Merchandising!

There’s been a lot of banter about the relevance of album artwork in the digital age across the metal blogsphere (starting on Metalsucks, then moving to Invisible Oranges). The conversation has generally centered around whether the fans want/need/appreciate album artwork anymore. Many folks don’t buy CD’s or vinyl any more, and those that do often just rip the music for their iPod and file the hard copy away without paying much attention to the packaging or artwork. There are of course others who view an album as a package – 10 or so songs made to be together, with cover artwork, sleeve notes, lyrics etc. – and consume as a whole.

However, in many ways, whether the music buying public want, or feel that they need artwork or not is somewhat beside the point. The fact is, aside from the artistic concerns, artwork has a very practical purpose, which means it’s unlikely to disappear any time soon.

It’s unlikely that bands are going to stop releasing songs in ‘collections’. It makes financial sense to record multiple songs in one session, not to mention that extra cost it would take to promote and market 1 song at a time. Whether you call it an EP, Album or twozzlefangler, this collection will need to be identiified by a ‘label’ – the title – so that people can identify it. But from a marketing and promotional perspective this is simply not enough. This is, after all (wether you like it or not) a product, and products need to be distinct and easily recognisable. Imagine if all that was on every washing powder box was the brand name – no logo, design, mascot, product picture, gimmick - how would you identify one from the next? How would you remember which one was recommended to you, Washomatic or Cleanomatic? Branding professionals have known about differentiators for decades, and the music industry is no different. So bands often have logos, so that people can easily pick them out and identify with them. This is our fist visual cue. But that doesn’t do a very good job of differentiating one album from the next – enter the album artwork.

Death Metal art looks like this dude

At corporate level, all the elements of the album package from the songs, to the logo, to the title to the cover image, are carefully harmonised to portray a particular theme, image, tone. This is called merchandising and it’s take VERY seriously. Merchandising can make or break a record. This merchandising is taken through to marketing – adverts, PR, press kits, live show promotion and is usually reproduced to some level as part of the live show itself.

So when you get your mate to throw together some artwork for your latest EP this is what you are doing – merchandising. It means that you have a way to visually present your collection of songs, so that people can easily identify it in a shop among a bunch of other blackened deathcore CD’s, on Amazon or iTunes Store, and when flicking through the cover flow in their MP3 library. People are more likely to remember the distinctive cover design than the obscure latin album title or your unreadable BM logo.

Read my logo mofo!

It goes further than this though. Album artwork tends to be similar within genres. If you’re a Death Metal band, you probably want to be noticed by Death Metal fans. Death Metal album covers are usually striking, disturbing and immaculately painted by some some disturbed genius. Black Metal covers are usually sparse and colourless. Next time you leaf through Metal Hammer or Terrorizer take note of which adverts you notice – somehow it mysteriously aligns with your music taste…wonder why that is?

In the digital age, where visuals are everything, I’d say that album artwork is more important than ever. Whether you spent hours gazing at it (like I did with Iron Maiden’s Somewhere in Time artwork when I was a teenager), or merely used it as a reminder when looking for particular album, it had an impact on you, and fulfilled a vital need.

The greatest of them all

Everyone’s saying it. It’s something worth celebrating. This really means something to people – in these darkened times, like so many before, people look to music to provide uplift, empathy, indulgence, inspiration. So shout it from the rooftops folks! Oh wait, most of those people (ie. people with half a brain) know this already don’t they? Let’s be more specific shall we? Get on the internet, identify a record label, and shout it out to them – email, phone, hack their site, get on down to their HQ in person. Here’s what you’re going to shout: “Despite you it has been a good year in music!”

The music industry has spent the last year telling us that the conditions, where it’s now easier and cheaper to access more music, hear more artists, love their work, is bad for music overall. How are we supposed to believe that the readjustment going on in the music industry is bad for us, when evidence clearly suggests otherwise? What we are paying to fund when we spend a tenner on a CD, is a bloated industry, desperately in need of streamlining and modernisation. Why should we bear that cost?

I read a depressing interview with French avant-guard/metal indie Season of Mist (home to Dillinger Escape Plan, Mayhem, Cynic among others) in this month’s Terrorizer. Through the years they’ve been committed to bringing innovative sounds to the market, but boss Michael Berberian says he’s not signing any new acts because their business cannot sustain them, until something is done to redress the balance. He goes on to suggest that the situation “is killing the the artistic side”. Depressing? Depressing indeed that such a defeatist and narrow view exists in a label that sees itself as cutting edge. Killing the artistic side? Oh wait, so everyone will stop making music because it got less profitable to do so, oh please. How is this helping all the bands out there? How is it helping the music fans hear the best new and innovative music? Really clever business plan mate, cos all the best businesses got through tough times by saying “let’s just hunker down until it blows over – if we complain enough something will be done”. I’ve got news for you friend, it ain’t going to blow over, and you will have 20 redundant staff on your conscience when you go under because of your lackadaisical attitude. Fuck you.

There are signs of hope out there. Earache-signed old school thrashers Gama Bomb just released their new album for download free of charge. Also Earache’s excellent and timely repackaging of the Peel Grindcore sessions (Grind Madness at the BBC) shows some real business and commercial smarts. British Stoner crew Taint have released their latest offering exclusively to buy on vinly, but have included a code to redeem a free download of the album online (you may remember me recently championing this approach).

This is the sort of thinking that’s going to help labels with the balls to deserve the business that they run trade through the tough times. Quite why the majority of the music industry doesn’t think it operates in the same economic environment as the rest of the business world is beyond me. Wake up people, because the music is happening without you.

It’s been a great year for music because the bands and artists made it that way, despite the harbingers of doom in the music industry.

Bands, you don’t need the record industry bringing you down, sapping your income to pay for accountants, useless, arrogant A&R men, and their £100 a day coke habit. You’re better off than you have ever been before as it’s easier than ever before to do things your own way. The world is waiting for you, so go out there and grab it!

Me, Yesterday.

It’s been a while since graced this dark corner of the internet with my presence. It may come as a surprise to you but I do have a day job, and these things have a habit of getting in the way of real life. I’ve spent the last couple of months being totally occupied by a project that has been progressively swallowing up my life for the past 2 years. It finally reached its zenith and now things are starting to calm down a little bit, hence my return to my ‘hobby’ – essentially talking shit to anyone who will listen.

There’s possibly an irony to be read into the fact I have a 9 – 5 (if only!) job, when many of the bands that I write about hold me in some level of contempt for doing so. Many a song has been written damning the ‘rat race’ – it seems to be a preoccupation for some bands. Cathedral damn me to the Corpsecycle, while Cancer Bats urge me to keep my chin up on Deathsmarch. Radiohead just want me to slow down.

I’m not going to defend the repetitive cycle of daily toil for an uncaring master, but it does have its benefits (like a regular salary), as does life in a band, however in the latter’s case these are often short lived or entirely illusory. The glitter and glory of life in a band is rarely what people expect. Layne Staley complained that his all consuming heroine habit “seems so sick to the hypocrite norm” while progressively removing himself from the gene pool – he was not a happy guy. Mustain’s and Hetfield’s foray into the rock and roll dream nearly destroyed them, and in Kurt Cobain’s (and countless others) case it actually did. These are just a few high profile cases shadowing countless others.

There’s glamour to these grubby tales, but for the vast majority of musicians a much more terrifying fate is to befall them: normality. Most artists don’t get to live the dream for very long, and when the fickle and unforgiving masses forsake them they more often than not have to join the merry rat race with the rest of us. Q magazine used to run (and may still do) a morbidly entertaining regular titled ‘Where are they now?” (or something similar) which tracked down short lived bands in their current purgatory. Cue quotes like “I haven’t seen John in a while, last I heard he was selling shoes in Birmingham”, or “I’m happy in my life as a full time mother and community worker, it’s far more fulfilling than being in a band”. However, there are countless stories of rock stars dropping off the radar to lead a mundane existence only to reappear decades later to pick up where they left off, a process documented in the gloriously deranged rockumentary Anvil.

Obviously assimilation into the rat race doesn’t need to be the end of a life in music, in many cases the day job exists largely to facilitate the music. As the money drains out of the music industry this will more and more become the norm, and certainly shouldn’t be shied away from. But is it possible to have a serious career as well as maintaining a fruitful career while maintaining a productive band?

Of course plenty of folks go on to have well paid and fulfilling jobs helping other bands pass through the music industry grinder.

I fully intend to break the shackles of the rat race at some point. At my age it’s probably a little late to try my hand at the rock n’ roll dream, maybe I’ll just take up cheese making instead, after all if it’s good enough for Alex James…

Apparently there are trace elements of metal in bottled water...

Still the filesharing battles wages on, despite the fact that there is no war. Dom Lawson’s entertaining article on this subject apparently fell foul of Metal Hammer’s editorial scythe. We can only assume that they didn’t want to fall on the wrong side of this prickly debate. And who can blame them, why risk pissing off your superiors over a war that’s apparently being waged elsewhere?

I do wonder though, how many folks out there who are earnestly ‘trying’ before conveniently ‘forgetting’ to buy. Is this costing the music industry money? Maybe. However, that’s largely beside the point. The issue here is that music is no longer a commodity that can be contained and rationed. The commodities are the physical items that accompany the music – the CD, the cover, the box – these are tangible goods that should be exchanged for money.

It’s because music is freely available that this situation exists. I’m sorry to restate the obvious, but it’s worth thinking about this. Water is ‘freely’ available in the UK. We pay for that by way of taxes (rates). The only time you pay at the point of receipt of water is when you buy the bottled stuff, and then what you’re actually paying for is the container and the convenience (plus the mark-up of whatever establishment you purchase it from). The future model of music will resemble this, and take a look at Spotify to see this in action. The music industry already knows this and the majors all own a stake in Spotify. The problem with this is the margins are much lower with models like this, and until the majors can shuffle their operating models to account for this and pacify the investors, they’re going to carry on chasing rainbows with lawyers and politicians.

By the way, the words on this page are not a commodity either. By the time this piece makes it onto the blog it will have eaten at least an hour and a half of my time. This blog probably eats more of my time per month than your average unsigned band does of the band members’ time. Should you wish to take these and consume them in any way you see fit then please feel free to do so. If you want me to save them onto a CD and send them across to you I’ll charge you for the CDR, postage, packaging, and round that up for my efforts. If more people start to read this blog, maybe I’ll put some advertising on it and try and cover the cost of the server and maybe I’ll even get a bit extra. If you want to take any of my articles and make money out of them (god knows how you would do this) by posting them on your own, commercial, website, then you will have to pay me. If you do not I may take legal action. Will I try and charge you for simply reading this article/blog despite that is takes time, effort and money to run? Hell no! Readers are more important to me than profit, and without them I stand no chance of making any anyway. The printed media industries learned this years ago. These days, some newspapers are moving to models that they no longer charge even for the physical product, and make money from the extra advertising revenue gleaned from the larger distribution.

I don’t know why I’m telling this to you lot – you already know this. I also don’t know why I bitch about the fact that this debate is still happening, I actually quite enjoy it.

Heavy

Do you ever get those “did I miss something?” moments? Perhaps you were still under the impression that the word ‘gay’ still meant ‘happy’ until you announced you were ‘feeling gay’ to your mates that time.

I’ve been having a slowly unfolding “did I miss something?” moment with the word ‘heavy’ when applied to metal music. You see, the understanding that I had of this term, in my 25 years of listening to metal music, was that it referred to music that is fantastically loud and aggressive. So if you asked me to name a song that personified ‘heavy’ I’d probably say Battery by Metallica or anything by Napalm Death – super fast, aggressive blast beats, screaming, you know, stuff that makes your nose bleed when you listen to it. But more recently I’ve heard it applied to bands like Electric Wizard or Earth (the early stuff) – in fact, doom in general and specifically anything that sounds like Sabbath. Now, these bands are almost the antithesis of what I would have previously considered ‘heavy’. They are slow, frequently have no drums or screaming – they’re more likely to cause the onset arthritis than a nosebleed. Now, I can see why this could be termed ‘heavy’, this term may well actually be more appropriate for that sort of music, it’s just not what I thought it meant.

I’d actually convinced myself that I had it wrong all these years and begun training myself into using this other meaning of the term, until I recently I started reading the fabulous book on the roots of Grindcore and Death Metal Choosing Death by Albert Mudrian. Here’s a bunch of folks talking about a period when the pursuit of speed and aggression superseded just about any other artistic value, and they’re all attributing these sonic properties to ‘heaviness’. These guys clearly understand the term in the same way that I always have.

So what changed? When did the word ‘heavy’ go from meaning aggression to depression? I’m actally genuinely confused about this. Someone please help.

This billboard speaks the truth

Here’s a thought for unsigned bands who a) are feeling a little squeamish about giving away tracks for free or b) still think filesharing is bad for them.

So when you go to your shitty day job every day, and you’re sitting in the same traffic or on the same train (running late for the 3rd day in a row) do you notice the billboards gliding past you? It’s the same ad every day for weeks on end. You probably forgot about it, but still it’s there day after day, same place. Whether you like it or not, the name of that washing powder if tattooed on you memory despite the fact that you’ll never use the stuff (beer is the ultimate substance for cleaning clothes right?)

Companies pay hundreds, if not thousands of quid for that sort of ad placement. Whether you’re paying attention or not, that advert is making an impression on you. This is an age old and well understood advertising technique, and is used widely in web advertising.

Now let’s imagine another scenario. You’re an unsigned band struggling to get noticed. You give away a free MP3 of one of your tracks and advertise it on your Myspace. People like free stuff, and 50 people download it. Think about what you have there now, before going off half cocked about how those freeloaders should be paying you for that track that cost you 200 quid to record. Your band name is Metatron (Industrial Acoustic Grindcore since you’re asking), and because you were diligent enough to get your ID3 tags set properly on that file it now sits comfortably under Metallica in the “Artists” menu on most people’s iPod. Think about that for a second. You gave up 1 track, and now, every time those 50 people go to listen to Master of Puppets they will see your band’s name (the same logic applies to iTunes, Media Player etc.).

The brain is wired to attribute value to this sort of connection. This is why companies will pay so much money to sponsor music venues. From now on, those folks are going to remember your band’s name, even if they never listen to that track again. It’s like you’ve got a mini billboard sitting in a bunch of folks’ pockets. Now, I’m not going to start banging on about your band as a brand (although I fully intend to very soon), but the more folk’s iPod you can get that track on, the less time, money and effort you’re going to need to spend on raising awareness of your band later on.

Knowing that, if I were an unsigned band, I’d be actively encouraging people to share my tracks.

This may be a “sure we all knew about this Alex, we were just keeping it a secret from you” moment, but it came as a surprise for me that there are no less than 2 rich digital media formats being touted to reinvigorate the ‘dying’ album format.

I hadn’t realised that the album had was dying – I still buy but most of my music either on CD or download whole albums. However much of the rest of the music buying world doesn’t – the trend is towards buying single tracks, and some bands have even opted to become singles only zones and eschew albums all together. After all, what’s the point of recording an entire, well packaged, sonically aligned collection, when most folks only ever download track 9 because they heard it on the radio?

It is for this reason that AC/DC refuse resolutely to (officially) release their music on digital format – we record albums, they say, not single tracks, and they’re made to be consumed that way. It’s not hard to see why they, and many other bands, feel this way.

The album frequently marks an epoch in time. “Here are 10 songs that represent this moment in our lives”, a distillation of their microcosmic zeitgeist if you will. All the best albums are comprised of tracks that feel like they really belong together, and they wouldn’t have sounded right on the previous or subsequent album. A poor album is often one that doesn’t gel. These are often albums made up of a mix of ‘singles’ or filler, and it’s perhaps these types of albums that no-one it mourning the death of.

Many albums are aligned on theme (Muse’s Absolution), tone and style (Death’s Sound of Perseverance, anything by Earth) and concept (Leviathan, Seventh Son of a Seventh Son), not to mention countless other configurations (try Flora by Chord for a rather obscure one). Even the track ordering is, for many bands, considered a fine art – Radiohead nearly split up over the ordering of OK Computer!

Some of the best albums released recently have been exactly that: albums, not just collections of good tunes. People downloading single tracks from Mastodon’s concept masterpiece Crack in the Skye surely miss the point and musch it’s beauty and power. Opeth’s Watershed and Baroness’s Red Album may not be ‘concept albums’, but the tracks belong together – they gel.

And it’s not all about the music. CD packaging is getting better and better and vinyl is still going strong. Putting together an album isn’t about recording a bunch of tracks, batching them up and putting them out, it’s an art form in itself, and one that many bands and fans alike still care deeply about.

So who thinks the album is dead? The bean counters of the record industry, that’s who.

The idea of repackaging the music download is not a bad one. The download market is one that never really lent itself to the album, and if people want to download an album, I can’t see any problem with making it a richer more rewarding experience for them. Packaging video, cover art, lyrics and (oh dear god no!) ringtones with the music is a way to help extend the album artform, and replace some of the value of the music that is lost in translation to download.

However, this whiffs of a cynical ploy by the music industry to sell more downloads to recoup revenues since those dastardly, party smashing plebeians, the public decided that they wanted freedom to download music however they damn well want. Given this motive it has the potential to pervert and cheapen the album art form out of recognition.

This is perhaps a moot point, as do people really want or need this? CD sales may be declining, but this is merely a symptom of the passive music fans who never really wanted whole albums anyway, but were forced to buy them, moving to another format. CD’s and vinyl are still the format of choice for real music fans. Given that music is now easily exchanged, bands are forced to put out much higher quality packaging and extras which, over time will become more valuable, collectable and will be truly cherished by fans in the way that these formats used to be.

So is the album format dead? Hell no, It’s stronger than ever!

(If you need any evidence that the CD Album format is alive and well check this out)

It’s not coincidence that the vast majority of the bands and musicians we see most frequently are also pretty well off financially. This privileged clique has billion pound corporations behind them, huge record deals, they get money for just turning up places. They are conspicuous because they have a load of money to promote themselves (and experienced professionals to help them do it) and from this they make more money. They also represent a tiny fraction of all recording artists, the vast majority of whom make little or no money from their art.

Perhaps it’s the lure of big bucks that leads unsigned bands to assume that they should make money from their efforts from day one. It’s just as likely that they’ve shelled a bunch of money for demo recordings and they need to cover costs. This is fair enough, but it’s also a very short sighted view. Let me explain.

Ever since serial smug twat Trent Reznor had his say on the matter of unsigned bands giving their stuff away for free I’ve been pondering the problem of new bands being able to support their art. This week journalist and industry observer Cosmo Lee had his say on his blog Invisible Oranges. Both these guys make very compelling points, but still I see dissent among unsigned bands who see it as only fair that they can recoup their investment.

Now, I’m not in a band, I don’t even work in the music industry. I do however work in the business arena, and from that perspective this attitude seems absurd. I’ll start out by saying that bands are NOT businessmen (for the most part) and should not be expected to be. Their job is to make music. To be able to continue doing this, and not end up in crippling debt, they need to have some income to support this. Having a job on the side is not usually enough – a lot of these kids want to make a career out of making music. This is a noble cause, and they should be commended for it, but it’s not easy to do so.

So, despite the fact that the primary motivator is, and should be, music, some consideration should, in most cases, be given to making money.

Now, for the sake of comparison let’s look at small businesses. I’ll use an (imaginary) example – Jenny is a hobby jewellery maker (really evil looking gothic stuff with pentagrams and shit). She’s been making stuff in her spare time and selling it on at cost to her mates, mainly for the love of it. One day she realises that she’s selling so much that she could make a career out of this. So she decides to quit her job and start her jewellery making business. Now, with her kit in the garage, she’ll never be able to pump out enough merchandise to support her doing this full time. So she’ll need to invest in some new kit and probably rent some a bigger space to house it. Also, although she’s selling a good amount of stuff now, she’ll need to sell a lot more to make the venture even break even. So she’ll need to promote herself – to advertise in trade and music magazines costs more money. So she borrows some cash from her parents and the rest from the bank. The understanding is that she’ll pay back the bank in monthly instalments immediately, and will start paying her parents back when she starts making a profit – her projections say in 3 years time (taking into account overheads, tax etc.), although depending on sales this could be more or less. In the meantime, she will take a salary of a bit above minimum wage to cover her living expenses.

This is a very common scenario. MUCH more common than instances of bands starting out. Jenny does not expect to recoup her initial investment as soon as she makes it, it will take time.

Now, back to the bands. Music is NOT a commodity any more for the most part – it’s freely available and easily exchanged. Jewellery is tangible and, assuming that the materials are worth something and workmanship is good, is a commodity. Jenny will more than likely receive money for her wares, but her business will not make money (ie. Profit), for a long time. The business will remain in negative equity and she personally will be living on the breadline.

Unsigned bands may expect (and be able) to sell CD’s or even MP3’s, but is this a sensible idea? Without a significant fan base, and their music being easy to exchange, it’s unlikely that they’ll recoup any investment at all. All that they are doing is making it harder for folks to hear their music.

Jenny had to shell out cash to promote herself. For bands, this is traditionally a role that record labels perform. For record labels this is a difficult task, for unsigned bands it’s nigh on impossible. One way of promoting yourself is to make your music freely available and encourage folks to share it. Get people to record your shows, and put them on Youtube. Take any opportunity you can to get your music heard, it is, after all, your wares, not the CD on which it’s recorded.

Once you’ve got a few people at your shows you can start really capitalising on this by selling merchandise, and maybe you can afford to make a really nice digipack version of your demo – something that people will really want to own (they probably already own the music contained therein).

Will you get return on your investment at this point? Hell no! You won’t even get it if/when a record label signs you. You may not even see it after scoring your first Gold record. This stuff takes time, effort, talent (sometimes) and a lot of luck (always).

If you don’t like to think of this outlay as an initial investment, call it a loss leader, a well understood retail tactic of offloading stuff at a loss, under the understanding that this will get poeple hooked in and coming back for more.

I’m not saying that bands should run themselves like a business, but business is in the business of making money, and you would be wise to pay heed of this. Unless you’re the next Artic Monkeys, it’s unlikely that you’ll see that cash rolling in from just being a band, so if you want to survive, be smart and forward thinking.

Join the debate over at UKMU.

When I grow up I want to be in a sandwich or a metal band

I had the violent displeasure today of (part)consuming what may be the worst pork sandwich I have ever had. I purchased this wretched morsel from a café near me that sells nothing else other than roast pork in rolls. How bad can it be? Well the stale baguette (they seem to have perfected the art of making them come out of the oven that way) was the worst bit, then the dry pork (I’m assuming it was pork, hard to tell) was the worst bit too, after the apple sauce (seemingly made be leaving the apples in pool of saliva to dissolve) it all went down hill (or to be more specific, in the bin).

How anyone could treat pig, not to mention food in general, with such disrespect is beyond me. To celebrate this most auspicious of occasions I’ve selected a few tasty pig related tracks for your entertainment.

War Pigs. The Faith No More version here, but there’s a multitude of excellent covers of the seminal Sabbath masterwork.

Piggy, the foreboding industrial ‘ballad’ from Nine Inch Nails’ astounding The Downward Spiral.

Some delightful, nosebleed inducing Grind from Pig Destroyer.

The fantastically silly, Scientology baiting Big Fat Pig from Clutch’s otherwise less than inspiring Jam Room.

May the pork be with you…

So all your fiends and family are either on the brink of redundancy or about to die of swine flu. Your house is worth less than the boat that you’re going to have to by when the ice caps melt and you’ve taken a liking to the new Beyonce track and you’re concerned that this may develop into something more sinister.

Don’t feel so down old chum. Here’s some reasons to be cheerful!

The new Dillinger Escape Plan album Option Paralysis will be released early next year which apparently will sound “dark and evil –very early ’90s thrash-influenced” and not “upbeat and danceable –very Justin Timberlake-influenced” like we were all expecting.

One more instalment of the 4 album odyssey that is the Devin Townsend Project. This one will be heavier apparently, which is nice. Strapping Young Lad will be revisited on the 3rd album apparently. Apparently there are also twitters regarding some possible live appearances next year. A visit to the UK please Mr. Townsend!

The new album New Junk Aesthetic from southern hardcore frontrunners Every Time I Die in September. The first track released from this has backing vocals from Dillinger’s Greg Puciato. Read my thoughts here.

Alice in Chains got a new singer, and have recorded a new album due for a September release. Against all the odds, the first track released off of this opus is actually rather good.

Baroness have finished recording their new album, which is due out in October. If it’s 1/10th as good as The Red Album, then it should kick the arse out of most other stuff released this year.

Apparently Metal is currently the most popular musical genre in the UK. I’ll leave it up to you to decide whether this is a reason to be cheerful or a reason to slit your wrists. If it leads to more unforgivable adolescent nonsense like this, then possible the latter, unless you’re 12, then surely the former.

Feeling happier? No? This should help (mainly because it’s what I’m listening to now, and it’s cheering me up).