Free Pony Theory ~ Band and their fans by ways of web

Joined: 23 Sep 2006 Posts: 1088

http://www.boston.com/business/ar..._indie_bands_find_stardom_online/

On the website MySpace, Boston punk band The Charms have amassed nearly 9,000 ``friends" with whom the band can communicate about upcoming shows and new releases. The old way of discovering new music was to hear a song on the radio, trek to a record store, and try to hum it for the clerk. The new way of discovering music is a dense swirl of websites, YouTube videos, blogs, MySpace pages, cell phone ring tones, and even video games. For emerging artists, the new technology creates opportunities to reach a wider audience -- especially when used cleverly -- as major labels and big-name artists fumble their way into the future.

``The record labels still don't know how to use the Web as adroitly and adeptly as the young people who grew up with it, who are now in these bands," says Phil Leigh, senior analyst at Inside Digital Media, a Tampa consulting firm. ``I do think that the labels will continue to be the major force in the music industry, but they won't be as dominant as they were in the past."

The Dresden Dolls, a duo who describe their music as ``Brechtian punk cabaret," invite their fans to send in artwork and videos inspired by their songs.

``A fan can send me a beautiful painting, and seven seconds later, it's up on our website , on the fan art page, and it's visible to thousands of other people," says singer Amanda Palmer. ``I love that we can connect with people that way."

That sort of authentic connection between a band and its fans is a relatively new phenomenon. Coulton, who writes quirky, fabulist folk songs about American history, star-crossed mad scientists, and technology, recently used his blog to invite the Web audience to submit an eight-bar solo for his song ``Shop Vac" on the instrument of their choice. The best one -- chosen by user voting -- was incorporated into the finished song.

``Audiences want to feel that Web authenticity thing," says Mike Denneen, a Somerville producer who has worked with Aimee Mann and the band Fountains of Wayne. ``They don't want to feel they're being marketed to." That puts the deep-pocketed marketing departments of such mega-labels as Universal Music Group and Sony BMG at a distinct disadvantage.

Joined: 23 Sep 2006 Posts: 1088

http://www.kurthanson.com/archive/news/110106/index.asp

Before becoming a Grammy-winning singer-songwriter, John Legend worked for three years as an associate consultant for the Boston Consulting Group. 'I look at myself as a businessman still, even though my first thing is music,' says Mr. Legend. 'Every day we have business problems we have to solve.'

"His current business problem: how to get a hit single.

"Mr. Legend, 27, sold more than 1.7 million copies of his last album, 'Get Lifted' in the U.S., but he has yet to put out a single that gets major radio play...

"The performer's new album, 'Once Again,' was released last week to rave reviews...

"Artists almost always make much more money from selling albums than from selling singles. But radio play of singles acts as advertising and helps to drive album sales. 'The lack of radio play concerns me,' says Mr. Legend. 'But I think I can get a hit record without it.'

"To do that, Mr. Legend is seeking to get his music heard on a variety of other channels, and he has entered into marketing arrangements with a wide range of companies...

"A growing number of musicians are marketing singles and sometimes turning them into hits without the support of radio, at least initially. Radio still matters -- a recent report by Mercury Radio Research, a company that studies the industry, found that the medium is still the primary way people discover new music. But other methods are making inroads.

Joined: 23 Sep 2006 Posts: 1088

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/sho...ith+her+homemade+album/article.do

Acoustic guitarist Kate Walsh has knocked Take That off the top of the iTunes download album chart - but does not even own an iPod.

The 23-year-old guitarist recorded her album in a friend's bedroom and named it Tim's House in his honour.

The homemade album has proved a unexpected hit with iPod fans who had downloaded it from the iTunes website in their thousands - knocking Take That and Kaiser Chiefs from the top spots.

Miss Walsh said: "You end up looking at it every day to see if you're still number one. I think I'm ahead of Elton.

"I don't actually have an iPod yet. I hear they are quite good for ten hour flights.

"I set up my own record label called Blueberry Pie and just got the music out there. It's pretty easy. Anyone can do it."

Joined: 23 Sep 2006 Posts: 1088

http://www.laweekly.com/music/mus...ique-record-labels-in-town/17828/

While the major-label juggernaut certainly won’t cede the lion’s share of SoundScans anytime soon, bands like the Shins and the Arcade Fire no longer need to leave Sub Pop or Merge to make the Billboard Top 10. Thanks to the Great Equalizers — blogs, Pitchfork and the increasing ease of digital commerce — the do-it-yourself indies of the ’90s have matured into respected midmajors. Locally, independent outfits like Dim Mak, Danger Bird, Eeenie Meenie, Stones Throw and Drive-Thru have became players, with Dangerbird even transforming the Silversun Pickups from Silver Lake house band into 200,000-selling rock-radio regulars. A few miles away, Steve Aoki’s Hollywood-based Dim Mak Records has recast the blueprint for an entire generation of indies, unifying the hirsute, leggings-clad masses under a singular branded aesthetic, building a miniempire across the worlds of fashion, nightlife and music.

Meanwhile, at the bottom of the food chain, a funny thing happened on the way to the industry’s obsolescence. Galvanized by the increasingly flattened playing field, a new generation of DIY-minded bedroom labels has emerged, many spun off from popular blogs and all aided by the same technology the majors are convinced is the spawn of Satan (and Shawn Fanning). Chastened by the overreach and bloat of the majors, while conscious of the limitations inherent in the piracy-ravaged landscape, L.A.’s latest label heads don’t harbor Geffen-size dreams of moguldom. Instead, they’ve created lifestyle businesses with modest goals: sharing the music that they love with the rest of the world — and, it is hoped, breaking even.