The record companies don’t get it. I think we can all agree on that. If they can’t monetise a unit sale then they can’t make their old business model work, and with the unit price of music online close to zero, (iTunes at al notwithstanding), the labels’ old model is probably dead, or at least waving its feet in the air twitching uncontrollably. They also appear to not be able to move to a new model, instead attempting to lobby and sue their way back to the good old days before Napster came along.
Presumably, at some point, we’ll see labels signing fewer bands, and certainly fewer good bands, instead concentrating on the sure-fire X-Factor end of the market and the long tail of their back catalogs. This leaves a pretty epic cultural gap for genuinely good music to be heard by lots of people.
It’s okay for Radiohead and Trent Reznor to not have labels; they’re leveraging the profile that their old labels bought in the earlier years of their careers. New bands can’t do that. It’s easy to say that there are opportunities for new bands to come along and use the interwebs to kickstart their careers, but without that crucial initial marketing spend, it’s still practically impossible to launch an actual career without the backing of a label.
So if the labels won’t bring us great new music in the future, who will? How can bands generate that level of media profile where people will come out on a wet night to watch them play, generating money through merchandising and ticket sales? Without label backing, you’re screwed.
How about a system of non-profit-driven promotion, handled by an culturally aware organisation which has a vertically-integrated structure handling content creation and delivery? Fat chance. Oh… hang on. What’s that you say auntie?
Yes, the BBC has all this in droves, so here’s my plan in a nutshell; the BBC should become a sort of public-service label.
It already dabbles of course. Lamacq will play something once from some band in the middle of nowhere, and a few people will hear it, but there’s no coherence or conviction, it’s just messing about. If there were a few people at the BBC genuinely seeking out new talent (A&R, effectively), rather than playing what the labels spoon-fed them, the BBC could coordinate its entire network to promote new music. It would put a whole new spin on the phrase “in new music we trust”.
Wouldn’t it be great if a band featured on Lamacq had a chance to be nurtured by the BBC, to be guaranteed some kind of rotation on the BBC radio network? At the higher echelons, there’s Jools Holland and Radio 1. Wouldn’t it be fantastic if an “unsigned” band got a slot every week on Jools, and corresponding daytime rotation on a national radio station? Profile that would previously have cost the label (and by extension, the artist) massive amounts of money could then be had for free.
Hell, it could even rejuvenate Top of the Pops, which everyone wants back, but which the BBC can’t seem to find a way to reformat so it’s convincing. Regular prime time TV exposure for unsigned acts alongside label-sponsored bands? How fucking cool would that be?
The BBC could even release music. Really, there’s not a lot of difference between shifting a “Blue Planet” DVD and releasing an album by a band, and CD sales could subsidise the system to a degree. Also, music fans are willing to pay for music, and if you sign genuinely good music, you’re in with a decent chance of tapping into that market.
There are downsides. Should the taxpayer pay for this kind of thing? I don’t know. I speak as a music fan and a musician, and the niceties of whether this would be public money well spent are slightly lost on me. I think so, but then I would, wouldn’t I? I would imagine also, that Offwatch, Offcom and their ilk would have something of a cow. Competing with the labels? How dare they?
And yes, there couldn’t be that many new acts “signed” to the BBC every year, but with a cultural brief, rather than an overtly commercial one, they’d probably be pretty good.
It’s only a thought. But isn’t it an exciting thought?
Browse Timeline
Comments ( 2 )
Fair play to Zane Lowe, he often champions unsigned bands and even gets then on the radio one play list every now and then.
Not quite the same as a record label but it’s a good start.
btw Isn’t this what Peel used to do with his strange fruit label (releases of peel sessions recorded for the beeb).
f01re added these pithy words on
May 07 09 at
12:30 pm
Yes, I know the BBC does muck about with it, but as I say, there’s no real commitment – just lip service at a network level. And yes, it is a bit like JP’s label, but again, it was just JP – no network involvement.
admin added these pithy words on
May 07 09 at
12:54 pm
