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THE FUTURE OF MUSIC MARKETING |
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| Bands are embracing new ways to promote
their music but are they selling out? writes Elicia Murray. Poured into black jeans, his hair falling over his face, Jet bass player Mark Wilson looks pure rock star. In a few hours his band will play an intimate set for 200 fans at The Chapel in Melbourne, but for now he’s determined to stretch his stovepipe jeans with leg bends and crouches. “They’re not tight, they’re just new,” he says. That’s not the only worry. Frontman Nic Cester, whose laryngitis halted the Australian band’s world tour in October, is still recovering. He’ll need his vocal dexterity tonight to nail Jet’s signature mix of soaring melodies and AC/DC-style screeches. One thing that isn’t weighing on the bass player’s mind is the hype surrounding the gig. The set will be streamed live on Vodafone 3G mobile phones and on the web at www.liveatthechapel.com. Add some slick post-production, then paytelevision customers will be able to watch it on MTV. For diehards, it screens on Channel Ten next Tuesday. jetrockband.jpg “All I really think about when I’m doing these gigs is who’s in the room,” Wilson says. “You can’t cast your mind out into the digital realm and play for people on their mobile phones, it’s just who’s out in front of you.” Around the world, bands are embracing what industry types call a “multi-platform approach”. The Arctic Monkeys inadvertently pioneered the online download format after fans posted clips of their gigs online. The debut single topped the United Kingdom charts before they had even released an album. Virtual world Second Life (www.secondlife.com) has proved another fertile music ground. Singer Ben Folds even held an album launch party in the online world. When Jet’s star was just starting to rise, the band scored a coveted advertising deal with iPod. Its single Are You Gonna Be My Girl featured in a worldwide campaign. “It’s not selling out any more because everything is about sponsorship,” Wilson says. “It’s a way of having a bit more control over your own music.” But do fans agree? “I don’t know and I don’t care either. Everyone does it.” Two million bands around the world have MySpace sites, according to Rebekah Horne, the Australian general manager of Fox Interactive Media, which manages MySpace. In Australia, 43,000 bands have jumped on board, using the social networking site to upload video and audio files, post bulletins about gigs and new album releases, write tour diaries and stay in touch with their fans. “We really are forging new territory in terms of broadcasting,” Horne says. “Sites [such as MySpace] are great for the industry because they open up music as an entity outside radio and television.” What the industry hasn’t achieved yet, she says, is a distribution model in which money from online downloads completely makes up for the drop in CD sales. Independent labels are at the cutting edge of these industry changes. Speak’n’Spell co-owner Dave Benge says smaller labels don’t have the luxury of big name artists to carry smaller pet projects that may not make money. “All we do is sell our pet projects,” Benge says. With tech-savvy bands able to record their music relatively cheaply and reach fans on their own websites, Benge predicts the value of record labels in the future will lie in their marketing skills. “You can still use traditional methods but when you’re introducing someone new, you need to develop that groundswell of support,” he says. “You can’t just slam in with a hooky song and hope it works.” Speak’n’Spell’s marketing armoury includes longstanding techniques – making pins and stickers, organising club launches, giving CDs to DJs – and newer methods. A week before a song goes to radio, for example, the label will contact influential MP3 bloggers to let them know what’s available for streaming. “That’s what a label becomes – a company that figures out how to use the technology best and comes up with interesting new ways [of marketing].” Los Angeles band the Sick Puppies, originally from Sydney, harnessed the power of changing technology when a video clip shot and edited by lead singer Shimon Moore conquered YouTube. He put the band’s single, All the Same, to footage of a man giving out free hugs around the city. It scored more than 7 million hits on the video-sharing website. The band members have since been interviewed by Oprah and signed a recording contract. Moore says the band was determined to make the most of the exposure by finishing their first album and coming home to tour. “If you work hard and you’re conscientious, people will keep coming back,” he says. “We’re giving it a shot and now we’re smoking because we’re going somewhere and that tastes so sweet.” |
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