Musicadium Blog

We read this article at NME in the Musicadium office this morning and we were left scratching our heads a little.  Just what is Prince thinking when he makes statements like this?

Just how is the internet dead? With CD sales plummeting and Digital sales rising, as well as the rise of the independent artist and their ability to promote via the internet, it seems to be just the beginning of the ways the internet can help artists.  The partnership between the internet and the music industry is really only just going through the teething phase.  Yes, there are problems, but it is still very much infant age and certainly not aged, senile or dead.

In an interview with The Daily Mirror, the singer said his stance on technology is the main reason why his new album ‘20Ten’  will not be available for download online.

“The internet’s completely over,” he explained. “I don’t see why I should give my new music to iTunes or anyone else. They won’t pay me an advance for it, and then they get angry when they can’t get it.

Ok, Prince. This article does serve to show the divide between the old and new music industry.  The divide seems to sit at about 1999 and 2001, the lost years of pre-iTunes/iPods, post-Napster.  Advances from labels pre-1999 were commonplace and Prince is obviously accustomed to this sort of treatment, but surely he can see those days are over?

So - Prince wants an advance from iTunes on sales.  While of course, iTunes could afford an advance of royalties to Prince, why should they take the risk? In this environment, they don’t really need Prince to continue to turn a profit.  Prince, why not make it available in digital stores for those who want to buy it in that format, sell loads and turn a profit anyway?  The long tail of the majority of artists do not get advances from anywhere and just get on with being an artist - why are you entitled?

The article goes on to say that he will be releasing his new album 20Ten via a redeem code in newspapers (presumably in stores for the CD).  With CD stores in the state that they are in (closures everywhere due to lost revenue) does he expect bricks and mortar retailers to give him an advance? Surely they have less money to give and more to risk?

If the redeem code gives the user a download code where it is redeemed at Prince’s website to claim, then this would be more innovative and clever.  Hopefully, Prince is not completely off the idea of the internet in general and can use it from his own website to capture user data to inform his choices about touring. The redeem code is a great idea, especially being that it will mean that each of those codes will result in a “sale” for Prince, virtually assuring the album will chart highly.   However, it seems that his statement that the “internet is dead” means he’s not overly open to the idea.

Here’s hoping that Prince sees new opportunities using the internet to spread his music in the future, as it will certainly go on living without him.  I am sure the internet will have him back when he chooses to jump back on board.

Last year at Brisbane’s annual Music Conference Big Sound (Check out this year’s plans - the speaker lineup looks epic and it’s being programmed by friend of Musicadium, Graham Ashton), Musicadium partnered with Dr David Carter to produce a look into what promotional activities help to drive online and digital music sales.  The findings were pretty awesome and they were presented to the entire conference.  It was talked about at South by SouthWest and also featured on HypeBot and Billboard.

You can download the PDF file of the report and the findings from here: http://www.musicadium.com/promotions/107-online-marketing-research-paper

Part of those findings was that offline presence and promotion was still and always has been a vitally important part of the mix of publicising a band. Here’s what the report had to say:

Artists ‘Off-Line’ Profile
Artists profile within the Australian music industry was also considered as part of the documentation of their online activities. Each artists profile was assessed qualitatively based on a combination ‘off-line’ factors such as how many years they had been performing for; how regularly and at what venues they were currently performing; frequency and type of press / media coverage; radio and television airplay and; if they were touring nationally or internationally. An artists profile was described as either low (recently formed, infrequent performance, little or no identifiable media coverage and airplay); emerging (generally formed within the last three years, frequent performance in small to medium size venues, some media coverage in street press or national media, some radio airplay, some interstate touring) or; established (generally formed more than three years ago, regular performance in medium to large size venues, regular coverage in national media, prominent radio airplay, interstate and international touring commitments). Those artists with an established profile received proportionally higher royalties, than those with an emerging or low profile.

This morning, I read this article at HypeBot regarding the Portland, US band The Dirty Mittens and their offline promotions idea of having punch cards that they give away when handing out their demo EP.  The card has an attractive design and the premise is that if you attend any 5 live gigs, you are entitled to a special reward (which they have said could be anything from a kiss from an eligible band member to a piece of merch).

As the HypeBot article states, this practice is actually so simple, it’s a wonder no-one had done it before (or at least got widespread notoriety from it.)

So what’s the lesson to be learned here?  While digital and online marketing is so incredibly important in this environment, genuine interaction at shows with fans and offline promotions (posters, street press editorial, reviews etc) and also campaigns IRL “in real life” are vital to be a whole package.

Even more important, it’s still all about having great songs to put out into the world.

http://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2010/07/dont-forget-the-power-offline-promotion.html is the link to the original article.