Social media junkie, wordpress designer, direct-to-fan (D2F) music marketing consultant, Topspin account manager, the penny black remedy bassist, diy music lover, web-head at strummerville, reader of too much music / tech news, total coffee-head.

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Keith, The Penny Black Remedy, back stage at Hootenanny, Brixton - Feb 2011

Keith, The Penny Black Remedy, back stage at Hootenanny, Brixton - Feb 2011

The British Government has given its backing to a Live Music Bill, which will allow pubs to host small gigs without a licence.

Still a long way to go but about bloody time…

Love and Endure Each Other - where is this?

Love and Endure Each Other - where is this?

Major ticketing services will see new players in the market with “direct-to-fan” platforms

I found this to be an interesting read, been checking out Gigwiz. Good to see they’re gaining traction..

Major ticketing services will see new players in the market with “direct-to-fan” platforms that allow event organizers and artists to turn to a smaller marketing middle man. Both Topspin and brand-new Gigswiz announced at the New Music Seminar this week marketing tools that artists can use to sell retail and direct ticket sales through their own websites.

It’s no secret that the last decade has been tough for the music industry...

Adverts placed on YouTube videos can turn a profit for their creators.

It’s no secret that the last decade has been tough for the music industry. Hit by piracy, recession and falling sales, record labels have shed artists and staff in an effort to stay afloat.

Costs have been cut in almost every area, with one glaring exception.

“What people tend to forget is there is a fixed cost in breaking artists,” said Mark Robinson, vice-president of Warner Music last year.

“On average, it still costs $1million (£621,000) to promote and launch a new band.”

It’s a big figure - incorporating the price of recording an album, styling a band, marketing their music and everything else that finally, hopefully, pushes an act into the mainstream.

But is there an alternative?

A growing number of musicians are establishing their careers on YouTube, with little or no financial outlay. Last year, an unsigned band from New York even entered the Billboard charts courtesy of their online fanbase.

Great article: Spotify should give indies a fair deal on royalties

Last year, major labels Universal and Sony received more revenue from Spotify than any other Swedish music service or digital and physical record store, according to local newspaper reports.

The news came as a surprise to many independent labels and to Swedish songwriters, as their royalty statements tell a very different story. It appears that not only do the majors own shares in Spotify, they – and their artists – also get much better streaming rates than the indies. Some of the indies threatened in early December to withdraw their music from Spotify in response.

david-noel: Seeing the name Joe Strummer by way of his foundation for new music used together with SoundCloud players for emerging bands supported by the foundation makes me incredibly happy. (weirdest sentence I’ve ever written in English?) Read more about this integration in this short interview with Steve Nelson over at Strummerville. Oh and check out the bands too, some really nice stuff.  (via soundcloud)

david-noel:

Seeing the name Joe Strummer by way of his foundation for new music used together with SoundCloud players for emerging bands supported by the foundation makes me incredibly happy. (weirdest sentence I’ve ever written in English?)

Read more about this integration in this short interview with Steve Nelson over at Strummerville. Oh and check out the bands too, some really nice stuff. 

(via soundcloud)

soundcloud: Around the same time last year, Steve from Strummerville got in touch with us to look into ways to use SoundCloud for the DIY initiative of the Joe Strummer Foundation For New Music. While Steve and the team started using SoundCloud back at the time, they’ve now rolled out a deeper integration with SoundCloud. Let’s hear what Steve has to say about it. Hey Steve, tell us what Strummerville is? Strummerville is a registered charity that aims to create new opportunities for aspiring musicians. Set up by the friends and family of Joe Strummer in the year after his death, we seek to reflect Joe’s unique contribution to the music world by offering support, resources and performance opportunities to artists who would not normally have access to them. What’s the latest? We’ve just announced our re-vamped DIY music platform and we’re really excited about our Top 20 DIY Playlist that features bands with the most downloads from the previous week - the response has been amazing. Our DIY pages give new artists an opportunity to be heard for free by a community of people who care about real music. How did you make use of SoundCloud and what made you decide to go with us? By fully integrating our DIY music platform with SoundCloud we can now virally promote the 250+ bands & songwriters we are working with (more being added daily). SoundCloud makes it really easy for fans of our DIY bands to share their favourite tracks on Facebook, Twitter, websites, blogs etc. with each download counting towards our Top 20 Playlist chart. As well as all this the SoundCloud team are an amazing group of people who absolutely love what they do and that’s move music, and that works very well for us. Thanks, Steve! We’re thrilled to be involved in the project of a legend like Joe.

soundcloud:

Around the same time last year, Steve from Strummerville got in touch with us to look into ways to use SoundCloud for the DIY initiative of the Joe Strummer Foundation For New Music. While Steve and the team started using SoundCloud back at the time, they’ve now rolled out a deeper integration with SoundCloud. Let’s hear what Steve has to say about it.

Hey Steve, tell us what Strummerville is?

Strummerville is a registered charity that aims to create new opportunities for aspiring musicians. Set up by the friends and family of Joe Strummer in the year after his death, we seek to reflect Joe’s unique contribution to the music world by offering support, resources and performance opportunities to artists who would not normally have access to them.

What’s the latest?

We’ve just announced our re-vamped DIY music platform and we’re really excited about our Top 20 DIY Playlist that features bands with the most downloads from the previous week - the response has been amazing. Our DIY pages give new artists an opportunity to be heard for free by a community of people who care about real music.

How did you make use of SoundCloud and what made you decide to go with us?

By fully integrating our DIY music platform with SoundCloud we can now virally promote the 250+ bands & songwriters we are working with (more being added daily).

SoundCloud makes it really easy for fans of our DIY bands to share their favourite tracks on Facebook, Twitter, websites, blogs etc. with each download counting towards our Top 20 Playlist chart. As well as all this the SoundCloud team are an amazing group of people who absolutely love what they do and that’s move music, and that works very well for us.

Thanks, Steve! We’re thrilled to be involved in the project of a legend like Joe.

Where will the music industry be in 2021? Let’s think about it. In 10 years time will there still be record labels? In 10 years time will people still ‘buy’ music? Unless we can time travel, of course, we will never truly know today the answers to these questions but one thing we have learned seen since the launch of Music Supported Here is that we all have opinions on what we think will be the future of the music industry. To try and make sense of this we want to know what you, our peers, think and so today we’re announcing the publication of a new poll ‘Ten in Ten’ – more info to follow in the coming weeks. For updates and general chit chat on this topic follow us on Twitter @musiciansrights using #10in10

Where will the music industry be in 2021? Let’s think about it. In 10 years time will there still be record labels? In 10 years time will people still ‘buy’ music?

Unless we can time travel, of course, we will never truly know today the answers to these questions but one thing we have learned seen since the launch of Music Supported Here is that we all have opinions on what we think will be the future of the music industry.

To try and make sense of this we want to know what you, our peers, think and so today we’re announcing the publication of a new poll ‘Ten in Ten’ – more info to follow in the coming weeks.

For updates and general chit chat on this topic follow us on Twitter @musiciansrights using #10in10


Mumford & Sons talk up plans for 2011

Marcus Mumford (Mumford & Sons) recently talked to BBC 6 Music all about their new material, plans for the year ahead and whether they’re feeling the pressure.

There seems to be no stopping Mumford and Sons following an incredible 2010 off the back of their debut album Sigh No More.

So, after a massive 2010, what does 2011 hold? Take a listen:

The Vagabonds (download now from Strummerville)

Had the pleasure of coming across these guys working on Strummerville DIY. The Vagabonds are from Dublin and have a great sound, here’s their track “John Mellor”

The Vagabonds

The Vagabonds - John Mellor

“…a brilliant slice of apocalyptic punk that’s just the medicine for recession depression. It’s no wonder legendary producer Stephen Street picked up on these lads.” - The Daily Mirror

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