| StoreTags: music industry, album
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I'm reposting this from the IDM list - Thor from Highpoint Lowlife talking about the current state of the music industry. There are no real surprises in here, but it has me thinking a lot about this music and what comes next for electronic music in general and Emulsion in particular.
From: thorsten AT NOSPAM highpointlowlife.com
Date: January 8, 2007 6:45:21 AM CST
Subject: Re: [idm] CD sales and the music industry
To: idm AT NOSPAM hyperreal.org
>wow, this is nice. To bad this cd is only available from overseas(I live in the US). To >much money. I would buy this if I could purchase from a US distributor. Very >surprised with this.
Which part are you surprised about? That its only available in the UK, or the exchange rate?
I wish i could help you out and say you can get it somewhere - but basically no you can't - 2007 is year the arse falls out of the music industry. No-one is interested in buying music anymore, and especially not electronic music. An electronic label to a distributor is a joke - They'd never sell more than 5 copies of yer release, so they wont even consider you.
That quote from Norman Records that Alan posted is a good indication of it, but basically sales of CDs stopped dead about 6 months ago. (i think a strong influence in why Smallfish records also closed)
Electronic music has been unfashionable for a good few years now, and i think its going to be one of the first hit areas which will feel the effects the worse. Its only at the top end of the popular music spectrum, that mainstream people are still buying CDs. Even people like us, who still buy CDs - i bet at most you can afford maybe 5 CDs a month (being optimistic here), and yet, theres like maybe somewhere between 50-100 decent electronic releases a week! So yeah, even if you bought 5 cds, thats still at least 195 that you didnt. Who supports those labels and artist?
At the beginning of 2006 i was getting quite confident about Highpoint Lowlife, we were doing pretty well in sales, and getting good press and reviews. Somewhere during the summer tho - sales just completely stopped, and every month since then we've been getting lots of returns from record stores which has just continued since then.
Our reviews and press have kept picking up since then, but sales are just gone. zilch.
i have one more release planned for Highpoint Lowlife, but beyond that, who knows what will happen, its just not feasible to run a label the same was it has been done - i.e. relying on CD sales. I have so much debt from the label, that i need to start paying that back.
What is interesting to compare though - what i think will happen, is that niche releases and handmade efforts are what will continue.
To compare economics of normal releases -
In the past, doing a run of 1000 CDs, which has been pretty standard - total cost for producing that runs to about £1500, including mastering, replication and promotion. If you only sell about 200 of them (and thats if you're doing really well!), and you only get abour £3 per disc (from your distributor), then you've covered £600. You've sent out about 100 promos, so that means your bedroom now has an additional 700 CD sitting around which will never sell, oh and you're also about £900 out! excellent fun.
Now, compare that to the limited run of 100 DVD-Rs we did recently -
That whole project cost about £200 for materials, the blank DVD-Rs, the cases, tracing paper for the artwork and the photocopying. They sold out pretty much straight away, on average for maybe £4 (£5 direct sales, but i sold a lot to Norman records for £3), and thats £400 in sales, so around £200 profit within a month! It just seems crazy, why didnt i start that years ago??!! 
I just saw this article this morning link
It's a pretty accurate predictions article for the music industry in 2007, and ties in very much which what i've been seeing.
Digital download sales are going okay, but they're very much a novelty i think, and used more by people with a conscience rather than normal consumers. They certainly dont make up for the hit in lost CD sales.
hope that doesnt sound all too gloomy gus! Big changes afoot, and in the end I don't think the music fan or the musicians will suffer, but we're in the middle of a massive watershed, and things will be radically changed in even a few years time..
thor
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01/09/07
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mlbot
LOL, meanie.
01/09/07
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jdg
c'mon.. that setup was unaviodable.
just like my bad spelling
01/09/07
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mlbot
I know.
The best part is that I think the answer "11" is 96% funnier than if you had answered "10", and 33% funnier than if you had answered 12 or higher.
The implications of the response "8" are intriguing-- that would suggest that Ultre CDs are being manufactured by other people and being returned to audiobulb for a refund.
01/09/07
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jdg
LOL
01/09/07
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Unknownforce
thats my first ROFL of the week
01/09/07
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room
arse
01/09/07
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room
it was more than 499 and less than 10 000
01/10/07
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deltasleep
mp3.com was the perfect example of what i'm talking about. democratization of media also comes with the price of democratization of the money that comes from media. In this case, the media is infinitely distributable and reproduced at no cost, so the money is spread so thin that theres nothing there in most cases. iTunes tries to restrict that duplication and distribution, in order to have a little more scarcity. But you just can't run a for profit business based on guilt or fear without generating resentment. It can't go on forever. Most listeners don't give a rats ass about artist rights or the artist making money. In fact, they probably don't even connect the music to a human being or to expression anymore- think about lil john records you know of. Selling "hardcore gangsta" records about how much you don't give a fuck and how much of a violent and powerful rebel you are, and then saying: "Pay money for this mp3 because you will hurt Jarule's feelings."
hilarious.
01/10/07
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djugel
Our parents killed art.
we killed music.
Neither meant to do it.
Remember Chris Farley destroying the bread roll in Tommy Boy?
01/10/07
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djugel
Not as many "listeners" as there used to be. Now everyone thinks they're a "head"
01/10/07
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deltasleep
this is true. i'm not that old, but i can remember there being fans in the 1990s, not heads. people who just liked electronic music, they listened and enjoyed. now everybody is a critic or a producer.
01/10/07
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astroid
bs
i know lots of teens who are just fans
they don't hear these boundaries
01/11/07
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cbit
whats a 'head'?
01/11/07
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room
thing is delta - from where i am sitting some of what you are saying could be construed as sour grapes
as though you feel cheated out of an opportunity> correct me if i'm wrong (i'm sure you will!)
but from where i'm sitting - you have always come across as being extremely talented and you should not give up trying to garner some "success" - a release or a deal because you have great ideas and good original style > i don't see why you could'nt be chasing fredo's tails - same with GEB & astroid - you all have a good deal of talent.... what you might not have done enough of is - promo & networking because whilst there are a lot of producers in the widest sense - if you are good enough and excite the right people you can still get a release or a career.... but it does'nt happen if you stay in your bedroom - you've got to get out there - tour and talk
edited: Jan 11 2007
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rizem
"The implications of the response "8" are intriguing-- that would suggest that Ultre CDs are being manufactured by other people and being returned to audiobulb for a refund."
Seldom is anything that funny to me on the Net anymore with everything being so cliche, so hip, or so trendy but that was fucking hilarious LOL!
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