Music Downloads = Expensive Concerts? 698
melonman writes "According to an article at BBC News, $250 tickets for the latest Madonna tour are the fault of P2P file sharing. 'Before the advent of illegal downloads, artists had an incentive to underprice their concerts, because bigger audiences translated into higher record sales, Professor Krueger argues. But now, he says, the link between the two products has been severed, meaning that artists and their managers need to make more money from concerts and feel less constrained in setting ticket prices.' And it seems David Bowie agrees. Is 'the fans always get fleeced' the rock industry's equivalent to Moore's Law?"
Right.... (Score:2, Interesting)
Oh, and by price of a barrel of oil, I mean CEO salaries and bonuses.
mmmmm executive greed mmmmmmmm
Brain dead BBS writer? (Score:5, Interesting)
Let's see: these are artists who have made millions upon millions, so the need to tour is just about zero. So they jack the price up.
Conclusion: illegal file downloaders cost live performance goers piles of cash. Um, yeah. Perhaps a better read is money hungry artists will fleece anyone they can for their new multimillion dollar home. Perhaps royalties *are* down on has been artists because of a combination of lower recording sales and their own stale presence on the market. So all they have is to repackage themselves doing classics live.
That doesn't really support the conclusion very well. Then they go interviewing people who bought scalper tickets to a sporting event to somehow prop up the story? Please.
I call BS! (Score:2, Interesting)
The artists they name in the article have made a good record in decade.
Bowie has advised his fellow performers: "You'd better be prepared for doing a lot of touring, because that's really the only unique situation that's going to be left."
Seems to me Bowie is saying play more shows not raise the prices so high nobody will show up.
Bowie agrees? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:or... (Score:3, Interesting)
Had to have existed in the first place for something to have happened to it.
$250 for ANY concert ticket (I don't give a damn if it's front row) is ridiculous. I seriously hope no one pays for this. I just don't understand how artists and record labels and agents are getting the idea that raising the prices of their respective products will combat piracy or ease the "negative effects" piracy is having on their sales (for now, let's just ignore all the publicity artists get from P2P). That's just completely counterintuitive in my mind. If they want their loving fans back, they should get their attention with reasonable prices. Nothing says "I appreciate my fans" better than lowering your concert ticket prices, just a smidge, so that everyone once and a while Average Joe can afford to enjoy your music.
I guess this is why I stopped buying record label music years ago. I've bought a few local band CDs, but I bought those in person from the band itself. Not just because I wanted to have their music handy, but because they rock, and they don't charge admission. They appreciate their fans enough that during intermissions, they'll get down off the stage and mingle. Now those are musicians.
In summary: to hell with Madonna.
Re:or... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Huh? (Score:1, Interesting)
You know, I'm getting sick of this being repeated.
Even a MINOR musician can make a living wage if they don't waste all their money on parties and drugs.
I know when I was first signed my contract SPECIFICALLY told me what I was getting paid and how I was being paid. I got X amount of $$$s to record an album and I was told to use X producer and Y engineer -- but if I made a case for it, I could use almost anyone I wanted (as long as they could guarentee a specific level of results).
The money to record was specifically taken out of what I got paid. A good friend's band was signed about the same time by the same A&R guy -- I had better contacts (though the other guy had better press and more talent) and told my A&R guy about him and he signed him immediately. We both got the same contract -- I had my lawyer strike a good deal of the clauses and make specific suggestions (and he took his 15%) while my friend 'trusted' the industry lawyer and signed. I had my changes made and no one blinked. I was a bit miffed I didn't kick a little harder.
I did my recordings with my band, took off for my home state between sessions...his band stayed in LA and partied and took all the 'gifts' the lable gave him. He'd show up to the fucking studio trashed and waste everyones time. I think his guitarist mentioned a 3 week session went through when NOTHING was put down on tape. I came in with prerecorded ideas and songs in Logic and Protools. He decided to 'write in the studio'.
So on and so forth.
I ended up making enough to go back to school at a very well respected college and not worry about anything. Never even cracked the top 40. Funny thing is, I still get royalty checks for this as a few songs got used in movies and otherwise. I kept my publishing. They asked for a cut of it, I said no, and they said We Tried shrugging their shoulders.
Friend ended up with 2 top 10 singles after a year in the studio. Not just a year hanging out in LA. IN THE STUDIO. Wasting everyones time. Paying for the doughnut guy that showed up and brought in pastries. He claims he never saw a dime and screams that the label ripped him off. No -- he simply failed to realize he was an independant business man that had funding from someone else that expected to be paid back. My A&R guy still brings me back to do work every so often. I took a week off to help tweak some songs last year for a respected artist that was trying to sound a bit more modern. Did a quick tour last year to backup a friend's tour at their labels request. Actually did more arranging and production for the tour -- get the band in synch with each other so that they could exhibit the energy they had live. Sad thing with these 'internet bands' is that they sound great on tape but no presense or connection to each other live.
All in all, I've made a lot of money at this -- and my friend that was successful in the eyes of everyone else 'made nothing'. Forget for the moment that he had in his hands probably a couple million dollars that slipped right through because he paid people to sit around, or had parties thrown (arranged by the industry) and needed to be flown to every event under the sun staying at the best hotels and eating the best foods. I've gone to some of these -- and I always sleep on a friends couch somewhere. I think my flight to Miami last year cost me all of $300 round trip + taxi to my friends place. And I didn't ask for anyone to reimburse me because it was FUN (and it would have come out of a future contract anyways).
Artists are business people. Business people have to know their business. To expect that just because they are creative they should be insulated from reading business contracts or exercising proper fucking control ove
I went to a pub the other night... (Score:2, Interesting)
...and saw four bands for 2 pounds. Two of the bands were selling promotional EPs, which I bought. The total expenditure for the evening was 8 pounds - this strikes me as being good value for money.
However, since the money I spent clearly won't go anywhere near the pockets of any record industry executives, this presumably this makes me a bad music consumer. After all, if everybody chose to spend their money going to pubs to see local bands and buying their self-produced CDs, people like Madonna wouldn't make any money.
Therefore, I suggest that there should be some kind of licensing scheme whereby small bands must seek the record industry's approval before attempting to play shows in pubs. They would give the industry a cut of the takings to compensate for drawing potential audience members away from official gigs by big-name artists. In return, the industry would promise not to sue these small bands for loss of revenue.
The wages of sin, I guess (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm always astounded how the measure of success in the music industry is not profitability but obscene profitability.
FWIW, the Grateful Dead allowed and facilitated giving away their music for free, and made an estimated $50,000,000 a year doing so. Almost all on concert sales. It was a good model- giving away their music and allowing it to be traded for free eliminated piracy and the bootleg market.
Too bad that the music industry hasn't tumbled onto the truth of why CD sales are slipping: that the music they are selling sucks.
The real reason is scalping. (Score:2, Interesting)
Some creative and potentially smart but misguided tour management team got the idea a few years ago for Rolling Stones concerts, to charge scalper-level prices for all the tickets, in the same patterns that scalpers actually charge. Front row? $700+. 2nd - 5th rows? $500+, everything else that's in a "good" seat, double the crappy seats. Why let the scalpers make all the money (which in some cases could be up to half of the money that the band/tour actually hauls in) when you can just jack up your prices to "market level" and sell the venue accordingly?
It's a good plan from a financial sense, since all of the artists to adopt this plan (springsteen, stones, madonna to name a few) are on the top grossing artists list. They can sell less tickets, make more money, and when they do sell out, make a ton of money over what they would with normal flat-rate section based pricing. The bands with expensive concerts aren't hurting for money, they're only capitalizing on what they can make money on with almost no effort. People are somehow willing to pay outrageous amounts of money for prime seating at concerts, why let that money go to scalpers rather than the band?
Of course, it's unfortunate that this is their solution to scalping problems and other people getting rich off their efforts. Scalping is far too profitable for the venues and ticketmaster to want to stop, since they suck up a good chunk of inventory at a potentially undersold show and make even mediocre shows look more popular than they actually are. Artists need to step up and do something about it in a tangible way that doesn't directly affect the real music fans. Even fanclubs and special internet pre-sales are infested with scalpers, and the only way to get rid of them so far, has been to jack the prices up so high that they can't make a lot of profit off the tickets they can get. It's one thing to spend $1000 on 20 tickets you can flip for $5000 if you do well, and you can eat half the tickets if they don't sell since you're up 1500 if you sell half. It's another thing to spend $1000 on 2 tickets that you may not even be able to flip for $1500 since they're expensive already, and that deters scalpers at least slightly. (not entirely, you can find plenty of Madonna scalpers on your local craigslist I'm sure).
If anyone else has ideas on reducing the amount of scalpers out there, in a way that can get the maximum amount of tickets into the hands of real fans at face value, I'm sure you can make a lot of money.
Why People Stopped Buying CDs (Score:2, Interesting)
The problem goes all the way back to cassette tape days. People bought cassettes because they were well worth the money. Just about everyone had a dual cassette deck with high speed dubbing, but we still went out and bought an original copy most of the time.
Then came CDs. These cost a considerable bit more, but so did the CD players. If you could afford a CD player, the high price of CDs probably didn't phase you much. Not to mention, CDs were cool, well worth the extra money.
Then over time the newness of CDs started to wear off. CD player prices started dropping and everyone began to buy them. The problem is, while the CD player prices were dropping, the CDs started getting more and more expensive. An album that was worth the "cassette price" to someone isn't now worth the "CD price". But CDs have given birth to a higher expectation of sounds quality in our music recordings. There's no way we're going to go back to cassettes. So we download.
So why are prices of CDs so high anyway? The artists barely get any of the profit. Most of it goes to record companies. And why do we still need record companies anyway? There are no more records. Music doesn't even need to be saved onto physical media anymore. It can be transferred over the internet to an iPod, notebook computer, or now even your cell phone for heavens sake. Yes, record companies help promote bands, but the internet is getting better at that everyday too. Just look at MySpace.
The record industry has been living the rock star life too long and has lost touch with reality.
Re:If Madonna prices it, they will buy... (Score:5, Interesting)
The argument I hear when I complain about this is that "he must get fed up of playing his old stuff". My response is: I don't give a fuck what he's "fed up of". I paid $60 to hear the stuff I like - his old stuff. David Bowie *knows* this and decided to play his new shit that's just awful.
I also went to see Bjork one time... It was in Seattle, at "the pier". She wasn't allowed to run her fireworks because we were standing on wood over water, so she got all sulky and did a short show without an encore. Who doesn't do an encore?! So the whole audience stood there like idiots chanting "encore encore". 10 minutes passed... We all looked at each other and slowly walked out, annoyed.
In short, fuck concerts, especially those of the old artists who don't enjoy them, don't care what the audience (the fucking CUSTOMER!) want, and are only doing it to finance their latest castle/porsche combo. Fuck 'em.
Re:Not Everybody Goes To Live Shows (Score:3, Interesting)
I guess thats about right too. But I argued about creating a gig culture, not that one already exists. How many people playing on the radio ever play near you. I'm not saying they should, or could, play gig's everywhere - but I do believe it should be there primary vocation - not going on tv to push themselves.
Most bands will never make it as a profitable venture. I'd like to know exactly how all of this digital music advertising is going to get the bands enough scratch to pay the bills generated by the rental of larger venues.
I think it's well known that most bands currently don't make it as a profitable venture, with a very very small minority being very very successful, and everyone else going bust. I'm arguing there are more good bands than succesful ones this current market can support.
Really, the only way most bands will ever play a stadium or concert hall is by having financial backing from some wealthy third party.
I never suggested that this way of music production would be able to support those venues, though there would still be the very few insanely successful bands that would, but the business model would be more based around "the long tail."
And if all you ever do is play bars, well... the life and scope of your band is limited.
I think this is what reveals your true feelings about the subject - you like it how it currently is. I like the idea of my kids growing up with weekly small intimate gigs, not in bars, but not in big venues. WIth role models they meet, and see and can judge. Not watch on television.
Most bands can't even afford the cost of professional recording. And despite what some guys with a $500 card and Cubase would have you believe, you need really good equipment and a talented recording engineer to make a really good demo. I've got $2500 in microphones in my little home studio. I understand totally - and know the difference it can make. But with a greater number of low to medium level succesful bands I believe a market to hire and use these facilities would be created putting them within the reach of "the bar giggers."
I don't want to see music become free, unless the artists who made it choose it to be.
I couldn't agree more, I want the artists to want it to be free.
Save Your Money: go to bars! (Score:4, Interesting)
I go to about one or two live music shows per week (mostly local bands) and a $5 cover is about right. Last night I splurged and saw a famous touring band, and even that was only $20. And guess who had more fun: me drunkenly banging my head within arm's reach of Exodus shouting "Last Act! Of Defiance!", or someone peering at Madonna through binoculars.
Re:If Madonna prices it, they will buy... (Score:3, Interesting)
At this point in my life it's not the price of the ticket that prevents me from going, it's the lack of entertainment value. I live 2 miles from a major venue and I only go there to take my kids to the circus.
Exception: I might be willing to pay $250 for a Pink Floyd concert. Their Division-Bell-promoting concert didn't suck at all. They played mostly older stuff...and it was only $50. Too bad they'll probably never tour again.
Re:Bowie agrees? How about Prince? (Score:4, Interesting)
Bowie's a god and all, but his live performances have always been less than stellar.
BBH
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Interesting)
Because they're working on speculation. They don't get paid unless the music sells.
What about the people that wrote the music, wrote the lyrics,
They are just as much "the artists" as the musicians and singers.
recorded and mixed the tracks,
They are paid a salary.
corrected the artist's singing flaws during editing,
They are paid a salary.
the people who created the cover art,
They are paid a salary.
the people who advertise and market the album, etc. etc. etc.?
They are paid a salary. If all those people were willing to work for no salary and instead just take a cut of the proceeds then they should get some parity with the artists. As long as they insist on being paid whether the record sells or not (i.e. take no risk) they their potential reward shouldn't be as great.