Digital Music Nothing but a Band-Aid?
A recent study suggests that digital music will not save the music industry from the sharp decline it has been experiencing over the last few years.
From what I’ve read in various parts of the web and the opinions some music bloggers are taking on this issue, some perspective needs to be gained.
Nobody Said Digital Music is a Passing Fad
The first thing to reconsider - many writers seem to be accusing the study of calling digital music itself a passing fad.
Wrong.
It merely says that digital music isn’t going to save a sinking ship.
This is only confirmation.
We’ve known that the music industry has been sinking for some time. We’ve all known that nothing could save it but a complete turn-around in the way it does business. We’ve also known that’s not going to happen.
Digital music is definitely not a fad. It’s a revolution. In an environmentally fragile age, we need to be conscious of our choices when it comes to wasteful distribution methods. For musicians, it means the end of era where the stranglehold on the music market is tight.
The mistake many musicians make is assuming that this means it’ll be easy for them to become rich and famous and rock out in stadiums.
It might level the playing field, but a variety of other skills - or contacts with these skills - are essential. The foremost among them is marketing.
Being able to work with a digital audience for your digital music helps.
The traditional music industry is falling down like a tree falling on a lumberjack. But the ideal of an independent band is not a completely realistic ideal, as I’ve said before. We all need to put in place business systems that make it possible for us to remain independent while working with those businesses that possess the resources to fulfill various functions.
Well, digital music means that you can safely remove distributors, retailers, and printing presses from the list (unless you choose to sell CDs, but that’s not going to work for long).
Anyway, let’s get back to watching this industry pull off its last band-aids before it’s buried in the coffin.
December 10th, 2007 at 8:31 am
I’m finding just like you’ve written about to be very true. I recently for the first time released my own EP and managed to get it into the big stores like Amazon and Napster. I can sell in any country in the world which I wouldn’t of been able to do without The Digital Revolution and this was unthinkable some years ago without a record label, distributors etc. But since doing this I’ve realised I’ve got to market my music and I’m finding that tough. I’m a musician not a marketer. Looks like musicians are going to have to learn a lot more than music.
December 11th, 2007 at 3:12 am
@Ed:Oh, you don’t want to be a marketer. You want to be a marketeer. There’s a difference. Good work on producing your own EP and getting it out there.
Understanding marketing is important, but marketing requires some pretty specialized skills, but above all it requires the ability to communicate, and you obviously already have that ability.
December 11th, 2007 at 6:43 pm
As a musician and creator of several DVD’s on Guitar Lessons, I’ve also had to learn the marketing of them. After several years doing this, I have people from all over the globe now learning my techniques.This would never be possible without Digital Technology. You can find me at: http://www.guitar5day.com. I also have a blog and a forum for musicians. It’s all about networking.
December 15th, 2007 at 7:13 pm
Digital technology helps rockers rock that’s for sure. But not just musicians. You seem to have taken some copywriting lessons Andrew–that true?