I've signed contracts with two labels in my time. Never got any royalites. 18% is pretty standard these days, major or independant. In the early ninetees and eightees it was 22% - 25%. Current levels don't seem good but when you consider that many artists would never qualify for get the kind of advance (bank loan) from any other source so you can see labels take quite a big risk. Look how untogether the Stone Roses were, took them 5 years and shitloads of money to record a substandard album.
Whether or not its a bad deal for artists depends on the expectations of the artists. These days many artists get excited about signing and have high expectations. Well frankly, if they care that much about the deal then are they musicians or businessmen? Starts to blur. Concentrate on the music and be thankful for any percentage.
Essentially the main gripe is that record companies absolutely clean up if an act is succesful and make far more than the artists. That does seem unfair, But look. They are gettng their karma for overpriced CD's. Law courts around the world are throwing out all the cases that being brought against file sharing networks. Ha! Nothing for the record company yet as an artists popularity spreads so does their ticket sales! Artists 1 Labels 0.
Someone mentioned NZ being hard to make money from music. Its the same everywhere dude. Try London where the competetion is so fierce, you can be a genius and get ignored your whole life.
nice one jet - I missed The Isolationist stuff.
my view of the apc is that some of their stuff is simply rubbish. terrible production and random words. but when they get it right its better than just about everything else out there. not since de la soul have we had this kinda vibe. apc are like de la soul on drip fed DMT.
yes, big fan of Saul Williams although he also puts out some terrible releases.
have you heard the Antipop Consortium vs Matthew Ship album on Thirsty Ear. some of that is good.
are you in NZ jet?
any one in NZ heard of the anti pop consortium? they are part of the nu spoken word/hip hop movement... really mad shit.
much respect gruesome, nonbreed, rudy, zippo, lucifer_sam and distortion. Thanks for your response and more importantly for the good vibes. I am definately doing darker stuff, zippo, and not really into house/trance/breakbeat these days (I used to make that stuff). I had already thought that Wellington would be it, so this confirms my instincts... Distortion, I will come to Auckland for sure. I'd love to do gigs there. peace.
I'm a UK artist thinking of relocating to NZ (thanks to a Aussie passport) because UK is, quite frankly, off its head. But I cannot decide between Auckland and Wellington.
The style I do is similair to massive attack over 200 bpm madness (not 4/4). Lyrics cover exposing the NWO and other babylonian secrets plus the usual...
It seems to me that with a limited market and lots of creative people (more than Australia it seems) it will be hard to break into the NZ scene being from abroad so want to start out by chosing the right city...
x sabre
ps anyone know any good electronic performers?
I worked with some well known London artists who got my friend to write a piece of software to chop up and re-arrange samples in a random way. Its never been released to the public but I got a go on it and made something I've never heard anywhere else.
I'm not the only one of course. A few others are working on the same idea.
All I can say is that if you throught you were hearing the future with Drum n Bass. Just wait for this stuff!