’t there at the writers table. Even bigger idiot if you don’t realize that a lot of writers will GIVE credit to bigger names simply because they know 50% of a platinum sale is better than 100% of some underground ‘hit’ that never charts (it is a wide spread practice…I know Elvis did this on a lot of his hits and there are only two songs that he was known to write).
I’ve been paying for streaming for quite a few years (first Slacker, now Spotify). But just prior to this phase I had stopped listening to music for many years. My expensive CD collection holds no interest for me anymore and radio is abysmal in every way.
Since paying for streaming I’ve learned about so many artists I never would have hard of otherwise. Spotify has even directed me to local concerts for the artists in my library.
If the artists aren’t happy with what Spotify gives them every time I listen to one of their songs then I guess I can go back to talk radio. I’m not sure what else I can do.
Quite a few members of the public seems absolutely willing to ignore the fact that artists do need to eat and turn to services that don’t pay for downloads at all. I’m sure some of that is related to pure ignorance about how musicians make a living. I’m not copyright hardliner, either, but expecting something for free isn’t going to get artists a living.
I think we do need to take into account cost of living, etc. Some of that is on the industry, some of that is on artists to make their work (in terms of how they make it, the labor involved, and the fact that they need to eat same as the rest of us) more transparent, some of that is on consumers to understand that in a capitalist economy, paying people for work is entirely fair.
Are you doing it for a living? Plenty of people play music for their own edification and don’t get paid for it. Making music is an entirely human endeavor. But when someone has decided that’s their career and they spend quite a lot of time working on the making of music as a profession, selling their music to an audience (and especially if they gain one), then the corporations (whether that’s labels or streaming services) should make sure they get fairly compensated.
People have been predicting the death of the recording industry for a long time. I’m afraid that as long as the production of music is profitable (as a mass consumable) we’re going to have labels. Punks were correct that it makes far more financial sense to make the label local and closer to the artists, because then their lots of throw in together. You’re much more likely to make a living and to be fairly compensated at 4AD or Alternative Tentacles as opposed to Warner Brothers or Virgin.
I think a lot more people realize that is the way to make a living now. The division of labor in the industry has changed radically since the rise of rock music. Far more people are both songwriters/performers, and even pop stars are smart enough to get songwriting/publishing credits.
And I’ll say that not all performers are well compensated for their work, just the famous ones (and not always).
Amazing to find out there’s Rasputina fans here. Just last year i managed to get autographs from every band member that recorded on their Radical Recital album, I thought the impossible one would be getting Zoe Keating since she has been unaffiliated with the band for years and years… and the last signature i got was actually Melora’s (the lead for the group).
But i listen to their music frequently would see them play more but Melora living in the east coast it seems that she likes staying in that part of the country. Pro-tip, she recently asked people that were subscribed to her news letter to send in their physical addresses because she likes snail mail. I’ve been considering having an artist friend of mine paint a portrait of her to mail to her
Me? I have tendinosis and will probably have to quit after this month’s concerts for at least a year if not permanently after years of just getting by and being in pain waiting for researchers to get the fuck on it. And I’m very sympathetic to your position about songwriters. I certainly consider myself to be much more of an artisan than an artist; I just play what other people write. I think y’all should get a good deal.
I am a professional musician yes. No, I don’t play reggae music on the bassoon for a living but that’s kind of my point. I’ve always felt “professional” and “amateur” are arbitrary distinctions; “did you practice hard, go to school and are you doing work” matters way far less than “is someone paying you?”. Getting someone to pay you is up to you. It’s why we have a union even though that doesn’t make a lot of sense to people sometimes. Heck, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to me sometimes. (Edit: for clarity)
would see them play more but Melora living in the east coast it seems that she likes staying in that part of the country. Pro-tip, she recently asked people that were subscribed to her news letter to send in their physical addresses because she likes snail mail. I’ve been considering having an artist friend of mine paint a portrait of her to mail to her 
