Tag Archives: charts

A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Music, My Stories

Sales vs Streams

Ryan Downey over at Stream N Destroy goes to some lengths to track what is hot and cold in the world of rock and metal and all the different sub genres that fall within.

The below Zombie and Queen stats are from his latest email blast, which can be read online here.

Rob Zombie, The Lunar Injection Kool Aid Eclipse Conspiracy
24,700 Album Units (Nuclear Blast Records)
Released: March 12, 2021
20.6k Album Sales, 2400 Song Sales
2.5M Song Streams this week

Queen, Queen
18,800 Album Units (Hollywood Records)
Released: July 13, 1973
54 Album Sales, 8k Song Sales
23.2M Song Streams this week

Check out the anemic album sales from Queen versus the song streams. 54 physical album sales vs 23.2 million song streams. This is why music and the catalogues of artists are becoming so valuable. People and especially investors have real data as to who is listening to what. Get people listening on streaming services and it will pay forever. And if you ain’t getting a slice of those payments, we’ll your deal needs to be renegotiated.

Once upon a time, when streaming started to be taken seriously, the record labels and Billboard had no idea what was hot or number 1. The Billboard charts didn’t correlate to what was played the most on streaming service. In other words the labels and Billboard were out of touch. So Billboard decided they had to bring streaming into the Charts equation and made their charts more like a mathematic assignment.

But at least the charts are now taking streams into account by using 1,500 streams as an album sale or unit. I still think it’s wrong to try a fit something new into an old metric, but hey what do we fans know.

Song sales also add up to album sales. 10 songs equal an album.

In Queen’s case, there is enough activity for those 23.2 million streams and 8K song downloads plus 54 album sales to equal 18,800 units.

Compare Queen’s numbers to Rob Zombie’s first week numbers.

There are 20,600 physical album sales from RZ versus 54 for an album released in 1973. While record sales will give people an instant quick payday and some bragging rights about charting, it’s streaming that will show if anybody is listening after the hype of the album release.

You would expect based on evidence right now, that RZ fans will be listening to his music in 40 years’ time. But will he keep replenishing his fan base enough to keep the streaming numbers. Because replenishing the fan base is the key to long term survival.

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Influenced, Music, My Stories

Billboard Album Rock Tracks For Week Ending March 6, 1993

These posts are very time consuming but well worth it, as it gets me listening to songs I hadn’t heard yet, I know how is that possible in this day and age, but it is possible.

Number 1
Pride And Joy – Coverdale/Page

This song had no traction in Australia when it came to the charts but all the American mags I purchased had it advertised.

David Coverdale even made the front cover of a Guitar World issue with Jimmy Page.

And what’s the deal with its digital release. It’s on Spotify Australia, then its removed, then it’s there and now removed again. But YouTube has it.

And everyone said it “sounds like Led Zep” and I’m like, “yeah it will”, because Jimmy Page is a pretty large part of the Led Zep song writing team, so anything he writes will always sound like Led Zep.

Since Led Zep wasn’t doing anything, Coverdale/Page filled the void nicely.

Number 2
Two Princes – Spin Doctors

While “Pride And Joy” from Coverdale/Page got no traction in Australia, “Two Princes” went all the way to Number One here and it was everywhere. 278 plus million streams on Spotify and the song still has value and life in its ecosystem.

Number 3
Don’t Tear Me Up – Mick Jagger

I’d never heard this song until today.

It has that “Walk On The Wild Side” feel in the music.

More U2 like than anything else.

Number 4
Won’t Get Fooled Again – Van Halen

The VH marketing team always tried to keep VH in the Charts. Their live album didn’t really do anything in Australia and neither did their cover of The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again”.

Number 5
Man On The Moon – R.E.M

R.E.M was massive in Australia during the album “Automatic For The People”, to the point that I started to hate every single song on the album. Radio stations played em relentlessly and it didn’t matter to which station you switched.

But time heals all wounds and I’m okay with it.

Number 6
Black – Pearl Jam

My favourite Pearl Jam song, especially that whole 2 minute outro. And to this day, Pearl Jam are massive in Australia.

They would play 5 to 6 sold out shows in the same city during each tour. I had a work friend who followed them around Australia on one of their tours circa 2005/6.

Number 7
Good Lovin’s Hard To Find – Lynyrd Skynyrd

I never got back into the reformed Skynyrd, so today is my first day hearing “Good Lovin’s Hard To Find” and it swings with the horns and the rockabilly blues.

Number 8
Cats In The Cradle – Ugly Kid Joe

Massive in Australia, a cover of Cat Stevens.

The message of a kid, wanting to spend time with his father and the father being too busy to do so because of work or tiredness, resonated with a lot of people.

And as the song nears the end, the father now old and retired, calls up his son to spend time, but the son is too busy because family life and pressures of the workplace and creditors keeps em estranged.

Number 9
If I Ever Lose My Faith In You – Sting

Disturbed covered it recently, trying to cash in on their success of “The Sound Of Silence”.

Sting’s solo career was hit and miss for me. This song is more rooted to his rock ways than some of the other stuff he did and I like it.

Number 10
Sometimes Salvation – The Black Crowes

Ballad like and bluesy with a 70’s Rod Stewart like vocal line. Black Crowes delivered on their earlier albums.

Number 11
Driven By You – Brian May

It’s that usual rock-a-billy style riff in the verses but it wasn’t something that captured my attention for long.

Number 12
Turn It Up Or Turn It Off – Drivin’N’Cryin’

A perfect rock and roll title for 1993. It’s got that heartland style chord progressions that John Mellencamp made famous.

Number 13
Somebody Knockin’ – Izzy Stradlin And The Ju Ju Hounds

The laidback jam like hard rock of Izzy Stradlin and his Ju Ju Hounds was perfect for 1993 and so far removed from what was happening on the main commercial charts.

And it struck a chord with people.

Number 14
Down On Me – Jackyl

And then you have Jackyl who took a riff from The Who and a riff and vocal style from AC/DC. They got no traction in Australia, but the U.S magazines had em featured.

Number 15
Pull Me Under – Dream Theater

When I saw the title, I thought, blah, another band with titles about sexual innuendo and metaphors. But my cousin kept saying, listen to it, it’s got nothing to do with that.

And I still remember hearing the opening arpeggio notes of the intro riff at my cousin’s place. Then the drum tom pattern came in and I was already taping over Side A on a cassette of new music which I just taped a minute before. I was hooked immediately and within a few weeks I would have the original CD in my possession, becoming a lifelong fan in the process.

Eventually the names of Petrucci, Portnoy, Myung, Moore and Labrie would roll of the tongue like the surnames of my best mates.

Number 16
The One I Am – Dan Baird

For a song that was Number 16 on the Charts back in 1993, I would have expected a lot more streams than 25,790 on Spotify.

First time listener today.

I remember seeing the name, but I never invested time or funds to listen. And I like the blues rock vibe. So similar to what the Black Crowes were doing, and Lynyrd Skynyrd, Drivin N Crying and Izzy Stradlin.

Number 17
Somebody To Shove – Soul Asylum

It was an MTV Awards performance of “Runaway Train” that made me a fan. When I did some research I saw that this overnight sensation was a decade in the making.

How good is the intro and the verses?

Number 18
Mister Please – Damn Yankees

This band didn’t do much on the charts in Australia. But I was still a buyer based on my fandom of Night Ranger. I didn’t mind Styx and Nugent, but I did like Night Ranger.

And Jack Blades, Tommy Shaw and Ted Nugent, worked well together. The two albums they did are excellent hard rock albums.

Number 19
Eileen – Keith Richards

So we had Mick Jagger at Number 3 and good ole Keith Richards at 19.

How can that be?

Both songs are good Rolling Stones songs.

Number 20
Heart Of An Angel – The Jeff Healy Band

Every time I listen to Jeff Healy (RIP), I think of the “Roadhouse” movie with Patrick Swayze. TJFB is the bar band in the movie and they play behind a Perspex screen so they don’t get destroyed when a fight breaks out.

Healy plays his heart out on the guitar and his soulful bluesy voice fits in perfect.

Crank this one.

Number 21
Waiting For The Sun – Jayhawks

First time, I’m hearing this song. I’ve seen the name “The Jayhawks” mentioned but was never interested at that point in time. And I like the Led Zepp influences and the solo section which sound like it came from “Stairway To Heaven”.

And speaking of solos, you get an outro solo as well.

Number 22
Courage – The Tragically Hip

I have been listening to The Tragically Hip recently as fellow bloggers Buried On Mars and Caught Me Gaming are doing tandem reviews of their discography. They are early in, just up to the “Road Apples” album, released in 1991.

This is the opening track of the next album due “Fully Completely”. And I’m a bit torn comparing it to the tracks from the previous albums I like.

Number 23
She Got Me – Masters Of Reality

First time listener today and it feels like a lot of songs I know. Just think of “Ballroom Blitz” merged with “Radar Love” and a bit of “Let There Be Rock”.

And goddamn it, I like it.

Number 24
Stand – Poison

Poison doing this kind of Country, Rhythm and Blues is perfect for their style. At times it feels like a U2 song and how good are the Gospel singers.

Number 25
In Bloom – Nirvana

This song spawned so many copycat bands in a few years’ time.

Number 26
Return To Serenity – Testament

This song is excellent. The clean tone intro, those little melodic leads and then it goes into a progressive 12/8 swing feel, with a bluesy lead.

This is the Testament I like.

Number 27
Bed Of Roses – Bon Jovi

It’s not my favourite Jovi song, nor is it in my top 100 Bon Jovi songs.

Number 28
Here Comes Trouble – Bad Company

Obviously by this time, I had thought that Bad Company was broken up. But they continued and I heard this album a few years ago.

Brian Howe (RIP) on vocals revitalised the band. This album was mainly written by Howe and guitarist Terry Thomas who also did work with Foreigner, Tommy Shaw and Tesla.

Number 29
Leave It Alone – Living Colour

Great groove rock with a bit of prog added for spice.

Number 30
Say Hello 2 Heaven – Temple Of The Dog

I heard this in the late 90’s as one of the drummers in the band at the time was a big Soundgarden and Pearl Jam fan. It’s like this song was lost in a time warp and resurfaced in the 90’s.

Number 31
Steam – Peter Gabriel

Gabriel tried to re-write “Sledgehammer”.

Number 32
Too Many Ways To Fall – Arc Angels

There is a 10 minute live version on Spotify, with some jamming in the middle section and I like it.

Number 33
Sweating Bullets – Megadeth

Musically, it’s like an Alice Cooper cut, more theatre like but done in a Megadeth way.

How good is that intro?

Number 34
Kiss That Frog – Peter Gabriel

I was way off the Gabriel Express by the 90’s and hearing this song for the first time today, tells me why.

Number 35
Sad But True – Metallica

“Hey, I’m the album that will never stop selling”.

Even in 2021, the self-titled album still moves more units than new releases.

Number 36
Stand Up (Kick Love Into Motion) – Def Leppard

It’s typical Def Leppard, but by 1993 and after being exposed to this kind of Lep on “Hysteria” and a bit on “Pyromania” it was time for a reset.

And “Slang” in three years’ time was the perfect antidote.

Number 37
I’ll Hate You Better – Suicidal Tendencies

First time listener today, as I never really got into the whole Suicidal Tendencies thing. I know that Rob Trujillo came from em, but even after he joined Metallica, I still didn’t go back and explore his past.

But after hearing this track, I like it. I think some time will be found to listen to “The Art Of Rebellion”.

Number 38
Nearly Lost You – Screaming Trees

First time listener today. I had seen the albums advertised but I never handed cash over. It’s that whole alternative rock vibe, which is okay, but there’s nothing here to get me to commit any further.

Number 39
Stop The World – Extreme

“III Sides To Every Story” is the best Extreme album.

How good is that whole “Stop The World” section, when they repeat the title name over an A, A/G#, A/F# and E chord progression.

All of the vocal layering feels like Queen but it’s not.

Listen to the solo section and how they build it back up.

Number 40
Runnin’ On Faith – Eric Clapton

It’s got that feel from “Wonderful Tonight”. If you like that song, you will like this one.

One thing that is prominent listening to these songs is that the 80’s bands classed as hair metal or glam metal, didn’t get killed by grunge, but by blues rock artists who returned to the source of rock and roll for inspiration.

It also didn’t help all of the 80’s hard rock bands that the labels signed a million other artist that sounded all the same and then saturated the market with D level product.

But in Australia, the alternative and grunge takeover was more prominent, as suddenly the charts and radio stations dropped hard rock bands from their playlists, (except for a few classic acts) and replaced them by alternative acts.

“Peaches” is still played very heavily in Australia.

So many peaches to eat.

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A to Z of Making It, Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Derivative Works, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

11th May 1992 Australian Hard Rock and Heavy Metal Charts Snapshot

I posted last week about the albums that made up the Top 20 in Australia back in 1992.

Here is the Singles List.

Number 1
Under The Bridge – Red Hot Chilli Peppers

The Hendrix “Little Wing” inspired intro from Frusciante converted a lot of rock heads to the RHCP. Their album was on top and their single was on top.

Number 2
To Be With You – Mr Big

Their worst song by far, but it cashed in on the Unplugged acoustic craze. It worked for Extreme and it worked for Mr Big. But those ballad fans who cross over for the song are fly by nighters.

Number 3
Nothing Else Matters – Metallica

The variety on the self-titled “Black” album is a big reason why it sold. There was enough there to please metal heads, rock heads, thrash heads, country heads and pop heads. And this song is a perfect example of it. Plus it has a killer James Hetfield lead break.

Number 4
Alive – Pearl Jam

I get why it was popular, but I didn’t like it when it came out and after I purchased the album, I preferred a lot of the other tracks to this.

Number 5
Let’s Get Rocked – Def Leppard

So you wanna get rocked…. I guess we still wanted to get rocked.

Number 6
Thought I’d Died And Gone To Heaven – Bryan Adams

This is from the “Waking Up The Neighbours” album that went to number 1 everywhere.

Adams has a lot of fans down under, so it’s no surprise his songs chart well. And what a run he had between 1983 and 1999. And he made some big choices, like moving from Jim Vallance to Mutt Lange and the momentum just kept getting bigger.

Number 7
November Rain – Guns N Roses

You get three emotive Slash solos.

What more could you want?

Number 8
Viva Las Vegas – ZZ Top

It’s a cover song, but at this point in time there was nothing that ZZ Top could do wrong. This is one of the two new tracks, the other being “Gun Love”. Like Adams, they were on a winning plus decade.

Number 9
Dream Alone – Killing Time

An Australian hard rock band, which had a band name, the same as the U.S hardcore band and after this single release they would change it to Mantissa.

They supported bands like Janes Addiction, Baby Animals and Pantera on National tours but they had a constant turnover of musicians which felt like a momentum killer.

Number 10
Sister’s Crazy – Candy Harlots

This band story is a combination of Anvil and Motley Crue.

They had a deal offered in 1987 but their manager refused to sign it, because he wanted a bigger cut and then signed the band to a four year management deal, which suppressed the band from signing the record deal themselves. No other label wanted to get involved in this legal mess. They finally did sign a deal in 1991.

They had a massive Club following like Motley Crue. There was tragedy when one of their main songwriters Ron Barrett died before they even got their deal. In the 90’s, Barrett’s death was reported as a drug overdose, while these days, its reported as an asthma attack. And the evolving door of musicians just kept on happening, with drummer Tony Cardinal being the only founding musician in the band when they got their deal.

And as soon as they released their “Five Wicked Ways” album in 1992, within a year it was over.

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A to Z of Making It, Music, My Stories

Charts

I’m sure you have read or heard or skimmed the reporting of how Tool beat Taylor Swift for the Number 1 spot. High fives all round for the perfect execution of the album release.

Tool is in Week 1 and Taylor is in Week 2 of their respective release cycles.

My thoughts on the charts, is an industry holding on to the past. Combining physical sales with a certain number of streams which count like a sale. Come on, that by no means indicates what is hot or not.

Still selling CD’s and mp3’s, even though CD players don’t even come in computers or cars anymore. And mp3 players are obsolete. The iPod is dead. And the way my kids don’t even know what a Blackberry is, there will be kids in 10 years time who won’t even know what an iPod is.

Seen the article about how vinyl will outsell CDs for the first time since the 80s.

Does the majority care?

Of course not. The amount of people streaming is greater than the amount of people buying.

Streams are facts, harder to scam, but people still try. Streams give an indication of what people are listening to as there is no way for an artist to know how many times a CD or vinyl sale has been listened to.

And streaming pays forever, whereas a sale pays you once. You might feel rich now but you will be complaining in the future.

And the record labels have manipulated the charts from the start, because they know the media reports on it, like it means something. Maybe it showed how many records got sold once Soundscan came into force in the early 90’s, but before that it was based on how many albums got ordered by record stores.

And the last 15 years have shown us how the first week of sales are high and the stories are reported everywhere, but by the fourth week, it’s down to a trickle and by week eight, its underwater. And people move on. Music in general is more important than any particular album. It’s a sign of the times, the era we live in.

Sure, bands in the metal and rock genre create albums which sustain and reach some status, but it’s all because of a mathematical formula combining streams with physical.

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A to Z of Making It, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

Change Is Slow But Evolving

In Australia, an unsigned band, charted very high, purely on digital sales and streams.

There was no marketing budget and they trumped artists on major deals.

And yes, they did move physical product, however the game is rigged by the big legacy players who set rules in place a long time ago to control the game. In turn, those rules meant that the online store of the unsigned band (which is Polaris by the way) that was selling the CD with no bar code meant that the physical sales couldn’t be tracked and therefore didn’t count towards their chart position. Talk about a technicality.

So what does this tell us?

  • There is so much more power in the hands of the fans than ever before.
  • If fans listen to their favourite artist via a streaming service, it all adds up.
  • If fans purchase their mp3’s via a digital service, it all adds up.
  • The media can publish reports about artists slamming streaming services. Meanwhile the fans move on to what is convenient. Some will purchase, some will download illegally, some will stream for free and some will stream on a premium subscription. The bottom line is fragmentation.
  • There is no difference between an EP and a full album anymore. As an artist you don’t want to be out of the market for too long, crafting this magnum opus, only to see it drop out of the conversation, weeks after its release. 10 songs every two years, doesn’t cut it anymore. Four songs every 3 months should be the new norm. All of the Classic Rock bands from Seventies, released an album each year and in some cases two albums.
  • There is a connection with their fans. The band distributed the album out of their bedrooms and sent out each pre-order with hand written messages to the fans.
  • If Polaris, keep this momentum going and if they keep on replenishing their fan base, the possibilities are endless.
  • There is no sure thing in music. Just because you have a label deal, it doesn’t mean you will make it. Just because you are an independent artist and unsigned it doesn’t mean you will get a deal or even get noticed.
  • Everyone involved in the recording industry are still clueless. The labels still have no idea what constitutes a hit or what they should sign and promote. No one saw Adele coming six years ago, or Five Finger Death Punch almost ten years ago. No one expected Mumford and Sons to move millions upon millions of product or Shinedown and Thirty Seconds To Mars to be consistent sellers.

See how the media is trumpeting Adele again and how she has sold 8 million albums in the U.S. Every news outlet is reporting.

Big deal.

Whitesnake sold 7 million plus on the U.S on their 1987 self-titled album. It doesn’t mean those same 7 million people are now listening to the album over and over and over again. Poison sold millions upon millions of albums between 1987 and 1994. It doesn’t mean they have millions upon millions of real fans. If they did, they would be playing arena’s and creating new music. Instead Poison is resigned to an opening act that plays the jukebox hits.

Some might say that the success of “Polaris” is a one-off. Back in August, another metalcore band from Australia called, “Northlane” actually topped the ARIA Album charts, beating out Lamb Of God among others. This band was signed to an independent label from Melbourne and Rise Records in the US.

But in saying that, how relevant are the charts these days.

In most cases, bands that chart in the Australia Top 10 have moved less than 10,000 in product.  It’s because the old guard still focuses on sales as the main metric of success and bands still like to report their chart position like it means something. Once upon a time it did, but not in 2016.

So again, it comes back to the same old question.

Are people listening to the music?

That is the metric that matters. Listens, not sales. I listened to Polaris on Spotify and I don’t mind them. For a metalcore band there is a lot of competition for people’s attention. In the same way the early Nineties had way too many hard/melodic rock bands, the two thousands and ten period is littered with a lot of metalcore bands. Eventually only a handful will survive the cull when it happens. It’s the way of the business.

Bon Jovi’s “What About Now” charted at Number 1.

Black Sabbath’s “13” also charted at Number 1.

And if I ask fans of the band to name me all of the songs on each album without referring to the album in the exact chronological order, they would struggle.

Hell, none of the songs are even in the Top 5 Popular List on their streaming accounts. Which is very different to Five Finger Death Punch’s account, which has three songs from their most recent album in the Top 5 Popular List.

And that is why Five Finger Death Punch still move product. They are constant on Active Rock Radio, their music is being listened too and as a by-product they keep on selling.

Change is slow but evolving.

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A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Music, My Stories, Piracy, Stupidity

Freedom With Streaming

I love freedom.

The freedom to live where I want, do want I want and when I want to.

I also love music and I also love to hear music wherever I go and when I want to. Today, there are a lots of ways to hear music.

  • to buy a digital mp3
  • to stream for free
  • to buy a CD
  • to pay for a streaming subscription
  • to illegally download it via P2P

Pre-Napster, the only way to hear the song you liked was to purchase the album or single it came on. Alternative methods involved waiting for the radio to play it and you dub it to cassette or you dub someone else’s original copy onto cassette or CD.

The big difference between then and now is availability. Did you know that Slash also used BitTorrent to release “Live At The Roxy”.

His reasons for it are real simple.

To allow people to access his music from any outlet they desire. He goes to Spotify to consume music and like many others, he still likes to have a physical copy in his hand.

I enjoy my music and I enjoy it a lot, however in the Eighties and early Nineties, I couldn’t enjoy it as much because I simply didn’t have enough money. Thank god that second-hand record shops became big business by the early nineties and it allowed me to purchase a lot of Seventies and Eighties LP’s that I couldn’t afford to purchase before.

Even though the clueless mainstream press always toes the RIAA and Record Label viewpoint that music is in dire straits, I say the opposite.

Look at how much money the labels are making from the various streaming companies who are paying a lot of money to license the labels catalogue. Here is a list of the top eight streaming companies out there;

  • Spotify
  • YouTube
  • Google Play
  • Apple Music
  • Pandora
  • Rdio
  • Deezer
  • JB HiFi (in Australia)

Each of the above companies paid the record labels a high license fee in order to have music on their service. They then pay the record labels (who are the major copyright holders) 70% of their profits for songs streamed. When you take into account that streaming services made over $1 billion in the US last year, 70% of that went to record labels. From the other 30%, the record labels took another cut via their licensing fee system.

Apart from streaming bringing in billions of dollars and putting a massive hole in piracy, it has also changed the way people view sales of music, the charts and every other metric associated with music.

The Top 40 once upon a time was a benchmark for what was popular. The metric used to judge popularity was sales. The view was that if an album or a song got into the Top 40, the artist would go on to become a household name. In 2012, the charts started to include digital sales and streaming. Streaming listens enable songs from the past to re-enter the charts, even though the band or artist who wrote it are retired or have departed this Earth.

Quincy Jones said recently that there is no music industry.

Maybe he meant to say that the record labels are making a lot of money from other avenues, however they are just not passing on those monies back to the artists and the songwriters. Maybe he meant to say that the recording industry does not have a monopoly on music anymore. In the end, the music industry as a whole is very much alive and well.

Quincy Jones also said that artists “can’t get an album out because nobody buys an album anymore.”

Umm, Quincy, or Gene or Paul or Yngwie, no one wanted to buy an album at all. All we wanted to do was to listen to music. Maybe he meant to say that people only want the best, so the concept of an album with a few good songs and a lot of filler is not working in 2015. Maybe he meant to say that instead of a handful of gated releases each week, in 2015, we have thousands upon thousands of albums released.

Quincy Jones said newer online distribution model’s don’t mean anything.

Maybe he meant to say that the newer online distribution models have taken away the record labels gatekeepers. With no filter in check, people are overwhelmed with noise. It’s a good thing and only the best will end up rising to the top. The fact that streaming services bring in over a billion dollars each year means nothing. The problem is the record labels. Those monies are just not getting back to the artists and the songwriters.

Quincy Jones reckons that selling 4.5 million albums today and thinking it is a hit record is a joke as he used to sell 4.5 million records every weekend in the 80’s.

Maybe he meant to say that selling 4.5 million records shows that you have an audience, people who care for you and people who will come and watch you live. The fact that people listen to the music over and over again is irrelevant to Quincy Jones. Yes, Quincy, that’s right, people streaming your music are just as important as selling 4.5 million records a week. Maybe he meant to say that I am so out of touch with what fans want, the only thing I know is sales and sales only.

I know that Quincy is not metal or rock, but his viewpoints echo similar viewpoints from Gene Simmons, Yngwie Malmsteen, Paul Stanley, Scott Ian, Duff McKagan, Kirk Hammett, Joe Perry and Roger Waters. You could easily change the name Quincy Jones above, with Gene Simmons, Yngwie Malmsteen and so forth.

Overall, being a musician is tough. It always has been and always will be. There are no overnight successes. Never have been and never will be. Ignore all the crap and make your own way. There is a lot of money to be made in music and it doesn’t just involve writing and releasing an album.

Remember back in the Seventies and the Eighties. Artists had to conquer their local area first, then their state, then the next state and so forth.

With the internet, artists have a global audience right off the bat. But the need to win fans city by city is still the same.

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A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Music, My Stories, Piracy, Stupidity, Treating Fans Like Shit

Random Thoughts

The Grammy nominations are out and as usual the metal category reads like a comedy. Why even bother, no one cares. The Grammy’s are as relevant as the sales metric. Maybe next year they will be renamed into the Streammy’s and some magic formula will be used to find nominations.

What is it about people or organisations sense of entitlement these days?

Consumers of music are finally given a choice (legally and illegally) on how to consume their music and all the middlemen come out screaming for the Governments or the courts to write new laws or set precedents that protect their business models. In the current case, you have the publishers BMG Rights Management and Round Hill Music via copyright troll “Rightscorp” using a 1998 law to compel ISPs to support its pre-internet business model. These organisations think that shaking down people is the way forward.

Sort of like Billboard. Seriously, what kind of fucked up maths goes into their charts. Hello, look at everything that is successful and you will see one common theme. They all kept it SIMPLE. Steve Jobs knew it. Daniel Ek knows it. Sean Fanning knows it. Mark Zuckerberg knows it. However, the people at Billboard have no idea. Someone, decided that 1,500 streams of any song equals an album sale. WTF. How does the stream count of any song reflect the influence (if any) of an album?

It’s good that Billboard is focusing on what people are listening to however it is bad that they are trying to recreate that listening metric to show a fake album purchase. Buying an album does not mean one listens to it, oftentimes people only listen to the hit. Report that.

The charts are there to purely satisfy the recording industry. It was never about the consumer. The recording industry and their press outlets all want to “high-five” each other on the number ones. And then what. 99% of the classic albums never got to Number 1. “Back In Black” from AC/DC never reached Number 1 in the U.S. “Led Zeppelin IV” never got to Number 1 in the U.S. “Master Of Puppets” from Metallica never reached Number 1.

I get it. Change is inevitable. For all the talk about monies, and what are those “poor start-up independent bands going to do” in the current free music industry it’s funny to see that more indie/self-funded music is being made now than ever before. Do you think the new breed of musicians are sad because recording studios or CD plants have closed?

Of course not.

While the recording industry promotes what it has lost, it fails to see what fans of music have gained. And by those fans gaining , the recording industry gains.

In Australia, the Government posted all of the individual submissions to the Australian Government’s Piracy Discussion Paper online and one of them caught my attention.

“I have spent a lot of time and money on my song to be mastered and distributed through CDBABY and iTunes. In the last 4 months since my song was released there has been over 30,000 hits on Utube [sic] where someone has uploaded it. To make matters worst [sic] there is only about $80 in the bank from the sales. Can someone tell me how to stop this.”

The first thing that comes out of that rant is how misinformed the “musician” is.

First, if someone put the song up on YouTube, then they are obviously a fan. Connect with them.

Second, YouTube’s has a Content ID system. There are players out there that can assist with this. Find them.

Third, 30,000 views on YouTube means an audience. Surely that is a good thing. What steps are in place to mobilise and grow that audience?

Fourth, without YouTube, how would that artist reach 30,000 people. Of course that would be via a record label. Which means gatekeepers and the chance of not being signed.

Final point, no one is rushing out to buy CD’s again or mp3’s.

Another that got my attention was the following;

“I am a writer so I want copyright to be protected to protect my livelihood.”

It’s hard to believe that people are in an industry without fully understanding why Copyright came into being. In a nutshell, Copyright was always about promoting the progress of society by returning works into the public domain once their copyright expired. Once upon a time, it did and it worked brilliantly and now (since about the Seventies), not so much as Copyright got twisted into what it is now.

Copyright was never about having people’s livelihoods depending on it.

Also there is no evidence that stopping copyright infringement leads to more purchases of music, movies or books.

After reading through a bit more of the submissions, I was dismayed at some of the words used like STEALING and THEFT.

It’s COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT.

No one has stolen nothing. iTunes still has the song for sale, Spotify still has the song for streaming, YouTube has multiple copies of the song for viewing. Amazon still has the book for sale in both hardcover and e-book format.

What the people have done is COPY the work.

It’s not that hard to understand, however people need to do the research to educate themselves.

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A to Z of Making It, Music, My Stories

The Death Of The Traditional Charts

The “traditional” single release used to get marketed and promoted for months. It would then get radio airplay and with all of the hype that goes with each single release, the record label and the artist would hope that the single would sell.

After the single does its run it would be removed from sale. During this period thousands or maybe millions of people would have purchased the single. They would hand over their money at the store and then take it home and play it as many times as they liked. The actual sale of the single was counted by the charts but all of those plays at home didn’t count for nothing.

Until now.

One sale is just one count towards the artist.

But now with streaming, a song/single can continue to have traction for months, years or decades. And there is the paradigm shift right there.

Albums were designed to have a longer shelf life. Singles were designed to have a short shelf life. Now with streaming, the border lines between singles and albums have dissolved. But the record labels and artists still insist on spending three to nine months recording albums. That was fine once upon a time, when albums did have a longer shelf life due to gated releases, but in 2014, albums have a shorter shelf life. Release frequently is the norm today, but nearly every established artists refuses to do it.

An artist will continue to earn a streaming income on a recording for years from their fans, whereas that fan would in the past have only paid once. Actually, if the artist gave their rights away to the record label for an advance payment, then it would be the record label that will continue to earn a streaming income on behalf of the artist.

Artists need to negotiate better. Sell your rights away for an advance payment, however have a clause in there that stipulates that if a song reaches a certain target, then a different rate of payment kicks in or the advance needs to be topped up. Because at the beginning no one knows how big or how low the actual song could go.

Going back to the new charts.

I am expecting the best to rise up again, the classic songs that we have known. Don’t be surprised if AC/DC and Metallica make a comeback to the charts. Journey will be there with “Don’t Stop Believin’ and Bon Jovi will be there as well. Old recordings will reappear. I have no doubt about that.

But with any technological product, it is open for misuse and I am sure that streaming services could skew the results based on their corporate deals with TV Shows and Record Labels.

But in the end it is a change and a big one.

Are the Heavy Metal artists and their fans ready?

This is their chance to bring Metal and Rock music back to the masses because the power of the radio and the labels is diminishing in this area for now.

The power is in the hands and ears of the individual streamer. The fans of the artist have the potential to control the musical career of their favourite artists. As an artist this is a good thing.

And business models around streaming and ownership of music will continue to grow.

“We can say with a high level of confidence that it no longer matters how many albums an artist has sold. All that matters now is how many listeners that artist can convert into owners.”

The words above are from the Arena CEO.

Who is Arena you ask?

Arena is another player on the scene and their business model is very different. Once a listener streams a participating single song 5 times, Arena then gives the listener the MP3 file to download and own. Arena then will pay the artist $0.85, in addition to the $0.21 for the 5 streams, as if the listener had purchased the song to own directly. This is a combination of streaming and ownership, because if peer-to-peer downloading has taught us one thing, it is that fans of music still want to own and they want to own music for free.

What Arena is paying is well above the industry standard rates from Pandora, Spotify, Beats Music, and YouTube. To top it all off there is no monthly subscription. If Arena will take off, or if it will get swallowed by Spotify is a different matter. What is clear is that it is addressing a gap in the record label business model that is still unaddressed.

And that is peer-to-peer downloads of mp3’s. And how these five streams = 1 download will count on a chart is another matter in its entirety and it further highlights how out of date the current charts are.

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A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Music, My Stories, Piracy

What Can Lorde and Spotify Teach The Metal World? Plus The Ones That Control The Talent Will Win In The Long Run

Record labels were dependent upon record sales and when the profit margins from recorded sales shifted from high margin returns to low margin returns, they screamed piracy. To them the only way they could remain in business was to have laws passed that protected their gatekeeper based business models.

However technology and innovation is always moving forward, so while the record labels are lobbying hard for new laws, at the same time they were being pulled into the future, kicking and screaming all the way.

Spotify to me is just a legal version of Napster, that has arrived in most markets. However before Spotify was even allowed to operate in certain markets, they needed to make licensing deals with the relevant record labels and publishing groups.

Spotify came into the market with the idea that they need to compete with free. And compete they did. The service even started to break artists to the masses, something that the record labels are clueless to do in current times.

Look at Lorde.
Her song “Royals” was added to Spotify on March 19th. It did nothing.

On April 2nd the song was added to the popular Hipster International Playlist by Napster founder Sean Parker. Isn’t it amazing what a little help can do and this was achieved without any dollars going into marketing. This was purely a stakeholder of Spotify, liking a song and sharing that song with the masses.

What’s that word again? Sharing.

On April 8th “Royals” appeared on the Spotify Viral Chart. What does this mean? It means that people have started to share it.

In relation to metal, I have posted previously how Dream Theater is doing it all wrong with their album release, putting money into marketing and believing that the old school scorched earth policy would bring results. It doesn’t. Sharing is what brings results. Fans sharing your music. Hey didn’t Napster do just this. Didn’t Napster allow fans to share music.

On June 10th “Royals” started to appear on radio. Remember when radio was cutting edge and used to be hip. This is proof that radio is a format that is dead and buried. This is proof that radio is always late to the party. This is proof that radio is clueless. This is proof that radio only plays what the record labels pay them to play.

So if you are an artist and your idea is to get your song onto radio, forget it. It is pointless. It does nothing for your career today.

Go on Dream Theater’s Facebook page and they are telling fans to contact their radio stations, so that “The Enemy Within” can be added to the playlist.

To use a quote from Flying High;
“Surely you can’t be serious.”
“I am and don’t call me Shirley.”

On July 9th “Royals” debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 – three months after debuting on the Spotify Viral Chart.
See how important sales are. By July 9th, Lorde was already a super mega star. It didn’t matter if she finally made enough physical sales to enter the Billboard Hot 100. She was already a success.

This is another lesson that the metal and rock world fail to learn. They still focus on the sales in the first week and the chart position. This is so old school and not a great measuring tool of reach or success, especially for new acts starting out.

But the metal world is still clueless. This is what we get from the bands, their PR companies and the various news outlets that report on metal and rock. Here are a few examples.

Loudwire: Dream Theater’s new DVD ‘Live At Luna Park’ recently entered at No 1 on the Soundscan music DVD chart.

Loudwire: Volume 2 of Five Finger Death Punch’s ‘Wrong Side Of Heaven; lands at No. 2 on Billboard 200.

Blabbermouth: “Wretched and Divine: The Story of the Wild Ones” sold 42,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to debut at position No. 7 on The Billboard 200 chart.

See what I mean. They are still reporting on the old system. What those websites are saying is that the first week of sales is a measure of success, which I totally disagree with. If that was the case, then the first Five Finger Death Punch album was a dud, after first week sales.

August 6 – Lorde plays her first US gig in NYC.

Slow and steady wins the race. You play where there is demand. Humanity wins out in the end. Those that can play, perform live and write their own songs will win. It’s a return to the song writer. Expect a back lash against the over processed songs written by a committee.

Forget about acts that focus on big screens and pyro technics. The people are looking for human performances. It is an escape from our increasingly digital world.

“Royals” is the most shared track in the US by a new artist this year. This is what matters. The track is SHARED. It means the fans are spreading the word, getting more people to invest time and money into you.

Spotify has finally released some information as to how they pay and it sure makes an interesting read. I have posted previously about the greed of the record labels and how that greed will ultimately kill the streaming star.

So let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. Spotify pays 70% of their revenues to rights holders. The rights holders in 90% of the cases are the record labels and publishers. The same people who lobbied hard to extend copyright terms and are lobbying hard again for longer copyright terms.

So in 2013 so far, Spotify has paid out $500 million dollars to rights holders in royalties. That’s right $500 million. When Spotify pays royalties to a rights holder they provide all the information needed to attribute royalties to each of their artists. Check out the post, it sure makes interesting reading.

http://www.spotifyartists.com/spotify-explained/

So it got me thinking about business models. It looks like to me that the new record label business model of today is to ensure that they have the talent. The one with the most talent wins.

The Record Labels are the only ones putting money out there and the rule of thumb is that if you want to dominate in the music business in the future, you have got to spend. So if record labels are spending, the talent ends up on a label.

That talent brings to the record label the following;

Any songs that BAND A writes will end up with the record label for the life of the artist plus 70 years after their death (the U.K has 90 years). So if the artist is say 30 years of age when they write HIT A, then the copyright of that song will be owned by the record label for 120 years (assuming the artist lives to 80 years of age). Talk about securing their future. Now multiply BAND A or ARTIST A by all the millions of artists who are getting into deals where they sign away their copyrights.

SECURE the most talent and be a winner in the long run.

Has anyone noticed the large push from Frontiers Records in signing up talent past and present? Has anyone noticed how they are getting the Eighties legends to re-record their classics by creating modern forgeries and in the process handing over the copyrights to Frontiers? Has anyone noticed how they are getting all of these artists together for special one-off projects like Michael Sweet from Stryper and George Lynch?

Since managers and other entities are afraid to spend on artist, the ones that do so will win. If a label is not spending money, then they are not in the game. If they are not in the game, then they do not control any talent.

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A to Z of Making It, Music, My Stories, Piracy

What Do The Charts Tell The Metal and Rock Community?

What do the current Billboard charts tell us. On the Rock and Metal chart we had the following list for last week;

1. Korn – Paradigm Shift (1 Week on The Chart)
2. Alter Bridge – Fortress (1 Week On The Chart)
3. Cage The Elephant – Melophobia (1 Week On The Chart)
4. Stone Temple Pilots with Chester Bennington – High Rise (EP) (1 Week On The Chart)
5. Avenged Sevenfold – Hail To The King (7 Weeks On The Chart)
6. Dance Gavin Dance – Acceptance Speech (1 Week On The Chart)
7. Metallica – Through The Never (Soundtrack) (3 Weeks On The Chart)
8. Five Finger Death Punch – The Wrong Side Of Heaven And The Righteous Side Of Hell: Volume 1 (11 Weeks On The Chart)
9. Dream Theater – Dream Theater (3 Weeks On The Chart)
10. Rush – Vapor Trails: Remixed (2 Weeks On The Chart)
11. Asking Alexandria – From Death To Destiny (10 Weeks On The Chart)
12. Skillet – Rise (16 Weeks On The Chart)
13. Volbeat – Outlaw Gentlemen & Shady Ladies (27 Weeks On The Chart)
14. Black Sabbath – 13 (18 Weeks On The Chart)
15. Bring Me The Horizon – Sempiternal (27 Weeks On The Chart)

Special mention:

Imagine Dragons – Night Visions (58 Weeks On The Chart)

So the above charts show me a few things:

1. That the fans love new music. There are 5 albums that have their first week on the charts.

2. After a week, if that new music is not great, we move on very quickly. Dream Theater is suffering this fate.

3. If that new music is great, we spread the word and the album hangs around in the “charts”.  Avenged Sevenfold, Five Finger Death Punch, Skillet and Volbeat are a few bands that are hanging around.

4. If you create a group of songs that connect, expect to be hanging around for a long time. Imagine Dragons is one such band.

5. Artists need to adapt their business practices. Instead of spending months on an album, just to see it fade away within 6 weeks, they should be releasing more frequently. It doesn’t have to be original songs all the time. It could be acoustic versions, cover versions, unique live versions, blog posts and so on.

6. Here today, gone tomorrow is the modern paradigm. Artist need to adapt, so that they are here today, everyday.

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