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Is it actually the case that signing record contracts was always a bad deal for artists? I was under the impression that they reduced risk for artists who could

Is it actually the case that signing record contracts was always a bad deal for artists? I was under the impression that they reduced risk for artists who could then use money from the contract as a more stable source of income to pay for, say, childcare expenses.

tptacek 12y ago
That is my understanding as well; in particular, a lot of popular mythologies about artists "recouping" and being stiffed on royalties seem to be just that: mythological. Here's a good post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3850935 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3850935
- 6stringmerc 12y ago
  Actually, it's not a myth; see the above link to what Steve Albini wrote if you'd like to get more educated and enhance your understanding of a very calculating and explotative business model.
  - tptacek 12y ago
    Serious question: how much do you actually know about Steve Albini? Are you a Big Black fan? Are you at all acquainted with the Chicago punk scene he's from? Have you read anything else he's written, for instance about any band not from that scene? Or, for that matter, any of the story of his business relationship with the labels? And you know how he makes his money, right? (hint: not by touring Shellac). (I am an unabashed and somewhat obsessive Albini fan). I think at this point you can safely assume that anyone writing an opinion about the music industry has read that old Albini zine post. If you'd read Lowery's post, I think you'd see that he in several ways rebuts it.
    - 6stringmerc 12y ago
      I've followed him enough, can't stand his music because it sounds like noisy, barely competent shit to me and I know he makes his money just like Timbaland makes his money - getting paid on the back-end for production work. I can safely assume that most everybody has NOT read that article based on the ridiculous notion that somehow the music industry has changed its principles and methods since my family got started in the business in the late 1960s. Why would I take seriously a person who says "Sound recordings are not cheap to make" and goes on to state "Artists still have to pay for that highly skilled labor" when frankly neither of these are true? Maybe it is for musicians who live in a 1960-1995 dynamic, but I have more computing and music making power and ability in my home studio than I know what to do with. Recording studios are dying by the dozens. For all the talk of disruption, that's one legacy industry that is taking it on the chin. Lowery is part of the problem, not the solution. Plus he tosses out anecdotes like "For a very long period of time record labels provided a decent living to thousands of lucky artists" and cites...nothing... So the most ground breaking conclusion he has is Free+Streaming+Digital Sales? WOW. It's my business model for the past 10 years! Boy did I learn something from this guy! Oh, wait, no I didn't. That link is one of the most rambling and thinly veiled self-serving "discussions" of music in the new digital environment. I'll eventually study it more, simply to use it as cannon fodder for rebuttals. Thanks for sharing, I can always use more proof I know what I'm doing is right.
      - tptacek 12y ago
        I can't tell whether you're talking about Albini or Lowery here. I think Albini is shackled to view of the industry that rejects anything that doesn't sound like The Jesus Lizard. For a good example of this: read the very long thread on the Electric Audio message board where his fans try to find a hip-hop track he'll like.
anigbrowl 12y ago
No, of course not. Bear in mind that most bands/artists had a manager, who took care of the business side and who earned a percentage of the payout from labels, concert promoters, etc., and was thus incentivized to get the best deal on their behalf.
6stringmerc 12y ago
No, whatever money is paid up front for the expenses (recording, shooting music video, child care while doing such things) must be repaid to the label. If you don't "recoup" enough through album sales, you have to pay them back out of touring...and on and on and on...Basically, just have a look at the following article by Steve Albini: http://www.negativland.com/news/?page_id=17 http://www.negativland.com/news/?page_id=17
- snowwrestler 12y ago
  My brother has been a professional rock musician for almost two decades. Several of his bands have broken up after one or two albums, the recording of which was financed by their label. In those cases, the label simply takes a loss. They're not sending debt collectors out or something. The recouping terms are set in the contract. It's not conceptually different from the term sheets that govern how and when investors will be paid back when they invest in Internet startups. There are examples of bad labels screwing artists, and there are examples of good labels supporting artists. The terms, not the concept, of recouping are what it make it good or bad. Ironically, the more exploitative labels are the ones that have done better under the pressure of piracy, because they are more willing to force bands into "360" deals where every revenue stream is subject to recouping: merch, sync, publishing, tours...basically they own the artist. So they're not hurt much by piracy. But this is not how all label deals are done. Many smaller and mid-size labels have historically limited their deals and depended more on album revenue. These are the folks--the good, artist-supporting folks--who are being most hurt by piracy.
  - bsder 12y ago
    > These are the folks--the good, artist-supporting folks--who are being most hurt by piracy. As much as I hate pirates, it isn't the pirates that killed the music industry. Look at this thread. Most of the people here are not going to spend more than $100 per year on music. That's simply too small a pool for the number of artists that exist. Think about these same people. They are willing to pay more than $100 for two video games. Guess which industry is doing better?
smackfu 12y ago
And remember that artists do not go to the press with stories of, "the label gave me a big advance and then the record was a flop."
- 6stringmerc 12y ago
  Haha yeah that's technically true, because if that scenario actually happens that artist/band is effectively ruined, blacklisted, radioactive, whatever. Practically speaking though, are you aware of the "Sophmore Slump" concept at all? It's well known that after the first big success the record company wants MORE SUCCESS and that rarely happens. There are outliers like Adele, but far more often things go the way of Sisqo and "Return of Dragon" which famously had a $1 million video budget, banking on the success of "Thong Song." Guess what: Didn't recoup for the label.
  - TheOtherHobbes 12y ago
    "Didn't recoup" doesn't necessarily mean the label didn't get its money back. More commonly it means that artist royalties - which are a small proportion of label income - don't exceed the initial advance. Book publishing works the same way. Labels/publishers can be comfortably in profit on a project, but the system is set up to make sure that artists don't get a share of that profit. Now - labels played all kinds of games to make sure they paid artists as little as possible, up to and including outright lies about the sales and income. (Some writers have discovered that publishers sometimes still try this.) Even so, most traditional label deals were far more generous to artists than today's streaming deals. Labels also spent significant money on PR, publicity, and payola, which Spotify and YouTube obviously don't. Even fairly minor bands could live comfortably for a few years from radio play and royalties from a single mid-list album. Top sellers could afford castles, private jets, and custom-built recording studios. This was partly a feature of scarcity, when there were far fewer artists selling music to a public that was more interested in music. But it was also a direct result of more generous accounting/royalty options, and the fact that once artists crossed a certain threshold they had enough spare capital to start developing alternative stand-alone businesses.
  - snowwrestler 12y ago

tptacek 12y ago

That is my understanding as well; in particular, a lot of popular mythologies about artists "recouping" and being stiffed on royalties seem to be just that: mythological. Here's a good post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3850935 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3850935

6stringmerc 12y ago
Actually, it's not a myth; see the above link to what Steve Albini wrote if you'd like to get more educated and enhance your understanding of a very calculating and explotative business model.
- tptacek 12y ago
  Serious question: how much do you actually know about Steve Albini? Are you a Big Black fan? Are you at all acquainted with the Chicago punk scene he's from? Have you read anything else he's written, for instance about any band not from that scene? Or, for that matter, any of the story of his business relationship with the labels? And you know how he makes his money, right? (hint: not by touring Shellac). (I am an unabashed and somewhat obsessive Albini fan). I think at this point you can safely assume that anyone writing an opinion about the music industry has read that old Albini zine post. If you'd read Lowery's post, I think you'd see that he in several ways rebuts it.
  - 6stringmerc 12y ago
    I've followed him enough, can't stand his music because it sounds like noisy, barely competent shit to me and I know he makes his money just like Timbaland makes his money - getting paid on the back-end for production work. I can safely assume that most everybody has NOT read that article based on the ridiculous notion that somehow the music industry has changed its principles and methods since my family got started in the business in the late 1960s. Why would I take seriously a person who says "Sound recordings are not cheap to make" and goes on to state "Artists still have to pay for that highly skilled labor" when frankly neither of these are true? Maybe it is for musicians who live in a 1960-1995 dynamic, but I have more computing and music making power and ability in my home studio than I know what to do with. Recording studios are dying by the dozens. For all the talk of disruption, that's one legacy industry that is taking it on the chin. Lowery is part of the problem, not the solution. Plus he tosses out anecdotes like "For a very long period of time record labels provided a decent living to thousands of lucky artists" and cites...nothing... So the most ground breaking conclusion he has is Free+Streaming+Digital Sales? WOW. It's my business model for the past 10 years! Boy did I learn something from this guy! Oh, wait, no I didn't. That link is one of the most rambling and thinly veiled self-serving "discussions" of music in the new digital environment. I'll eventually study it more, simply to use it as cannon fodder for rebuttals. Thanks for sharing, I can always use more proof I know what I'm doing is right.
    - tptacek 12y ago
      I can't tell whether you're talking about Albini or Lowery here. I think Albini is shackled to view of the industry that rejects anything that doesn't sound like The Jesus Lizard. For a good example of this: read the very long thread on the Electric Audio message board where his fans try to find a hip-hop track he'll like.

anigbrowl 12y ago

No, of course not. Bear in mind that most bands/artists had a manager, who took care of the business side and who earned a percentage of the payout from labels, concert promoters, etc., and was thus incentivized to get the best deal on their behalf.

6stringmerc 12y ago

No, whatever money is paid up front for the expenses (recording, shooting music video, child care while doing such things) must be repaid to the label. If you don't "recoup" enough through album sales, you have to pay them back out of touring...and on and on and on...Basically, just have a look at the following article by Steve Albini: http://www.negativland.com/news/?page_id=17 http://www.negativland.com/news/?page_id=17

snowwrestler 12y ago
My brother has been a professional rock musician for almost two decades. Several of his bands have broken up after one or two albums, the recording of which was financed by their label. In those cases, the label simply takes a loss. They're not sending debt collectors out or something. The recouping terms are set in the contract. It's not conceptually different from the term sheets that govern how and when investors will be paid back when they invest in Internet startups. There are examples of bad labels screwing artists, and there are examples of good labels supporting artists. The terms, not the concept, of recouping are what it make it good or bad. Ironically, the more exploitative labels are the ones that have done better under the pressure of piracy, because they are more willing to force bands into "360" deals where every revenue stream is subject to recouping: merch, sync, publishing, tours...basically they own the artist. So they're not hurt much by piracy. But this is not how all label deals are done. Many smaller and mid-size labels have historically limited their deals and depended more on album revenue. These are the folks--the good, artist-supporting folks--who are being most hurt by piracy.
- bsder 12y ago
  > These are the folks--the good, artist-supporting folks--who are being most hurt by piracy. As much as I hate pirates, it isn't the pirates that killed the music industry. Look at this thread. Most of the people here are not going to spend more than $100 per year on music. That's simply too small a pool for the number of artists that exist. Think about these same people. They are willing to pay more than $100 for two video games. Guess which industry is doing better?

smackfu 12y ago

And remember that artists do not go to the press with stories of, "the label gave me a big advance and then the record was a flop."

6stringmerc 12y ago
Haha yeah that's technically true, because if that scenario actually happens that artist/band is effectively ruined, blacklisted, radioactive, whatever. Practically speaking though, are you aware of the "Sophmore Slump" concept at all? It's well known that after the first big success the record company wants MORE SUCCESS and that rarely happens. There are outliers like Adele, but far more often things go the way of Sisqo and "Return of Dragon" which famously had a $1 million video budget, banking on the success of "Thong Song." Guess what: Didn't recoup for the label.
- TheOtherHobbes 12y ago
  "Didn't recoup" doesn't necessarily mean the label didn't get its money back. More commonly it means that artist royalties - which are a small proportion of label income - don't exceed the initial advance. Book publishing works the same way. Labels/publishers can be comfortably in profit on a project, but the system is set up to make sure that artists don't get a share of that profit. Now - labels played all kinds of games to make sure they paid artists as little as possible, up to and including outright lies about the sales and income. (Some writers have discovered that publishers sometimes still try this.) Even so, most traditional label deals were far more generous to artists than today's streaming deals. Labels also spent significant money on PR, publicity, and payola, which Spotify and YouTube obviously don't. Even fairly minor bands could live comfortably for a few years from radio play and royalties from a single mid-list album. Top sellers could afford castles, private jets, and custom-built recording studios. This was partly a feature of scarcity, when there were far fewer artists selling music to a public that was more interested in music. But it was also a direct result of more generous accounting/royalty options, and the fact that once artists crossed a certain threshold they had enough spare capital to start developing alternative stand-alone businesses.
- snowwrestler 12y ago