Is The Music Production Business Dead?

[Jace-BeOS]

"if you make music people like, you will sell... chances are huge..."

Yeah, I have to join in on this laugh too. This is some kind of blind optimism. No matter what some industry masturbatory financial report says, most artists are not making a living on art.

There are several musicians I really like (who I have struggled to throw some money at, despite being poor) who I’ve interacted with online. They still have day jobs and make no money with music. They make music in spite of it being a financial loss. This is with them putting out a considerable amount of effort to self-promote, collaborate with other musicians, do live shows, and actually attract a following of some kind. I have tens of hours of free music in my collection because these artists realized they couldn’t make money with it and therefore offered it for free. As far as I’m concerned, most of it is great stuff (some of it even has a fairly wide appeal, IMO).

Those of us that are willing to put money on the table to pay an artist for an entire album of music (or even -GASP!- willing to buy it on physical media with art and liner notes, are very few. There’s just too much good music out there getting no attention, drowning in a sea of even more abundant bad music (taste notwithstanding, there’s definitely a “signal-to-noise” ratio to deal with, and the noise floor is WAY high). Even limited to only “the good stuff”, there’s way more music than society has attention.

Since most people think music is fundamentally free, almost no one wants to reward the work, even when it’s excellent craft. The corporations care absolutely 0% about the artists. As I said earlier, it’s all about corporations shuffling control over property access rights. I really wish that wasn’t the case because I have ZERO entrepreneurial function (nor do I wish to develop it), I am not a performer, and I would require a publisher to do the business part for me in order to publish and get an paying audience.

If I wasn’t certain of just how horribly and hopelessly competitive the landscape is for music (and art in general), I might actually put some serious effort into making music (or photography) every day. As is, I know it’s a hobby, a loss (not a financial gain), and I have difficulty motivating myself to put out the hard work more than a few times per a few months (and this shit is really hard for me) in order to get paid. FFS, I sure need the money and I sure don’t fit into any mainstream workforce.

“Chances are huge...”

...that you’ll spend your life struggling to find more than a 20-person, paying, audience, even if your music is really cool/fun/genius. Extremely uncommon good luck is the key, more than ever before. Skill may or may not matter. Being in the right place, noticed by the right people, at the right time, is what matters, regardless of the amount of good hard work you do.

If you do get noticed, and hooked up with some publisher to hand you money for your work, you’re probably going to get shafted by them anyway. It was never good for artists (even when the “golden age” of throwing vast sums of money at a few massive celebrity rock stars was a thing), but end-stage pathological capitalism has ensured that almost no one will really INVEST in anyone or anything much any more (certainly not someone/something NEW). It’s all about demanding maximum profits now, for minimum effort ever. Workers do a lot more than they used to because each worker is supposed to do the job of three people, but artists aren’t even valued as workers. The goddamned 1% who run all the corporations and industries? The pitchforks can’t come soon enough (figuratively; I’m not advocating for violence whatsoever).

[Jace-BeOS]

Whether it's back in the day or now, you have to do a LOT more than be good at music. Personally I think next-to-no one in EDM for da club is good at music, but whatever.

You have to be out doing it, you need some money behind you, you need to move merchandise, you need to, or someone behind you needs to have business savvy and treat it as a business and constantly be aware of things at that level.

To assert 'people like it' and 'chops at both blah and blah' means a "huge" chance you'll make it shows me, to be frank, a lack of experience on this planet and following that, terrific overconfidence in your assessments.

But of course if you proceed from the notion of "I will make music people will like so money and success will naturally come to me" certain other failures of the reasoning engine are bound to follow. Struck me as rather vapid, you know. But knock yourself out, I'm done.

God I wish there was a like button on this forum.

Agreed. With all of this. To both of you.

[Jace-BeOS]

no one really values music like they used to. It is a freebie thing to everyone now. Plus no one buys stereo's anymore. All the music playback is on awful stuff for the most part. Sonos is considered audiophile level now, so sad.

Yeah except audiophile scene is about 100% a scam so I'd personally be happy that people aren't buying their shit with the pretense that without that stuff, they can't truly enjoy any music that I'd make

Well, some of it. Maybe even a lot of it. But not 100% of it. The “better sounding copper wires” people, and the people who think vinyl is superior to CD, can bite my shiny metal ass

But I really don’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water. I hate seeing stereo systems, with proper speakers, being replaced with those ridiculous sound bars with zero stereo separation and which can barely drive any air (that’s at best; more people than I can comprehend will just listen to their mono phone speaker). My parents recently relegated the proper audio system from their TV area to the basement, replacing it with a friggin “sound bar”. It sounds thin, tiny, and narrow. Do they care? Not one iota. They are NOT music people. Yet my mother subscribes to these stupid streaming services.

I hate seeing good quality physical media and playback devices being mocked and, worse, disappearing from the market, with only the weird retro fetish of vinyl (and cassette tape; TAPE, FFS!) becoming a fad for the few people who believe in music enough to spend some money on it. I mean, if you’re going to spend money on media, choose the one with longevity and practicality! (and buy a real amp and speakers too)

I love being able to put a ton of music on one tiny device and take that with me. Wherever I go, though, I sure as hell connect it to an actual amp and decent speakers to listen to it!! I don’t want proper sound hardware to disappear or become some super-expensive niche market that I cannot afford. I don’t want to become some new poverty version of “the weird audiophile guy”, just because I want to hear music from multiple pairs of tweeters & woofers (in sets separated by at least five feet). We should be able to respect sound quality enough to hold on to it, without making it into some kind of voodoo religion.

[Jace-BeOS]

So tell me, where's YOUR Grammy award?

Why you need it to be successful, for me not having to work another job than making music is success, which I do now, again.

Ah, now I understand. You are being mislead by a logical fallacy:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias

[Jace-BeOS]

I really need to stop coming late to these threads and acting on the impulse to reply to things that make me have impulses...

[jancivil]

"If you make music people like" - as though this is a given. That by itself is enough for me to be astonished.

It's coming from a place where the instinct is not to make the best music you can make, qua music and a set of values derived from a life deeply caring about music, it's an instinct to pander. If you're looking for a guarantee of "people", as broad as this usage demands, you're looking to appeal to a very low common denominator, by definition.

The more of an artist you really are, the farther from this you're going to wind up.

I was a performer. I was someone who could play and was known for it where I came up. I didn't want a life chasing the pop dream because I saw enough of it early enough. I did figure to have a go at it once I could perform reliably as a classical soloist; but I saw people noticeably more... gifted and personally better suited for the life out there starving and I was just too precious for that life as well. Once I was composing my own music, with actual agency as a creative individual, there were few venues for it. And I do not totally lack entrepreneurial acumen. I put together shows, shows people f**king LOVED. But, I had to make a living, and I got hurt making a living so even that modest level, a full-time JOB entailing generating interest was never available to me. To do that, as a serious musician, doing the legit venues and the high class whole trip? I found this out practically immediately: what you're going to need to do all the time is peddle other things. First of all you're going to be selling ALCOHOL. You need to establish yourself as a non-profit and get a deal on a liquor license. This is where you'll make a real profit. You'll need a good low overhead setup for manufacturing T-SHIRTS. You'll want to manufacture as much paraphernalia with your logo, your visage, everything you can come up as possible. You'll want an art department.
YOU'RE IN BUSINESS selling yourself.

You may trust me on this. And it's much much harder now than 30 something yrs ago.

Of course if you're properly connected you may make some money remixing established successful hugely selling singers for da club. But wait, that's the OP's premise, they're running into a wall there. There is no there, there unless you absolutely dedicate yourself to the proposition, money; as someone that has figured out where the money is. The people who are so special they have a corporation doing that for them are pretty rare. And they are prostituting themselves and have the type of personality to become that high-class hooker. Not to diss hooking, it's the oldest profession and I have as much respect for it as anything. But you better have some *huge* things working for you, and it doesn't come without a price.

[jancivil]

So tell me, where's YOUR Grammy award?

Why you need it to be successful, for me not having to work another job than making music is success, which I do now, again.

You tell us.

if you make music people like, you will sell, perform and be heard, if you have chops to be writer, producer and etc, chances are huge you will succeed.

It's the whole thing he was replying to, you saying "chances are huge you will succeed". Just get noticed for some remixes like what-his-name, the dead guy.

[risome]

So tell me, where's YOUR Granny award?

I don't know but I've got 2 vinyl releases ,and quite a few digital releases on respected labels.I make music i like and if other people do then thats good.If they don't ,i couldn't give a shit.If success comes from this process then thats a bonus.You have to network, work hard at your music and keep pushing your own sound otherwise your just screwing yourself chasing success.People like leaders not followers or imitators.Yes the old system is dead and its exciting being part of the evolution of music production.People made music before language and they weren't doing it to make money.Have fun, make music and keep on learning.

[Zexila]

So tell me, where's YOUR Grammy award?

Why you need it to be successful, for me not having to work another job than making music is success, which I do now, again.

Ah, now I understand. You are being mislead by a logical fallacy:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias

Whatever, I'm still happy I can do thing I love and make a living from it, have a blast.

[Zexila]

The more of an artist you really are, the farther from this you're going to wind up.

I'm not an artist/musician/performer or care for public appreciation, I'm a writer/(ghost) producer and we will always have work, because of folks who wants public to admire them and feel important, so yeah, music production business isn't dead, it's just over for some folks/minority who was lucky enough to survive this long doing what they do, but majority/everyone else is still doing fine.

I'm out, have blast!

[Frantz]

I'm a writer/(ghost) producer

Hey man! Stop all this chit chat and finish my album! I need to release it before Christmas.

[Functional]

no one really values music like they used to. It is a freebie thing to everyone now. Plus no one buys stereo's anymore. All the music playback is on awful stuff for the most part. Sonos is considered audiophile level now, so sad.

Yeah except audiophile scene is about 100% a scam so I'd personally be happy that people aren't buying their shit with the pretense that without that stuff, they can't truly enjoy any music that I'd make

Well, some of it. Maybe even a lot of it. But not 100% of it. The “better sounding copper wires” people, and the people who think vinyl is superior to CD, can bite my shiny metal ass

But I really don’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water. I hate seeing stereo systems, with proper speakers, being replaced with those ridiculous sound bars with zero stereo separation and which can barely drive any air (that’s at best; more people than I can comprehend will just listen to their mono phone speaker). My parents recently relegated the proper audio system from their TV area to the basement, replacing it with a friggin “sound bar”. It sounds thin, tiny, and narrow. Do they care? Not one iota. They are NOT music people. Yet my mother subscribes to these stupid streaming services.

I hate seeing good quality physical media and playback devices being mocked and, worse, disappearing from the market, with only the weird retro fetish of vinyl (and cassette tape; TAPE, FFS!) becoming a fad for the few people who believe in music enough to spend some money on it. I mean, if you’re going to spend money on media, choose the one with longevity and practicality! (and buy a real amp and speakers too)

I love being able to put a ton of music on one tiny device and take that with me. Wherever I go, though, I sure as hell connect it to an actual amp and decent speakers to listen to it!! I don’t want proper sound hardware to disappear or become some super-expensive niche market that I cannot afford. I don’t want to become some new poverty version of “the weird audiophile guy”, just because I want to hear music from multiple pairs of tweeters & woofers (in sets separated by at least five feet). We should be able to respect sound quality enough to hold on to it, without making it into some kind of voodoo religion.

I repeat: all of it. ALL OF IT. All of it. You certainly said absolutely nothing to counter the huge flaw in audiophile scene: the whole premise of the expensive listening equipment is that you can't truly enjoy music unless you have it. Which is bullshit, because, and I repeat myself; your ears get used to listening equipment. Be it terrible, be it extremely good, your ears will eventually phase out that quality and instead focus on the actual music. You're unlikely to discover whole new galaxy in your listening experience unless like, your old cans don't reproduce anything above 1khz.

And audiophile scene will always be "voodoo religion" as long as it ignores this aspect about how we perceive sounds. But what option does it really have, when this aspect really just ruins their whole thing?

And honestly, you can get ATH-m40x for like $100 and those KRK monitors for like $200-300? A mere consumer shouldn't need anything above that for their listening experience and those are fairly cheap considering what kind of prices you get when you go into the audiophile scene.

[Zexila]

I'm a writer/(ghost) producer

Hey man! Stop all this chit chat and finish my album! I need to release it before Christmas.

Sorry, I'm on it.

[Hink]

no one really values music like they used to. It is a freebie thing to everyone now. Plus no one buys stereo's anymore. All the music playback is on awful stuff for the most part. Sonos is considered audiophile level now, so sad.

Yeah except audiophile scene is about 100% a scam so I'd personally be happy that people aren't buying their shit with the pretense that without that stuff, they can't truly enjoy any music that I'd make

Well, some of it. Maybe even a lot of it. But not 100% of it. The “better sounding copper wires” people, and the people who think vinyl is superior to CD, can bite my shiny metal ass

But I really don’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water. I hate seeing stereo systems, with proper speakers, being replaced with those ridiculous sound bars with zero stereo separation and which can barely drive any air (that’s at best; more people than I can comprehend will just listen to their mono phone speaker). My parents recently relegated the proper audio system from their TV area to the basement, replacing it with a friggin “sound bar”. It sounds thin, tiny, and narrow. Do they care? Not one iota. They are NOT music people. Yet my mother subscribes to these stupid streaming services.

I hate seeing good quality physical media and playback devices being mocked and, worse, disappearing from the market, with only the weird retro fetish of vinyl (and cassette tape; TAPE, FFS!) becoming a fad for the few people who believe in music enough to spend some money on it. I mean, if you’re going to spend money on media, choose the one with longevity and practicality! (and buy a real amp and speakers too)

I love being able to put a ton of music on one tiny device and take that with me. Wherever I go, though, I sure as hell connect it to an actual amp and decent speakers to listen to it!! I don’t want proper sound hardware to disappear or become some super-expensive niche market that I cannot afford. I don’t want to become some new poverty version of “the weird audiophile guy”, just because I want to hear music from multiple pairs of tweeters & woofers (in sets separated by at least five feet). We should be able to respect sound quality enough to hold on to it, without making it into some kind of voodoo religion.

I repeat: all of it. ALL OF IT. All of it. You certainly said absolutely nothing to counter the huge flaw in audiophile scene: the whole premise of the expensive listening equipment is that you can't truly enjoy music unless you have it. Which is bullshit, because, and I repeat myself; your ears get used to listening equipment. Be it terrible, be it extremely good, your ears will eventually phase out that quality and instead focus on the actual music. You're unlikely to discover whole new galaxy in your listening experience unless like, your old cans don't reproduce anything above 1khz.

And audiophile scene will always be "voodoo religion" as long as it ignores this aspect about how we perceive sounds. But what option does it really have, when this aspect really just ruins their whole thing?

And honestly, you can get ATH-m40x for like $100 and those KRK monitors for like $200-300? A mere consumer shouldn't need anything above that for their listening experience and those are fairly cheap considering what kind of prices you get when you go into the audiophile scene.

you're missing something though, yes your ears do get accustomed to lower quality sound but when you are in a better environment whether it be a room with better acoustics or a better system the difference will be huge. You might be accustomed to the lessor tone quality but your mind will still notice and appreciate the better quality.

I agree with jace, I have a nice but modest 7.1 surround system* I can run it in surround or kill the surround and run it in stereo (with or without sub) with old school front and back stereo. This is a huge improvement over pioneer tower speakers I had before. The overall tone from the speakers was just not as good for me, it felt like some frequencies were not sounding as well and as a result it was like my ears were stuffed. I grew accustomed to those, I had to replace a smaller set of polks with these pioneers and when I got another set of larger polks it was like taking a wet blanket off of my speakers.

Your headphone story is similar to my experiences but I was not satisfied with that sound at all. I also am not an audiophile like you describe, I too have an mp3 player hooked up to my system, I also have an ipod usb jack in my car so it is used frequently between. Guess what happens when I have been in my car for hours and then I take the ipod inside to my home system? It sounds much better for my tastes.

I put considerable time and effort into making my sound best for my tastes, I dont care what audiophiles say (and I have one very snobbish audiophile friend who has been one of my best friends since 4th grade). I did not just get use to crappy sound, I was proactive in creating the best listening experience I could afford and it as done me very, very well. Exactly what I did collecting several tube amps to build a system suitable for my tastes as a guitar player.

*lower end Sony 7.2 receiver (hdmi switching) with my main front and backs being vintage polk audio and my surround speakers (ms-10's in the front and ms 4's in th rear high on my wall) are klipsch (sub is new polk)...all bought used but I like my polk audio 10's because hey have a passive radiator as opposed to a woofer. I lived in apartments for decades, I didn't have a sub until I bought a house, passive radiators gave me plenty of perceived bass with considerably less thump to disturb neighbors.

[dark water]

As a side issue, although one still pertinent to this discussion, it used to be possible about 5 years ago to release a decent unofficial remix and attract some attention with that.
You would still need enormous luck at that time to get your music/name known, but at least it was a possibility, and often if the remix was any good the original artist might even tweet about it etc (as happened to me a couple of times).

Now just a handful of years later, the spirit of remixing as it existed from roughly 1985-2010 is dead, partly affected by technology and partly affected by greed from the short-sighted and hypocritical music companies still in the game.

If you try a bootleg remix (regardless of how competent your remix is), Soundcloud's filters will nearly always delete it within a few minutes, whilst Youtube will throw up a 'sounds like' copyright notice, which the original record company then usually applies in an intolerant fashion immediately.
I'm sure other similar audio websites will be getting in on this if they haven't already.

Hence, your work of the past 2 weeks gets spiked within a couple of days (as, for example, happened to me when Mark Ronson's company decided to get YT to 'hide' my acoustic remix of one of his recent songs, despite the remix being praised for its skill/musicality etc by around 100 people, and not disliked once, beforehand).


Control is everything to the big music companies still in this game.
They select 2-3 official remixes of their tracks and (nearly always) will get any other excellent but unofficial remixes removed now.


Which is ultimately an ironic joke given how hip hop / dance / dub / R&B built themselves up in the 1970s-1990s on the back of (re)sampling, remixing and reinterpretation.


So I won't be wasting my time doing any more remixes (but at least I have some sort of amusement to know that Mark Ronson's company wanted my acoustic remix binned before they brought out their own 'acoustic' version).