Nicholas Paul Endean
Tutor : Adrian Budgen
Wednesday 2nd March 2005
There are as we are all aware, a vast array of different musical styles, rhythm types, instrumentations and techniques that go into creating the world music scene; and each has it’s own place in forming part of the massive and ever growing global market.
Historically, the music industry itself has been very much left to it’s own devices in both controlling and marketing the mechanisms for how popular music has been produced, recorded and advertised.
So relinquishing some of it’s product revenue thanks largely to the technological revolution brought on by the world wide web which has allowed more or less total consumer freedom and choice; was and is, never going to be acceptable to those sitting with their fingers on the buttons of power.
The threat itself is only in it’s infancy and can at best with all the marketing know how in the world be described as a concern for the future and not of the present.
Seeing how music sales figures have shown a slump for a number of years, and well before the ability to download and share music files can only go to show that something needed to change a long time ago.
I am of course referring to the p2p software that is widely and easily obtainable throughout the Internet.
What is P2P?
P2P in it’s most simplistic form is a way of allowing files of more or less any type to be transferred from one or more computers directly to another by way of a direct connection. Widely used and in the most part with a small downloaded software footprint, it has changed the face of music purchasing as we know it, and revolutionised the way in which music can be obtained without the need to leave the house. Heralded and embraced by the many but frowned upon by the few including the mass music industry, p2p has begun to cause the music business the beginnings of a much needed wakeup call.
But this wakeup call has also caused much controversy. There has been much publicity that most will have been made aware of in recent years, from the shutting down of the napster company and killing off both the community of users of it’s open source file sharing program.
Napster was originally the brainchild of a university dropout called Shawn Fanning who in 1998 stumbled upon the idea of how easy it would be to write a program that would allow the sharing of files between computer users from around the globe.
It didn’t take long to take off, and by the end of 1999 the development and availability of his software had become something that could only be described as a phenomenon.
Users were able to log on and update their files and Shawn with the help of other programmers and home developers added the ability to chat in real time. Soon, music appreciating users had begun to use the software to share music files with each other.
Napster eventually became something of a business and with a name change to Napster Incorporated had at it high point had in excess of sixty million users worldwide.
But, it’s demise was soon to come. The Record Industry Association of America was listening and watching in the background and was about to take action.
With it’s representation of five major record labels who were crazed at the losses in possible sales revenue and liberties they felt were being taken, the RIAA began legal action to sue Napster for copyright infringement. In all Napster was found to contain over one point six million song titles filenames, and a US judge ruled in February 2001 that Napster had to stop the distribution of these music files.
Then in July 2001 another US judge ruled that Napster must block all files from being transferred which effectively caused the company to cease and shutdown.
In September 2002 Napster was no more, and was sold off.
Napster has since been reborn as a legal online music purchasing program and company. It was re launched in the United Kingdom in 2004.
Many other P2P software downloads are available both freely and through a purchase plan via the internet, but many are now beginning to take note of the strength of legal power the RIAA actually commands and can bring into action. Some or perhaps all will inevitably be forced to either close their cyber doors or find other ways around with legal loopholes.
Some of the other P2P titles I have come across are:
If we first start at the beginning and take a look at the business itself, it isn’t difficult to see just how easily it can be effected by an outside influence whereby control is partly siphoned away from it by way of product distribution.
So lets begin and take a look at the industry from the bottom up.
Inside the music company itself there are several different departments. Here are a few of the main ones and a brief outline of them.
A&R
To begin with we have the A&R department.
The A&R department is defined and split into two separate areas. First we have the A&R Coordinator.
Responsible for the searching and sometimes in the signing of new acts, groups, bands and solo artists; these people spend most of their working lives living on fast foods and late nights, frequenting showcases, clubs and pubs in the search to find new talent. This is their responsibility in the hope of finding the right one that can be signed to the record company label and marketed in the best way possible to create a speedy profit.
With regard to their role and purpose, their options are limited to what is available at the time and finding the right talent at the right time.
An A&R Coordinator can spend many late nights watching and listening to as many acts as possible and will at times need to listen and view both demo taped music and promotional video material to find purchasable music for pre signed acts to record.
The other area of the A&R department is the A&R Administrator.
These people work towards keeping control of a pre defined budgets, contracts, goals and agreements and confine themselves in a close working relationship with the A&R Coordinator. They will make sure a financial agreement for an artist or bands costs do not fluctuate out of control or spiral beyond redemption and cause the record label an unnecessary or costly loss.
The Publicist
The Publicists job involves writing press releases, maintaining the correct media coverage, and keeping an artists name in the news. They will also arrange interviews and make sure an artist can be at the right time at the right place to further their media profile.
Promotions
Their job is simply to mange the way in which a artists music is put out via radio station coverage. They work by communicating with DJs and radio station controllers and will make sure a product is played at the right time and heard in the right places.
Publishing and Publishers
A publishing representative or a publisher can be either in house or work as a separate entity for an individual publishing company.
Their goal in the music field is to acquire the copyrights to new music and publishing them.
Ideally a publisher will spend time listening for a potential hit record. Once a record is bought and published it is also their job to make sure any revenue made from sales, playing and licensing is done as efficiently as possible.
Manager or Agent
To represent the artist in the best possible way is the role of the manager or agent.
They will keep track of possible gigs, personal television promotions and interviews and make sure the artist appears and arrangements are kept and are up to date.
Management, Managers or agents are usually independent of the actual record company an artist is signed to although it is not unheard of for them to be in house and part of the company itself.
In all there are four major record labels that make up the majority of the music industry itself.
They are: EMI, Sony Music Entertainment BMG, The Warner Music Group and Universal/ PolyGram.
Each has it’s own unique history and must be individually recognised as separate powerhouses within the music industry.
EMI
With a host of top selling artists now under it’s belt, EMI whose roots can be traced back to the nineteenth century; has in it’s present form become one of the top players in the industry. Not one to fall behind the wayside, EMI is now a global company that has a network of distribution, manufacturing and production studios around the world.
EMI has seen it’s fair share of mergers and restructuring policies that have taken place since it came into being in it’s present form back in 1931.
Sony Music Entertainment BGM
The Sony company originally started out in life as the Tokyo Telecommunications
And Engineering Company back in 1946. In the beginning their product and manufacturing was purely electrical goods.
Through the years Sony has become one of the most talked about and widely available multimedia product developer and manufacturers in the world with one of the most well known brand names.
Over the years Sony has made many shrewd business moves. Two of which have
been the purchasing of CBS Records in 1988 and Columbia Records in 1989.
Sony also merged on the 5th August 2004 with the BGM company which produces, publishes and prints multimedia products.
Out of all the major recording companies, Sony are in a unique position to not just record and produce it’s recording artists but can use it’s own brand studio and production equipment.
Warner Music Group
The Warner Music Group began life back in the 1920s when it was originally called Warner Brothers Pictures. In the beginning it’s main output was producing and distributing films, but all that changed when it took over the Brunswich Record Label.
Further to this strategic move into the music industry, Warner made several buyouts in the 1960s when it took over the Atlantic, Elektra and Asylum record labels.
In 1988 a giant leap forward for the company took place when it merged with the Time Incorporated Company renaming the joint venture as Time Warner.
Universal Music Group/Polygram
The combining of Universal and Polygram in May 1998 heralded the creation of another of the worlds largest music companies.
Universals history can be traced back to 1906 when a 36 year old Bavarian immigrant called Carl Laemmie opened his first Nickelodeon theatre in Chicago, USA.
Later moving onto silent movie distribution, he formed The Moving Picture Company of America in 1909.
The Universal name actually came about in 1911 when Mr. Laemmie created the Universal Film Manufacturing Company of New York.
In 1915 the gates first opened to Universal City which became Americas first self contained movie making community. This had been a dream of Carl Laemmie for most of his adult life.
Carl Laemmie retired from the industry in 1936.
In 1958 another company called MCA who started out in life as a small talent booking agency purchased the Universal City Studio Lot but eventually merged together with the Universal company itself.
Keeping the name Universal it finalized and
acquired the Polygram record company in 1998 and became the Universal Music
Group.
It seems funny now on reflection, when to think that in 1956 Elvis Presley appearing on the Ed Sullivan show was only allowed to be filmed from the waist up. It was at the time thought wholly inappropriate to allow the performers swinging hips to be televised and shown to the viewing public.
But so much was about to change, and Elvis; along with what was to become the beginning of the rock and roll revolution did his bit and changed music history forever.
Following the fashion, the look and the attitude came as a natural progression even back then.
Trendsetting in music was in itself virgin territory but the power that popular music began to have combined with the visual effects on a generation was not about to be ignored by the recording companies.
Through the years trends have certainly changed in direct connection to the music of the time.
In the 1960s trends changed rapidly with the dawning of the hippy movement the origins of which came about as a direct influence from both the style of music and the topical news entries of the day such as the Vietnam war which pushed further the worldwide antiwar movement.
In the 1970s and1980s trends grew further stemming once again as a direct influence from the current pop music of the day.
The future could be very bleak for the present music industry model. It has been able to sit back for far to long with more or less no real threat to it since the first twin cassette players hit the consumer market back in the early 80s.
To survive in an ever changing climate, there needs to be a complete turnaround in the availability, distribution and revenue structure of the whole business.
What with the wave of portable media devices that are fast becoming the consumer choice in archiving and playback; the “norm” that once was is no longer.
For my CCP project I have been working together with Greg Zbroizek to put together a printed media package for a local firm in Felixstowe.
The company consists of a second hand shop, an antiques shop and a home removals business.
The company is called FBS which stands for Felixstowe Business Services and after various meetings and discussions between us it was decided that we would create single sided advertising pamphlet.
We are using Adobe Photoshop and will be creating several different designs which will be given to the company allowing them to decide on which they wish to use.