singemonkey wrote
Currently they're just riding their experience in promoting musicians. It's not going to be long though before specialised marketing and promotional companies, with absolutely no business in recording or distributing music, make enough contacts where it counts to throw the market wide open. In other words, the next Lady Gaga could as easily be promoted to success by ACME Artist Promotions as Sony Music.
What is true though, is that musicians are not going to do this themselves as a rule. It's too specialised, and they have to concentrate on making good music and performances (and having exciting hair). But these promo companies will work for the artists - not the other way around. That's huge.
Well that's what some of the indy labels do. They act as a distribution and marketing channels.
Richard Thompson left the "big leagues" in 2000 and his sales went up! He had the option of staying at Capitol, where he'd been for a decade, but he "went indy". He financed his next record himself (less overdubs!) and then licensed it to various labels (for USA, Japan and the rest of the world). They understood niche markets better, worked with university radio etc etc and he sold more AND retained ownership of the recordings.
So, yes, that's part of the deal. The "majors" now, it seem to me, want 2 or 3 Lady Gagas and a whole bunch of old recordings that they can re-issue cheaply. The smaller labels are moving in to fill the vacuum and give the artist more artistic control.
Good too for the studios and engineers that aren't tied to a label.
For me there's been a lot of great music the last few years - from grizzled veterans and newer, younger artists - and most of it has completely by-passed MTV, the big labels etc.
