Distribution

There are many distribution methods available to artists today. One way it seems most artists are availing of is that of digital distribution.

Definition of Distribution
Distribution is how albums get into shops. Distribution companies sign deals with record labels  that gives them the right to sell that label's products to record stores that have an account with that distributor. The distributor takes a cut of income from each album sold and then pays the label the remaining balance.

News on Distribution
Now there is a lot more of illegal distribution than legal, and to respond to this the music industry took up substantial legal action. The industry succeeded in closing down popular file-sharing network Napster, however after this received a significant slow down in revenues which almost proved fatal.  By 2012 digital music sales had topped physical sales. This has become more of option for listeners due to the increase in popularity of sites like Itunes and other options available on the android market.  However although the increase in digital music legal downloads, the revenues from CD's has not been recovered. The 2008 British Music Rights survey showed that 80% of people in Britain wanted a legal P2P service, however only half of the respondents thought that the music's creators should be paid. This website is useful in regards to the increase in digital music distribution: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-18278037.
     

Scenario of change in Music Distribution

Assume you live in New York and you make a watch you want to sell. You take your watch to the nearest watch store and ask the owner if you can sell it in their shop. They agree and ask how much you want to get paid if it sells. You tell the owner $10 You return to the store a month later, your watch is gone, the owner hands you $10, however you have no idea how much the watch sold for. Maybe it was given away, maybe it was sold for a million dollars. 

The next day you get a call from Joe at Joe Smith Watch Distribution.  Joe tells you he is a watch distributor from Chicago who can help you sell more watches.  If you are interested, you can send him all your watches and he will store them, insure them, inventory them and more.

In addition to warehousing, he also tells you that he has a sales force of 40 people that walk all around the country to watch stores showing the new watches to the owners and he mails out a paper catalog each month to 4,000 watch stores.

Back at his warehouse, he has 20 more people that pick, pack and process the orders.  If a watch is damaged, it is sent back and Joe Smith fixes it.  Each time a watch leaves his warehouse, you will get paid regardless of if Joe gets paid. 

Finally, Joe will provide you opportunities to market your watch in the store.  For example, it will be displayed up front when people walk in.

In return for all these services, Joe asks to be paid 25% of the money earned from each watch sale. If a watch sells for $10, Joe will get paid $2.50 and you get the rest.

This is the music industry - only instead of watches, it's CDs, and record labels hire people to make their "watches".

• http://www.tunecore.com/guides/promote_introduction  This website is useful for information on the changes within music distribution

Record Labels

Identify a variety of record labels and identify the owners of these labels.

For this task I'm going to look into 5 different record labels from 5 different genre's of music - Electronic, Indie/Rock, Pop, Country and HipHop and give an explanation for each of them. I'm also going to look into their ownership. Are they independant or part of a conglomerate?

Electronic

Downstream Records



Downstream Records are a record label based in London, England. There motto is "a label dedicated to bringing you “electronica” in all its forms." It is an independent label which was opened in 2004 by Damon Vallero, a previous producer of music in this genre. He had previously ran Hard Techno label Electrocom, however he didn't have much scope with this label because it was predominently Hard Techno. 
     Orginally from South Africa, he joined together with friends to create 2 singles under Warner, however they didn't achieve much success. He then moved to England in order to start producing music, the actual process of creating the music wasn't for him.
     Due to proliferation of music genres and advances in technology it is now almost virtually impossible for one label to focus on one set genre and keep expanding their business. For this reason Downstream Records have branched out into a variety of Electronic music under many different guises. This label has been rather successful gaining airplay on big stations such as Radio One, and winning the Diesel 2002 Music Competition in the house category. The label markets their products through a variety of media including a website,  a facebook page, a twitter account, arkada and last fm.
     Their goals for the future include branching out into further fields of techno and keep their music diverse and fresh. They also want to keep reaching out into as wide a market as possible. When I take into consideration the above points and the fact that this company is an independent label, I would say they have been rather successful in their field. They have realised the development of technology and the greater need for diversity and applied this to the label in a successful way. 


Indie/Rock

Aardvark Records



Aardvark Records is an independent british label whose main genre of music is Indie Rock, however they also deal with other genres such as Electronic, Pop and Country. They rose to fame due to their uptake in new distribution techniques. This was mainly through social media sites such as Youtube, Twitter and podcasts. They are based in Cornwall and were started by Andrew Reeve and Alex de Savoia. The original intention for this company was to champion local bands in Cornwall, when this label was started Cornwall wasn't exactly on the world stage for music. This labels main strengths were due to its recognition that digital music was going to level the playing fields for small independent labels and major labels alike. 
     This label unlike others is a fair trade music producer and publisher, they ensure that their music artists receive a higher than average royalty split and that their expenditure is kept at a minimum level. Along with this they also refer to themselves as a "Green Label" ensuring that their actions will not impact negatively upon the environment. This includes production of Eco-Friendly CD's and relying heavily on digital music and the internet thus reducing the impact of their carbon footprint.
     Some of the methods they introduced for the distribution of music include :

• Podcasts
• Blogging
• Online Streaming Sites (LastFm)
• Social Networks
• Paying fans to share their music via their own sites.

The company also have a very strict policy on copyright, staying up-to-date with the different illegal download sites and having their music removed if they spot it. They have a wide customer base ranging from Teenagers to Adults in the 30-35 range and generally have received a good response. Their blog is a good point of reference for the news and occurences within the company: http://aardvarkrecords.blogspot.co.uk

Pop

EMI Group

* This as a seperate label is no longer as of  2012.
EMI was a british multinational music recording and publishing company.  Standing for Electric and Music Industries it was founded in the 1930's as a merger of 2 companies. They state on their website that they bring "artists and fans together by driving action and creating value wherever music is experienced". They say that they base all of their work on the origins of music and try to show this through their modern music. They have been at the forefront of music production and distribution wiht EMI engineers developing the stereo recording, electric television, radar and assisting with the development of magnetic tape. 
     Some of the pop artists they represent include David Guetta, Kylie Minogue, Katy Perry and Cold Play. 
However in recent years they suffered a lot within the Zombie Economy because they didn't adapt as well to the introduction of digital music, relying more heavily on the physical distribution of music. That being said in 2011 they sold their music operations to Universal Music at £1.2 billion. They therefore are now a subisdiary(child) of this Major Label.  They kept the name of EMI due to its worldwide recognition, and set up a UK subsidiary in the form of Virgin EMI. 
     At one stage EMI was the largest music publishing company in the world. They have copyright of over 1.3 million songs. 
     In regards to copyright, they adhere to principles set out for musical recordings. 

• C1 - Publishing Rights
• C2 - Master Recording Rights.

In recent years they have faced extreme criticism due to their copyright held over the Martin Luther King speech "I Have A Dream". Within the above principles there is a further 4 sets of rights:

• R1 - Reproduction
• R2 - Communication (R2A-Distribution, R2B - Public Performance)
• R3 - Adaptation
• R4 - Synchronization 

The below diagram gives a fairly easy explanation of the above points:

Also refer to this website for an indepth explanation of the above points:

http://www.emimusic.com/openemi/basic-rights/

Country

Sony Music Nashville

Sony Music Nashville is the country music branch of Sony Music. It is a conglomerate of 3 other country music labels as well as a Christian Music Label, namely:

• Arista Nashville
• Columbia Nashville
• RCA Nashville
• Provident Music Group.

In terms of distribution this company between January 2011 and February 2012, signed deals with 2 companys regarding distribution of their music. Therefore all their music distribution is done through these other companies through methods such as CD's and on the itunes market. This is really the only interaction which they have with digital music. 

    Noteable artists in this label include Carrie Underwood, Miranda Lambert and Brad Paisley. In 2012, Sony Music as a whole company introduced a new copyright policy, this has involved them reducing their physical product in line with the digital age. When researching look at this http://www.sonymusic.com/copyrightinformation. This area of the Sony website contains good information on the new and old copyright and distribution patterns of the Sony company as a whole. Sony Music Nashville as a subsidiary to Sony have to abide by the copy right procedures they have in place.

HipHop 

Young Money Entertainment

Young Money Entertainment is a record label which was founded by rapper Lil Wayne. He has since stepped down as president with the new president being Cortez Bryant. They are based mainly in the HipHop and Rap music genre. They deal predominently with the production of music and ownership while using other distribution companies namely:

• Republic (In the US)
• Universal Island Records (Outside of the US)

This label is an imprint of Cash Money Records which is overall distributed by Universal. Because Lil Wayne is signed by Cash Money Records, all artists who are part of this company are therefore signed to Cash Money Records. It is therefore part of a conglomerate. Some well known artists who are part of this conglomerate are names such as Drake, Nicki Minaj and Christina Milan. In regards to Cash Money Records, in 1998 they signed a $30 million pressing and distribution contract with Universal, entitling the label to 85% of its royalties, 50% of its publishing revenues and ownership of all masters.

Case Study - Soul Jazz Records

Soul Jazz Records is a british record label. The label started in the 90's, with predominately "black music" such as reggae, soul, dub and jazz. They do however cover a wide range of genres including hiphop, punk, house music and latin. It is also responsible for other media including books about different genres. Some artists who they have signed include Altered Natives, Larry Marshal and Kode9.

What kind of music do SJR's produce?
They originally started out producing music dubbed "black music".This consists of genres such as:

• Reggae - music strongly accented subsidiary beat, originating in Jamaica in the late 1960s. A famous artist within this genre is Bob Marley.
• Soul - music originating in the USA during the 1950s and 1960s. combining elements of African American gospel music and rhythm and blues. A famous artist within this genre is Al Green.
• Ska - music genre originating in Jamaica in the 1950s. It was the precurser to Reggae. A famous ska group would be the Uptones.
• Jazz - a music that originated at the beginning of the 20th century within the African-American communities of the Southern United States

It has now expanded and produces music such as electronica, hiphop and punk.

What strategies do they use to promote and distribute their music?

They use a variety of methods. As previously mentioned they also publish books to do with certain records. Their audience can purchase the music they produce off their website or indeed purchase one of their books if they aren't aware of the different artists. They also distribute their music in large high street music outlets such as HMV. Their records would usually be found in the area of World Music however may also be characterized under the forementioned genres. They also make use of merchandising, producing other products which wouldn't originally associate with music - mugs, t shirts etc. They host a variety of free gigs, therefore attracting an audience who wouldn't automatically choose to go to this sort of concert, but will because of the gratuity of no charge.

 Who is the audience?

I think sjr have quite a set idea in the audience they are trying to target because they target such specific genres.  I would think of myself has being quite into my music, but before this task I had never heard of this label. I think their main audience would be those people who aren't originally from britain, those ethnic minorities from which their genres derive. I think the main target audience would those from the 1960s/1970s generation when this type of music was widely popular. However, it is impossible to make a sweeping comment on this and therefore I also have to take into account of other audiences. I think this is main one which they would target however.

What is the relationship between SJR and the mainstream music industry?

Because of the genres in which this label mainly operates, we could say that they are very independent of the mainstream industry. As I said before, they target specific, niche audiences, and therefore being part of the huge business which is the music industry may not be worth anything. We need to recognize however, that because of this, there isn't neccesarily any competition between the mainstream industry and SJR. SJR are a more personalized label and therefore would possibly become lost within this large industry. I think was SJR try to target more than anything is the experience of consuming the music rather than fitting into a set image which would come along with being part of the mainstream music industry.

Glossary

Production:
The act of producing. Simply put, this is a creation - the creation of music,film etc.

Distribution:
The way in which something is shared out among a group or spread over an area

Marketing:
The action or business of promoting and selling products or services.

Consumption:
Consumption very simply is the using up of a resource. Therefore, it is the using up of for example an album.

The Music Industry:
Also known as the music business. This consists of individuals or companies involved in the production, distribution and marketing of music.

File Sharing:
File sharing is literally what it says. It is the action of a company or individual sharing files with others. Wikipedia define it as "the practice of distributing or providing access to digitally stored information".

Vertical Integration:
Vertical integration is a business structure. It is the combination in a single company, of 2 or more stages of production often operated by 2 seperate companies.Apple Inc. have been listed as an example of vertical integration, specifically with many elements of the ecosystem for the iPhone and iPad.  Hardware itself is not typically manufactured by Apple, but is outsourced to contract manufacturers who manufacture Apple's branded products to their specifications.

Synergy:
Synergy is the co operation of 2 different companies and combination of 2 things which at the end make something greater than what the companies originally began off with.

Convergence:
Media Convergence is the merging of mass communication outlets (such as television and internet) along with other technologies. It allows professionals to tell stories, present information using a variety of media.

Copyright:
Copyright refers to the laws that regulate the use of the work of the creator.

Conventions:
A convention is the way in which something is usually done especially within a particular area.

Demographic:
A demographic is a statistic characterizing human populations.

Download:
A download is a copy of something - picture, song, film etc from one system to another or a seperate disk.

Hardware:
Hardware is the physical components which make up a system.

Independent:
To be independent something solely operates by itself, it does not rely on any outside body.

Subsidiary: 
Something which is subsidiary is less important but still relevant to the task in question. For example, a subsidiary company, is a company which is not totally responsible, but is still relevant to the main business. An example of a subsidiary business would be Warner Communications who is a subsidiary to Time Warner Inc.

Horizontal Integration:
Horizontal Integration is where an organisation develops by buying up competitors in the same section of the market. An example of horizontal integration would be when one music publisher buys out other smaller music publishers.

The Big 3:
The Big Three Television Networks are the three traditional commercial broadcast television networks in the United States. The three networks are: NBC, ABC and CBS.

Changes in Music Production compared to the 20th century.

With the changes in music consumption greatly different to the 20th century. There is no doubt at all that there had to be changes to music production. Following, I have copied small areas of sites explaining this change, then below I've explained each of these changes in my own words. I copied the paragraphs because they contain the vocabulary necessary for the exam, but explained them in my own words so I can get a better grip of it. 

Music Production change from the 20th Century to present day.

"In the first part of the 20th century the record producer's role was similar to the role of a film producer in that the record producer organized and supervised recording sessions, paidtechnicians, musicians and arrangers, and sometimes chose material for the artist.In the first part of the 20th century the record producer's role was similar to the role of a film producer in that the record producer organized and supervised recording sessions, paidtechnicians, musicians and arrangers, and sometimes chose material for the artist."

In the early 20th century, music producers were responsible for everything to do with music, except that actual singing of the song. They organized and supervised everything that was taking place while the music was being produced. I feel a good comparison is drawn between the music producer and the film producer. A film producer today is known for the many tasks they carry out that oversee the success of a film, in the early 20th century, music producers too had this role

"Prior to the 1950s, the various stages of the recording and marketing process had been carried out by different professionals within the industry – A&R managers found potential new artists and signed them to their labels; professional songwriters created new material; publishing agents sold these songs to the A&R people; staff engineers carried out the task of making the recordings in company-owned studios."

Before the 1950's, there was a lot of people involved in the different stages associated with music production. This meant a lot of time and effort had to be spent on finding the correct people for the correct jobs, some of the neccessary staff included:

• Managers - People to find the artist, convince them to create a song/album and then signing that artist up.
• Songwriters - people to write a new and original song.
• Agents- these people were those responsible for the marketing process, they were the ones who sold these songs to people, who then in turn created these songs into big sellers.
• Artists - to actually record the song.
• Engineers - to carry out the task of creating a new record, maintaining that record and ensuring that technical problems had been sorted before recording could even begin.

We could present this hierarchy of people necessary for the correct production of music could be shown in a diagram such as the waterfall model:

"Another change that occurred for the role of producers occurred progressively over the 1950s and 1960s. The development of multitrack recording and new technology such as electric guitars, amplifiers, and better microphones led to a fundamental change in the way recordings were made. The goal of recording no longer was simply accurately capturing and documenting live performance. Instead producers could manipulate sounds to an unprecedented degree, in practical terms, almost impossible to realise in live performance."

I think this paragraph explains in simple tierms that with the growth of new technologys throughout the 50's and 60's, things such as autotuning became more accessible, so therefore less time had to spent and therefore money in re-recording over and over again, an artist could simply perform once, and then that performance could be manipulated in order to sound perfect, and the difference was almost impossible for the ordinary person to see.

"With the turn of the 21st Century along with the focus on digital audio workstation (DAW) technology, a record producer's role is expected to include many skills. Most producers have roles insongwriting, music composition, sound engineering and audio mastering."

As seen in the diagram above, previously, in the 20th century, many people were required to carry out each individual task. As the 21st century arrived, it was more required of producers to have all of the skills neccessary to complete each of these tasks. Therefore reducing the number of people required from what could range from as little as 10 to as much as over 50 or 60 people. This meant a lot of money could be spent on other tasks such as the actual marketing of music. 

** Digital audio workstation(DAW) - is an electronic system designed for recording, editing and playing back digital audio. There are different types of DAW, the 2 main are:

• Integrated DAW - This is a mixing console, control surface, audio converter and data storage all on one device. An example includes a hard disk recorder.
• Software DAW - This is the more popular form today. Integrated DAW was more popular at the end of the 20th century and beginning of the 21st, when technology was still a relatively new concept.  This can be run on almost any computer, popular software DAW include FL Studio 10.

"With the increase in demand for music videos on-line such as on YouTube, the traditional tasks of a record producer for independent artists are beginning to include such visual and filmmakingaspects as well. Independent producers such as Korean Producer PSY who produced the world famous Viral Video Gangnam Style, Los Angeles Record Producer Clarence Jey who was instrumental in the song Friday by Rebecca Black, as well as Australian Producer Gotye who produced the chart topping hit song Somebody That I Used to Know, performed a broader role in coordinating the music to match the appropriate visual content along with a Viral Marketing campaign."

In this paragraph, with various examples given, this examples now, more than ever, many producers/singers/songwriters, are opting to take on all three role due to this new viral age we are living in. The people who are singing the song are actually now getting involved with the production of the music. This has become a big deal recently, because people can now just upload their own video to youtube, with themselves singing, and virtually they have become all three of these roles. This could suggest that from the previous need for one producer to be able to adopt all aspects of production, there is actually only one person required in the actual  creationg,singing,marketing of one track.

Gotye(seen above) is the perfect example of this in action. Whether you like his music or not is different thing all together, but he created his video, his song and his music. He is by himself, a producer, a distributor, an artist and a manager all rolled into one. And it isn't an extravagent claim to say that the video for Somebody that I used to know was certainly eye-catching, suggesting that this new form of production is actually having a greater effect on the music consumers of today.

Music Consumption

Clarify definition - what do we mean by music consumption?

Music consumption is ultimately the way in which we consume music. How do we listen, deal with, buy, share music. 

Before the technological revolution so to speak, how was music consumed?

I suspect this is before stage would be referring to the generation before me. I spoke to my parents about this and they said that when they were teenagers, there was no such thing as cds, dvds, internet etc. They listened to their music by buying a record, a cassette or listening to the radio. Even the radio, which isn't as big today, wasn't widely available, in the 1960's in the UK there was still no UK-based commercial radio. IT seems records were the common form of music consumption, my dad can still recall the first record he bought. I think also attending concerts was a bigger deal back then too because now people don't actually need to attend a concert to see it, they can watch it online, with many services offering live broadcasts/repeats and DVD's. 

What is the digital revolution?

The exact definition of the digital revolution is: "the advancement of technology from analog, electronic and mechanical devices to the digital devices available today." The era started during the 1980's and is ongoing today.

How has this transformed the ways in which audiences consume music? Consider both legal and non legal methods ie file sharing; streaming of live concerts (U2 on youtube example, buying concerts on Sky etc); putting live concert on USBs after the show etc. 

This has definitely changed the way in which we now consume music, as previously mentioned, people before bought records, went to concerts to get the full experience of an artist/band. Now-a-days, people can get that same experience sitting in the comfort of their own living room.

Audiences more than ever today are making use of the different media available to them, I would consider myself also part of this audience. Why should someone pay sometimes more than £100 to view a concert, when they can stream it free online, watch it later on youtube, or buy it off their television provider. Well that is a personal opinion. 

With platforms such as youtube, lovefilm, nowtv etc. the prospect of buying films on dvd or bluray seems a bit silly, why should a person pay up to £20 for a HD dvd, when they could just as easily get the same quality for £5 a month from subscription services such as lovefilm and now tv. And with the growth of illegal sites such as 1channel, solarmovie and motionempire, people are more and more leaving the legal options behind and opting for these free streaming services. In 2011, it was reported by the bbc that illegal download figures in the UK were up by 30%, and there has been no report of these figures falling. This same perspective could be applied to music, with services such as tubidy, songlover and musicskull all offering the free download of songs and/or their music videos, people are less likely to be spending money buying a song or album. The digital revolution introduced the use of the internet, and the internet is what is providing all of these sites allowing for this sort of activity. 

With the use of torrents significantly on the increase, people are able to download films directly from the internet, compressed, then decompress them, burn them to a disk, and play them in the same quality which they would get with a normal dvd. These free services are well known to civil authorities and law enforcement, yet because it is so widespread, and the majority of downloads are for personal use and entertainment ( not illegal films like snuff,child porn etc) action isn't taken. I can't see either any time when action will be taken. As i previously mentioned, government news bodies, like the BBC are reporting on this sort of crime, but in reality, I think you could go as far to suggest that they just don't care. 

I would like to do further research in this area. 

Along with digital consumption, what other ways do people still consume music and it's related products today? CD sales? Concert tickets?

I'm going to contradict myself here and say that concert tickets are still widely sold. Figures released by many news websites revealed that tickets for Glastonbury 2013, sold out in 100 minutes,a record for the festival, and considering that this first round comprised of 140,000 tickets, it would be difficult to argue that people don't still attend concerts. We hear even of small festivals such as belsonic, or tours by bands/artists selling out in under an hour and this again is proof for us of the ever present interest in concerts. CD's as a piece of hardware, I would have to argue are falling. We can see through large retail chains such as HMV that this is true. I'm not saying people are necessarily opting for the illegal option, but with online sites like itunes, they now have the option to buy and download a whole album to their computer from these stores. According to the guardian, a total of only 163.4 million albums were sold in the UK in 2012, when we compare this to the 100 million sold by only one band in 1982, we can see a strong difference to today. I think the main methods of consumption for people today is either download straight from internet - illegally or legally and attending concerts. I'm glad that attending concerts is still a big one because I think that everyone deserves to experience that atmosphere.

Music in the 21st Century

In relation to the music usage in the last 10 years I used my answer to a previous question as I feel it targetted all key points:

It is obvious that music consuption trends have changed greatly since the 90's. We listen to music in a profoundly different way than we did in the 20th century I believe that a reason to explain this is the introduction of Apple products. Althopugh they didnt invent the portable music player, the vision of Steve Jobs and his company of designers and engineers changed our listening landscape dramatically in 2001 with iTunes and the iPod. Concerts and merchandise are obviously still big favourites with music fans everywhere however their popularity is having no difference - or very little on the revenue of the music industry. Therefore I believe it is essential to focus on the consumption methods which are deeply affecting the music industry, whether that be driving profits up or creating a loss. I don't ever believe there will be a time when music is not listened to or enjoyed, however we need to recognize that there are changes occuring in how we listen to and enjoy our music. As digital music consumption increases and becomes more varied, it is important for artists and consumers to find new ways to engage with the digital landscape - for example, digital music services such as Spotify. They are helping drive this argument by providing a musical discovery and sharing platform which caters for modern consumers, while suppporting the artist and driving increasing revenues back into the music industry. However while we can see that services such as Spotify aim to increase revenues, this is infact not the case, it has shown that sales, especially in albums between the period of 99 and 09 have fell 8% each year. With revenues falling to $6.3billion in 2009, a huge difference compared to the $14.6billion of 1999. The actual sale of music has also proven to have fallen with only 44% of americans who pay for music online believing that that music is worth paying for. Also the volume of anauthorized downloads is not showing any sign of slowing down, as it represents about 90% of the market (according to online download tracker Big Champagne). Music artists are not oblivious to this volume of illegal downloads. Dan Ingala the lead singer of band Plushgun said, 2People will steal music regardless, so it's not worth trying to fight against something where the fights already over." Indeed, he is talking from experience, as when his band released its album on popular site What.cd, it was the most downloaded track with more than 10,000 illegally downloaded tracks. So, for my personal opinion. With some rsearch and examination of graphs illustrating these topics and my own personal experience, I believe that consumption of music has most definitely changed in the 21st century, many will put this down to the double recession we experienced, however I would say that the reasons for this change in comsumption trends has happened simply because the greater platform through which we access music. The only change the 90's had to experience was that from cassette and vinyl to CD. As a teenager, I would most likely agree, that downloading music is a much easier, stress free, cheaper way of getting music, rather than attempting to go the through the process of purchasing it. Therefore, in conclusion, I believe that while consumption trends are changing, consumption levels will not change and that downloading music - legally or illegally is the future. However, no one can predict the future, if we could we would all be millionaires!