Music Publishing & Songwriting

Hope everyone had a great holiday! While most music weasels remain sequestered away on holiday, trying to shield themselves from the year-end numbers or the Bahamas sunshine, it might be an apt time for a year-end wrap-up, and some thoughts for the new year. Here’s a start:

Let’s officially declare the Music Business of 2007 a Disaster Area. There’s no way to put a positive spin on this one. Major record label profits are down by as much as 50% from last year, which itself was not exactly a Golden Age. The biggest tours of the year were by artists that in better times would be considered oldies acts. Among the few new artists emerging this year—Daughtry, Colbie Caillat, the Plain White T’s—it would be hard to find anyone breaking much new ground. Even among music fans, there seemed to be more interest in new marketing strategies like the free Radiohead release or the Prince gift with newspaper purchase scheme, than in any new musical trend. You could call it a time of challenges. You could call it a mess. Let’s just call it over. Onward to 2008…

So what can the industry do in the new year to avoid a repeat of last year’s highlight reel? What has to change? Who has to change? And how do we find the solutions to the problems that are draining both the profits and the fun from our industry? My suggestion:

Start with the little stuff. No one is going to solve the dilemma of the 99 cent download or the waning public interest in new music overnight. Certainly, no one is going to do it alone. So in the meantime, here are a couple of suggestions to the musical community—record label executives, music publishers, artists, writers, managers and producers – that we can all undertake on our own. These won’t solve the problem. But they might create an environment in which all of us can do a better job, make better use of our time, and hopefully bring the talents that have gotten us this far to bear on the challenges now staring us in the face. THE MUSIC WEASEL’S NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS:

1. Stop the bleeding.
However the music business comes back, it’s unlikely to do it in a way that justifies the midtown skyscraper office buildings, private planes, company dining room, and lunch at Mr. Chow lifestyle that the record business seems to feel is part of the cost of doing business. The sooner we cut back expenses, the sooner we can all re-imagine a way to make this industry profitable. The major labels are like a couple of drunks lingering in the empty ballroom on New Years Day. The party’s over guys. It was fun. But now it’s time to go to work.

2. Stop stalling.
Imagine a year where we all quit wasting each other’s time. Where phone calls were returned the first time. Where people actually said what they thought. Where the artist turned up at the session on-time and ready to work, and the producer didn’t triple-book, and the songwriters actually showed up at their writing session.
Where showcases started on time, rather than keeping the whole industry milling around the bar for an hour. Time is running out my friends, because we’re wasting all of it!

3. Start innovating.
This year, let’s figure out what we would normally do—and do something else instead. If we’ve got a hit single, let’s not make a perfunctory and over-priced album. Let’s try another single. Or an EP. If we find a hot new songwriter with potential, let’s do a single song agreement, rather than an onerous and expensive three-term co-publishing deal. Let’s try a few projects on spec, or use some street-team marketing techniques, or play a venue that hasn’t had music in the past, or figure out ways to tie into electronic games, or theater productions, or books, or sports events. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

4. Have fun.
Sure, it’s a job. But it’s a job that is hardly necessary for the preservation of life as we know it. It’s a job that most of our parents told us not to take. It’s a job that we chose because we wanted it, so let’s at least have some fun before they shutter the doors and we all go to work for Steve Jobs. Enough of the corporate back-biting, and “the record label ruined my life” whining, and the anti-technology bickering, and the endless negotiating over contractual points that will be forgotten the minute the deal is signed. Let’s make some music and have some fun. It’s worked before.

All the best for the new year. See you in 2008!