steevio +1 on nearly everything you`ve said with that post. that`s one (of many) reason(s) why I am doing a netlabel and not a commercial one. I think the artists on my netlabel are likely getting more recognition that way than being on beatport where nobody knows us and fewer guys are buying our tracks. however.steevio wrote:yes but you wont make much money from selling your music unless you are making mainstream commercial pop music, or you are one of the tiny percentage of artists who rise to the very top of the game.Toloache wrote:At the moment im investing lot of energy in this, i have two things i love in my life, graphic design and music and would like to earn money to live from one of the two, the first in the list being music. It's something i could spend hours without being bored and will really like to live from it. I dont wanna to be rich, but i would love to spend my life doing something i love doing. So in a sense, i hope not to remain underground.steevio wrote:i've never copywrited a tune in my entire life.
whats the point? this is the underground.
the most likely way to make a living from electronic music is gigs.
i only have one thing that i love in my life apart from family and friends, and that is music. i survive, but i couldnt if i was relying on sales of my music. i treat that as promotion. and if someone big uses your track in a DJ mix they will have to contact you anyway for permission, copywrited or not. i've had several tunes used on big mix CDs and the DJ / record companies have always asked permission. however you wont make much money from that either, by the time the production costs, record company profit and all the royalties are taken into account, you get a tiny percentage.
i had a track on a Josh Wink Ministry of Sound Sessions Mix CD, and i hardly got anything for it, but the amount of promotion i got from that was increadible. that was worth thousands of times more than what i got paid for it.
if anyone who isnt well known uses your track, then who cares ?, they arent making anything out of it either, its just free promotion for you.
if someone big steals your loop, then the Creative Commons License might protect you, but lets face it, theres so much genericism in electronic music, that its often hard to tell whether its yours anyway, with everyone using similar equipment, generic 4/4 rhythm patterns, it would have to have some original (not sampled) vocal, or really unusual sound in it, to stand out as your own, especially if its been doctored in software.
release some good music, which in turn will bring the promoters to your door, and get out gigging, and stop worrying about someone using your music, thats my advice. see someone using your tunes as a positive thing, and a compliment.
and like you`ve said, nobody has the feeling with the few earned cents that it`s worth. better getting gigs if money is the case.
regarding to your "who cares" when a loop is stolen : yeah, right. actually, if somebody asks me, I`d love to give my loops or sounds from a particular track away (for free). but there`s something like ego which comes into play when, and that`s important I think, somebody takes it without asking you and maybe doing a commercial thing and earning money. I am pretty shure every artist on my label would give parts or a whole track away if somebody asks for it. the other way round all of them would be pissed off. and why`d they be pissed off? because of the ego. not the money or so. some stolen loops or vocals, made to a million dollar track, isn`t your merit although you`ve made that loop. simply because you didn`t make that track and neither had the idea! one woudln`t have done it anyway, maybe in a parallel universum.
Nevertheless, for me its a respect thing asking for permission! Now you may ask why demanding permission when giving away anyway? ego. and the joy of respectful behaviour. my electronic music origin is freetekno, which preaches the motto "free music for free people" and not "steal music from people who are giving it to you for free if you ask".
toloache : I personally don`t wanna listen to premastered demos. All labels to which I`ve sent my demos demanded mixes and no premasters, so do I. the label guys wanna know if you can mix (what inherents that you know what you are doing). so make a nice song and do a decent mixdown! at least I would love to know if the artist`s mix sounds good without mastering...
regarding to creative commons : now I know what you are talking about ... I woudln`t copyright a track anyway just for sending it as a demo. If you use soundcloud for uploading tracks and showing them and you don`t want the people to download it just disable downloading so everybody has to stream.
But its good to have a goal. Maybe you can live from what you love someday, if not world goes on. but having a goal in mind definitely helps reaching it! or at least coming near. think positive (referring to your goals) and things will happen!
(so much hippy attitude today) =)