the next big sound

The Book Business vs. The Record Business

I came across a Big Money article entitled The Kindle Revolution that described the book business. The parallels with the record business were immediately obvious:

The book business is a distribution business, pure and simple. It’s about getting the words and ideas of a writer into the hands of a reader. In the old days, publishers had to get the books piled in the bookstore so readers would notice them when they came in to buy. They also needed to get them reviewed because that’s where book buyers learned about books. Book publishers made nice profits by proving their mastery of everything from getting the cheapest printing and most efficient trucking to having clout with bookstores and reviewers.

The record business is a distribution business, pure and simple. It’s about printing plastic discs, loading them on trucks, delivering them to stores and stocking them on shelves. In the old days, record labels paid for posters, end caps and fancy displays to make their records stand out from the competition. Labels were able to reap large profits and support their massive overhead by dominating the production, distribution and media channels.

Few readers buy books based upon reviews anymore. Farrar Straus and Giroux’s editor in chief, Eric Chinski said, “Reviews don’t have the same impact that they used to. The one thing that really horrifies me and that seems to have happened within the last few years is that you can get a first novel on the cover of the New York Times Book Review, a long review in The New Yorker, a big profile somewhere, and it still doesn’t translate into sales.”

Few listeners buy music based upon reviews anymore. The traditional authorities, Rolling Stone reviews, radio play, MTV picks and the like don’t carry nearly the same punch as they used to.

What does translate into sales? A direct connection to the reader. That comes from publicity or word of mouth. What publishers pay for when they pursue the high-risk strategy is access to publicity—fame in one of its many forms or something sensational—or their sense that a book will tap into a kind of social currency. That’s everything from the next hot idea to the next book club must-read.

The important thing here is to recognize that the purchasing decision for a book doesn’t take place in the bookstore anymore. You don’t need to hold the book, read the flap copy, or weigh the sincerity of the jacket blurbs anymore.

People don’t trust reviews anymore and aren’t browsing the shelves at Tower Records every Tuesday when the new albums are released. The purchase decision is no longer made at the record sales counter and able to be swayed by physical promos and posters hung by label reps. Recommendations by friends, social music discovery engines and blog posts are now a powerful driver of sales. Consumers have also shown that they want to hear music rather than making a “blind” purchase as used to be the norm. More and more of this sampling is moving online and unlike books, music engagement can be easily tracked by measuring views, plays, friends, comments and mentions across the web properties where people are already interacting with their favorite artists. Music has always been at the forefront of societal and cultural changes. The direct connection from artist to fan is of the future of the music business and the rest of entertainment industry at large.

Just dropped off on my desk by @toddburry. Best use of staples and scotch tape I’ve seen in a long time.

Just dropped off on my desk by @toddburry.

Best use of staples and scotch tape I’ve seen in a long time.


iTunes DJ...

…is awesome.

We’ve been looking for a group playlist creator for a long time in the office — at some point we even kicked around building one ourselves. Using iTunes DJ we can each add songs to a playlist, vote up songs that other people add, and generally democratize our listening experience.

It’s not without shortcomings though — as far as I know you can only vote via the iPhone app. It would be really nice to be able to vote via an OSX widget or web based interface. Further, iTunes chokes on the huge library we’re pulling in from an external disk (as discussed here).

But overall, iTunes DJ has been an awesome way to listen to music in a group setting and keep all ears happy by giving everyone a voice.


I’ve been rocking out to The Format’s catchy-as-hell song “The First Single” pretty much for the past week straight. That’s how I listen to music, on repeat. Ok, so I’m a bit late on getting into The Format. They’ve been on my list to check out for years but I’ve been busy. Deal with it. The Format announced a “hiatus” to their roller-coaster career ten days before Valentine’s day 2008. The manager for the band took the one year anniversary to reflect on the journey with the band via an intelligent and moving blog post. I’ve quoted him liberally below. Quick review. Signed amidst huge buzz, Nate and Sam of The Format were just 18.  Making an album under the thumb of a major label, with multiple producers and huge sums of money spent.  The same record label being bought just after the band’s album was released, practically assuring that it would get lost in the shuffle of commerce.  An ungodly amount of touring.  A slow and steady rise in audience, despite indifference from radio stations and magazines.   And through it all,  just enough money to get them through to the next tour and keep them from giving up. He began managing the band right around the end of the first album’s cycle. We opted to release their second record with only the help of the company that I worked for, a concept which is now gaining popularity but seemed like assisted suicide at the time.  We tricked out the internet, trying almost anything that was invented in any given week, with the band’s newfound freedom allowing us to out-maneuver the clumsy beasts that are known as Major Record Labels. We kept everything together with duct tape and crazy glue, selling about 70,000 albums over the first twelve months.  The band shouldered all of the marketing costs but ultimately saw a lion’s share of the revenue. It’s hard to describe the relationship between a manager and the band. It is no doubt one of the most complicated relationships there is. In my limited experience it seems to resemble everything from brothers playing jokes on each other, to therapist/patient correspondence, from best friend situations to strict parent-child interactions and everything in between. As he tells it: Every manager can pick up on the subtle tones from the artists with whom they work, and “call me” voicemails can go unreturned for at least a few hours if necessary.  “You should call me” is very different.  It often means that the band’s recording session is a complete disaster, that the artist wants to pull off of a tour or that the van’s real axle has inexplicably fallen onto theground. A manager always looks to fix things, since most Total Fucking Freakouts (TFF’s) last exactly 24-36 hours and number 7-10 per year.  The call on February 4th was different. Imagine working for two years, rebuilding a band that was dropped from their label and everyone had given up on. After clawing their way back to relevance and within striking distance of the payoff you’ve been anticipating, your professional efforts collapse due to something totally outside your control. Product managers at P&G never have to deal with their products that they’ve honed and crafted refusing to appear on store shelves. “The First Single” was set to be a mega hit but it was not to be. The lyrics could have been written by the manager himself who felt like their breakup was the equivalent of folding his cards with four aces. “Oh my God I gave my best but for three whole years to end like this…”

I’ve been rocking out to The Format’s catchy-as-hell song “The First Single” pretty much for the past week straight. That’s how I listen to music, on repeat. Ok, so I’m a bit late on getting into The Format. They’ve been on my list to check out for years but I’ve been busy. Deal with it.

The Format announced a “hiatus” to their roller-coaster career ten days before Valentine’s day 2008. The manager for the band took the one year anniversary to reflect on the journey with the band via an intelligent and moving blog post. I’ve quoted him liberally below.

Quick review.

Signed amidst huge buzz, Nate and Sam of The Format were just 18.  Making an album under the thumb of a major label, with multiple producers and huge sums of money spent.  The same record label being bought just after the band’s album was released, practically assuring that it would get lost in the shuffle of commerce.  An ungodly amount of touring.  A slow and steady rise in audience, despite indifference from radio stations and magazines.   And through it all,  just enough money to get them through to the next tour and keep them from giving up.

He began managing the band right around the end of the first album’s cycle.

We opted to release their second record with only the help of the company that I worked for, a concept which is now gaining popularity but seemed like assisted suicide at the time.  We tricked out the internet, trying almost anything that was invented in any given week, with the band’s newfound freedom allowing us to out-maneuver the clumsy beasts that are known as Major Record Labels. We kept everything together with duct tape and crazy glue, selling about 70,000 albums over the first twelve months.  The band shouldered all of the marketing costs but ultimately saw a lion’s share of the revenue.

It’s hard to describe the relationship between a manager and the band. It is no doubt one of the most complicated relationships there is. In my limited experience it seems to resemble everything from brothers playing jokes on each other, to therapist/patient correspondence, from best friend situations to strict parent-child interactions and everything in between. As he tells it:

Every manager can pick up on the subtle tones from the artists with whom they work, and “call me” voicemails can go unreturned for at least a few hours if necessary.  “You should call me” is very different.  It often means that the band’s recording session is a complete disaster, that the artist wants to pull off of a tour or that the van’s real axle has inexplicably fallen onto theground. A manager always looks to fix things, since most Total Fucking Freakouts (TFF’s) last exactly 24-36 hours and number 7-10 per year. 

The call on February 4th was different.

Imagine working for two years, rebuilding a band that was dropped from their label and everyone had given up on. After clawing their way back to relevance and within striking distance of the payoff you’ve been anticipating, your professional efforts collapse due to something totally outside your control. Product managers at P&G never have to deal with their products that they’ve honed and crafted refusing to appear on store shelves. “The First Single” was set to be a mega hit but it was not to be. The lyrics could have been written by the manager himself who felt like their breakup was the equivalent of folding his cards with four aces.

“Oh my God I gave my best but for three whole years to end like this…”

It’s been a long time since we’ve updated The Next Big Sound blog, but it’s not without good reason. A lot has happened in the past few months and we’re excited to share what we’ve been up to and where we’re headed.

Techstars and moving to Boulder, CO
In early April we found out that we were accepted into Techstars. More about Techstars:

TechStars is a mentorship-driven seed stage investment fund. Each year we run a summer-long program in Boulder, Colorado and Cambridge, Massachusetts. We’re very selective - each year hundreds of companies apply to the program and we only take about ten per city.

It’s hard to explain how excited (and grateful) we were when we found out about the acceptance — basically, we were ecstatic. We left Chicago on May 8th around 7pm and drove 1,000 miles overnight to Boulder, CO. I wish we’d taken more photos, packing three dudes into a 2 door hatchback filled to the brim with dirty laundry and computer monitors was quite a sight. We did snap one or two pictures, here’s one of the sun rising as we entered Colorado.

We rented a four bedroom house on The Hill near CU and set-up shop. Boulder is lovely. We’ve made some great new friends, met some exceptional mentors, and been super impressed by how strong the community is here.

The Video (look up there ↑)
Techstars is making weekly videos following three teams over the summer. We’re stoked to be one of the teams included and today at noon the first episode was uploaded to techstars.tv. This video details the first week of the program… more to come soon!

What We’re Working On
Between getting into techstars, moving to Boulder, and having a sweet video series made about what we’re up to it would be a shame to not share what we’re working on. Basically, we’re exploring a bunch of different ideas and directions to take The Next Big Sound. We’re really excited and we’ll be unveiling more details as the summer continues. If you’re super curious about what we’re doing, you can follow us on twitter. I’m @dodeca, Alex is @shalek, Samir is @samirrayani, and walter is @walterblaurock. See how the two engineers both use their full real names? Tricky tricky.

That’s it!
Until next time, 
David


The Next Big Sound in The New York Times.
The Next Big Sound in The New York Times.

We just made exploring music much more fun. Don’t like a song in your radio player? “Trash” it, and you’ll never have to hear it again.
We just made exploring music much more fun. Don’t like a song in your radio player? “Trash” it, and you’ll never have to hear it again.

We’re excited for some cool new features. Check out the map and the new artist directory.
We’re excited for some cool new features. Check out the map and the new artist directory.

Merch! We’ve got a batch of Unsigned Music Doesn’t Suck tshirts for sale in the store. They’re $15.00, come in all sizes, and are printed on American Apparel. Have a great monday.
Merch! We’ve got a batch of Unsigned Music Doesn’t Suck tshirts for sale in the store. They’re $15.00, come in all sizes, and are printed on American Apparel. Have a great monday.

Featured in Thrillist Chicago.
Featured in Thrillist Chicago.

Artists, we’ve given your dashboard a refresher complete with a bunch of extra data and easier to use interface. The home page was also revised to make it simpler and easier to sign up and log in. Also: continuous playback during log in and sign up as well as m4a support.

Artists, we’ve given your dashboard a refresher complete with a bunch of extra data and easier to use interface.

The home page was also revised to make it simpler and easier to sign up and log in. Also: continuous playback during log in and sign up as well as m4a support.


Congratulations to XXII Records - last week’s winner of the Silver Bose Around the Ear Headphones for being the top mogul of the week. This is the last week of the competition, so sign up, sign artist, and win some sweet headphones.

Congratulations to XXII Records - last week’s winner of the Silver Bose Around the Ear Headphones for being the top mogul of the week.

This is the last week of the competition, so sign up, sign artist, and win some sweet headphones.


Mogul Profiles and Charts are now playable. You can now share your profile with your friends and they’ll be able to listen to the artists you’ve signed right on your page. The songs that play are your most listened to song from each artist. The charts page plays the most popular song from each artist listed. p.s. We also added support for all our international friends.

Mogul Profiles and Charts are now playable.

You can now share your profile with your friends and they’ll be able to listen to the artists you’ve signed right on your page. The songs that play are your most listened to song from each artist.

The charts page plays the most popular song from each artist listed.

p.s. We also added support for all our international friends.


Top 10 Played Songs on The Next Big Sound

drumroll please….

  1. Rideshare - Be
  2. The Tomorrow People - Mmm…. What Ya Say
  3. French Horn Rebellion - Up All Night
  4. Canyons - Maybe We Could Take A Weekend
  5. Question Mark - Don’t Fail Me Now
  6. Canyons - Aqua Del Corazon
  7. Question Mark - The King Returns
  8. Mind At Large - Come Up Swinging
  9. Cavashawn - Out Of My Mind
  10. Gran Trizz - Subway

    Congratulations to New Leaf Records! For being the top mogul on The Next Big Sound last week, New Leaf Records won a pair of Bose Around The Ear Headphones. Register as a mogul today, start signing artists, and become the top weekly mogul to win your own set of Bose headphones.
    Congratulations to New Leaf Records! For being the top mogul on The Next Big Sound last week, New Leaf Records won a pair of Bose Around The Ear Headphones. Register as a mogul today, start signing artists, and become the top weekly mogul to win your own set of Bose headphones.

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