tpb

[Matt Shields]

On Feb 4, 2008 6:37 PM, Kristian Erik Hermansen
<kristian.hermansen at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Feb 4, 2008 11:49 AM, Ben Holland <sheepskin505 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Musicians get most if not all of their money from their live performances.
>
> I think Radiohead stated that self-distribution gave them more money
> than ever.  Don't know how much that compares to live performances
> though.  Typically, I heard it is about $1 per album sold goes to the
> band, which is a very low amount indeed.  A great article on the music
> industry and their extravagant spending is below.  It doesn't sound to
> me like the record companies are being fair to the consumers with such
> antics (passing costs on to paying customers)...
>

The actual amount depends on a lot of different things.  Usually
there's around between $1.50 to $2.50 per album to distribute.  This
amount depends on what was negotiated in their contract, but it
doesn't all go to the band/artist.  It's split between the performer
and the authors.  So the artist usually gets around 50% for performing
the songs, plus a percentage if they wrote/co-wrote any songs. But
this is were the math gets complicated.  If this is a new artist (3-4
or less albums), they are usually already in the hole from money
prepaid upon signing, plus all sorts of costs that the labels can come
up with.  What it comes down to is usually the first 2 albums the
artist doesn't make very much to live off of, usually because the
artist has sold his soul to the devil (the labels).  So the way they
make up for not getting any of the sales is from touring and
merchandise which the labels don't usually get anything from.  Also,
albums that the band sells themselves (like at performances) the band
usually keeps a higher cut, because they have purchased them at the
wholesale cost and are selling them at a large markup.  Also, if they
were smart they kept the rights to sell their own merchandise.  Like I
said, some artists are so eager to sign, they give away everything,
sometimes even foolishly the rights to their songs.

So in the end, yes and artist will make more money on their own.  But
the reason artists are so eager to sign with labels, especially in the
past, is because of the national or international exposure.   If you
look at all the performers, how many have made it on their own.  The
labels are also at an advantage, because they deal with so many
artists, they get better deals for production, distribution and
marketing.  How many retail outlets that you know of want to deal with
hundreds of thousands of individual artists and purchasing and
royalties.

And my parents said a degree in audio engineering and production was
worthless.  Guess those classes on contracts and copyright did come in
handy, I'm glad I paid attention. :)

-- 
-matt

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