Thom Yorke Dissing The Album Format Doesn't Mean 'Free' Business Models Don't Work

from the ok... dept

I believe that one of our frequent critics has been submitting a series of stories which s/he believes "disproves" the basics of what we talk about here. I don't know for sure that it's the same individual, as they always use different names, but the names are all of the same nature, and the comments are effectively the same mocking tone -- often included with a claim along the lines of "you'll never post this because it shows you're wrong." Later the same person (again, this is an assumption, but one with a high probability) has been posting comments insisting that "Mike always ignores my submissions because they prove he's wrong." The thing is, that's clearly not true. If you hadn't noticed, I often post stories suggesting something I've written about may not be true (and in some cases, I'd love to be proven wrong). The problem is that when you break down the stories, they don't prove anything of the sort. And, with this particular critic, s/he's either so incredibly misread the story or misunderstood what we wrote about, they didn't seem worth posting.

But since the onslaught continues, I figure why not spend one (and only) one post responding to two such recent submissions to explain. The first was the fact that, back at Bonnaroo, Trent Reznor announced to the crowd that it was Nine Inch Nails' last US show ever. The critic seemed to think this was proof that Reznor's brand of connecting with fans & giving them a reason to buy was a failure. Except... someone hadn't been paying much attention. First, the news wasn't new at all. Reznor had stated well before the tour even began that he was putting Nine Inch Nails on hold after the tour, but that he would continue with a variety of other musical projects. He also announced this same fact at other shows on the tour. The final statement was hardly anything new or anything of note. It certainly wasn't a sign that Reznor's efforts were a failure, but that he wanted to try something new -- a point he'd been making for quite some time. (Also, it's worth noting that since then, Reznor decided to do a few more NIN shows in the US, as he felt that Bonnaroo and the NIN/JA tour weren't the best way to go out).

The latest is a similar misreading, with a similarly misguided "nyah, nyah" comment from the critic. In this case, he pointed out that The Sun (hardly a standard for journalistic excellence) is reporting that Thom Yorke of Radiohead is saying the band doesn't want to do any new albums. Again, as with the statement above, this is not a new thing. Hell, just last week we linked to an interview with Yorke where he said the same thing. But, again, this critic seems to be confusing the fact that Yorke doesn't want to produce a certain product ("the album") with the idea that the In Rainbows experiment was a failure.

But that's not what Yorke is saying at all. In fact, Yorke has been complaining about the album format for some time. But that's a complaint about the format itself, not any sort of statement on whether or not In Rainbows was a success (which all the data shows it was a huge success). Furthermore, even the fact that Yorke wants to do something different doesn't mean the original experiment was a failure. Hell, in the very link this critic sent (the one above), Yorke states that In Rainbows was a success as an album. On top of that, in an interview last year, Yorke pointed out that it makes no sense to just keep doing the same thing, and even if they did another album, they wouldn't use the same method, because it had been done already, and they wanted to do something new. He was realizing, correctly, that you get more bang for your buck by doing new stuff, not just repeating the same old thing.

Nowhere does Yorke say that he won't still be producing music, or that they won't come up with new and innovative business models. But that he just doesn't like the album format. This is something a lot of artists agree with, and is hardly a condemnation of the original experiment.

There have been a few other submissions along these same lines, but rest assured, if I'm not posting your submissions (and we get about 50 to 100/day, and we only have so much time to write up stories), it's not because you've somehow "proved me wrong." It might be because the stories you submit don't actually say what you think they say... or... well... anything interesting at all.

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Radiohead's Thom Yorke Explains How Recording Industry Milked CD Business

from the quotable dept

JJ sends in a short quote from Radiohead's Thom Yorke about the music business:

"There's a process of natural selection going on right now. The music business was waiting to die in its current form about twenty years ago. But then, hallelujah, the CD turned up and kept it going for a bit. But basically, it was dead."

Bingo. The "recording industry" has basically been a "sell plastic discs" industry for way too long, and used the monopoly rents it received from the government to significantly overprice its products, and then lived fat and happy for many years. So, of course, when better, more efficient formats for distribution, recording, promotion and listening came along, it wanted absolutely nothing to do with them, because they didn't present the same sort of monopoly rents.

And, that, of course has been the point we've been trying to make here for quite some time. This has always been a business model issue. The record labels lived off the CD business for so long that it refused to recognize that a better, more efficient system was showing up, because it meant giving up some easy profits.

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David Byrne Breaks Down New Business Models For Musicians; Confirms Radiohead's Success

from the changing-world dept

Wired is running a couple of stories involving well-known musician David Byrne. The first is an interview with Thom Yorke from Radiohead, where he confirms what a huge success the "name your own price" offering was, contrary to CNN's editors calling it dumb. According to Yorke: "In terms of digital income, we've made more money out of this record than out of all the other Radiohead albums put together, forever." Yorke also confirms other things that we've said about new business models, where touring can be a big part of the model (contrary to people who insist that's impossible). Yorke notes: "at the moment we make money principally from touring." Yorke admits that he's not a fan of touring (partly for ecological reasons), but that's how the band makes money (this is similar to what we've heard from other bands as well). So, again, given all the publicity around the "name your own price" deal (which Yorke admits they basically tried on a lark and only agreed to it right before announcing it), it should pay off well with more people willing to pay more money to see the band on tour. The one thing Yorke says that I disagree with is the idea that the model only works for Radiohead due to its following. As we've pointed out, most of the examples of bands successfully trying similar models involve much less well known acts. In fact, Byrne himself later points to the success of Jane Siberry, who tried a name your own price model years before Radiohead, and certainly didn't have the same huge following, but found that the model was quite successful.

The second article is by Byrne himself, where he does a nice job breaking down the business models of the recording industry. Much of what he says will sound familiar to folks around here, though he adds in some interesting numbers concerning how much a musician makes per CD and per iTunes download (it's not much). He points out that the value proposition of a record label is decreasing rapidly as areas where they used to be needed (money for recording, promotion and distribution) are approaching free in cost, meaning the labels provide little, if any, value on those points. He then lists out what he believes are the six business models a musician can adopt these days, noting that it's nice to see more than just a single option. This highlights another point we've tried to make: the new business models for the music industry mean that there isn't just one business model for every musician. In fact, just about every successful new business model we see is slightly different -- though most pick up on some important economic cues. The one problem I have with Byrne's explanation is that it still mainly focuses on one thing: how do you sell the music itself. This comes even after he talks about how the idea of selling music is only a recent phenomenon, and historically, music was always tied to the performance itself. The less bands focus on "selling music" and the more they focus on using the music to sell other stuff, the faster a path to success will become clear.

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