Changes in the music industry won’t unplug the music. Although industry profits have been pummeled in the past ten years, experts are now focusing on an evolution, not an end. Compact disc sales may be declining, but the music is playing as loudly as ever.
“It’s pretty rough, but businesses everywhere are struggling,” said Joe Nardone Jr., owner of Joe Nardone’s Gallery of Sound, a chain of music stores in the northeast that sells CDs, tapes, movies, posters and more. “There are people who still want physical CDs, and then there are people who just want music.”
The record industry needs to respect the market competition from online products, such as iTunes, but it seems as though they are trying to hold on to old traditions, said Nardone.
CD sales have slumped, mostly because of price. “Now prices are artificially low from discounts and sales,” said Nardone. “[Prices] are lower than they used to be five years ago, but CDs should be $10, no matter how ‘classic’ they are.”
Profits from CD sales are sliced, chopped and distributed before artists can see a single penny from their art. Musicians need the cash to pay for the record label, distributors, recording and studio costs, promotion and advertising, design and packaging and other miscellaneous expenses. At the final crescendo, artists often have to use their royalties to pay record companies because those companies have provided the musicians with an advance payment. Sometimes musicians can be left with next to nothing, even when recording with a major label and after selling hundreds of thousands of CDs. And CDs cost less than $0.25 to manufacture, according to the book “Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass Communications” by Richard Campbell, Christopher R. Martin, and Bettina Fabos.
Online markets march to a different drummer, but executives are still cashing in. While packaging, shipping and other digital music sales expenses are lower, record companies and distributors are pocketing most of the dough. iTunes acts like the distributor in this case, and easily rakes in the cash. Artists like Kid Rock and “Weird” Al Yankovic have been speaking out about the great profit divide.
No matter how much an artist makes from CD or digital music downloads, there are always piracy, or copyright infringement, issues. “Piracy is theft, plain and simple,” said Richard Rupert, owner of Green Valley Recording in Hughesville, PA. “The only time music should be copied is if it is given freely by the artist.”
Piracy has been popularized by a certain age groups – there is an entire generation of people who think music should be free, said Nardone. Though there have been efforts to take the foot off the pedal of piracy, the most publicized being the demise of Napster as a free downloading service in 2001, the bigger problem is that the record companies underestimated the power of the Internet early on, said Nardone. “They need to realize who their competition is now,” he said.
Radio was once a big player in the industry as well, but consolidation and the lack of independently owned stations turned down the volume for new artists, according to a panel on the PBS program, “Frontline.” Legislation passed in 1996 amplified the limits on radio station ownership, and eventually companies that may have once owned a few dozen stations could now own over a thousand. As a result, new artists have less opportunity to get played in their hometown than international artists do.
But local artists have options for maintaining harmony between art and business. Bands that go solo and forgo some sort of management are able to directly connect with fans, said Nardone. Releasing music downloads for free is one prerogative that may help more than harm musicians’ chances at stardom. “It’s too easy for anyone to put music out for free,” said Nardone.
Artists can’t downplay the power of music. “All you can do is play,” said Rick Berry, bassist and vocalist for The Big Green. “Play everywhere you can.”
And the key is widespread exposure for an artist’s music, said Nardone. “You have to get out of your neighborhood.”
Money may be an issue, but the music will never stop, said Rupert. “Fortunately for me, I have not seen any downturn in my business. In fact, the past two years have been the busiest in the 29- year existence of the studio,” he said. “Recording is not immune to the economic conditions that control any non-essential service, but it may be that even hard times can’t dampen artistic expression.”
'You Can't Stop the Beat'
By Sarah Hite
Published: Sunday, February 22, 2009
Updated: Sunday, February 22, 2009 20:02
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