Dance Music Business Resource

David Byrne ; the end of the age of repetition

David Byrne, as intelligent as he ever was:

Before recording technology existed, you could not separate music from its social context. Epic songs and ballads, troubadours, courtly entertainments, church music, shamanic chants, pub sing-alongs, ceremonial music, military music, dance music — it was pretty much all tied to specific social functions.

This point is also brought up really well in Atalli's Noise. The recording age was an odd thing. It was this bizarre separation of the original social musical event into a sound recording and a promotion event. Recordings became icons in themselves and something we got really into producing as objects.

But at first it was seen as very strange and the live musicians only thought of it as a way to attract people to come here them play.

So again we are changing to something else; leaving the age of Repetition. Which is why we have to stop thinking of recordings as holy artifacts, because that age is waning.

Byrne lists the options:

1. 360 : the artist is a brand; the label is involved with every aspect and with all money streams

2. traditional manufacturing and distribution deal : the label makes CDs/records. The artist gets maybe 10%. Lots of costs to pay for. Label retains copyright and control over promotion (or fails to promote, or even fails to release as it sees fit).

3. License deal : artist lets label produce record for a specific period in a specific market. The label is unlikely to invest a lot in long term promotion.

4. Simple profit sharing : many DJ type labels work this way. This involves a lot of trust. Label is unlikely to do much promotion.

5. Manufacturing and distribution : label is strictly involved in P&D. Artist gets all money, does all promotion.

6. Self distributed : artist runs own label and does all sales directly at shows or online.