The State of independents #1

In eight years working in the music business I never attended an AIM meeting, until this week’s 10th Anniversary AGM. I have to say I rather took to it. There was an informal and certainly collective, feel to the proceedings. And a celebratory feel too but in a modest, nicely understated way. Nothing seemed too staged or rehearsed.

Hearing Alison Wenham reflect back on the ten years since AIMs inception and give her ten wishes for the new era, it wasn’t difficult to get a sense of just how much AIM has managed to achieve, against the odds I suppose, when the job in hand is basically herding cats. And what cats. Alley cats that’s for sure. As Chris Blackwell says in his forward to the AIM Anniversary brochure “The indies will always be the lifeblood, usually started by misfits who are passionate about music and the excitement of youth culture”.

Having worked on a project lately that has required partnership with a number of indie labels I can see the spot they’re in and it’s a very sticky one. If we assume a future scenario of gradual continued devaluation of recorded music (can you see any other?) then the only means to long-term survival for record labels is diversification into other revenue streams and rights ownership. In which case, only the Majors (& not all of them!) have the muscle to wrestle their way through, surely? If you run an indie label, record sales are your lifeblood – not gigs, T-shirts etc. And that means that soon enough, you’ll be relying on the true misfits of society – record buyers – to keep you going.

But surely, someone somewhere will come up with a more effective platform for indie music than those currently on the market. There are so few around, most notably e-music – the world’s number 2 music service by value. The others – Bleep.com, Beatport – are small – smaller than the sum of their parts basically.

The indie scene in the USA is a little more dynamic, but mainly due to the proliferation and popularity of music blogs – Stereogum, Aquarium Drunkard, Brooklyn Vegan et al. including my own favourites Daytrotter.com and Ear Farm. But blogs are also less than the sum of their parts. Blog aggregators like Hype Machine and Elbo.ws do a good but perfunctory job of corralling blog content, but these hardly make compelling music store experiences. The indies could do with a branded platform (digital and physical) to help them do exactly what these others fail to do – punch above weight, not below.

There cannot be a more marked indicator of indies punching below their collective weight than a glance at the annual best-seller lists. The IFPI publishes the top fifty best-selling albums worldwide each year. Over the past two years (i.e. out of 100 slots) indie label albums have featured just four times, with all of those from one label in one fanatical marketplace – Japan (Indie label Avex is basically a Major in Japan).

Small Labels, Big Ideas

At the AIM meet, board members sponsored individuals to shout out their big idea for AIM and the indie sector going forward. This was both intriguing and engaging, and the ideas were pretty good too – many of them pragmatic – like an industry database of media contacts to assist indies with their low-cost marketing efforts (a tie-in with The Guardian Media Guide perhaps?).

My favourite big idea was ‘Death to the CD promo’ – an industry wide switch to promo streaming. This is one of those no brainers for the modern age – creating a greener and more secure network for digital distribution of all promo tracks to media and brands. Not only that, but the flow of information from this network could be so much more effective than now, i.e. phoning around in vain to see if anyone in the media received or has listened to, your tracks. Not only that, with services like SoundCloud on the market, this could be achieved within a year. I’m sure it would be supported by the Majors but would be a nice one for AIM to lead. However, the idea was voted number 2, runner up.

Number 1 was this: ‘Lobby the BBC to encourage them to play a wider range of independent music on Radio 1 and Radio 2’. Now it’s easy to see why this got the most votes even in the absence of knowing what the other eight big ideas were (they’ll be on the AIM web pages by now if you’re interested). I’ve no doubt that if I switch on the radio right now (lunchtime basically) I’ll get one of Take That, Pixie Lott or if a commercial UK radio channel, inexplicably, ‘Halo’ by Texas. Either those, or (Still) Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol (aren’t they really an indie band though?).

I’ve mentioned a few times on this blog in the past how radio has a lot to answer for, in the UK and even more so in the US. Radio is still the number one music discovery platform according to surveys (though I’m convinced the surveys are wrong and that radio’s position as tastemaker is secondary to its role as background music for people who can’t be bothered to like music that much). And because of the huge audiences radio reaches it remains priority 1 for record promotion.

However, the strategic dilemma for indies is whether AIM should bother lobbying the BBC about the R1 and 2 playlists or whether it is better off working with alternative promotional platforms to get a greater presence for indies on those. To my mind it’s the latter, because I can’t see a huge audience of indie music buyers regularly tuning in to R1 and 2 during daytime, but I can see them streaming more alternative radio shows via digital channels or reading about new music in Clash, or streaming new music on Spotify.

And so to the other great dilemma of the day for indies – to license or not to license (or perhaps more how & when to license and at what price) – new digital services like Spotify. This was also a big idea: to ‘persuade digital service providers that independent music is essential for any complete, compelling and successful music service’. This idea didn’t get such a big vote on the day, but probably only because AIMs members felt this is already very much in hand – which it is, through licensing body Merlin and through digital distributors like The Orchard, IODA and Vital.

However, speaking with my strategist hat on, I’m not sure if the indies collectively aren’t missing a trick with digital licensing. Fighting your corner on deal terms is one thing, but AIM should consider if it’s worth licensing to digital streaming services at all. I’m not advocating that the indies don’t license, I’m saying that it would be a valid strategic decision not to, on the basis of unquantifiable net value (i.e. after substitution effects and relative assessment of deal terms compared with Majors).

It would be an even more valid strategy if the indies could create an alternative platform to the current crop of streaming services. On the day, several members emphasized the exclusivity and ‘quality’ of indie music and I can’t help but think that there are better ways to leverage this than licensing to a slew of services as second fiddle to Majors catalogues. They could opt to support e-music more proactively, giving it another push, though it seems that with e-music now actively courting Majors, the opportunity is lost. Or the indies could look at creating a platform of their own – perhaps working with more innovative technologies like Songbird or similar.

Perhaps the biggest obstacle to an alternative platform strategy for indies is the music itself. Yes it is exclusive and of quality, and comes from a place of passion first, above commercial priorities. But that’s true of plenty of the repertoire on Major labels too. One out of 2 of my own favourite ‘indie’ bands are in fact released on major labels. While there is still a gap in the market for an indie music platform, consumers simply don’t divide music between Major and indie labels in that way.

So finally, to my big idea (with the benefit of a review of the ten presented on the day of course) as follows:

Launch a new branded platform for independent music (not exclusively indie label music, but it could begin there) that focuses on emphasizing the passion behind the music – the exclusivity, the quality etc. - everything that isn’t just availability, basically.

A boutique brand for indie music is what springs to mind. By necessity it would have a digital presence (downloads, streaming, radio and a licensing platform for blogs), but also very much a physical one as well – after all the brick & mortar space is somewhat less competitive these days. This could be through a small network of new stores or through a network arrangement of indie shops.

It’s contrarian, sure, but that’s the essence of indie culture, isn’t it?

The AIM meeting was the culmination of a week of events celebrating the tenth birthday and ‘Independents Day’ – when we are all meant to flock to our local indie music retailer to buy CDs & support the biz. I didn’t get around to shopping for indie music from an indie store on Independents Day, sadly. In the end I was too busy and not near an indie record shop – and in truth I would not know where to find one. Besides I suspect they wouldn’t be stocking my current wish-list of music. If I could have though, I would have!

My current indie music wish-list is the entire back catalogues of Spoon, Dinosaur Junior, Death Cab and Laura Veirs (only two of which are on Major labels).

Newsflash for latecomers: Glenn Peoples from Billboard (and formerly Coolfer of course) has alerted me to exactly what I refer to above - a new indie platform - in the US, called Thinkindie, here...http://digital.thinkindie.com/...which is interesting innit?
Nice use of the black sheep mascot too. One to keep an eye on.

The new way to listen to music – self-imposed scarcity

This week I finally received my copy of Spoon’s GaGaGaGaGa (snappy title guys) from Amazon. It was one of those where Amazon undertakes to get it for you not from its own warehouse, but from some tiny shop in a small mid-west American town what has one of the two last remaining copies on the planet (why is this album so unavailable?). Subsequently it’s taken about eight weeks to arrive.

In fact, I ordered it shortly after writing the ‘Music Discovery, Spoon Fed’ post back in mid-April. Have I minded? Yes I have, a bit. Of course I wanted to hear it, was dying to. But I’m a patient guy. I dipped into Spotify of course, as one does. Not there. Spotify has ‘Gimme Fiction’ by Spoon and I streamed that. (Quick aside: Spotify has got approximately one in every three albums I search for – are my tastes becoming so obscure?). Last.fm didn’t have GaGa either (let’s use the short version). At this point I can’t get to hear it, basically, and I’m thinking, that’s a savvy move by Spoon. Maybe they know I’m a fan since I connected with them on Daytrotter.com. More chance of me becoming a lifelong fan if I buy rather than stream GaGa. If I’d streamed it, like I did with Gimme Fiction, maybe I’d still be considering buying it, in a somewhat non-committal fashion, like I am with Gimme Fiction. Yes I realize I could easily get it from Bit Torrent etc. but I’m not that kind of music fan.

As it is, not only have I bought it, but patiently waited for two whole months to finally hear it. Now here’s the punchline though (no it’s not that the record was released in 2007, though that’s true). It was well worth the wait. It’s sooooo gogogogogood. This album is the best thing I’ve heard in about three weeks – only because I’ve been listening to a very high standard recently – stay with me.

Having been denied GaGa during the overlong Amazon source-pick-pack-ship process, I subjected the album to the 'New Way I Listen to Albums' treatment. This is basically what music journalists used to call ‘heavy rotation’. I first gave it an initial late-night spin on the CD player, through headphones. I was immediately impressed. Next morning I ripped it into iTunes and played it back over & over for at least 2-3 days. I was commuting into town and so I got through the record from start to finish at least 6-7 times in this initial period, becoming familiar with the sequencing, certain lyrical couplets starting to connect with me in a very relevant sort of way.

Then as the week progressed I had the chance to get it on the stereo through the speakers (B&W 686’s, I love ‘em). It sounded ACE. The opening track blew me away, just the sound of it. Spoon can play, no question, but it was more the production that blew my mind. Whoever produced this record knew exactly what they were about. The second track is 'The Ghost Of You Lingers' and you might already know how I feel about that track from the earlier post. This was the first time I’d heard the studio version, properly. It is one of the best things I’ve ever heard. I will keep coming back to this track forever.

But here’s the thing – the album just gets better and better from there. After ‘Ghost’ which is a really heavy, almost disorientating listen, the mood lightens wonderfully with ‘Cherry Bomb’ which is just a great, great pop song. Pop, pure & simple, with a nice brass ensemble – lovely touch. Very uplifting. I can’t exactly go on like this track for track, so to cut a long story short, it dawned on me that the album format will never die, ever, thanks to records like this. Because what takes a great album is much more than a collection of songs.

The songs have to be good of course. There isn’t a single filler track on GaGa, it simply ebbs & flows brilliance throughout. So songs, tick. Production, tick. The playing is phenomenal – great musicianship. The rhythm section especially. Tick. The track sequencing is just great, so you don’t skip tracks or shuffle or even want to turn it off until it ends. Each song amplifies the next and when you become familiar with it, you simply look forward to hearing the next song. Even the album sleeve is intriguing – some artist at work on a major ‘installation’ and a collage of burlesque-like ladies on the back. Good shot of the band on the inside (I still don’t like it when you don’t get a band portrait, which is common on indie releases for some reason). It’s all just a fabulous ‘in the zone’ thing. And it’s not even a concept album! (I’m partial to concept albums, future post coming).

Now on the business side, who knows? I know I couldn’t get hold of it here, but my understanding is that in the US, Spoon have slow-burned their way to a reasonably successful commercial career. All their previous records have got very decent reviews and Spoon's Wikipedia entry seems to describe a nicely escalating commercial success with each successive release. Damn right too.

So how come it’s only the best album I’ve heard in three weeks. Well, it’s because I’ve had a really good run lately. This is down to good taste (sorry to be modest), good choices and luck I guess. But I recently bought John Vanderslice latest album Romanian Names. Don’t get me started with this one. Also brilliant. Why did this record get ignored by the UK music press? I didn’t see one single review. It’s awesome, ticking every box like the Spoon record, and with Vanderslice’s talent for evoking mysterious little stories within his songs.

The track ‘Too Much Time’ has become my theme tune. The lyrics are the best I’ve heard in ages ("freedom is overrated" etc.). Again, I subjected it to the new listening method, finding that I didn’t want to listen to anything else that week I was enjoying Romanian Names so much, just wasn’t interested in anything else. And the production on that record is amazing. The acoustic guitar ‘solo’ on ‘Fetal Horses’ says it all.

Finally, the exact same thing happened with another recent catalogue purchase (part of 2 for £10 in HMV this time) – Death Cab For Cutie’s ‘Plans’. The most recent record was in my top ten last year anyhow, but Plans is better. Again, it’s a completely successful album, creatively speaking. Songs (those fabulous Ben Gibbard lyrics), musicianship (bassline & drum combo on 'Summer Skin'), production, sound, sequence. Once again, it’s all there, meticulously and beautifully executed, for our listening pleasure.

Give it a try. Put the temptation to stream every new over-hyped record-of-the-day on Spotify to one side for a week or so and try my new method. Make one album the soundtrack to your life for at least one week and see what happens. It’s addictive actually.

I’ve spent my whole listening career basically searching for the next breakthrough record for me – the next life-affirming set of songs that you can call on and rely on as a resource – come rain or shine. But I reckon they’re harder to find these days, what with the sheer number of releases (of pretty good sounding records, mind). You just have to pick them out, buy them (even if you have to wait a while for them to arrive) and then ignore everything else for a while. Create your own scarcity, basically. It works.


Footnote: Now it’s obvious I’m a fan of a certain genre here - American Indie I suppose, though I prefer to call it ‘sophisticated pop’. In a discussion with Conrad Lambert last week (just about my favourite European artist, aka Merz) we talked about why this sophisticated pop genre is so dominated by American bands. For example I also love Wilco, Laura Viers and Sparklehorse. I like Nada Surf, Silversun Pickups and The National. And there are really strong new bands like The Local Natives et al. – this music in abundant in America. Basically, it’s the size of the country I guess. There doesn’t seem to be a UK equivalent scene, unless I’m missing something. The best UK record I’ve heard this year so far has been Madness’s Liberty Of Norton Folgate! Blur is back though, and of course, our National Treasures The Arctic Monkeys. Make do I suppose.

Digital State of the Nation # 2: partnerships - when will it all go right?

[As promised, the second part of my assessment of the current digital space. This is a slightly longer version of what became an opinion piece in Music Week a couple of weeks ago. In the two weeks since, it’s been interesting to see the PRS change its license rates for streaming music and the commentary about Warner and other majors bleeding the horse for some ad-funded streaming services including iMeem. It was also interesting to read Hilary Rosen’s retrospective in Billboard - http://bit.ly/WTZoE Clearly things continue to move at a dazzling pace in the digital music business even if we’re no closer to figuring out which models will last it out. This piece is a call for a more strategic perspective on licensing and partnership, until we do].

Following recent developments in the relationships between music producers and their evolving digital partners, a fairly messy picture of the digital music landscape emerges. On the one hand, we have had the recent failures of new music start-ups including Muxtape, Mixwit and FabChannel – all of which have pointed the finger firmly at the record labels’ (and music publishers) collective lack of a flexible licensing policy. Seeqpod seems to be rapidly going the same way.

Perhaps most significantly given the overall direction of the business (towards music streaming) are recent grumblings by digital juggernauts like YouTube, iMeem, iLike and Last.fm that licensing costs are, erm, making life difficult. On the other hand, we have the buzz of Spotify and the tenacity of iTunes, continuing to make the best of its market leader position and loyal audience, if lately pushing it a little with price changes.

Such is the uncertainty of the digital music business however, that no one can say, hand-on-heart, which services will still be around in say, five years time. Spotify could be the new improved Last.fm with all the same commercial problems in the end. As for iTunes, it could either go the way of the streaming models or simply tough it out as the last man standing in downloads.

In each & every case the central issue is the same – that of the commercial value of music. In recent weeks I have had discussions with a number of young digital businesses all with a stake in music. Not one of them holds a belief anything other than music (at least, digital music) will be free within five years. I’m not going to argue with that notion here, as much as I’d like to - there isn’t enough room to do so.

My point here is to argue that the digital music business – suppliers and partners – have a choice in whether digital music is to be free in five years or not. Music doesn’t have to be free if the business cannot find a way to deliver it for free. I don’t care what Mike Masnick or Chris Andersen or whoever super-geek thinks about it. Are the movie or games businesses considering a free model? I don’t think they are. The music industry might not look too smart in five years if music’s free but digital films & games are commanding good prices.

It seems clear to my mind that an unambiguous licensing policy might help to start with. I don’t mean stubborn, or prohibitively expensive, just clear. For an innovative new music model that is non-threatening (one that for example passes my test of ‘natural friction’- not DRM or price friction, but repertoire based when set by users themselves – such as playlists, which don’t replace albums even when shared), licensing should be nice and flexible. It should represent good value, thereby incentivising innovation.

I hope the recent deals between ProjectPlaylist and at least two of the major labels fall under that category. Music providers can even support such services in other ways, through direct investment or content development, such as exclusives. It would mean label digital departments doing much more than deal-making and accepting cheques. It would mean Content Services and Account Management teams really working to support & sustain service partners in innovative ways. And both parties need to share and use collective consumer data better to iterate service development in line with users needs.

For a major ground-shifting service that potentially speeds up cannibalisation, licensing is much trickier and therefore by necessity of managing risk, more expensive. This challenges the service provider to find a workable model at the point of usage. If that model doesn’t exist or cannot be created, it can’t afford the license. Buying up content in advance distorts this picture longer term, adding to ambiguity in defining what is successful and leading to more market uncertainty.

If a clearer, more strategic licensing means a potentially smaller short-term digital business I think that is a fair trade-off for one of potential longer-term value. I don’t know if this is what the UK Government was driving at with its recent recommendation for a Licensing Agency – maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t quite sure itself. Maybe we'll see later this month when the full Digital Britain Report comes out.

It doesn’t take a government initiative, but it does mean music providers need some more collective clarity. With a clearer set of criteria for digital licensing, the music industry can meanwhile develop its other products and revenues more confidently, including improvements in physical product, merchandise et al.

New product post #3: Digipacks vs. Jewel Case - majority decision reached

I’m all for improvements in CD packaging – have been for a long time. I’ve talked about it both on this blog and during my time at the IFPI.

Indeed, in a memo to Guy Hands last year (did anyone in this industry not write a Memo For Guy?) my first recommendation was for him to take the initiative in transforming CD packaging across the piece - no more jewel cases.

Labels and music retailers should show the customer that the industry cares about its product and release all CDs in the superior digipack format (preferably using recycled materials).

After all, until we discover the value in digital music, surely the best route to monetization in the current music business, is through a better physical product?

Of course this call to action is naive, because it would cost the industry money to do this, and it isn't necessarily a cost that can be passed on to consumers. The CD is a volume product. Not only that, it is rapidly being commoditized. UK single artist CD prices have fallen by one-fifth over the past five years, from an average of £10.21 in 2003 to just £8.10 in 2008.

To reverse this trend is probably impossible. However, it's conceivable that music buyers’ perceived value of a CD album is, in this day & age, much lower than its current price. A notable shift in the quality of packaging (coupled with content extras) might be enough to hold CD prices where they are, or at least allow retailers to stem the relentless tide of discounting.

There is of course, a long list of logistical manufacturing issues to contend with. The digipack is more labour-intensive (someone has to stick the booklet on the inside card cover) and has longer lead times than jewel boxes. Demand planning is trickier, since jewel boxes are interchangeable with any CD booklet insert, whereas a digipack cover is printed specifically for that title. You need to plan carefully for how many you can sell - and who on earth can judge that accurately in this most unpredictable of businesses? In summary, it's difficult, costly and risky for any one company to move unilaterally on this issue.

Until now that is. At long last, there is a real catalyst to change CD packaging for the better. That catalyst is the environment, which music industry organization Julia’s Bicycle has articulated superbly so far.

At a recent event Hosted by Sony Music, Julie’s Bicycle took the opportunity to begin the process of aligning some key packaging goals across the whole music business. The facts are pretty compelling, as recently published in the Julie’s Bicycle report ‘Impacts & Opportunities, Reducing the Carbon Emissions of CD packaging’:

• The recording industry could reduce its packaging emissions by up to 95% by switching from the plastic jewel case to card packaging
• Consumers would prefer card packaging, particularly heavy CD buyers. More than half of those surveyed (55%) preferred the card wallet version of Coldplay’s Viva la Vida to the jewel box version
• 75% of CD buyers agreed it would be a positive step to shift to environmentally friendly packaging
• Some manufacturers are developing even more environmentally friendly versions of the digipack (the current digipack format already reduces emissions by two-thirds compared with the jewel case)

So the call to action is right there. As Tony Wadsworth put it at the event “I don’t see that there has to be a dichotomy between commercial goals and environmental goals, especially if we take a long term view”. Quite right too, especially when consumers would support packaging changes. Julie’s Bicycle has set out a roadmap for change with the ultimate goal of discontinuing the jewel case. In 2009 the major labels and Beggars Group have set a target to reduce emissions by 10%.

As for artists, ask any A&R or marketing exec, manager or indeed artist, which packaging they prefer. It’s a no brainer – artists would kiss goodbye to the jewel case in a second (probably preferring some ridiculously expensive alternative such as embroidered velvet, but hey, they care!). Beggars Group claims that nine out of ten artists request alternative packaging for their releases.

It’s about time we retired an old, much-hated, faulty product. I say product, because for some consumer goods, the product is the packaging! Packaging plays a key role in music – with CD buyers firmly attached to liner notes, artwork and tangibility. Putting music into beautiful but responsible boxes sets a great agenda in extending the lifecycle of the industry’s core product. After all, just letting the CD wither on the vine until we wait for digital revenues to materialize is a do nothing option that won't be enough in the longer term.

Music's changing product

[This post appeared in last week's Record of the Day as the Insight piece, just here in case you didn't catch it...]

A few years back I came up with an idea for a label, to present its pipeline as an online feature, called the 'Creative Curve'. The idea was to show a curve or spectrum with all the key creative points along it as a music project was being created - writing, recording, mixing, releasing, promoting and touring. For each point along the curve there would be a featured artist project at that stage of development.

The idea was meant to build anticipation, provide fans with an insight into the creative process (for example to see how artists work differently and handle those points along the curve with whatever degree of joy or dread) and potentially to offer products or at least promotional clips such as demos, song stems, interviews etc. which could also be widely syndicated to other digital platforms.

The idea didn't fly, since everything the label did needed to be artist-specific, not label specific. Also, there was a concern that opening up the creative process in this way would spoil the mystery and annoy the artists. In the end the will to mix up the product in this way wasn't there at the time, but things have moved on at a pace since then.

Indeed, there has been a constant, breathless innovation to the way music is being released to consumers. In recent weeks we’ve had the first pixel-interactive video, with Empire Of The Sun's new single, a new band More Than Thieves recording and releasing four exclusive sessions for each major streaming service, and another couple of high value box set packages from the likes of Metric and The Smashing Pumpkins. Meanwhile, some long-established artists have really been ripping up the rule book on what the ‘music product’ is, although I almost hesitate to mention the usual suspects since they get referenced everywhere (which is perhaps partly the intention – to capture our collective attention). No, I will not mention Trent Reznor in a piece about digital product. Doh!

To some extent these initiatives could all be categorised as promotion – an expanding array of gimmicks designed to shout the loudest to simply do what the industry has always done – “work the album”. But there's more to it than that. Music, it seems, is constantly in search of a new way to present and package itself now that the album has been de-coupled and the physical product is being slowly but surely eroded.

The business 101 book says that when a core product is being devalued and commoditised the only way forward is to build new products, services and experiences around what was the old cash cow (in our case, albums) and meanwhile milk that cow dry. Other sectors have made successes in doing just this - indeed it’s been the raison d'être of Richard Branson’s Virgin brand for some time – it’s how flying got a makeover for example.

Entertainment industries have had makeovers too. HBO did it for TV and Marvel did it for its catalogue of super-heroes - they transformed their respective industry’s products and allowed them to flourish whatever new distribution channels emerged. The movie business is currently working through product transformation via digital projection and 3D film.

With music, it's been harder to tell how to respond to the impact of technology and the resulting changes in consumer behaviours. Piracy, other entertainment products, digital distribution and now apps, have all shaken up consumption to the point where consumers seem to spend more time searching, writing about or playing with music than actually listening to it. The term the 'Kodak moment' just doesn't do music justice. What Kodak went through was child's play compared with the current challenge of music producers.

Arguably, those producers have placed too much attention on distribution, with little genuine sustainable value created from this. It has taken too long to switch focus to the obvious – music the product.

But with new product innovations now arriving that seems to be changing. We have high-end physical album packages that come with a range of valued extras including even gig tickets, like Metric & Smashing Pumpkins mentioned above. Some debut artists like Laura Marling did it with her ‘Song Box’ release of Alas I Cannot Swim. Radiohead really got that ball rolling. The much talked about release of In Rainbows skewered the two polarising trends in music consumption: digital - get it now, get it cheap, no frills - serving one end of the scale and the £40 box set serving the other. Clinical, simple, genius marketing.

Audio-visually music has come on leaps & bounds despite the reduction in the volume of expensively made promos. Again, the music video market has widened to cover lo-if or user generated low cost clips for YouTube to high brow art films for theatrical distribution, such as The Arctic Monkeys Live at the Apollo and Wilco’s two great movie projects. Artists at all ends of the spectrum are creating interesting film product, from U2's recent arty collaboration with Anton Corbin to Conor Oberst’s superb recent touring film.

Despite being in the eye of the hurricane, the pop song itself hasn't changed, although the singles format has actually benefited. Meanwhile albums seem to have remained intact, my own theory (statistically unproven) being that albums have both shortened and improved as a ‘natural response’ to current market pressures. With ever more music products growing around the core song & album formats, two things need to happen to affect a notable shift in the commercial fortunes of music:

1. High-end physical product will need to become more standard rather than ‘special edition’. This will extend the physical life-cycle for music across all demographic groups that value physical product, be it CD, vinyl or USB. This would take investment on the industry’s behalf but will pay-off over the long-term. Besides, standard CDs are just not good enough for modern day consumers.

2. More & more peripheral content – film, video, apps etc. should be packaged & offered commercially as product, not purely in the name of promotion – after all, what exactly is being promoted these days except an ever-reducing sales yield for the standard CD?

There has been an ongoing debate in the convergence era as to what is King, content or distribution. To my mind it is clear, content wins, distribution is just access to content. People will always want music content and will pay for the privilege, but music the product has to change and improve with the times. Consumers appreciate that more than anything.

[See also http://www.creativereview.co.uk/crblog/what-no-jewel-case/]

Will all CDs go The Way of the Shed?

It’s just been the May bank holiday weekend in the UK and I undertook to do some typical bank holiday weekend stuff, including clearing out my garden sheds (that’s right, I have two! Yes I’m aware this is a seriously privileged over-allocation of sheds).

This involved the usual detritus... a decrepit lawnmower, baby & toddler instruments with bits missing, hundreds of dead spiders and much worse, a few live ones as well.

Inevitably it also involved CDs. Lots and lots of CDs, hundreds in fact, boxed up randomly – all but abandoned - a travesty of wasted plastic. Most of the CD cases are cracked of course and they generally don’t look attractive – what a faulty product when you really think about it.

I cleared a shelf unit at the back and unloaded the boxes – anything to make extra space. My god, look at this! I never even played half of these all the way through. Here’s a random sample:

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – their over-rated, over-hyped debut (mind you, their 3rd album Howl is on my ‘classics’ shelf)

Teenage Fanclub – Bandwagonesque – isn’t this said to be a classic? – might have to revisit soon
Diesel Park West – Shakespeare Alabama – as above

Grandaddy – Sumday –I do remember being distinctly underwhelmed by this

John Frusciante – Shadows Collide With People – I think this is his 25th solo record, doesn’t he make an album a month or something?

Aha – Minor Earth Major Sky – This has a great B side on it called Barely Hanging On, but as an album it’s hardly up there alongside the likes of Scoundrel Days (or lost A-ha classic Memorial Beach)

Athlete – Tourist – their overly ambitious and eventually career limiting second – it contains literally one good song. Athlete, if you’re still out there, please go back to being the real you!

P.I.L – Greatest Hits – surely this has some crackers on it

Jerry Cantrell – Boggy Depot – what? How many solo albums do I have by guitarists from old-favourite heavy rock bands? I almost certainly paid well over a tenner for this. What was I thinking?

Gomez – Liquid Skin – One-time-lauded indie golden boys, they have actually just released a new record I see

Terrorvision – Regular Urban Survivors – assume this was a bad mistake attempt at a guilty pleasure – you can’t deny they had a sense of humour though (check out Superchronic and Bad Actress for example)

The National – Boxer – wasn’t this on several blog best of lists a few years back? If so what’s it doing in the shed? Maybe it’s a spare copy. Note-to-self - Mistaken for Strangers and Guest Room must be ripped & re-engaged with asap

Guilty Pleasures Rides Again – got to be something here for the bank holiday barbeque playlist surely

Etc.

What are these fit for now?

Since there’s a set of old Mordant Short stand up speakers in here and an old amp and CD deck, I could set it all up and spend the month of May on a nostalgia trip. I’ve got the urge to just select a disc at random, and play through my favourite track from it. That might be a fun way to squeeze some value out of this motley collection. But I don’t have time for that.

I could just throw them in a box and take them down to the next car boot sale (yard sale US readers). But I don’t even think I’d get a punter for them these days. Ten years ago I did do this and the CDs sold out rapidly (a pound for three). But these days, it’s probably only old mobile handsets and iPods that fetch decent prices.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could claim a refund on CDs you never got value from? I’d be in for a good few hundred pounds cash-back on this set (which I would happily spend on new music of course). Maybe there could be an industry recycle scheme whereby you can trade in the CD and get the download version for free, or maybe exchange an old CD album for one new download track?

At least I should spend an hour with the laptop in here ripping a select bunch of tracks into my iTunes library – the Shed Playlist Spring 2009. That’ll work. I’ve created something out of it after all.

Ways of Listening

As I sorted through the piles, I thought about how varied our listening habits have become as consumers and how it all started not with digital but with the CD. One friend of mine, back in University days, would get his new CD home, shove it in the deck and promptly skip through it one track at a time, previewing each song. “How can you do that?” I would say in disgust, “you’re spoiling it for yourself, have some patience man”. And this was ten years before 30 second clips! He always was a futuristic thinker.

Another friend took it to the furthest extreme the other way. Whenever he acquired the new release disc of one of his favourite artists, he would first insist to take it upon himself to play back the entire catalogue of that artist, in chronological order. “Unrealistically obsessive, mate”, was my considered response to that one.

I fell in between these two extremes, always insisting to myself that I wait for the opportunity to playback in full any new CD purchase, on the hi-fi, not headphones. Of course, this hardly ever happened due to the ever dwindling amount of free time, hence not listening to half these abandoned CDs in my shed.

Just lately, I have actually been buying more downloads, mainly from 7 Digital. You can’t argue with the prices (many new releases on ‘sale’ at £5) and the 356 bit rate MP3’s sound pretty good to me. I miss the tactile quality of CD packaging of course and still go for some stuff on CD (recently Metric, Spoon, some classic back catalogue by Talk Talk). But after an experience like this weekend, it might be more downloads from now on and a little less plastic.

The future of music is: Filtered

[this post is featured as the comment editorial in this week's indespensible UK-based Record of the Day http://www.recordoftheday.com weekly magazine and is part 1 of 2 posts on innovation in music. Next week's focuses on music the product].



If the music industry is changing so much, how come the biggest promotional platforms for bands are still mainstream media - radio, press, TV and The Charts? It might be tempting to think that it’s because music label marketing is so steeped in the tradition of radio, press, TV and The Charts that they know not much else. But this is no longer true, especially in labels where digital specialists beaver away on this or that initiative for new music campaigns via apps platforms, social networks, e-tailers and blogs.

The simple fact is that radio (followed by TV) is still where the majority of consumers say they discover new music – at least it is when you look at research tracking by the likes of NPD, Viacom etc. I find that remarkable in this day & age, but the point where this changes is when it gets really interesting for music and for the way music is marketed.

It might even be the point where the business itself finally tips into a new paradigm where radio and TV matters less than digital media, or even doesn’t matter much at all. Some artists have already reached that point, such as Ingrid Michaelson, with 250k album sales and 800k downloads with barely a mainstream murmur. Indie band Metric has had recent similar success.



The reason is that many fans have reached that point too. Forward moving artists will concern themselves less with a radio-led charm offensive and more with a fan-base-building digital campaign along the lines of Michaelson.

It is in many ways surprising that mainstream media is still seen as the golden ticket to success, when we’ve had some ten years of development in digital. But then, since digital only represents just one fifth of industry revenues, perhaps it isn’t surprising at all. The business will still focus supply and marketing activities firmly towards where consumers discover the product and spend the cash.

However, over the next year or so, there are some clear signs of a more full-tilt transition to digital. An obvious one is the increasingly moribund physical retail space – you can’t buy CDs if there’s nowhere left to shop for them. Another is breakthrough digital only applications including of course, Spotify and applications platforms like the iPhone.

But what could make a greater single impact than these factors combined is if music discovery really came on leaps & bounds, digitally. It has been threatening to for a while of course, with numerous recommendation engines (most notably Last.fm) and music social networks emerging as more effective music discovery platforms than radio and retail for a sizeable segment of music fans. Such services have certainly improved upon the basic search capabilities that drove earlier generations of music services, including of course P2P.

But for all their clever functionality, no recommendation engine or social network has become the music discovery standard in the way radio has. This is for a variety of reasons: algorithms are yet to work perfectly as filters for music (if they ever will); recommendation results are still a bit hit & miss; social networks like last.fm are a bit too cluttered for mainstream use. Blog aggregators and blogs are too specialist.

But there are a number of ways in which music discovery will change in the next year or two that will collectively make a huge difference:

1. Music crawlers and mega-charts. Going beyond the boundaries of any one social network or just crawling blogs, combined web crawler services that cover all the major metrics of play-counts, profile views, search-terms, twitters etc. – for both bands and songs – will aggregate everything and provide constantly refreshed mega charts to replace the traditional charts as we know them. The BBC’s Sound Index was pioneering for band buzz, but for a more focused application of the concept take a look at We Are Hunted (wearehunted.com). Fresh out of Australia this web crawler amasses all into the 99 most popular tracks of each day, presented in a simple 9-track-a-page format with a stream & buy button on each & every track.
   
2. Social programming. So-called fourth generation discovery after the first three generations: 1. The EPG; 2. Search and 3. Recommendation. Go Fish and You Tube already pioneered social programming to some extent, allowing individual users to programme & broadcast very simple personal video channels. Now iLike & Facebook have really opened up social programming in audio. I’ve been sceptical about this - who wants to discover content through a multitude of individually programmed channels? I wasn’t sure until I tried Peoples Music Store (peoplesmusicstore.com), which I think is a fun and very social way to discover (and even shop for) new music. Judging by this week’s news, Universal music agrees, licensing some 300,000 songs to the service.
   
3. People, places & lifestyle. Geo-location technologies will allow users to use their mobiles to filter all sorts of content by location, timing and lifestyle preferences. Imagine a playlisting application that can give you a playlist relevant to a business trip you are taking today, or the mood you’re in as you are stuck in your tinderbox on the M1 on a hot sunny day.
   
4. Personalised home pages. This one is for the ISP’s to crack, although iTunes really should have done it ages ago as well. The BBC and Google are masters of it. You really don’t have to bother going anywhere for discovery other than your own personalised homepage of your preferred access provider. The likes of Sky, Virgin & BT are developing it as the holy-grail for their multi-platform customers.
   
5. New content brands. In many ways the antidote to all that goes above, new content brands are old fashioned, trusted editorial brands that thrive digitally due to their expertise in exploiting long-tail content, reduced barriers to entry and targeting of audiences previously underserved by mainstream media platforms. Think Lost Tunes, Mondomix, Pitchfork, eMusic, Daytrotter et al. Established Blogs and even Brands that do it well can create new preferred destination services for digital users.

With all this space for music discovery to develop it keeps me optimistic for generating new opportunities to drive more immediate consumption – transactional as well as streaming. Current discovery platforms like YouTube, Pandora, Last.fm & Spotify aren’t necessarily good purchase drivers for music, but that doesn’t mean new ones won’t in the future.