4 ms·

15 years ago, a niche artist could earn tens of thousands a year by selling CDs and especially digital albums. Not enough to make a living, but definitely an e

by vemv 7y ago

15 years ago, a niche artist could earn tens of thousands a year by selling CDs and especially digital albums. Not enough to make a living, but definitely an encouraging amount that enabled touring and buying more music gear. Now in the Spotify days that same artist would earn essentially nothing. This "saving" of the music industry is just a temporary patch that works by redistributing niche money to the mainstream. It should be quite evident (or at least intuitive) that 90% of Spotify subscribers are niche (deep into rock, electronic, hip hop etc) and couldn't care less about saving the old industry. Soon this will become unsustainable (even more than today). Source https://www.residentadvisor.net/features/3511 https://www.residentadvisor.net/features/3511

djaychela 7y ago
Was going to say much the same here. I release trance music with a friend of mine (nothing serious, just a couple of friends who spend an evening a week working on music together), and have done for years. Pre-spotify, we used to make some money from sales of tracks - not a lot, but enough to have a few nights out here and there. Now we make literally nothing, due to the way that royalties are paid - we see tiny (£0.0001-scale) royalty payments for the hundreds of listens that the tracks get, where we used to sell a few tracks a week. Most spotify listeners assume that their monthly payment goes to the artists they listen to, but that couldn't be further from the truth.
- TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
  For a long time the industry relied on an external cultural of independent producers and distributors - all genres, not necessarily "indie" music - to keep the system running. The indies generated, promoted, and distributed the next generation of music. The majors would then either sign the bigger artists or buy out the bigger indie labels. Both would get rolled into the big machine and the cycle would start again. Spotify has killed that. Never mind earning money - indie artists can't get significant exposure. Not from unit sales, not from touring, not from streaming, not from anything. Sooner or later someone is going to realise that an indie-Spotify has to be a thing, because there's always going to be a significant market for people who want to discover non-mainstream music and music is going to stagnate and choke on its own products if the main distribution system is a monopoly.
  - ubercow13 7y ago
    I don’t understand this take. Can’t indie artists get their music ok Spotify? How is the situation worse for them?
    - superpermutat0r 7y ago
      Big labels negotiated good deals for their own artists so royalties from streaming benefit them, not the indie artists. Although, music industry is even worse. A pyramid scheme where old, still living artists negotiated big deals and the label gives peanuts to new.
- IshKebab 7y ago
  > Most spotify listeners assume that their monthly payment goes to the artists they listen to, but that couldn't be further from the truth Yeah I assumed the pay a flat rate per listen to the artist. > Spotify pays about $0.006 to $0.0084 per stream to the holder of music rights. Which is pretty flat, and you should have got at least a dollar surely. Is this not the case?
  - isostatic 7y ago
    > For example, Spotify says that its average payout for a stream to labels and publishers is between $0.006 and $0.0084 but Information Is Beautiful suggests that the average payment to an artist from the label portion of that is $0.001128 – this being what a signed artist receives after the label's share https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/03/how-much-musicians-make-spotify-itunes-youtube https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/03/how-much-... This seems to clear it up > We aggregate all of this revenue from these two streams, and distribute back 70% in royalties based on a pro rata share in accordance with the popularity of a piece of music. For example, if one of your songs has been streamed 1% of the total number of streams in a month, you will get 1% of the 70% of royalties we pay out to rights holders. http://www.musicthinktank.com/mtt-open/how-does-spotify-pay-artists-an-answer-that-makes-sense.html http://www.musicthinktank.com/mtt-open/how-does-spotify-pay-... If the latter is true, let’s assume everyone pays $15 a month for Spotify and there’s 1 million subscribers each listening to 1000 songs a month 900k listen to Ed Sheeran exclusively 1000 times 100k listen 1 times to each of 100 indie bands. Total revenue $15m Total royalties $10m Ed Sheehan gets 900m listens Each indie band gets 100k listens - total 10m listens Ed Sheehan gets $9.9m Each indie band gets $1k You’d think that the $15 the Indy subscriber would pay would go equally to the 100 bands - giving 15k per band, and 9.4m for Ed, but it apparently doesn’t work that way. Those who binge listen are subsidised by those who listen rarely. That’s my understanding anyway, but it seems to be based on a line from an “artist in residence”
    - imtringued 7y ago
      It's obvious when you think about it. Artists get paid per stream but users only pay per month. When someone listens to more streams than they have paid for, the money has to be taken from someone who has listened to less streams than they paid for.
wodenokoto 7y ago
> It should be quite evident (or at least intuitive) that 90% of Spotify subscribers are niche (deep into rock, electronic, hip hop etc) Not at all evident or intuitive
- vemv 7y ago
  People who care enough about music to pay a monthly fee, surely are also invested enough to develop their own tastes? IOW, who pays for listening to "radio" (Top 40) music? There's an audience for Top 40 music, but they will typically belong to the ad-supported tier of Spotify, not the paying tier.
  - Spivak 7y ago
    I exist as a counterpoint. I pay for Spotify because I have terrible taste in music, zero idea how to cultivate it, but want to listen to music when I do things. I pretty much just search a vibe and let some rando’s playlist take it away.
    - flurdy 7y ago
      Same here, I'm not deep into music, but I have it playing in the background all the time. And I hate ads. So I have gone from buying 1 or less music CD per year to happily paying a monthly subscription for over 10 years. And mostly for playing songs from the 90s and current charts. Without adds and offline on my mobile. It is the hassle-freeness I pay for. Though the previously good suggestions and Discover Weekly has turned rubbish since my kids started to use my account on my ipad. Hurry up 2027 when my youngest turn 13 and they can all legally have their own Spotify acounts...
      - dajohnson89 7y ago
        you may not have sophisticated taste, but i suspect the top 40 fare played on FM radio stations wouldn't cut it for you.this is what op meant
Sharlin 7y ago
> And even more perniciously, I think, are the playlists curated by utility. Like "showering music." I mean, that's offensive. It's an offensive concept. And so that's one level of it. I push back against that notion, just because I think that it's offensive and barbarian. Yeah, fuck Spotify for catering to different ways that people like to enjoy music. I guess he finds traditional music radio offensive as well, never mind mixtapes or the shuffle button on a CD player…

by vemv 7y ago

djaychela 7y ago

Was going to say much the same here. I release trance music with a friend of mine (nothing serious, just a couple of friends who spend an evening a week working on music together), and have done for years. Pre-spotify, we used to make some money from sales of tracks - not a lot, but enough to have a few nights out here and there. Now we make literally nothing, due to the way that royalties are paid - we see tiny (£0.0001-scale) royalty payments for the hundreds of listens that the tracks get, where we used to sell a few tracks a week. Most spotify listeners assume that their monthly payment goes to the artists they listen to, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
For a long time the industry relied on an external cultural of independent producers and distributors - all genres, not necessarily "indie" music - to keep the system running. The indies generated, promoted, and distributed the next generation of music. The majors would then either sign the bigger artists or buy out the bigger indie labels. Both would get rolled into the big machine and the cycle would start again. Spotify has killed that. Never mind earning money - indie artists can't get significant exposure. Not from unit sales, not from touring, not from streaming, not from anything. Sooner or later someone is going to realise that an indie-Spotify has to be a thing, because there's always going to be a significant market for people who want to discover non-mainstream music and music is going to stagnate and choke on its own products if the main distribution system is a monopoly.
- ubercow13 7y ago
  I don’t understand this take. Can’t indie artists get their music ok Spotify? How is the situation worse for them?
  - superpermutat0r 7y ago
    Big labels negotiated good deals for their own artists so royalties from streaming benefit them, not the indie artists. Although, music industry is even worse. A pyramid scheme where old, still living artists negotiated big deals and the label gives peanuts to new.
IshKebab 7y ago
> Most spotify listeners assume that their monthly payment goes to the artists they listen to, but that couldn't be further from the truth Yeah I assumed the pay a flat rate per listen to the artist. > Spotify pays about $0.006 to $0.0084 per stream to the holder of music rights. Which is pretty flat, and you should have got at least a dollar surely. Is this not the case?
- isostatic 7y ago
  > For example, Spotify says that its average payout for a stream to labels and publishers is between $0.006 and $0.0084 but Information Is Beautiful suggests that the average payment to an artist from the label portion of that is $0.001128 – this being what a signed artist receives after the label's share https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/03/how-much-musicians-make-spotify-itunes-youtube https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/03/how-much-... This seems to clear it up > We aggregate all of this revenue from these two streams, and distribute back 70% in royalties based on a pro rata share in accordance with the popularity of a piece of music. For example, if one of your songs has been streamed 1% of the total number of streams in a month, you will get 1% of the 70% of royalties we pay out to rights holders. http://www.musicthinktank.com/mtt-open/how-does-spotify-pay-artists-an-answer-that-makes-sense.html http://www.musicthinktank.com/mtt-open/how-does-spotify-pay-... If the latter is true, let’s assume everyone pays $15 a month for Spotify and there’s 1 million subscribers each listening to 1000 songs a month 900k listen to Ed Sheeran exclusively 1000 times 100k listen 1 times to each of 100 indie bands. Total revenue $15m Total royalties $10m Ed Sheehan gets 900m listens Each indie band gets 100k listens - total 10m listens Ed Sheehan gets $9.9m Each indie band gets $1k You’d think that the $15 the Indy subscriber would pay would go equally to the 100 bands - giving 15k per band, and 9.4m for Ed, but it apparently doesn’t work that way. Those who binge listen are subsidised by those who listen rarely. That’s my understanding anyway, but it seems to be based on a line from an “artist in residence”
  - imtringued 7y ago
    It's obvious when you think about it. Artists get paid per stream but users only pay per month. When someone listens to more streams than they have paid for, the money has to be taken from someone who has listened to less streams than they paid for.

wodenokoto 7y ago

> It should be quite evident (or at least intuitive) that 90% of Spotify subscribers are niche (deep into rock, electronic, hip hop etc) Not at all evident or intuitive

vemv 7y ago
People who care enough about music to pay a monthly fee, surely are also invested enough to develop their own tastes? IOW, who pays for listening to "radio" (Top 40) music? There's an audience for Top 40 music, but they will typically belong to the ad-supported tier of Spotify, not the paying tier.
- Spivak 7y ago
  I exist as a counterpoint. I pay for Spotify because I have terrible taste in music, zero idea how to cultivate it, but want to listen to music when I do things. I pretty much just search a vibe and let some rando’s playlist take it away.
  - flurdy 7y ago
    Same here, I'm not deep into music, but I have it playing in the background all the time. And I hate ads. So I have gone from buying 1 or less music CD per year to happily paying a monthly subscription for over 10 years. And mostly for playing songs from the 90s and current charts. Without adds and offline on my mobile. It is the hassle-freeness I pay for. Though the previously good suggestions and Discover Weekly has turned rubbish since my kids started to use my account on my ipad. Hurry up 2027 when my youngest turn 13 and they can all legally have their own Spotify acounts...
    - dajohnson89 7y ago
      you may not have sophisticated taste, but i suspect the top 40 fare played on FM radio stations wouldn't cut it for you.this is what op meant

Sharlin 7y ago

> And even more perniciously, I think, are the playlists curated by utility. Like "showering music." I mean, that's offensive. It's an offensive concept. And so that's one level of it. I push back against that notion, just because I think that it's offensive and barbarian. Yeah, fuck Spotify for catering to different ways that people like to enjoy music. I guess he finds traditional music radio offensive as well, never mind mixtapes or the shuffle button on a CD player…