catapult magazine

The internet, Courtney Love, Ani Difranco and certain technological advances present challenges for a music industry that’s still structured according to a fifties and sixties model.

Labels typically act as loan companies that help artists pay for studio time, as long as it promises a return. This gives the label, which often cares only about profit, too much say in the final product. But now there are more Mobys, artists who can record anything they need to in their bedrooms or basements without needing a big budget or financial support from labels. Labels are still needed for mass-marketing, of course, but look what the marketing machine turns out these days: phonies like Alicia Keys while the real deals like Wilco get cast off.

The question is not IF the music industry has become irrelevant or WHEN it will crash and burn; the real question for Christians is how the industry should be structured now? Christians should be way ahead when it comes to reforming the industry, since Christian musicians and many Christian music listeners have been complaining about the limitations of Nashville’s CCM industry for decades now. What should an alternative to CCM and the broader music industry look like?

Grassroots my friend. Keep it on the small scale. The record companies, generally, are nothing but a pit of vipers. There are mob ties dating way back to its origin. This is an area that is very difficult for the Christian artist, seeing as while they are working for a “Christian Label” the label is most likely owned by one of the 5 major labels that ultimately dictates how they do business.

If a Christian is determined to market his or her music, it might take longer but, they should market on tehir own. A large number of “secular” artists are seeing the light in this and developing their own micro-labels where they do all of the work to get their product out. They set up their own distribution deals and have very minor ties to publishers. Unfortunately, the path is a difficult one but is much more lucrative financially, as well as spiritually, in the long run.

A couple books you should read:

Confessions of A Record Producer by Moses Avalon
The Hitmen (not sure of the author on this one)

The problem with grassroots marketing is that it takes too much time and creative energy away from the artist. The artist should not be burdened with the excessive marketing necessary to reach the masses.

It seems like this is an area where Christian business-folk ought to be working feverishly to come up with alternative ways to promote and produce excellent Christian musical artistry. Unfortunately, CCM, for the most part, does not engage in Christian business practices. It seems to me that we ought to be rebuking Christian business-people for not helping Christian artists rather than bemoaning the fact that there aren’t enough good Christian witnesses in the field of music.

Try Incubator Records out of Washington State. You will be pleasantly surprised with them. They usually have a couple spots open on their roster at the begining of the year.

Also, I think it is essential that the artist be involved with his or her own marketing strategies. It is their art. Their baby. No one understands it the way that they do. They don’t, necessarially, have to do it all themselves, but should be an intrical part of the process.

Christian business people are just that…business people. They still have to look at the bottom line, and the arts are always a very risky venture financially. Yes, there is priority in them, but regardless it is a “bad” business investment on the large picture. Yes, there are bands and individuals who succeed, but out of how many that fail? So, you must understand the reservations on the part of the Christian business community.

That’s not even going into the whole thing of whether or not Christian Music is to “new” a thing for many of them. There are a vast majority within the church that still think the drum is tool of Satan. (Perhaps that is a bit exaggerated, but makes the point).

If you have a dream…it is your dream. Chase it and make it happen.

I’m not willing to let Christian business people off the hook so easily. A Christian who is gifted with business sense ought to seriously ask her/himself if Christian business ought to be motivated by the bottom line. I don’t think ‘Avoid risks!’ should be the slogan of any Christian, business-minded or otherwise (isn’t this the point of Christ’s parable of tenants?).

Certainly Christian artists ought to be involved in all aspects of their art, but it is not just their baby. The artist’s work does not belong only to the artist. It is birthed to live among others. And for a work of art baptized in the Christian community, it belongs to all in that community. Everyone in that community is responsible to God for the upbringing of that baby.

This does not mean that every Christian had better go find a Christian artist to nurture. But we ought not think of Christian business people as in some separate camp. The Christian community (including Christians in business) should be very concerned if their brother and sister artists are the only ones taking the risks. And if the Christian community is suffering in the art department because of a non-supportive economic environment, that’s not just the artists’ problem. That’s a problem for the whole body of Believers.

An interesting take. What comes to mind is Waterdeep. They were sponsored by their church when they toured as a band and were given salaries…but made no money off the shows (only royalties). All money from the shows was immediately pu back into the church fund that sponsored them. They were considered “missionaries” from their church to the United States. A system that worked well due to the accountability they had with their church. It also gave the church, and subsequent business investors, some grounds on which they could see fruit from their investment financially.

I don’t doubt that there are bands that dig up funding from Christian business folk. That takes initiative on the part of the artist however. Rarely have I seen any business person knocking on any ministry door to give money. There has to be a wooing process, an information access and a genearl business plan laid our. The fact is that the majority of artists out there have no (or little) business sense and passionately drive their enterprise into the ground.

To beat those odds, it is imperical that the artist develop themselves and present a smart plan of attack. Budgeting and smart business approaches speak volumes to those who might be intrigued enough to invest into the artists enterprise.

Take this forum, for instance, Rob and Kirstin developed their plan of attack, got church support for their venture, began construction of the forum, developed some smart business tactics (with the assistance of business people in their church and other personal circles), and are now raising support for cino. After establishing themselves as a team who not only is driven by its passion but also by its smart business concepts thay have arroused the interest of some corporate sponsors and, God willing, will attract more. Their “business”/ ministry is growing by the day (evident by the numbers of people joining the forum and participating) and with time they will hopefully attract the sponsors they need to be successful as a full time ministry.

There is an order to things. If you want corporate or business sponsorship, you need to develop a plan of attack that will attract those who might be interested in investing.

Yes yes to all of it. I do think that something that continues to demand examination is our view of success. What do we really want when we create our art. At times it feels as if we want the justice of the gospel but the rewards of the secular cuture. The business of music is money. And, when we talk about these things as Christians I seem to hear the same questions that the greater industry is asking…which is, how do we make money.

And as Christians, the question about how to make money should be asked with the greater interest of how to serve God and others with that money. So, there’s nothing wrong with Christian music making money as long as it goes along with a desire to make/promote more great music with that money etc. If great music is what we’re after—and not just making money—then we as Christians are going to have to define “great music”. If we’re not going to define great music as “that which makes enough money”, then we must find better ways to define Christian artistry (which belongs to another topic on this site).

It seems that Mike is pointing out the problem I’m trying to get at with this topic, which has its focus on music as an industry. I would like to reform the structure of making music (and art in general) so that the business aspect is not such a pressure, so that artistic success is not defined monetarily by profit or financial gains. I believe the church is in a great position to make such reforms—in a much better position than Courtney Love, Sheryl Crow, Ani Defranco etc. These reforms would not eliminate the business aspect from artistic musical work, but would structure the business of music in a way that accomodates the arts, rather than the other way around! The example you give, Jabird, is a good start, but I think the church has to think much bigger than this, which means thinking much bigger about the church.

Since I have been involved in the birth and on-going process of *cino from the very beginning and have travelled with Rob and Kirstin on the same road for the last three years, I can say that the pressure of finances continues to be a huge hindrance to the many great ideas we have. Though we have received the support and helpful guidance of people with business experience, the structure of society—and moreso of the church at large—can make it difficult to do what needs to be done. If *cino is a positive example of anything, it is a model for how the Church ought to think of itself and its cultural task as times continue to change. If *cino does what it is intended to do, I hope churches won’t ever again feel like they have to “justify” giving money to a rock band by calling it a “mission to the United States”. As our name indicates, the very definition of the Church and its mission should always be CULTURAL ENGAGEMENT; this should be taken for granted among the community of Believers.

Grant, I like the concept…what are your ideas to make this happen? Idealistically it sounds great, but how can this be instituted realistically? Let’s start designing!

I don’t think that anyone is questioning the financial aspects of the music biz, we all have to eat. But how do we eat and still remain truly passionate to the arts that we endeavor? How do we sway a system that is not Christian based with our Christian ethics and morals?

amen…good questions. I do think a place to start is to create a mission statement of sorts that attempts to wrap its mind around fresh def. of success, exposure, and finances. To really ask what an artists expectations of their art is. To deal with questions of exposure. We somehow assume, potentially because we see Universal records do it, that our art should reach the whole world at once. Maybe a better place to begin would be to develop a tour plan that would bring the live art to the audience. This could happen with a living network of people and churches that would be hospitable to the coming of the artists. In this way you could side step many middle men who make money off the art and then push the prices up and away from the actual creators of the art. I just really think that the key is going to be to re create the networks by which art is given to the audience. Do you know that major labels claim to only make money off of big releases after 100, 000 albums sold. There are simply too many people involved in the process. All of which take their share.

I studied the music industry pretty heavily in school. There are some rational reasons they do not make money until after an album has sold well (the number actually depends on how much advertisning was done, how much was fronted to the artist and various other things) but you are correct in that there are too many hands in the pie for the average artist to make a living on the Big Industry scale. The fact is that there are thousands of bands making good money doing things on a small scale and never involving themselves with the Big 6.
The fact is that 2% of the bands signed to the Big 6 are bringing in 90% of the profits. These are the Brittney Spears and N’Syncs out there. That is why it is so difficult to break into the industry. You don’t just get “discovered” like back in the 70’s. Now a days you have to get out there and sell albums on your own, develop a large fan base, do your minor to midsize touring, get your local radio attention, etc. A band I remember from back in AZ, just got signed to to a subsidiary of Arista on a $350,000 note, had sold over 100,000 copies of their 3 or 4 albums themselves, toured regularly throughout AZ, CA and TX and had developed a huge fanbase. They worked hard to get to that point. The interesting thing is that now they are in debt $350 K and it will probably take about 2 million albums to pay that off. If they get an advance on their second album, they will spend the next 2 million to pay that off, and the cycle continues. The more the advance, the more albums they have to sell to pay it off. They also are responsible for all of their studio time with that money and after they pour a couple hundred thousand into the production of their album the label will most likely shelve it because they sound like alot of the other bands the label already owns. The label will not create competition for the bands that will definitely make them money. It’s possible they will be owned by a label and will never really get the chance to survive as a band if the label so deems it. Also, such contracts are usually 30 year deals or 5 option deals (albums) so if they get shelved, they will never get more money to work toward the last 4 options and will be stuck for the next 29 years playing at bars until they are out of style. The labels are more of a gamble than they are worth. That’s in the secular market.

The Christian market has not been quite as cut throat, but also the advance money is typically less and the profit margin is less. It’s a small niche in the big scheme. When a band like Jars Of Clay, Sixpence or POD start crossing over and making more money for the parent label they get added to the roster of the next subsidiary above that branch until they make it to the parent company. So then the money that is being made on their albums is going into many more pockets and the artist is still left with just as little as they started with.

OK. I am done. I hate the record companies. Bunch of thieves. :)