Musicadium Blog

This HypeBot article talks about the need for labels, companies and distributors to put away the idea of CDs as their main revenue generator by December 2009.

The source article from Gartner, says “…reliance on revenue from the sale of CD’s is hindering the music industry from fully embracing online distribution opportunities.”

We aren’t arguing with this point, because we are a business firmly built on looking to the future of how Music will be consumed/listened to in the days to come.  We do have questions, though - we know bands will have something to say about it (the overwhelming majority I know still believe that the first thing that they want to do for their band is record for the purpose of making a CD) and more to the point, so will physical CD distributors/manufacturers and probably labels, who are making the majority of their money from the sales/making of these.  If the events of this article were to come true, then these guys should probably come up with a quick solution.  It’s late in the game and if they haven’t got their digital strategy in place, there’s no time like the present.

We are asking you this - should the transition be a little more gradual than this, or has the CD really run its course?  Being digital-savvy here in the office, we are all confident that we could take the plunge, but are the public ready as a wider, general rule? We have all heard about the huge sales in iPods and other MP3 Players, and MP3 docks, MP3 adaptor kits for Car stereos etc., but what about actually purchasing the tracks?  Does everyone have a computer capable of doing this? Is everyone tech-competent enough to download the track and then burn it to a CD or put it on a USB stick to play in their stereo or stream it from their computer to their stereo using a wireless device such as Apple’s Airport express, using their iPhone as a remote to control their iTunes playlist?  If this becomes the standard practice, does this mean tracks will be DRM (Digital Rights Management) free? Will they be High Quality MP3s or lossless FLAC files or similar?  Do the general public know about the technical difference between a 128kbps MP3 to a 320kbps file?

We believe that this day will come, but is it right now?  It’s definitely in the mail, but should we not give them a few years to work themselves out of circulation and the less tech-inclined to catch up?  The real test would be if your parents (who, probably, have just mastered playing their CDs on their stereo) could do it. These people are still in their comfort zone with their nice, easy CD in their hands that they can see, feel, touch.  What are they going to do when realistically, they have to think about their music in terms of it being a computer file, made up of 1’s and 0’s.

I still have many people say to me that while they accept the rise in the MP3/digital revolution in music, they don’t believe the CD will ever truly die, because they still like holding the product in their hands and having the artwork and the liner notes/lyrics.  Do you believe that a digital pack, that technically, can provide more, i.e. interactive content such as weblinks, will ever replace the CD?

Never before has there been this predicament when a medium was about to be outdated.  We have never gone from a physical medium to an abstract medium, one that couldn’t be held in one’s hands - Vinyl to Cassette Tape, though there was a massive loss in sound quality and they were easily destroyed (ever try to roll the heads and get the tape back in to the Cassette after your stereo chewed it?), was a more convenient physical product, smaller in size and the making of the mix tape was almost a rite of passage.  Cassette to CD was an easy transition, as I am guessing the sound quality (though still not as ‘warm’ as Vinyl) trumped the Cassette tape and was still a manageable physical size.

What of the millions of Music stores the world over?  Will they become a series of booths that you plug your MP3 player/Laptop into, feed your cash/credit card in and fill up on tunes?  Will you miss trawling through the piles of CDs/Vinyl to find that treasured relic?  Or will you rejoice that the trawling is finally over and the search function on the iTunes store will do that for you?  Are you excited that websites like last.fm and functions such as iTunes genius are finding new and varied music for you from the world over?

A few things that the articles suggest is that CDs become press-on-demand items or giveaway promo items.  Press-on-Demand is a good idea, but as promo items?  CD pressing in mass quantities at the moment is a fairly expensive exercise for not that many products (depending on where you are and what deals you can cut) so will labels/bands bother with this??

This is all up for debate.  We are ready for the digital revolution.  Are you?  Are your parents?

Charlie Trindall is one of Australia’s most prolific indigenous singer songwriters. A descendant of the Gamilaroi people of North Western NSW, Charlie began playing music in his early teens and has risen to great heights, having released two independent EP’s “Going Home” and “When Angels Fall” in 2008 alone.   Musicadium caught up with Charlie after recently discovering he’s latest accomplishment, a nomination for the 2008 Deadly award for ‘Single release of the year’. Congratulations Charlie!

How did you start playing music?

I started playing when I was a teenager and couldn’t do sport because I was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis.  My mum got me a guitar as my mate played so he and I started to learn!

Who or what has influenced your music throughout your life?

I loved to write poems and I loved to listen to the radio and always wanted to either play football or music! I loved to listen to the lyrics of artist such as Bob Marley and John Lennon and later the likes of Paul Kelly and Kev Carmody so I sort of got a feel for songs that told of social influences…

How do you tackle the song writing process?

I get an idea or an issue to write about in my head and toss it around for a while but this could be minutes, days, weeks or even months depending on how much I am inspired or moved at the time. The words start to flow and some kind of beat or tune and usually it flows from there!

What career would you have had if you’d not been a musician?

I write and play as well as work as a Project Officer in the Public Service.  I have also worked for many years in the arts industry which has helped to influence my creativity for so many years.

What has been your best performance experience so far?

I played at this years (2008) Yabun concert with my band mates from Armidale on 26 January in Sydney!

If you could collaborate with any other artist, who would it be and why?

I would love to co-write a song with Paul Kelly as he is a national icon in the Australian music industry and I love his lyrics and music.

What are you plans for 2009?

I plan to complete my new album and do heaps of live performances, touring and shows

Check out Charlie’s music on

Well, Christmas isn’t even here yet, but we are already thinking about what our New Year’s Resolutions will be.

Here is our wish list of what we want to ensure we provide in 2009!

• Do heaps more Musicadium showcase gigs to help promote artists and their digital content - the two shows at Barsoma so far have rocked really hard and have been massively successful.  We want to take these to the next level very soon and be actively implementing ideas like the bluetooth distribution of an artist’s track on the night in more depth.  Look for us to have interstate Australian Musicadium-distributed artists on the lineups in the future as well!  (P.S. if you are interested in playing one of these gigs, comment or e-mail tim@musicadium.com)
• We will be adding more outlets to our distribution list in the near future.  One new outlet will come up very early in the new year, with hopefully, a few new exciting outlets during the year - these will hopefully come with some special deals for bands already distributing with us!
• Keeping you informed about the goings-on of the digital distribution game at large by scouring the net for information and being active in digital music forums.  We will be bringing you another e-book during 2009 to further what “9 Ways to ride the digital wave” started, as well as bringing you information through our blog and email newsletter.
• Keep up with new technologies/online services that will aid artists in their search for the elusive 1000 true fans (who can possibly provide you with that income stream to continue making your art).  We want to endeavour to let you know about one new online tool to try out every month.
• Provide great service to you, the artists.  We already have a great model (in that you get 100% of your earnings from the outlets) in place, but we want to make sure that you get a great experience with us as well.  Feel free to e-mail us when you have something exciting that you want us to blog about or put in our email newsletter, or e-mail us with any questions or just to say Hi!
• Upgrade our online facilities.  We have plans for some exciting new features coming soon, that will streamline the entire adding an album process.  Definitely watch this space!
• Speak and present at more industry conferences and training/education facilities for a few purposes - to find more volunteers to help us out and also to spread th word about Musicadium! We had representation at Big Sound, Sydney Song Summit, AIR Awards, QUT, TAFE and at various Q-Music workshops this year, we hope to get to all of these plus more in 2009!  We would like to speak at more peak industry bodies’ presentations! Get in contact with us if you would like us to speak at your conference, business or institution!
• We would love to do a tour, where we travel to various towns, working in conjunction with local music industry bodies to speak at a gathering of artists to inform them about digital distribution! Queensland first, then the rest of Australia, perhaps!
• We distribute for thousands of indie artists!!  We’d like to help more indie artists get their music out there. Obviously, we have a lot of Australian artists, but we also distribute for many international acts and would like to expand our reach to different countries!
  

Is there anything that you would like to see from Musicadium in 2009 for us to consider?

This week’s hottest album cover belongs to Whyte Zebra and was painted by local Gladstone artist Melanie Williams from Gladstone award-winning art space Cedar Galleries. The result is an effective, striking image that manages to look cool and slick while remaining natural and organic. This completely suits Whyte Zebra’s music as they cite the John Butler Trio as an influence and have played some memorable shows with Ash Grunwald and Diana Ah Naid.

Check them out here, and let us know what you think of their cover art by commenting below!

I came across this on Hype Bot a few days ago. It’s about this website, Bopaboo, who are claiming that, if you do not want a MP3 anymore, you can put it back up (upload it) on the site and re-sell it.  Basically, a pawn shop for used MP3s.

From Hype Bot: Still in private beta, bopaboo provides a simple marketplace to buy and sell mp3’s and potentially other digital content. In a test, I was able to upload a random mp3 and have it on sale for 45 cents (a typical price) in seconds. Using a bopaboo provided $1 credit, I bought another mp3 and downloaded it easily.  Seconds later, since it was still in my online locker (bopabox) as well as on my computer, I had the same track back up for sale.

As brought up by Hype Bot, does the website confirm the origin of the “used” MP3?  The track could be illegally downloaded via P2P channels or torrented. Essentially, this allows people to make 100% profit on something they did not own in the first place, let alone consider or pay the original artist. The website states on its blog that they do have the copyright holder’s interests at heart, but how is this true?

From Bopaboo Blog: Importantly, bopaboo is not ignoring the right of the copyright-holders. We had always envisioned that our model would include an appropriate arrangement with copyright holders. We are encouraged by our meetings with content providers so far and look forward to completing those arrangements. Look for further announcements relating to our experienced management team and advisors, as well as partnerships with key content providers!

Rather than fix the problem of illegal P2P file sharing, does this not take it one step further??

We at Musicadium are very apprehensive about this.  The idea of a “used MP3″ store where a user can essentially strip the artist of all of their copyrights seems highly unethical to us, not to mention illegal, though, somehow, the site seems to be getting off the ground.

In our minds, there is no way in the world that EVERY copyright holder in the world can be considered in this arrangement.  They say they are putting the consumer first and are trying to provide a legal alternative to P2P sharing. If users in large numbers are uploading, ala youtube, there is no way to check every file at the upload stage, unless you had a warehouse of people checking files around the clock as they were added.  A user could obviously flag a copyright infringement, but that may be way too late for a user, whose song has just been distributed, possibly to hundreds, if not thousands of people and not seen a cent for it.

Hype Bot are posting an interview with the Bopaboo people very soon, it will be very interesting to see what their response is.

I also found this great blog, LockerGnome, who brought up this great point.

I also spent some time reading over the terms of service. You, more or less, are promising your uploads are legal. You are assuming responsibility. That should not surprise anyone. Is that enough though? Will that protect bopaboo from any liability if it is not a legal “used” mp3?

What do you think?  Leave a comment below.

The Rogues are a four piece old-school rock outfit from Brisbane, Australia.

This week we want to know what you think of their track “Wrecking Ball Blues” from their EP, KNUCKLES.

Check out their MySpace page!

Let us know what you think of the track here by leaving a comment.

This week’s best Musicadium album covers is a contrasting mirror-image of an alleyway, as seen in the light of day and the dark of night. We like the duality of the image!

This is the Album Cover Art for Mr Ben’s release, “Day and Night.”

We love the design here in the office - do you agree?

If you like Mr Ben’s songs, buy them on

If you think you should be in the running for the hottest album cover, shoot us an email with your details including the cover art and why you think it is hot.

Leave a comment below about Mr Ben’s cover art!

It’s no secret that we’re massive fans of Mr. Wally de Backer (a.k.a. Gotye) here at the Musicadium office and were very excited when the talented Belgium joined our esteemed ranks. So, we were beyond excited when we heard the news that his release, ‘Like Drawing Blood’ had been named as one of the best albums of 2008 at the iTunes UK Store! Well-deserved Wally, we congratulate you whole-heartedly! We’re already starting to babble about what will be next for the man of many talents, but we all agree that it will be something spectaular. Check it out at

Brisbane band The Rogues are Musicadium favourites, because apart from knowing how to totally rock a crowd, they also don’t take themselves too seriously. Check out their MySpace for inspiration on how to pimp your own profile, shred on the guitar and how to grow the  best rock hair in Queensland! (Seriously - check it out, it’s hot.) These guys are what rock is all about. We caught up with them for a quick chat and had some interesting results! Check out their debut EP ‘Knuckles’ on

How would you describe The Rogue’s music to punters who haven’t heard it before?
A music devouring Sex Tornado that is loud and raucous.
What is in store for anyone who attends a live show?
A life altering experience involving long hair, rock, and sexual innuendos.

Who are the greatest Rock and Rollers of all time?
Alex Van Halen, Malcolm Young, Darryl James Dio.

What are your top 3 albums for a Saturday night?
Airbourne: Runnin’ Wild, Tom Waits: Mule Variations, You am I: Sound as Ever.

How should someone dance to the Rogues? (If at all…)
Rock out with your *&#* out!

Two of our favourite artists (and previous featured artists on this very blog!) have had a major success today.

They have managed to secure themselves a spot on Australia’s premier summer festival, Big Day Out (BDO), through Australia’s youth radio network, Triple J and their Unearthed Competition.

Brisbane’s Hungry Kids of Hungary will play at the Gold Coast BDO and Adelaide’s The Shiny Brights will take the stage alongside international greats Neil Young, The Arctic Monkeys, My Morning Jacket, Serj Tankian, The Ting Tings and The Prodigy, as well as prominent Australian artists The Living End, Cog, Birds of Tokyo, Sparkadia and The Grates.

Both of these artists are bands who use their online presence well (The Shiny Brights are also in the Tooheys Extra Dry UncharTED competition, which also secures artists a spot on the Big Day Out).  They both make use of e-mail marketing, use their social media profiles well, utilise street teams and have fantastic live shows.

Hungry Kids of Hungary are currently on tour with The Boat People and The Shiny Brights are gearing up for their Southbound Festival appearance on January 3rd in South Australia.

We would like to congratulate these artists and wish them well on the day!  Hopefully we will be there at the Gold Coast Big Day Out to report back on how the Hungry Kids went!