Distribution Ain't Everything!

As an aspiring artist, I’ve always been behind the scenes before getting to this point of even recognizing that I am an artist.  For me, I’ve seen projects happen from the writing of the song to the cd in stores. Unfortunately, that’s where the CDs remain.  I would always hear individuals say you need distribution as if this would solve all of their problems.  But this is not the case and it is important that every aspiring artist, songwriter, and music business individual recognize this fact.  I read this article on Music Biz Academy on distribution. I want to focus on 3 aspects distribution, radio play, retail price and positioning, and touring.

The issue at hand is that when you as an artist go store to get your CD sold there you have to consider that the store needs to make money as well.  One of the ways you could be considered is if you have radio play.  If you can vouch for how many radio spins you are already getting then that’s one way to get their attention.

The second way is retail price and positioning.  You think you want to get the CD in a store but they want to shove you in the back somewhere.  What makes you think they’ll put you out in front before the mainstream and major artist? A 'one sheet' is an item where a store can see on one page how popular you are becoming and gives them a little insight on what selling potential you may have also.

Touring has always been the win/win.  When you think of putting your cd in stores try thinking of putting it where you may be touring at the time on ‘consignment’.  Consignment deals put the store at no risk allowing you to sell your CDs for a lower price, but the store will get their cut right away.  A bonus is that you could even do an in-store performance as well. All of this can happen as you build relationships with storeowners as you frequent certain areas. 

Reality Shows

Reality shows have been the craze or the “thing” to do for the last couple of years.  It seems that anyone can do it if they have a following and able to make money for a network.  I’ve tried to see what the ‘hype’ was about shows like Basketball Wives and Mob Wives, but it just seem like some of the most trashy and disrespectful women that I would never want to be around.  Especially when I watched Basketball Wives and most of those women were either ex-wives or girlfriends.  Not interested. 

But then I heard about a new show on the TVOne network.  It’s called R & B Divas.  Now I totally love the show because it features some of my favorite female artist of the 90s R & B scene.  To date the one that put it all together is Faith Evans.  She is the widow of the hip-hop star Notorious Big, AKA ‘Biggie Smalls’.  She has since worked on several albums that have brought her great success the last few albums. Evans says, “We’re not about jumping on tables and throwing bottles.” Which is something you’re most likely to see on the previously mentioned shows. Another creator of the show and featured on the show is Nicci Gilbert who is the former lead singer of the 90s group Brownstone.  Syleena Johnson is another artist featured.  She’s best known for her vocals featured on Kanye West’ song All Falls Down.  Monifah is another featured artist best known for her song “Touch It”.  Then finally my favorite of singer of them all is Keke Wyatt.  She’s best known for her duet with male artist Avant with a remake called My First Love, which was originally recorded by Rene and Angela in 1983.

As you can see the “cream of the crop” is featured on this show.  Sure, I could name a few more that could be considered R & B Divas also, but we’ll save that for later.

Now back to the positivity about the show.  It allows people to see friends and life behind the music.  All of them are wives and/or mothers, which is something maybe only fans may have known. The show is full of laughter and even tears as the ladies share their heart about what is really going on in their lives.  The last show is October 8^th and they are not sure if there will be another.  Evans says that there is also going to be a compilation cd coming out soon with these ladies and some others like Kelly Price and Fantasia featured as well. 

Industry Insights

This week’s blog touches on several topics based on some very interesting blogs I had a chance to listen.  In these blogs I’ll discuss a little information from each concerning the 360 Deal, Trademarks, and a copyright infringement case.

Podcast #1: Entertainment Law Update: This podcast discusses the legal aspects of the 360 Deal.  It takes a look on whether on the deal is in violation of the California Talent Agencies Act. It says only a licensed agent or agency can only procure or find employment opportunities, except record deals, for their talent. If you are working with a licensed agent that the licensed personal and you were requested, then it’s ok to procure employment.  The website has the full article written by Firemark’s guest.

It goes so far that if the Act were violated, one would have to give back all commissions for any items that you needed a license.   My company wants to represent artist, and as an independent label and manager, I would first have to look to see how a 360 Deal would benefit me as a label, then how it would benefit my client.  I believe if the deal is based upon grooming my client to be a huge artist, then I believe the 360 Deal will be in that client’s favor.  As a label, that’s not something I’m interested in that will work for my company.

Podcast #2:  This Week in Law 176:This podcast talks about the legal perspective of copyright infringement.  The conversation goes into how technology has definitely advanced, but actually hurting our copyright owners.  Denise Howell called it the “Whac – A – Mole” mentality, meaning once there was success at handling how songs were getting out for free then something new came along that needed to be figured out.

Laws are still being developed on whether it will be okay to just give music away free.  Licensing has been more of an option through venues like Spotify and MOG. Licensing still does give some money to a songwriter, but nothing gets paid barely any money.  The example given by guest Loren Mulraine puts it in perspective when she gives an example of a songwriter who sees their royalty statement with 200,000 units, but received $.40 of income.  Her college students didn’t really see the significance of why it’s NOT okay to take free music.  Why pay for because it’s free?  But she said the students sang a different tune when they realized that they wanted to make a living at it.  Hopefully there will soon be some progress so that we as creators will benefit. This law applies greatly to my business plan because it seems that I’ll have to be even more creative with finding ways to get my music out there and get paid for it. I can see it’s already hurting the industry, so it will be important to my business to have great marketing strategies to find out who is actually buying music and then marketing to them.

Podcast #3:  This Week in Law 119: The legal issue deals with the trademark law with a real life court case in session. Five years in the running because Apple feels that Kokin used part of their trademark to create his brand.  Daniel Kokin is the creator of Video Pod.  Kokin said he wanted to invent something that would be more for the home and not the conference room.  He talks about how he didn’t even think Apple at the time as being a threat since they were focused on audio.  Unfortunately, this has been holding his small company from gaining success and Kokin feels trademark laws don’t really support him.

This case was instrumental in helping me make better decisions when developing my trademark for my company. It is important to conduct the proper research to ensure your idea for your business is secure and not infringing on anyone else.

That's My Song!: A Look at Plagiarism

Collaborating is one of my favorite ways to write a song. Its nothing like getting together with fellow musicians, song writers, and singers that you respect.  Although, you might feel like this is the circle where you can trust everyone, its not always the case. Whether its who wrote the song or are you giving credit to parts of a song you've used.  It's necessary to get these things street from the beginning.

There was the court case between a song writer Janne Suni and super producer Timbaland.  He produced a song for Nelly Furtado called Do It. Suni was suing for the usage of samples from his song Acidjazzed Evening.  Timbaland denied all claims and said he heard the music on an old Commodore 65 Game System.  He also said he didn't know who it belonged to anyone. In the end, the case was dismissed for the plaintiff because it was found that the song was never sent for copyright.  Huh? I was a little confused.  I was trying to find more information other than Wikipedia, but it was interesting to me that Timbaland, knowing it wasn't his music on that Commodore 64, didn't check for the owners of the music.  I'm just wondering. Not cool in any instance.  

In the gospel genre of music there was this great song performed by Vashawn Mitchell and written by Darius Paulk. The song rose to the top of the charts and everyone loved it.  It even won a Stellar Award for Song of the Year.  But there was another person claiming to be the other writer on this song, Travis Malloy, and he's suing EMI Gospel and Darius Paulk for have of the earnings.  According to Paulk he wrote the song by himself and Malloy says that Paulk sang the song to him and he wrote the music to it.  The case is still open and I'm very interested to see what the outcome will be.  I do believe that if they were together working on this tune and Paulk didn't pay Malloy for his services, they should share the copyright.  

The last example I wanted to point out is why its important to understand the contract and follow it.  Matthew Knowles company Music World Entertainment, also the father of superstar Beyonce', is being sued by Cathy Hughes, owner of Radio One.  She is suing his company, BET, and MTV for violating the exclusive rights deal she has with the Essence Festival in New Orleans.  This article is interesting because it seems to have gotten personal with Ms. Hughes.  Since she knew that Matthew Knowles company has some of gospels great new stars, she had all 12 of her radio stations to pull all of the artist off of the their playlist.  Of course this seems evil, because Knowles is losing money.  Nevertheless, someone broke the contract and they'll have to pay regardless.

So there are more cases that we could analyze to give us examples to show us that in we always should have the proper understanding when collaborating and make sure we get permission to use any portion of creativity that we didn't create. Simple right?  Not in every situation, but at least you can cover yourself in the end so that you can have the proper back-up in case you ever come across a situation similar to ones above.  Go create!!

Knowing Your Artist

Since the last couple of classes that I've been engaged in at Full Sail University, I've been given a wealth of knowledge on the importance of knowing your artist.  I have been looking into my business plan and evaluating or reevaluating what my strategies are to make sure that I'm representing an artist correctly.  The first thing I had to look at was if me and my artist were a good fit for each other. This is very important for me to have an understanding of the artist's vision.  Then the question is if I am capable of helping the artist fulfill the vision.  Sometimes a manager may not be able to travel and that's ok, but it needs to be understood so there can be a road manager in the works of the contract. Finally, I would want to make sure that as we move forward that we make sure we agree on the contract that we put together.  This requires research of my artist type of music and population they're trying to reach. This is important to the success or failure of any artist/manager relationship.

Life of an A & R Rep

The A & R Rep also known as the Artist and Repertoire representative is the core of any label.  Before there is  any success for a record label it is imperative that there is a song and artist that is unique enough to garner enough attention to gain millions of records in sales. It's about the song and the artist. If you look at music past and present and really analyze the presence that our huge artist have had, they had to be unique, and there's a song that just makes you remember where you were at that particular moment.

Attached is a video documentary segment I found on You Tube about the A & R rep for Def Jam Records. She is a young lady by the name of Tina Davis.  She has been successful in spawning the careers DMX, Method Man, LL Cool J, and Redman. In this video you get a glimpse of her life as a record executive.  She is seen in a few meetings with hopefuls as she listens to track after track, instrumental only or some with vocals. She gives positive yet constructive feedback. She says, its just a gut feeling that she has to have that she just knows what artist needs to be apart of the label, and what songs need to be on the album. "Her advice is to stay focused, and don't do anything that does not pertain to your goal." She believes that the A & R department is the most important part of a label that you can't do without.

If I didn't learn anything else that she discussed was the importance of asking one of the hopeful managers, "What makes him special?"  As a potential artist manager, I know now that its very important not to waste anyone's time telling them they've got 'it' and they don't. What I mean by having it, means that your set apart or incomparable with what you're bringing to the industry. "Build your own story", Davis says.

Check the video out if you'd like.  Tina Davis A & R Rep for Def Jam

Entertainment Management

I interviewed a manager of clients like Christian hip-hop artist, musicians, and singers.  He said he heavily deals in negotiations 75% of the time. I truly thank him for the time he made for me.

Me: Ok..I know you have managed different artist which means you have had to negotiate on their behalf in some way. Can you give me a brief description of what type is your business, and how much of your business is negotiations?

Dave:  Sure...I do mostly artist development & road management although I have been heavily involved in contract negotiations for record deals, DVD production deals, & publishing deals. About 75% is negotiations...even negotiating with the artists I represent.

Me:  Awesome..I definitely have a lot to learn from you!

Dave:  Successful negotiations always begins with you knowing two starting points...your WATNA (worst alternative to a negotiated agreement) and your BATNA (best alternative to a negotiated agreement). All the space in between these two points is your room for negotiation.The goal is to end closest to your BATNA while facilitating a win-win agreement between opposing parties.

Me:  That's what I was going to ask you..When reaching for your BATNA, how have you handled separating people from the problem..if any. How do you separate the emotion?

Dave:  Separating the emotion isn't very easy all the time...honestly, I've had to remove myself at times by taking any "gain" for myself out of it. In other words, I've done lots of negotiations pro bono. I build in my take away on the other side of my successful negotiations.

Me:      I hear you, that has to be hard at times, especially know that some of your clients have been your friends as well.

            One last question and I'll let you go, can you give me an example of a time of how you worked toward a 'mutual benefit' when negotiating?

            Also, what is your favorite type of deal?

Dave:  Remaining neutral is essential. You have to do your research to know what is of value to the opposing party as well as know what is of value to the individual you represent. Also, you must think of more than immediate gratification...think big to make concessions or offerings over time

Dave:  I don't have a favorite type. Just as long as I can make all parties feel as of they've had their main needs/wants satisfied.

Me:  Well put Dave..I can tell this is your passion and study to show yourself approved:) I can't wait to sit and really talk with you this summer. Thank you sooo much for your time