What don't you like about major labels today?

[Formant024]

Well, the thing in Europe is that the charts over here differ alot from country to country. Reasons for it are language, national preference and the national media driving/plugging their countries chart material. Every country has their own artists in the charts ranging from trance dance ( the real cheesy club shit like gigi d'agostini or by known producers within the country and last but not least, native language popmusic and below average quality one time hits by onetime artists, also in native language. The difference in approach here is defined by tracks in the chart, because besides those features that I've mentioned above, there are also the US artist being placed throughout the whole chart, mostly filling a good deal in the top15 between the native or european artists. Oppossed to US charts, everything is english/american and occasionaly spanish cq. latin oriented, but that's really it. European charts have to be based upon individual countries, countries are relativly small and very few countries share the same language. A practical example, a song sung in german ranking a top10 status will not be found in the dutch charts, simply because our native language only sounds alike but is a different lingua. That makes it less lucrative so exploits are nationaly biased in order to be cost effective. Those exploits that are internationaly distributed with succes will most likely be french, spanish or english but sung by a artist which native language isn't english. These artist are also most likely under contract with international major labels that are located worldwide but for this european condition only aim per country, hence only them being financialy able to promote an artist outside his native country. The obvious nr.1 criticism is the english/american accent, if the native accent appears non alike then the artist will have no future outside his country or outside europe for that matter. I haven't mentioned the UK because it's the only european country where the native language is english and relates it's indusrty a lot to the US market and vice versa. The difference to the UK and the US is that the english market also leans a lot on the club segment of plugging/promotion dance music since the UK has been dominantly in the picture during the last 15 years of dance music and they're good at it too. Now the UK has both the international pop represented aswell as the international dance industry, but the difference again is they speak english as their native language meaning that the Uk potential crowd of artist will have lesser problems coming through while the other european will have to accept their inability to master good english vocals without corny accents. It's also this difference that explaines why dance material ( trance, club, hardhouse whatever etc ) takes a big share in the music industry in Europe, there's a market for it because the majority of clubs are dedicated to all or one specific form of dancemusic and your accent isn't important since you dont sing as an artist but simply produce commercial tracks and pull out a face behind the wheels at some major event ( if you know how to spin, most dont really know ). So when native artist hardly sing in english the demand for it will increase and chart places will be open for dance, native pop and international ( UK and US ) exploits.

 

[Formant024]

The thing, is, I very well can't see it. Dance music (trance, etc.) is marketed in much the same way to a captive teenage demographic?

What I think you dont see is that there's a huge target group in Europe and abroad exploits for artist in the dance industry, so there's a very big demand and a huge field for exploit that originates/executes from Europe to the US and Asia. This target group is also much in the hype/trend sensitivity brought to them by the commercial entertainments industry and media channels sponsored by THE brands offcourse, so it's basicaly the same approach as in the US in how to bring a product to the consumer. US teens and European teens might have different social interest and appeals but they're still teens getting over a 4000 commercial messages shuved up their ... A DAY. Those messages say, " those shoes, that car, that watch, that mobile, those jeans, those sunglasses, look like him, look like here, hype, hasbeen, that pc, that laptop, this student bank account, this insurance, this make up, that cologne ".

Just the music is different.

 

[God]

I understand doing things for the "love of music," but wouldn't you want to pay the bills doing music yourself?

Sincerely,
God

 

[blaqcyde]

Originally posted by bigdmakintrax
My list of grievances!

1. CD prices way out of control
2. Signing acts only with the concern of making money, not the actual talent or quality of the music, and not taking the time to market new acts that might sell but unwillingness to take chances with new music.
3. Large differences between underground music charts and what they push and market to the mainstream airwaves.
4. Indirect but Complete control of Radio Station Formats

yeah i agree wit the cd prices being too high which is why cd aren't selling as much anymore...but they the sales on music dowloading which is ridiculous. u cant hardly download anything nowadays without the file being corupted. An album just aint worth 20 bucks any more.

they either need to lower cd prices or add like extra features like they do on dvd movies.

 

[Formant024]

Originally posted by God
I understand doing things for the "love of music," but wouldn't you want to pay the bills doing music yourself?

Sincerely,
God

I personaly can produce a lot genres for exploit, meaning that I dont need to put pressure on the things I like, like hiphop, nu skool breaks or D&B. They wont be headrunners so it's important to have a stream of good running commercial exploits to back up the "loss" made by the urban underground species. Then there's the amount of tracks you should produce per month to define a potential income for either me as an artist or the production-house itself, which just varies by the genre or specific label. Eventualy I dont feel good about the idea of marketing underground music, meaning promoting that material which has little chance of appeal with a major label ( at least most majorlabels ). It's like trying to sell fridges to a pro audio store, which seems like a possibilty that could happen but isn't certain. If you go for the money than produce as much as possible in the catagory of commercial exploits available, at that current time. It's not about what you like to produce, in commercial perspective it is the point to produce a product which plays into the expectations a specific (major)label and to push your product to them. That's my job, making hiphop beats is fun and there's no need to exploit it. If I would, it would be the hiphop I dont like, but can produce.