{"id":88548,"date":"2024-06-20T12:09:03","date_gmt":"2024-06-20T16:09:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/2024\/06\/20\/why-some-artists-are-waiting-to-put-albums-on-streaming-services-2\/"},"modified":"2024-06-20T12:09:03","modified_gmt":"2024-06-20T16:09:03","slug":"why-some-artists-are-waiting-to-put-albums-on-streaming-services-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/2024\/06\/20\/why-some-artists-are-waiting-to-put-albums-on-streaming-services-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Some Artists Are Waiting to Put Albums on Streaming\u00a0Services"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\n\tWhen NxWorries, the duo of Anderson .Paak<\/a> and Knxwledge<\/strong>, released their second album on June 7, they made it available on vinyl, CD, and cassette. But fans had to wait a week to stream Why Lawd?<\/em> The goal was \u201cto recreate the nostalgic feeling of truly appreciating the experience of a physical product that we all grew up with in the pre-streaming era,\u201d says Anna Savage<\/strong>, who manages Paak.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tNot only that: \u201cWe wanted to do something special for their fans by giving them an opportunity to experience the record a little earlier,\u201d adds Jason McGuire<\/strong>, general manager at Stone\u2019s Throw, the label that supports NxWorries. Combined with a pop-up event in L.A., hopefully \u201cmore people [are] talking about the record leading up to the streaming date.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\"charts\"<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tPushing Songs Up the Charts Was a Label Job. Then Fans Took\u00a0Over\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3><\/div>\n

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\n\tMost modern albums are released simultaneously on streaming services and in an array of physical versions \u2014 or they hit streamers first and the vinyl edition comes later. But as the streaming model is increasingly under attack from all sides, for undervaluing music and limiting artists\u2019 ability to cultivate relationships with their fans, more acts are experimenting with alternative rollout strategies.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThere shouldn\u2019t be \u201ca one-size-fits-all strategy,\u201d says Andrew Jervis<\/strong>, chief curator of Bandcamp. \u201cWe\u2019re talking about art here \u2014 we\u2019re not talking about widgets.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe hope is that different approaches can fire up the base and serve to re-engage some listeners at a time when album releases are increasingly rote, with all the magic of a morning commute. \u201cThe consumer is not happy with the way that they are consuming music right now,\u201d says Enrique \u201cMag\u201d Rodriguez<\/strong>, founder of EVEN, a platform that enables artists to sell albums and experiences directly to fans before their releases hit streaming services.<\/p>\n

\n\tTesting alternate release strategies may also allow musicians to generate more money from their biggest followers. <\/strong>\u201cIf you permanently emphasize pointing your fans somewhere where they can simply listen to whatever they want, whenever they want, for this rental fee, it\u2019s kind of hard to convince them to come back and open their wallet,\u201d Jervis notes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Independent<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tHow Vinyl Can Harness the Influence of Superfans (Guest\u00a0Column)\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3><\/div>\n

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\n\tAs former Spotify chief economist Will Page<\/strong> wrote<\/a> recently, \u201cfor a streamer to provide a record label the same amount of value from an album as a vinyl buyer, a customer would need to press play over 5,000 times \u2014 or stream for almost two weeks straight without sleep,\u201d a virtual impossibility.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cConsumers are paying more for the same with vinyl,\u201d Page continued, \u201cbut paying less to access more with streaming.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tNotably, a lot of alternate rollout ideas echo debates from roughly a decade ago, when the music streaming model was starting to take hold. Rodriguez points to Nipsey Hussle, who famously sold 1,000 copies of his 2013 release Crenshaw <\/em>for $100 a piece while also making the project available for free on various mixtape sites. The rapper said<\/a> at the time that he was \u201cfocused on fully serving the [fans] that have connected already.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAround the same time, multiple stars like Adele kept albums off the platforms for a time \u2014 25 <\/em>didn\u2019t make it to Spotify until seven months after release, for example, which helped ensure a massive first week of sales. (Adele said<\/a> new releases \u201cshould be an event\u201d and called the streaming model \u201ca bit disposable.\u201d) Some artists debuted albums exclusively on Apple Music or TIDAL before making them available more widely, or made them available only for premium subscribers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Sophie<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tCatalog Hits Were Soaring on the Charts. Why Have They Fallen Off in\u00a02024?\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3><\/div>\n

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\n\tBut these \u201cwindowing\u201d strategies went out of fashion in the mainstream music industry. Major labels and prominent indies often want streams and physical sales to hit the same week, so they can maximize the first-week numbers that the industry uses to judge commercial success. More than 600 million people around the world now listen to music on Spotify every month \u2014 any artists looking for global scale are unlikely to turn their back on that potential audience. Plus they are wary of offending the streaming services by withholding releases.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tSmaller artists and record companies are making different calculations, however. At this level, earning even just a few hundred extra CD or LP sales by temporarily withholding an album from streaming can provide a nice boost.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile Jervis \u201cencourage[s] people to put their music in as many places as possible,\u201d he has seen this boost firsthand. Last year, the duo Knower released Knower Forever <\/em>exclusively on Bandcamp. \u201cThey were pretty forthright about, \u2018we need to make some money, here\u2019s where you can come and support us by buying this record,’\u201d Jervis says. And that\u2019s what fans did, purchasing \u201csomething like $85,000 worth of vinyl and some similar amount in digital.\u201d The album didn\u2019t appear on Spotify until several months later.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tOne of the Top 25 labels on Bandcamp is International Anthem, the jazz label co-founded by Scott McNiece<\/strong>; for about six months, the company has been experimenting with putting out physical releases and digital downloads a month before uploading albums to streaming platforms. Like McGuire, McNeice says, \u201cwe want to be serving people who care enough about that particular album or artist to directly purchase the music.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\"MGMT\"<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tWith Major Label Deals Expiring, Will Beloved Alt Bands Go Indie\u00a0Again?\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3><\/div>\n

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\n\tInternational Anthem hasn\u2019t \u201creceived any pushback yet from streaming services as far as other people getting the album before them,\u201d according to McNiece. And\u00a0as an added bonus, indie record store owners are thrilled with the label\u2019s approach. \u201cEspecially with the dwindling media market for music, having people care about your music on the ground level at independent record stores is one of the main ways to get the word out,\u201d McNiece continues. \u201cWe\u2019ve gotten an enormous amount of positive feedback\u201d from record store owners who are excited to have an exclusive release to tout to customers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBoth McGuire and McNiece believe that offering physical releases first will not cannibalize the streaming audience. The people who buy the record will probably stream it at some point anyway.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tNot only that, \u201cbefore, when all the different formats were released on the same day, our energy was split with our messaging,\u201d McNiece adds. Stream the album! Buy the vinyl! Under the new regime, though, \u201cwe\u2019re able to focus a lot more energy specifically on driving traffic to those streaming platforms\u201d once the albums are uploaded to the various services \u2014 a later streaming date provides a second marketing moment.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tRodriguez is also adamant that selling directly to fans before putting albums on streaming services is additive. \u201cAs fans purchase, they are more likely to share on social media, boosting artist algorithms,\u201d he says. \u201cThis also translates to increased visibility on streaming platforms.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Market,<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\t\t\t\t\tVinyl Sales Keep Growing \u2014 So Why Does It Look Like They\u2019ve\u00a0Dropped?\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3><\/div>\n

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\n\tEVEN, which raised more than $2 million in 2023, has run more than 3,500 campaigns for artists to date. Rodriguez likens his platform to traditional movie theaters and music streaming services to Netflix. \u201cMost campaigns go live on EVEN 14+ days before their wide release,\u201d he says. \u201cThe average album sells for $25, and the average single sells for $9. It\u2019s all done in a pay-what-you-want model, where the fan decides its value, with a minimum preset by the artist.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe aren\u2019t taking away from the traditional models that exist,\u201d Rodriguez adds. \u201cNo one is squeezing the lemon in this way.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Aller \u00e0 la source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When NxWorries, the duo of Anderson .Paak and Knxwledge, released their second album on June 7, they made it available on vinyl, CD, and cassette. But fans had to wait a week to stream Why Lawd? The goal was \u201cto recreate the nostalgic feeling of truly appreciating the experience of a physical product that we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-88548","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-musique","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88548","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88548"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88548\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88548"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88548"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberlego.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88548"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}