My Escapade tearing it up at our With Digital Love showcase
We’d like to say a huge thanks to all those who were there to make it such a great night as well as to our guest DJs Tim and Damien. A big shout out also goes to The Last Beatniks who took some awesome photos that you can check out here.
Looking forward to the next one!
Musicadium’s WITH DIGITAL LOVE Events are now an institution. A tried and true party, always with amazing acts, great vibe and lounging relaxation of the BarSoma surrounds. Why should this one be any different? Saturday May 29th sees BarSoma once again hosting the Digital Distributor’s contribution to the Brisbane live music scene, with a night of dance and rock acts, followed up with DJs to see the night through to completion – or sunrise, as it were.
Once again, the Musicadium staff has curated the lineup of the night and hand-picked (from thousands of acts on the roster). Leading the night is Gold Coast’s ELKE, amply backed up by party act The Beligerents and opening the night My+Escapade.
A new feature of the nights will be 3 DJs to see the night out, yet to be announced and shrouded in mystery, but sure to amaze, playing a variety of indie classics, disco burners and dance floor igniters! Watch this space for more details on celebrity DJs and local legends!
ELKE was designed as a response to what it’s four members wanted so badly to hear in the QLD music scene. Beginning in late 2007, the boys spent close to six months simply as a recording band before their first gig amongst the Queensland finalists of the MTV Kickstart competition. It wasn’t long before people started to take notice of ELKE’s infectious self-produced recordings and the shows began to line up around the block. Having shared the Goodvibes stage with acts such as Chromeo, The Presets, and Fatboy Slim, ELKE have also played support slots for international groups, Datarock (Norway), Ratatat (USA) as well as Australian wunderkinds, Grafton Primary, Van She, Lost Valentinos, and Art Vs Science.
The Belligerents are a new-age dance punk five piece and their fast-paced, high-energy live shows will spawn a dance frenzy of epic proportions. Their message is communicated via an avalanche of catchy pop hooks, 80’s synth fun, dance heavy bass, high tempo drumming, loud cow bell and guitars that sing. The band are now ready to launch their crusade after being schooled under the likes of Talking Heads, Joy Division, Foals, Radiohead, Cut Copy, Bloc Party, Franz Ferdinand, Arctic Monkeys, Does It Offend You Yeah, Midnight Juggernauts and The Rapture.
My Escapade has become best known for their haunting and uplifting live performances along with our experimentation with alluring melodies and tribal beats. Their sound is often described as soulful, alternative rock, reminiscent of early Coldplay and Jeff Buckley, with tributes to more modern sounds evocative of Muse. They have supported such acts as Dukes of Windsor and Little Red and are sure to blow minds.
Entry will be $10 and doors are at 8PM, with the first act taking the stage at 9PM. More information can be found at http://www.facebook.com/musicadium.
Everything that you need to know about using Musicadium can be found at our Frequently Asked Questions section - however, there are some things that you may not have thought of or have forgotten about!
Claim your digital outlet Royalties at any time - no waiting for us to send you cheques!
Musicadium uses an online payment system via PayPal for you to pay us for the upload fees required to distribute to the outlets and we also use that system to pay you your royalties - which by the way, you can claim at any time after they have been made available in your account!
If you’ve been wondering “Hey, Musicadium never pays me my royalties!” or “I wonder if I have ever made any sales on iTunes?” - wonder no more. The reason you’ve never heard from us is because you hold all the power! You can check any time. The best time to check your account to see if you have made any sales is any time after the 15th of every month. Some outlets pay Musicadium monthly, others quarterly.
You can check your royalties and request a payout of your royalties into your PayPal account at any time (provided you have more than $20.00 AUD in your account) by logging into your account at http://www.musicadium.com/members/login.
You can use Musicadium as a distribution point for a Digital Record Label
These days, it pays to be as savvy as possible in the Music Industry. Which means that at least one person in your band probably has a pretty good handle on how to do most things for your band and is constantly learning. That person may even be you.
When it comes to putting out your Music (and possibly others) and releasing to the world, have you thought about about starting your own digital record label?
In terms of distributing music digitally, you could easily become a digital record label and use the endless number of online services to distribute and promote your acts - more importantly, you could use a Musicadium Manage Multiple Artists account to distribute numerous artists on your label. You can either create a new account at http://www.musicadium.com or email support@musicadium.com to request to have your account changed over to a Manage Multiple Artists account.
Example: Come up with the name of your record label. Sign up to Musicadium under a manage multiple artists account. You are then able to add the releases of numerous artists and manage the accounts/royalties for each of these artists. Disseminate royalties to artists when we pay you!
We’ll leave whatever business model you wish to implement for your label up to you, but you could be helping to bring the other bands you love to the rest of the world’s attention! Everyone wins!
Musicadium can deliver your music to radio stations around Australia
Time and time again, we have seen that radio play can significantly influence the amount of digital sales made. That’s why it only makes sense that we help you out by making it easy to get your tunes there for public listening pleasure!
Musicadium has a contract with D-Star MPE - a digital delivery to Radio (not a radio plugger) service - to supply them with the latest and greatest tracks to play on their shows.
If you would like to know more about how this all works and the kind of packages we offer for this, check out http://www.musicadium.com/dstar-mpe.
We distribute video clips to iTunes
One of the topics written about at length in numerous blogs is that a great film clip is almost necessary these days.
But what do with that film clip once recorded? Rage? Video Hits? YouTube? iTunes?
We distribute film clips to iTunes - if you would like to know more about how to distribute these, shoot an email to info@musicadium.com.
We run showcase events (and we are looking to put on events in different places!)
3-4 times a year in Brisbane, we put on showcase events at BarSoma!
If you are a band distributed by Musicadium and would like to register your interest in playing at one of the showcase gigs we put on, shoot an email to Tim - tim@musicadium.com.
2009 was (still is, for a little while longer!) a year of major growth and success for Musicadium and we are glad all of you who joined in 2009 have jumped on board, and those of you who have stayed with us, we are pleased to have you with us on this brilliant digital voyage.
We hope that your 2009 has been productive, creative, filled with music (seeing and playing gigs, creating, recording, releasing and more!)
So…without further ado, let’s recap.
This year, we continued the tradition of fantastic showcases at BarSoma and included one at Brisbane’s newest live music venue, X & Y Bar.
February saw Melbourne-dwellers Foxx on Fire headline, along with The CityScape Riot and Spider8 at BarSoma - see photos here.
June saw Brisbane Rockers The Gallant headline, as well as Streamer Bendy’s very first gig EVER, with Musicadium team member Steve Laubscher’s rockin’ band Moonjog - See Photos here!
July’s showcase at X & Y Bar was a change of scenery, but still every bit as Rock and Roll, with Sarah Haigh, Skara Brae and The CityShakeUp, as well as Musicadium Team Member Roxy Burt aka Jane Doe DJ hitting the decks straight after - see photos here.
October saw the very first weekend Musicadium Showcase - Melbourne Trip-hoppers Sietta headlined, Brisbane’s industrial/electro, female-fronted Felinedown supported and Soul-Tripper Andrew Chen crooned to the audience. Jane Doe DJ, Will Timmins and DuaneMC partied the night away with everyone till the wee hours (4am!) - see the photos here.
Thank you to both venues, as well as all the performers who played at the showcases and all of our Musicadium team members who volunteered their time to make these showcases happen. We are looking forward to more amazing live music in 2010.
In late 2009, we implemented an upload process into our album release system for artists to directly put their music into the Musicadium archives for storage, encoding and packaging to send to outlets.
This now meant that, due to using iTunes’ more technical, server-side process - we could send music videos! One of the many, many inquiries Musicadium gets every week is if we distribute video to iTunes.
This means that, at this time, Musicadium is the only distributor in Australia with the technical ability to provide video to iTunes.
One of our early video clients, Sydney band, Cameras was featured on the front page of iTunes as a free download (Single of the Week), where people also had access to purchase the beautiful video for the haunting, melancholy song.
The ability to send video to iTunes also meant that we were asked to partner with ARIA, iTunes and Youth Beyond Blue for a special project - sending the video and audio content of the artist performances from the event to iTunes, collecting the royalties and sending 100% of the proceeds to Australian charity supporting the needs of young people with depression.
Musicadium distributed videos and audio tracks by The Hilltop Hoods, Robbie Williams, Keith Urban, Kate Miller-Heidke, Lisa Mitchell, Sarah Blasko, Ladyhawke, The Temper Trap and Jessica Mauboy.
A final amount to be donated to Youth Beyond Blue is yet to be reached, but it will be made known when it is available.
2009 was the year of new outlets for Musicadium - Nokia Music and (available soon) MySpace Music.
Nokia’s popular Nokia Store and Nokia Comes with Music outlet was added at the same time as the upload system was implemented. Nokia featured electro-wizards Foxx on Fire’s new single White Sands as a free promotional download on their front page in November.
MySpace Music was launched in late 2009 in Sydney and Promotions and Development Manager Tim Price attended, partying the night away with the Philadelphia Grand Jury lads.
Starting in early 2009, Griffith University’s Dr David Carter approached Musicadium with an idea of analysing some of Musicadium’s data about artists we distribute. Taking a look at anonymous data, he constructed a research paper that looked at the causal elements of driving digital music sales.
The Paper was presented at Brisbane’s annual QMusic Big Sound conference in September, alongside showcases, keynote speakers and 4 days of industry discussions.
The results were tweeted about the world over, as well as featured on music feature sites such as HypeBot, Billboard and The Music Void. Ariel Hyatt of Cyber PR loved the results and review the research paper on her website.
See Photos here and take a look at the results.
Also, while on the topic of Big Sound, Musicadium distributed free samplers of the Musicians featured in the showcases at the Conference to AmazonMP3 and eMusic for the month’s leadup for the attendees flying in from the world over to sample prior to arrival. Artists such as The Middle East, Washington, The Basics, Old Man River and The Boat People were featured.
Over the course of the year, we have been very lucky to grab some great coverage for some fantastic artists in our catalogue on both the iTunes and Nokia Music Stores, as well as participate in samplers and other promotional activities.
Foxx on Fire - Single of the Week - Mission Abort (iTunes)
Cameras - Single of the Week (iTunes)
Buckley Ward - Single of the Week (iTunes)
Tokenview - Single of the Week (iTunes)
Little Scout - New and Noteworthy (iTunes)
Sally Seltmann - New and Noteworthy (iTunes)
Foxx on Fire - Single of the Week - White Sands (Nokia)
Big Sound Sampler - The Middle East, Washington, The Basics, Old Man River etc
ARIA Artist Performances - The Hilltop Hoods, Robbie Williams, Keith Urban, Kate Miller-Heidke, Lisa Mitchell, Sarah Blasko, Ladyhawke, The Temper Trap and Jessica Mauboy etc
Myer Christmas Gift Card Sampler - Rick Price, Tina Arena, Diesel, Human Nature etc
Musicadium once again supported the Queensland, Australia music scene by sponsoring Qmusic QSong Awards in two categories - the New Music/Experimental category and the Pop Music Category.
Kley and Michaela awarded the New Music/Experimental award to The Rational Academy and Tim and Sarah awarded The John Steel Singers with their award for the Pop Music Category.
See the photos here.
In late 2009, Tim travelled to Melbourne to participate in the Music Council of Australia’s Digital Think Tank #3, for distributors, labels and ISPs.
Tim participated in the discussion that should help shape the future of Australia’s digital policy for the Arts and copyright.
Musicadium follows Hypebot as an indicator of the digital music industry - reporting on the most up to date information from around the world.
So, it was an absolutely ecstatic moment when Hypebot listed Musicadium as one of their Twitter “Five to Follow” list - http://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2009/10/five-more-worth-following.html. 
2009 has been an amazing year for Musicadium and we can’t wait to let you know what we have in store for you, the artist, in 2010. We thank you all for participating in the digital revolution and supporting Musicadium. We hope to be helping you look over the horizon towards new music industry models and being a professional in that industry. We look forward to continuing to provide you with an artist-friendly way to distribute and more.
With Digital Christmas Cheer,
The Musicadium Team
I don’t know about you, but I think about all the big questions in life - why is belly button lint blue? Will lemon juice make you thinner? Where do babies come from?
You know who knows the answers to these questions? No, not your mummy, but everyone’s favourite science boffin and new Musicadium artist, Dr Karl!
Dr Karl, an artist? Yes people, Dr Karl has been working with his mate Jay from Triple J’s Jay and Doctor and a few of his muso friends to realise his dream of becoming a rock star. The result is his new punk track “Get Fact” which will be available shortly on iTunes.
In the meantime, you can pick up Dr Karl’s new book Never Mind the Bullocks: Here’s the Science at any reputable book store. He’s also coming to sign said book at a store near you sometime in the next month, so check out the dates for his book tour here. He’s also on Twitter, or you can catch him with Zan Rowe on Triple J mornings every Thursday at 11am.
Hello!
My name is James (or Jimbo which I’ve been nicknamed By Sarah and Tim) I am a 22 year old graduate located in Birmingham, United Kingdom. I have recently finished a three year BA Hons degree in Music Industries, obtaining a 2:2 classification and many beneficial skills throughout my time on the course. During the evenings I work as an assistant promoter for Plug After Hours Club, a live music venue situated in Digbeth, Birmingham. I deal with all the online promotion of the club and it’s upcoming events, including weekly bookings of deejays and artists from across the UK. I also DJ dubstep music under the name Arctic, having residencies in various night clubs across the city. I spend my days working in a garden centre (it pays the bills!) of which I’m currently saving my pay checks on a monthly basis, necessary in funding my move over to Australia next February 2010.
In my spare time I also co-run an independent record label, Andromeda Records, specialising in dubstep, minimal and underground electronic music. Other activities include participation with an online blog, Bassache, focusing on the discovery of new producers and deejays within the electronic field. I also run two club nights at the Plug venue, one focusing specifically on unsigned bands, entitled, Un-Plug Live. My other night, Bassfaced, is a club night I have ran previously, focusing on deejays and emcees surrounding bass music culture.
I’m extremely excited to be on board the Musicadium team, keen on bringing some of my own ideas to the table.
Nice one!
Musicadium has always been a leader in the Australian market for digital distribution of independent music to the world’s leading digital outlets, but from this week, Musicadium is raising the stakes and providing a range of new services, with more to come in the following months.
As early as tomorrow and throughout the coming week, Musicadium will release updates to the current website and to the album-adding process.
This very exciting development has been the product of a number of months’ work for the Musicadium team - the announcement of which has us all celebrating!
The purpose of this is:
1) To streamline the process to get music to us and straight through to the online outlets by adding an upload step in the album process (files are to be submitted in WAV files - stereo, 16bit, 44.1khZ). This feature will be made available from Friday 26th September, 9AM EST. This will aid the album adding process for overseas artists and reduce the postage costs for Australian artists to distribute their music digitally!
2) To add an extra outlet - Nokia Music (which also gets your music into the Nokia Comes with Music subscription service for mobiles). This feature will be made available from Thursday 17th September, 9AM EST.
3) To add the ability to distribute video to iTunes (this feature will be available from Monday 21 September, 9AM EST and details on the requirements for distribution will be made available then). Musicadium will be the only Australian-based aggregator to be supplying music video content to iTunes, to distribute globally!
These features will be available and accessible from the members area on the Musicadium website.
If you have any questions regarding these developments, please e-mail info@musicadium.com or call (07) 3252 9962.
Last year, Musicadium sponsored the New Music/Experimental Award - this year, we are sponsoring both the New Music and Experimental award AND the Pop Award! We are proud to be associated with the premier Song Awards in Queensland.
FROM QMUSIC’S FORTNIGHTLY MAILOUT: Queensland’s annual search for the state’s finest songwriters closed last Friday with a record number of entries. More than 2140 songs from across Queensland have been entered this year in 14 categories.
Q Music Executive Officer Denise Foley said “This is by far the most outstanding response we have ever had from Q Song. It’s truly a year to celebrate Queensland creativity with the number of exceptional songwriters we have in our state.”
Entries are currently being featured on www.qsong.com.au and each week 612 ABC Brisbane features Q Song artists on Thursdays at 1.30pm with Richard Fidler. Listeners can tune into local radio Queensland to hear outstanding entries.
Entrants in Q Song 09 will have the opportunity to not just showcase their songs, but also to share in $25,000 worth of cash and prizes aimed at building their careers.
Past Q Song winners include Kate Miller-Heidke, The Boatpeople, The Grates, The John Steel Singers, Robert Foster, Kev Carmody, Bernard Fanning, Ben Salter (The Gin Club), Kate Bradley, Jackie Marshall, Tim Steward, James Grehan, 8 Ball Aitken, Emma- louise, Shari Williams and many more.
While Q Song principally targets emerging and unpublished songwriters, those with established songwriting careers will also be eligible for the Published Song of the Year Award.
Finalists will be announced on June 29, 2009 with the Q Song Awards event to be staged at Fortitude Valley venue, The Tivoli on August 11.
Also announced on the night will be the Grant McLennan Lifetime Achievement Award, and The Courier-Mail Peoples Choice Award.
For more information about Q Song 2009 visit: www.qsong.com.au
Musicadium is sponsoring this event - we are giving away a digital distribution package to the five bands who make the grand final!
Check out the RockSchool Challenge’s MySpace page - http://www.myspace.com/rockschoolchallenge
Australian Performing Rights Association (APRA) put out a magazine 3 times a year - and the March 2009 edition features an interview with Tim Price, Musicadium’s Promotions and Development Manager.
FROM PAGE 5 OF THE APRAP (March 2009)
Musicadium is an Australian-based company that helps self-released artists and independent labels to digitally distribute and market their music across the globe.
Musicadium is focused on digital distribution and have rapidly built a local profile and customer base, as well as servicing customers worldwide. Aprap spoke with
Tim Price, Musicadium’s Promotions and Development Manager.
What sort of music content are you looking for?
Everyone, basically! We have a very large indie and rock base, as well as a lot of singer/songwriters. We are beginning to see jazz and dance music coming in and there is always room for any genre imaginable. We take all comers; we do not reject content, so we really are in the business of allowing any artist to have their music online and for distribution. We want to allow anyone to generate new revenue streams for themselves.
Which DSPs do you supply?
Currently, we supply iTunes, Emusic and Amazon. We are in the final phases of testing with Nokia and that should be live very soon. We have a view to expand this list to cover all of the major outlets.
How do you charge for your service?
We believe our fee model is the most artist friendly. We charge up-front and don’t take a percentage of royalties earned. We charge on the basis of the number of outlets you wish to distribute to. You can distribute your albums to iTunes, emusic or Amazon mp3.
What is the best way for a music creator to get your attention?
We don’t make judgment calls on bands’ content; therefore the best way to get our attention is simply to sign up! Though, there are ways of making us work for you! When you sign up, make sure you are organised and have your artwork (high res files), track details and PayPal account info ready to enter into our system. Also, send through press releases when you have something exciting come up: whilst we can’t promote every release we get, we love to blog about it and put it in our e-mail marketing campaigns. We love it when one of our artists has some success!
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In the very near future, expect an announcement about our brand spankin’ new upload system as well as a new outlet that you can distribute your music to - Nokia Music becoming available! And YES…you will be part of the Nokia Comes with Music plans if you choose to opt in!!
There is no exact date set yet, but these two wonderful developments will come online at the same time. Watch this space to find out how to add your release to Nokia Music.
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Melbourne band Little Red are now among the artists we distrribute, as well as the classic Australian Band, Dragon.
Check out Little Red @ Myspace, Facebook and Twitter.
Check out Dragon @ their Official Website.
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