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rogerthat 
Prog Reviewer 
Joined: September 03 2006 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 9869 |
 Posted: October 04 2014 at 06:18 |
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I am confused as to how a ringtone could be included in certifying ALBUM sales, since by definition a ringtone roughly approximates a single. Anyhow, according to Nielsen Soundscan, every one of the top 10 selling albums of 2013 in US exceeded a million, digital, CD and vinyl combined. I don't see how a digital download of an album is less valid for certification than a CD or vinyl, by the way. Further, in 2009, Susan Boyle's I Dreamed a Dream sold 9 million albums worldwide and Taylor Swift's Fearless exceeded 5 million. So I am not sure how that ties up with a ringtone being the only thing that went platinum in 2009. Or do you really mean diamond? There's no doubt, by the way, that sales of top pop artists have dramatically declined. At the same time, they do still manage to go platinum and in that sense are far more successful than artists outside the mainstream. So that seems to go against a claim made earlier in the thread that prog would be insulated against illegal download UNLIKE pop.
Edited by rogerthat - October 04 2014 at 06:22 |
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Kati
Forum Senior Member 
Joined: September 10 2010 Location: Earth Status: Offline Points: 6253 |
Posted: October 04 2014 at 06:12 |
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damn how can I quote someone and not post that whole boring stuff? Even I will not read that long whatever it may be.
 my quoted post above looks more like a math's hypothesis  Edited by Kati - October 04 2014 at 06:13 |
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Kati
Forum Senior Member
Joined: September 10 2010 Location: Earth Status: Offline Points: 6253 |
Posted: October 04 2014 at 06:10 |
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lol Dean  you are naughty 
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Kati
Forum Senior Member
Joined: September 10 2010 Location: Earth Status: Offline Points: 6253 |
Posted: October 04 2014 at 06:08 |
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I am not a musician but now feel even more depressed 
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Dean
Special Collaborator 
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: October 04 2014 at 05:52 |
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Thanks Mike
The truth about gigs. Getting gigs to play original music is difficult and when you do the attendance is small. If you are in a Prog band playing original music it is highly unlikely that you'll make any money by gigging. If you want to make pin-money then form a covers band and play music that people know. If you want to make a living then form a wedding band, but then you are in direct competition with mobile discos and they have far lower overheads. When starting out you can probably get all your gear in a couple of cars, probably owned and driven by parents of band members so you don't pay for petrol or up-keep of the vehicle but later you will be using your own transport so then you have to pay for fuel and other running costs. As your band grows it acquires more gear, bigger amps, more keyboards, more guitars and pedals, a bigger drum kit and several flight-cases of leads and mike stands. You may want to bring along smoke generators and extra lighting, it gets very hot on stage, so you may want to get electric fans to keep you cool. So now you need a van. To begin with you will hire one, then later one of the band may buy one so as well as fuel that will have running costs to keep it on the road. All this gear fits in the van but there is no room for the musicians and hangers-on, (roadies, people to man the merch stall, girl-friends, friends etc,), so now they need transport too, you can use several private cars or you can hire a minibus and thus the expense keeps mounting up. You will also have to have all the electrical gear safety tested (PAT tested) because most venues will want to see your safety certificates before allowing you to use the equipment. You have to pay a professional electrician to do this, it costs money, and you have to do it every year. Bouncing all that gear around in the back of a van will result in equipment failure when you are on stage, you will need duplicates of most of the essential stuff - even something simple like breaking a string can bring the show to a halt. It's amusing for the audience for the first five minutes to see a musician or roadie faff around on stage trying to fix a problem, then they get bored and eff-off to the bar for a drink - it is always embarrassing for those on stage. Sod's Law says that if something can break down it will, Murphy's Law says if something can go wrong it will and Finagle's Law this will happen at the worse possible moment. Other bands will help you out but don't rely on them to in your hour of need (they have their own set to worry about), be prepared, make arrangements with them beforehand to share equipment, assume nothing. No matter how amateur your band is, the moment you step on stage you are a professional, so you need to be as prepared as any professional band, and this includes all the instruments and back-line equipment you bring with you. I despair at the number of bands who turned up for a gig unprepared - I've had bands that didn't know what songs they were going to play, with insufficient material rehearsed for their set, or not knowing how long their set was. I've had them turn up missing stage amps, leads and mics, and I've even had musicians arrive for a gig without their instruments (seriously), expecting to borrow from other bands on the bill. I've had bands turn up late and still expected to play (sorry chief, if you're bottom of the bill and miss your slot, you don't play), and I've had bands that have refused to sound-check ("we're plug and play" ... erm, you maybe, but our sound guy isn't, if you don't sound check you go on first). I've had bands turn up and spend all their time in the bar before staggering on stage - one drink is fine for a bit of Dutch courage but frankly, if I want to see a bunch of drunks murder a song I'll go watch karaoke. I've had one singer so drunk that they could barely stand and had to use the mic stand for support, which promptly buckled under the weight and collapsed - which was hilarious for the audience but brought the set to an untimely end. Be professional or don't get on stage, these are paying gigs not school recitals. If you disappoint the promoter he will not book you again. When finding one gig is difficult this difficulty increases exponentially when you try to put on a tour. If you are successful in putting on a tour, or even when you have managed to secure a single gig that is miles from home, you need to add in transport costs (fuel), accommodation and food. In an amateur band each band member pays these additional cost out of their own pocket - they will never be reimbursed for these out-of-pocket expenses - if you want to tour, start saving. I was talking about this with Cian Houchin (bass player with Carl McCoy's short-lived Nefilim band) when he was playing a one-off gig with his band Saints of Eden. SoE was a one-man-band so when Cain gigged he needed to hire musicians to play his music, as well as paying them to appear on stage he also had to pay for their transport, accommodation and food. He explained that even with merchandise sales and ticket revenue he lost money on every gig so could not afford to mount a tour even if he could find venues to play. If you dream of getting on a major tour supporting a known band (then dream on), to do that you need representation and contacts into the tour promoters. If you are unknown then they are not interested in you. They want bands who will attract an audience, even if you are at the bottom of the bill they expect you to bring paying punters to the show because they are not in the business of providing a free-ride to unknown bands. To get on the bill you will probably have to pay-to-play and this may not necessarily mean handing over money to the promoter, there are other ways of doing this. The promoter will only book you if you can attract extra attendees so he will ask you to promote the gig and sell tickets, to ensure you do sell enough he will make you buy them from him to sell yourself. He will also probably want a cut of any merchandise sales you make to cover his expenses. When you are low down on the bill you will not be playing to the whole audience (most will still be in the bar, none of them are interested in you, they are waiting for the headline) so even if you are in a 5,000 seat venue you will be playing to a few 100 people, so don't expect to sell loads of merchandise. Making money from gigs is difficult to the point of being impossible. If you are not making money selling CDs and downloads then it is highly unlikely that you will make money from a gig.
Edited by Dean - October 04 2014 at 06:05 |
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infandous
Forum Senior Member
Joined: March 23 2006 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 2447 |
Posted: October 03 2014 at 13:29 |
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Sometimes I think the only reason I come here is to read Dean's wonderful posts
Seriously, Dean hits the nail on the head every time. As a musician whose never made a dime playing music (well, a couple of paid gigs here and there, but I don't think the money did much more than cover expenses and a meal for the band), I am someone who always pays for music. Though I have sampled albums for free, at artists web sites when the artist made them available for listening. Just a side note for anyone that thinks that the "major" pop stars of today sell just as many albums as they did in 70's, 80's, and 90's...........I think you need to look at the sales figures again. The biggest selling acts sell a fraction of what they did back in those days. The criteria for gold and platinum albums has changed and now includes download, ring tones, and videos. It used to just be physical album sales. If you look here, you will note that a ring tone was the only thing that went platinum in 2009 (http://www.riaa.com/newsitem.php?id=c91c40e1-a65a-0f81-ebb3-8fe3b7c0ecea). A ring tone. Obviously, sales are down across the board. Is illegal downloading responsible? Hard to say for certain, but it certainly hasn't had any positive impact. With all the prog artists talking about how they are struggling with sales (some who have had precipitous drops since the 90's), I'm not really sure how anyone can justify illegal downloads anymore (especially with legal options available.......which are not really much better for the artists, though they at least get some compensation, even if it is pathetically small). Here are all of 2013's gold and platinum releases (a video by an old artist and a hits compilation): http://www.riaa.com/goldandplatinumdata.php?content_selector=gold-platinum-searchable-database (you may have to type 2013 into the search bar, as it doesn't seem to retain the information in the link) |
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Davesax1965
Forum Senior Member
Joined: May 23 2013 Location: UK Status: Offline Points: 2839 |
Posted: October 03 2014 at 11:09 |
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I was going to say "one step at a time", but it's actually 16.
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Dean
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: October 03 2014 at 07:53 |
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 isn't that a sequencer rather than a synth Dave?
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Davesax1965
Forum Senior Member
Joined: May 23 2013 Location: UK Status: Offline Points: 2839 |
Posted: October 03 2014 at 07:35 |
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A little point here.
I am, of course, a sad old muso. Everything is done on the good old computer, in a box bedroom where if the cat comes in and sits on my lap, I get claustrophobia. (True. ;-) ) I have guitars, saxes, basses, keyboards of all kind crammed into a room, bits on shelves, everything. I am about as "cottage industry" as you can imagine. I can spend some money on musical bits now and again, but.... the revenue comes from download sales. After about 50 sales for this album (excuse me if I plug it again) http://brotherhoodofthemachine.bandcamp.com/album/trip-hazard (shameless advert) - well, I've got very much the same amount of stuff as before. If I was getting more CD sales..... then I'd be building my own analogue Eurorack synthesizer. Which has lovely bitties in it like this  which I would solder up myself from a kit. I would then be doing LIVE gigs. So. No capital, a lot of musicians will go nowhere. No sales, they have no money for amps, pedals, cables, recording, you name it. No more decent music, no live gigs.
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Dean
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: October 03 2014 at 06:47 |
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Not sure why my questions should have offended you so much, when you present "a case" then it naturally raises questions, which you have addressed perfectly in your very detailed reply. You are correct that there is an indication of a causation and as you say, since it complex it is not a simple correlation. In fact there may be no correlation at all. We don't know. This is all we can conclude. There is no before and after control data to compare to and there are no actual numbers for the illegal downloads. We can never measure the number of illegal downloads, we can only speculate based upon anecdotal evidence (i.e., the number of people who admit doing it and the number of illegal downloads they will admit to). We can never assume for example that the numbers of "illegal" downloads are different in a country that does not prosecute downloaders to one that does. [Sweden does not legalise the downloading of pirated material it just does not criminalises those that do. This is not a subtle distinction, nor is it clever playing-with-words - the material downloaded is still taken from the owner without their express permission, the record companies and the artists did not sign up to this, the copies downloaded are still illicit copies]. The number of prosecutions for illegal downloading is practically zero. It matters not whether a country criminalises illegal downloading or not, people do not download free albums because it is legal or illegal, they do it because they can, and it is easy, and they won't get caught. Legislation does not change this. The only reason people still buy music is because the artist gets paid for providing it. This is a matter of conscience not legality. Whether taking music without paying the artist is criminalised or not, some people will still pay. When artists offer "pay what you like" most people still pay something. Morality trumps Legislation. Every time. In the UK selling goods this way is called A Honest Box - a farmer will place a table of eggs by the road with a money box bedside them. The public has three choices - pay for the eggs, take the eggs without paying or take the eggs and the money box. People are naturally honest, even when they can take something without paying they still leave payment. The farmer trusts them to do that and the customers honour that trust. If this did not work the farmers would never do it. What we have in the Norwegian study is an example of that "conscience" at work ... whether it is a criminal offence to download pirated material or not, people do have a conscience, they do see that taking the artists work without paying for it is wrong, so when an alternative is presented then they use it. Peace out.
Edited by Dean - October 03 2014 at 06:53 |
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Windhawk
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator Joined: December 28 2006 Location: Norway Status: Offline Points: 11401 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 16:02 |
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I went looking for a set of official numbers that supports the claims of piracy affecting sales and didn't find the numbers I expected. Hence the question - are there other factors involved that will explain why the Netherlands doesn't have lower sales of music as a free for all download nation - when compared to similar nations? As for the numbers being used in US Dollars, that is a choice by the IFPI. It is also a report, not a study. The edition I have looked at covers the years 2007-2011, but some key stats are for 2011 only. The number of illegal downloads in total and for each country are data I have yet to see accurate, documented stats about. Unknown waters as far as I'm concerned, and not a subject I want to speculate on. Looking at the total reported sales of recorded music in the three nations I selected from 2007-2011, the official numbers from IFPI are as follows (in millions of US dollars): Netherlands: 285 - 272 - 279 - 273 - 240 Sweden: 156 - 145 - 162 - 150 - 155 Belgium: 189 - 179 - 167 - 156 - 140 Roughly converted into spend per citizen in US dollars: Netherlands: 17 - 16 - 16 - 16 - 14 Sweden: 16 - 15 - 17 - 16 - 16 Belgium: 17 - 16 - 15 - 14 - 13 Sweden had The Pirate Bay in all those years. Downloading material for personal use was legal in the Netherlands in all those years (it became a criminal offense in April 2014). This is of course simplistic, but the numbers in the IFPI report are the most accurate available when it comes to the total economy of recorded music as far as I know. And I found the case of the Netherlands a puzzling one. The one nation in Europe that had a legislation allowing it's citizens to effectively download as much free music as they desired, and despite of that they appear to buy just as much music there as in comparable nations. Does that indicate that there isn't a cause and effect relationship between piracy and sales? My answer to that would be negative, that there is a cause and effect but at a more complex level. There are some people that would never buy music anyhow, there are many who have switched from buying to leasing and prefer the latter, and there's a core audience that will continue to buy music physically or digitally. Would a liberation, like the most liberal pro-piracy brigade wants, have a further detrimental effect on sales? That is a question where I'm somewhat more unsure these days. I suspect actual sales will continue to fall no matter what legislation is in use, and that the greater majority will switch to streaming solutions. That development is occurring in Norway and Sweden, and I don't think we're so special here in Scandinavia that what happens here represents something unique to our nations. Surveys done in Norway have seen illegal downloading plummeting as Spotify (music) and Netflix (movies and series) have become available and common. A survey quoted in 2013 documented an 80% decrease in illegal downloading, and appearing to continue downwards at a fairly steep rate. I obviously can't vouch for the quality of that survey, but it was quoted in one of out most factual oriented newspapers. With this I'll refrain from coming with any further primitive and barbarian thoughts on the subject in this thread. Edited by Windhawk - October 02 2014 at 16:03 |
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Websites I work with:
http://www.progressor.net http://www.houseofprog.com My profile on Mixcloud: https://www.mixcloud.com/haukevind/ |
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Dean
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 14:06 |
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exactly.
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Meltdowner
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator Joined: June 25 2013 Location: Portugal Status: Offline Points: 10273 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 12:44 |
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There are some record stores that sell prog in Lisbon and Porto (not FNAC's definitely) but the money I would spend to drive there, I can buy 7/8 albums online
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Dean
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 12:26 |
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Whenever I'm in a different country I usually find something to buy, when I was in Lisbon I do recall I couldn't find a single Moonspell album, but I did pick up a Triana CD ... which struck me as amusing. It was probably in FNAC... I can picture it now... an impressive old white building that had been converted to an arcade/mall with modern escalators, lots of glass and bright lights... just like in every other European city centre. I never looked to see if they had VdGG or Rush... they had lots of fado though... However. Amazon is everywhere.
Edited by Dean - October 02 2014 at 12:27 |
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Meltdowner
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator Joined: June 25 2013 Location: Portugal Status: Offline Points: 10273 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 11:53 |
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I have to agree with him to one point: the prog selection here is lousy. I've never seen a VDGG or Rush album on any record store I visited; not even a Supertramp album (only single compilations). Sure we can buy them on-line (and that's pratically the only way I do nowadays), but it's more difficult to get into prog when you can't find anything localy |
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Dean
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 11:46 |
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You simply cannot make these kind of simplistic comparisons and draw the kind of conclusions you are making. You are assuming causation when there is no evidence to support it. It states spend converted into dollars. Does that account for exchange-rate variations (Sweden in not in the Euro)? Does this account for price-variation (the cost of living is high in Sweden)? Is there a comparable (control) study from before Sweden became a clan of ersatz-Viking pirates? And/Or from before the Dutch developed a conscience? Are the numbers of illegal downloads for each country know? |
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Windhawk
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator Joined: December 28 2006 Location: Norway Status: Offline Points: 11401 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 11:32 |
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This covers all music, not just rock music. My problem is that I don't see a trend. If piracy has such destructive effect on sales, then sales in the Netherlands should be substantially lower than in neighboring Belgium. Much the same with Sweden really. While downloading is illegal there they have some very well known illegal providers, known by the entire population, and again a negative effect should be clearly visible in the amount of money spent on music. Especially since Sweden is also one of those nations where just about every household is online, and these figures are from before Spotify really got popular too. There should be a visible trend there, and I find the lack of it troublesome. |
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Websites I work with:
http://www.progressor.net http://www.houseofprog.com My profile on Mixcloud: https://www.mixcloud.com/haukevind/ |
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Dean
Special Collaborator
Retired Admin and Amateur Layabout Joined: May 13 2007 Location: Europe Status: Offline Points: 37575 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 11:26 |
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Who needs a record company when you can get your fans to steal from you? That is illogical captain. Who needs a fan that does not buy music? I have been buying Prog Rock for 43 years. It has never been difficult to buy Prog. It is easier now and that is nothing to do with piracy. But it was never impossible. Certainly at no point in their existence have Van def Graaf Generator, Flower Kings or Riverside records ever been unavailable. Not once. Sometimes I had no money to buy CDs so I had to go without. Some months it was more important to buy food or pay the rent than it was to buy an LP or CD. *sniff-sniff* But I survived. I do not have the money to buy a Porsche 911, I think Volkswagon AG charge to much for them, can I steal one? If I am caught by the police can I blame the road providers? I pay road tax, that should pay for stolen cars! VW should charge the same for a 911 as they do a Beatle - its practically the same car anyway. They are the theives!!!!!  If Prog is more popular because of piracy then why do bands sell less albums now? Is it because the thieves who steal the albums do not pay for them? Is that not how stealing works? |
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Bonnek
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator Joined: September 01 2009 Location: Belgium Status: Offline Points: 4521 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 11:22 |
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Belgians have no clue about rock music whatsoever so that explains the low figure. Also they are anarchists and too greedy to spend money on anything but french fries, beer and choclats. To anser your question, I don't really see a trend there. Sweden is up but they also have most bands/musicians who probably buy a lot of stuff from other bands to support them. Which doesn't really help anybody... Edited by Bonnek - October 02 2014 at 11:23 |
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Bonnek
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator Joined: September 01 2009 Location: Belgium Status: Offline Points: 4521 |
Posted: October 02 2014 at 11:17 |
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Honestly I think it's a sort of dark ages for artists right now. Prog or otherwise doesn't matter. Established names can keep going because they have a fanbase who'll reach for their pockets anyhow. But honestly, do you think we would have seen Opeth, Porcupine Tree and others become what they are now if they hadn't been so lucky to pre-date illegal downloading by just a couple of years? They may not have made much money in those early days but somehow they garnered just enough interest for a record label to believe in them and keep them going. The newt PT and Opeth of the last decade? I haven't seen them. Maybe they are out there, maybe they are even better, but how can they break through now? how are they supposed to sponser a decent recording? Spotify and Bandcamp? Sjee.. I won't repeat what Dean explained so profoundly. For myself, downloading / streaming / youtube has been really good for me myself and I. At the end of the 90s I was fed up with buying (disappointing) CDs that I bought based on one track heard on the radio or a quick listen in the recordshop. Around 2000 that changed entirely and since then I am a happy buyer of around 50 cds a year, nearly all of them after thorough listening to the availalble channels. 15 years later it looks like this has been a very short-term advantage... If there are new artist there worth my time then I'm not finding them and when I do by chance I only get frustrated as they get virtually no sales/attention/money meaning they'll probably give up years before they could have developped into something really fantastic. In case of PT and Opeth we might have been stuck with their first two albusm or so, imagine what a waste of talent that would have been) PS. If you don't like PT or Opeth, feel free to substitute with Dream Theatre, Radiohead, IQ or whatever makes your day. Edited by Bonnek - October 02 2014 at 11:18 |
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Will piracy kill off prog rock ?
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infandous wrote: