I made the decision to put my new CD online at Bandcamp.com. If you're not familiar with it, Bandcamp lets you put your music online and people can stream it for free, at good quality. If they want to download it, you can set the price or you can let fans name the price, including zero. I set my minimum price to 25 cents per track.
In the news we see music heading in vastly different directions. ASCAP and BMI apparently want you to pay them every time you hum a song in your head. You pay more if you whistle it out loud. It's almost that bad - no, actually they want iTunes and other stores to pay them every time someone listens to a 30 second preview of a song. They are fighting for their business lives and are getting desperate. This move will no doubt drive even more music fans to illegal file sharing.
Meanwhile, Billy Corgan (ie Smashing Pumpkins) has announced that he's going to release 44 songs for free online. Free as in totally free downloads, you don't have to enter your e-mail address, etc. I wonder if Billy is with BMI or ASCAP. He's got to be with one of the two. I can image their reaction to this.
Billy could still sell music, no doubt. Why release it for free? To get people to come to gigs? I assume he can do that already, too. For publicity? Maybe. I dunno. If this trend gets hot and all the big artists start giving music away and living off concert tickets, then it's going to make it harder for small artists to sell music. I wouldn't be hurt too badly - music is a hobby for me. I could afford to give it away for free. But I'd definitely feel it. I use CD sales money to help buy new instruments and equipment. Everything costs money.
Well, anyway, check out my bandcamp page when you get a chance, at:
http://richardmaclemale.bandcamp.com/
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