My favorite singer, Dwight Yoakam, went with an independent label, New West, reportedly for more artistic freedom but after reading this I suspect some of the reason may have been to keep some of the money he earns. Related to this post, I have heard that recording artists make pretty much all their money on tour, not from record sales.
Paul McCartney went from EMI to Concord (a jazz label) this year.
EMI sold 69,000 post-Beatles albums from McCartney last year. Or so that is the tally.
Music on radio and tv sucks so much because the public is fed what the big labels are forcing, as they did in the 1970s.
The monopoly needs to be broken up. The racketeers in the music industry (real crooks) need to be sent to prison.
None of this will happen. So now the public listens to music off the grid and “big sellers” are far below what they once were.
450,000 bands instead of 14,000.
Speaking as a presenter of live shows and a music writer, I can say that touring COSTS money, it’s not where the profit is made, unless the artist is a supertar filling a stadium/arena. More than half the lif=ve music on tour is there becauae of the record label’s TOUR SUPPORT — paying the shortfall between what the tour costs and what it earns.
The label pays, thousands of dollars for the tour because it’s a chance to sell records.
Without tour support it’s very hard for artists to travel — think of the costs of transporting a band of 5 or 6 from NY to Seattle. Add hotel. Add food. Add paying the band. THen take a venue that holds 300. Multiple that by about $20 a ticket. Still not enough to cover costs. And that’s not counting advertising and promotion.
A friend of mine was signed to a major label in the 80s. He had been pretty successful in the local scene and was making enough to live off his music.
The label signed him and he though he was on the way to the big time. They gave him an advance and he set about recording his debut — essentially a remix of an unreleased album he had finished.
By the time the label had charged him for recording, flights to NYC, hotels, and every other expense they could find, he owed them $250k against royalties. They owned his copyrights, they even owned his name. Despite sales in the low six figures for the debut, he never saw another penny from the label.
Within 18 months, he was back living with his mother. Here he was, a musician signed to a major label and he was living with his mother in the same room he had when he was 10.
Luckily, he was dropped during a major cost-cutting purge, so he was forgiven his “debt” to the label.
Once back as an independent, he returned to success as musician and a decent middle class lifestyle. He was even able to buy back the rights to his music after a few years.