KVR Audio

tedinmexico · Post by **tedinmexico** » Mon Feb 23, 2015 5:03 pm

Choosing a distributor for your album (that you worked so hard to complete) can be an ordeal, and can deep-six your career if you do not read the fine print. Here are some of the things that I uncovered:
1. Some distributors advertise a low start price, then require a monthly or yearly fee, forever. If you don't pay or miss a payment, then they can take all of your music off the Net in all stores. Imagine if you have a lot of songs or albums and you are paying forever?
2. Some distributors stipulate that you must sign with them for one year. So if they screw up your album distribution, you must wait one full year to change distributors.
3. Some distributors can literally take control of your music videos, if you make a mistake when choosing their "collect youtube royalties" service. They can and do put ads on your youtube videos. Can you imagine someone placing a 30 sec or 1 minute ad in front of your music video?
4. Let's say you want to distribute your music only to stores that sell and not subscription or free services. A number of them distributors bury your choices in submenues, or just won't allow you to choose your stores. Be careful here. Your music could be offered free to anyone, or offered for pennies.
5. Then there are the distribution services that use other companies for sub-services. Who is auditing the revenue stream? Does anyone audit anyone on your behalf? Try to find the answer to that question in their FAQs.
6. Support. Write them a question. See how long it takes to get an answer. See how long it takes to get an answer from a second e-mail. Many do not have phone service. You're stuck if you can not get answers to important questions in a reasonable time frame, like two days. Or what if you do not get any answer at all.
7. A lot of these distributors have glitzy web sites; But the details are hidden, or buried in FAQs or just not answered at all, by design. Choosing a distributor can be a daunting task, especially in an industry that has such a strong record of taking advantage of young artists and stealing their earnings.

thecontrolcentre · Post by **thecontrolcentre** » Mon Feb 23, 2015 5:11 pm

It's always best to negotiate a non-exclusive deal (unless you're being well paid up front) ... that way, if they mess it up you can go elsewhere (or do it yourself).

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 23, 2015 5:37 pm

I think this is the right place to call a spade a spade, i.e. if you think a certain distributor does this or that, list the name so that people are warned.

BERFAB · Post by **BERFAB** » Mon Feb 23, 2015 5:53 pm

Or, better yet, list the good ones that you found.

tedinmexico · Post by **tedinmexico** » Mon Feb 23, 2015 6:13 pm

I am not going to list all the inferior ones; then get into arguments with people. However, the only one I am looking at now is Catapult. They accept wav files only, not MP3s as one distributor wanted. You can stipulate your song demo start time for music going to ITunes (only). As far as I know, they do not interfere with your youtube videos. I also believe you can cancel without a one year waiting time. As far as choosing the exact stores, I do not know. I have an email out to them. Also, there is no yearly fee. It's a one and done with a reasonable percentage of sales going to them. I have not decided yet. Hopefully this week, I will have all the info. I wish I knew more. But I don't.

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 23, 2015 6:24 pm

I suppose they all have their pros and cons, else everyone would opt for the same one.
I have no idea how those sites work, but I suppose I would pay attention to things like these:
- does the copyright stay with me or is it transferred to others?
- do I have control over where my music is offered, i.e. can I remove it myself whenever I want (for instance because there is a grammar mistake in my lyrics

)?
- what if I want to burn and sell CD's myself?
- what if I want to have my own site, can I offer my music there as well?

ksandvik · Post by **ksandvik** » Mon Feb 23, 2015 6:33 pm

I would stay far away from any distributor that does not accept uncompressed 16-bit or better files. Why? Because they will re-code the let's say 320k MP3 file to AAC for iTunes and the sound gets even more artifacts.

tedinmexico · Post by **tedinmexico** » Mon Feb 23, 2015 6:34 pm

This one I have to answer. Never, never, never, let anyone take control of your copyrights!!!!
Never! Never! Own all your copyrights, forever. I know personally of a highly talented band that got destroyed by doing this when they were young, letting their evil producer own their copyrights. NEVER!!!! Also, do not deal with anyone who does not allow you to sell music off your own site, or use your site to promote yourself, as you wish. It's your site. No one has any business telling you what to do on your site.

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 23, 2015 6:51 pm

Here in Europe songs usually cost about one euro, sometimes a bit more, like 1,20. How much of that does the artist ultimately get?
I assume one would have to sell a whole lot to really earn serious money that way. And when that happens, you will probably sooner or later end up with a real contract with one of the big labels.

Sometimes the best/most famous songs of an artist are deliberately not available as separate tracks, only the less known album tracks of the CD that also contains the famous track. Is that the distributor's or the artist's decision?

Maybe because of potential disputes it makes sense to pick a distributor who is close to home. If I am European and a US distributor screws me over, there is not much I could do.

fluffy_little_something · Mon Feb 23, 2015 7:01 pm

This seems an interesting review of some distributors:

http://www.digitalmusicnews.com/permali ... any-review

tedinmexico · Post by **tedinmexico** » Mon Feb 23, 2015 7:13 pm

I read all that stuff. It lacks detail.

tedinmexico · Post by **tedinmexico** » Mon Feb 23, 2015 11:28 pm

As things stand now, I will go with Catapult Distribution. They answered my email addressed to support. I can credit the singers for individual tracks. I can select the stores I want my songs to be sold to. And I don't need to furnish the U.S Copyright Office Numbers. Currently for two of my songs, I am waiting for the numbers. However, I have all the paperwork and proof of delivery to the office. The three biggies are that I can specify the stores; I can determine the start of the demo song for each tune, and no one can interfere with my music video on Youtube. I also like that it is a one and done payment. No yearly fees. Of course, I will supplement this distribution with a web site of my own. They answered my email on the same day it was sent. Excellent.

SampleScience · Post by **SampleScience** » Sat Mar 07, 2015 5:13 am

I think CDBaby is pretty safe and reliable.

dune_rave · Post by **dune_rave** » Sat Mar 07, 2015 6:32 am

or Google Play !

Be Very Very Careful when Choosing a Music Distributor