Sell A Band
by deletedsoul | August 8, 2007 | In Entertainment, Music | 2 Comments
For an aspiring musician, a lover of music or even a casual mp3 collector, the internet can be a wonderful place. Even without signing away the rights to the music you created, an artist can get themselves out there to the many music communities.
The sad part is, there are a lot of people who do not want to branch beyond the mainstream artists they are presented with on radio, or the "featured artists" on sites like MySpace. You miss an awful lot of great music by not listening to a band because you do not recognize their name!
I blogged about the indie music site Amie Street recently, which offers all artist-submitted music for free when it is added to the site. The value (cost) of the music grows as it is downloaded, and can grow up to .99 per track. One of my favorite bands, State Radio, was a find on Amie Street earlier this year. They have a sound that cannot really be put into a box, but is extremely enjoyable.
MySpace can offer some interesting choices, even though it is difficult, at least more difficult, to find music on MySpace than it is is on other music sites. Sometimes you can happen upon something good, however. A couple of decent bands I've found are Jminus and BiPolar. Totally different genres, but a lot of potential there.
Today I was browsing Amie Street, and found a band by the name of Cubworld. Their label was listed as sellaband.com, which piqued my interest.
Apparently sellaband.com is a music promotion site which, like Amie Street, allows artists to create a profile on the site for free, and add demo songs, artwork and other artist information to it. Unlike Amie Street, none of the music on sellaband.com is for sale. The purpose of the site is to enable unknown indie bands to get a chance at making a record with fan generated income. As a fan, or "believer" as the site dubs the users of the site, you get the chance to search the artists on the site, listen to up to three demos, read information and learn about the band. If you find a band that you "believe" in and really enjoy, you are invited to donate to that band. 10.00 buys you a "part" of the band (there are 5,000 in all). Once the artist gets $50,000, they record a CD and are introduced to bigger record labels. The fan gets a CD and a portion of whatever the artist earns with the sale of the CD created with sellaband.com.
I think its a step in the right direction. While the goal is still recognition by the "big four" labels (BMG, Sony, Warner and Universal), I like the idea that the initial recording is fan driven and doesn't cost the artist(s) a cent. Plus, it would have to feel good knowing that your success was created by your fans, not a clever marketing scheme by a multi-billion dollar industry.
I take issue with the state of the artist/label relationship as it stands today. If I can avoid giving ANY money to the music titans that own the most popular bands, I will.
