The Grammy's: Part of the cause or effect of the fall of the current music industry?

[l0ckd0wn]

I had a friend post this on FB and with that a reply that I agreed with. I retorted what I put following:


The Grammys saluting Steve Jobs twice tonight when all he did for the music business was put it to a slow death. As I type this from my iPhone of course. Yes people. The mp3 has killed the music business. When's the last time you held an album cover in your hands?

His buddies' response:


I've got to disagree with you guys.

The medium of the music (vinyl, casette, cd, mp3) doesn't damage a person's ability to enjoy it. More than just vinyl enthused audiophiles can enjoy a good song.

What did destroy the music business, is the music business. By commercializing music and turning it into a "what's hot" commodity wherein every song is just part of a passing phase, it has made it difficult for people to really connect with music (and musicians) in a meaningful way.

When was the last time you put on an album (vinyl, cd, digital), and just listened to the entire thing to appreciate it? iTunes may have made it easier to buy songs piecemeal, but it did not introduce the idea. Most people were already in the habit of buying a cd (or downloading illegally) and only listening to the hits. Apple was just an opportunist ready to exploit peoples' pre-existing disrespect for the art.

My response:

I have to agree with Andrew. Blaming iTunes/Apple for the slow demise of the "big 3" of the Music Industry is like blaming your treadmill for you not running on it and still being fat. Their business plans began to implode with the mass adoption of the internet. With the consumer development of digitizing audio to sizes that were manageable along with the near perfect duplication of CDs it was only a period of time before the distribution medium was becoming to expensive with the availability of high quality digital content (where we are right now). The studios are now racing to try and "fix" their bad business models by trying to influence public policy in a way that punishes the masses instead of actually fixing the problem - A classic sign of treating the symptoms and not treating the illness. Had the big studios colluded on a digital distribution method that rivals iTunes, Beatport, Juno Download, Rhapsody and all the other digital music distribution schemes we wouldn't be having this conversation and the market would be purely dictated by what the users want rather than creating the artists they market.

But, we don't have that, and we are still bound by a music industry that is looking to profit off of models that punish their audiences rather than nurture, placate or bribe them. See RIAA and likewise the MPAA for movies. If you look at the video game world, which IMO offers up much richer content than a 80min CD on average, for games as little as $5-10 you get 10s-100s of hours of play time. Some games go as high as $60 a pop. Now you look at the average price of a CD @ $15 for any major studio release and , if you are lucky and get 80min, is the content viewed as being worth that much? Generally, no. So the next best alternative in a physical media is $5-$7 for a CD single that might have a few remixes on it, maybe an additional track by the artist. And yet you can right now buy that track online for $0.99 and if you mess up that file, there is a great chance that the service you purchased the file through can replace it for you - This is impossible when buying a physical medium, and even then you only own the right to PLAY the content and you only actually own the foil and plastic of the CD, with no guarantee that you can replace it without paying full price or buying it used.


Any ideas, comments?

Discuss.

[Smallz]

The mp3 and distribution has not killed the music industry. It's transformed it, and all the big record companies have no idea how to cope with it. Nowadays you see every artist trying to create their own label to push their stuff out there in order to get around these companies. For a bunch of unknown artists a while ago, things like the mp3 and internet sites such as myspace were godsends because it was so much easier to put their music out there to such a massive audience.

And there was no way the Grammys weren't going to acknowledge Steve Jobs with the creation of iTunes being such a polarizing mechanism for music distribution.

[login]

http://vimeo.com/34608191

The music industry is not dead, the players are changing, the economic models behind it are transforming. There is still a place for majors since people really like pop.

[l0ckd0wn]

The music industry is not dead, the players are changing, the economic models behind it are transforming. There is still a place for majors since people really like pop.

I have a problem with the way you worded this and I think that is where I'm coming to odds with this statement...

The music industry will never die, per se, but it will change as you said, however the major players have not changed their business models. The majors is just a place for pop and artists that want to sign up to be in the "signed artist" circus. Not everyone seeks this path to acknowledgement and fame, mostly because we are seeing the evolution and birthing of artists that skew the lines of "radio ready" tunes. The artist power and exposure might be larger than ever, but that is in no way related to the music industry at large and really only speaks for the ease of information sharing via the internet.

[Sigma]

I think both guys have a point.

Before the Internet was around, I bought music from local record stores. I got to know the staff and other people that shopped there. In one shop, the owner would put records aside for me cos he knew I'd almost certainly buy them, so he was helping me to discover music. I would buy music magazines and papers just to read reviews of albums and find out what was coming out, cos that was the only way to do it. I had access to a slice of what was out there, but I wasn't overwhelmed with choice and I always found and bought plenty of good music. I have memories attached to certain albums simply because I can remember the day I bought them, or part of a conversation I had with someone in the shop on that day, or the anticipation of checking the record racks to see if it was in stock or what not.

I think some of that magic is lost with the Internet. Obviously, it has advantages of its own. If I want to ID a track, I can Google some of the lyrics or I can use apps like Shazam and SoundHound. Back in the day I'd go into a record store and say "do you know the one that goes....." and then be humming a track like a fucking idiot, lol. But it's kinda like walking into the biggest unstaffed self-service record shop in the world. Some of the human aspect is gone. I have no stories to tell or fond memories about the day I downloaded an album from the Internet. Whether people write that of as some romantic/nostalgic idea, it's still real.

Also, the way music is "designed" now is a little different I think. An album used to be a body of work designed to be listened to from beginning to end. Some singles would be released from it, sure, but if you were into the artist you bought the whole album. You'd have to play it a side at a time on your record player, so you got to hear the tracks you hadn't heard as singles and some you would grow to love, maybe over time. Now you can just go and say "I want tracks 1, 4, 6, and 8" and you may never get to hear the rest. The concept of the album as an album, rather than a collection of singles with a couple of fillers, seems to have been somewhat lost, although it obviously hasn't disappeared altogether and of course there were "collections of singles with a couple of fillers" back in the vinyl days too. The balance has shifted though.

But that said, I think the second guy you quoted has a stronger point. The record labels and big corps control more of the airwaves (TV and radio) than they ever have. Music is seen more like a commodity. They want to bang out the pop hits or sign up that Internet sensation that's already part of the way there and they put less time into nurturing upcoming artists. There's less risk taking. With hip-hop especially, sampling laws changed too and that prevented lots of albums from being made simply because a producer can't afford to pay $100,000 up front to clear a 10 second sample of some old 60s track.

So in a nutshell, I think the problem now is that you have the majors controlling more of what we hear on the radio and see on TV, and a way to go and quickly buy just those songs. To someone that's not a music head (music heads will always seek shit out, no matter what), that leads to their taste being somewhat more constrained I think, which obviously affects what they buy and on the cycle goes. We're DJs, so seeking out tracks is part of what we do. We may see the Internet is this great tool for music discovery - which it can be - but that's because for us it starts with the desire to seek stuff out. For the ****** music listener it's not like that.

[Paulie65m]

http://vimeo.com/34608191

The music industry is not dead, the players are changing, the economic models behind it are transforming. There is still a place for majors since people really like pop.

watched 40 min so far, really good also inspiring me lol :tup:

[BuddyUK]

Moby is full of shit, he started out releasing records on a network of independent labels with independent distribution to independent shops, sold lots of records (the very fromat the majors were trying to drop)and troubled the pop charts all over Europe, the majors did what they did and eventually bought out those independent labels, unable to compete with them making them subsidiaries, Moby went with them and sold his arse to EMI etc. and collecting his filthy lucre Also who the fuck has a 35mm camera and cutting equipment? Democrotisation my arse. Also Hank Shocklee has had deals with the majors since the 80's, also the RED cameras sell at around £60K, affordable my arse. 21:00 BULLSHIT people on the dole were making, cuttiing and distributing their records in the UK 20 years ago, where do you think all those white labels came from? Corporations bought out the indepenndents, the shops closed, distributors were closed, the music industry couldn't compete so they bought them out and shut them down, pretty much turned it off after that. Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. you pretty much have 4 choices nowadays, do it yourself and lose money, give it away and lose money, go to beatport or youtube or whoever and make them money or hope for some grammys or whatever and cash in while you can.

[bernardgregory]

Award shows are crap. Just more of the industry telling you what to like.

[login]

U mad bro?

Why the majors never bought EDM labels?

[BuddyUK]

They did you twat, they bought up labels and signed artists like crazy in the 90's

[moyo wilde]

my two cents on the reasons for the fall:

digitizing made it too easy to create an pretty much exact copy for cheap.

shoddy product the lp is a dying art form because digital music changed the way most people listen to music. in addition the industry spends to much time making artists sound like the new flavor.

downloading/bootlegging people can now get music for free easily. have a friend who wants to sell his music, i told him he needs to give it away. i asked him "when was the last time you bought music?" no answer blank stare.

[mrkleen]

Now you look at the average price of a CD @ $15 for any major studio release and , if you are lucky and get 80min, is the content viewed as being worth that much?

This was the start of the downfall of the music business. CDs have always been WAY over priced. If major labels offered full CDs with the artwork and extras for $4 or $5 15 years ago (which would have STILL ensured they made a plenty of money) - they might have made Napster redundant and saved their business model for a few more years. But in the long run - change is inevitable and being able to carry around music on a portable device was coming - one way or another.

If labels had gotten on board earlier, they could have developed their own "Napster" or "Itunes" - but they cant agree on anything, so we got what we got. All Steve Jobs did was capitalize on a dying distribution model - and show them a new way to make money.

[jazzyj]

The performers of the early early generation probably said something similar when the first vinyl was born...

Vinyl generation said the same of the 8-track generation.... 8-track generation said the same of the cassette gen... Cassette gen said the same of the CD gen... CD gen said the same thing of the MP3 gen....

And now the MP3 gen will say the same thing of the Streaming gen... and the Streaming gen will say the same thing of the Infinity Chip gen.... etc etc...

[Manu]

people will always get hold of the music they want, regardless of what technology is used.

[login]

They did you twat, they bought up labels and signed artists like crazy in the 90's

Yeah but must of eletronic music labels remains independent. Why other genres can't do it too?

[Skeyelab]

I hear a lot of people complaining that would want nothing more than to win a Grammy.

[Skeyelab]

Yeah but must of eletronic music labels remains independent. Why other genres can't do it too?

because they want to make money. they don't want to book 400 person events in clubs, they want to book tours of 15,000 events in arenas

[RDRCK]

http://vimeo.com/34608191

The music industry is not dead, the players are changing, the economic models behind it are transforming. There is still a place for majors since people really like pop.

A few minutes in, and the first thing I thought was, "Jeez, Apparat has an enormous head!"

Seriously, that thing must have it's own satellites!

[l0ckd0wn]

Good discussion. Sigma, MrKleen, gotta spread it around. Jazzy, good points. Moyo, I absolutely love Moby, but I've always found him unrealistic in his idealistic points of view. I have similar convictions as he about similar things, but it's a question of reality vs. an improbable world view.

Oh and Skyelab; who wouldn't want to earn a gold trophy from the defacto mainstream authority? It's publicity guarantees popularity and exposure. Consider the Academy Awards and foreign films - It's one of the only way the "mainstream" of the US has of getting exposure to foreign films. (This is totally discounting premium cable channels like Sundance because even those that have this station don't normally watch it and await critic reviews.)

[jay melis]

Apple doesn't sell mp3's :/

People also had a big hand in destroying the music industry.

I will get back into this topic later... first some other things to do!

[KLH]

I agree with a lot that's been said. MP3s did NOT destroy the music business. The market for music has actually grown. Unfortunately- like porn - the profits haven't.

In the past, people have paid for the distribution of music via inflated media pricing. Now that that is gone, we're seeing money being spent for ONLY the music.

-KLH

-KLH

[NickyNines]

I don't think the Grammy's have anything to do with it. It's that darn technology and dissemination of information...

It's the now era and the mainstream people want everything right away. Quick money, quick cash, and quick catchy songs. Some of my friends that "hated" EDM loved the build ups and break downs, but didn't have enough patience to wait for them. What is your average pop song 2-3 minutes. Average EDM song more like 5-7 minutes.

Along with that, I think people get bored of new music quicker as well. On one side you have less quality in production. People are rushing songs out of the gate to be the next hit instead of taking there time with the track to make something that is really creative and could potentially stand the test of time. You look at an artists first ep that is solid, and it probably took them a year or two to put together. Then all of a sudden they release a track every week that has a similar sound and is no where near as good.

On the other side people get everything as soon as it comes out, so they are always on the search for whats next. Been there... heard that... type of attitude. So instead of appreciating something it is more disposable. This makes some artists want to do the bare minimum after they get some name recognition.