Why and Who The Hell Are We Charging?

I was reading the comments from the enough is enough, damn it article and by the way. John M., owner of M-PIRE Recording Studio, a beautiful recording studio in Los Angeles added a comment that I fully agree with. But at the same time, it fueled me on another subject that frankly just pisses me off! 

John M’s point was that it’s hard to have people commit to a project if and when there’s no money involved. This is very true, more so today than ever before. There are thousands of musicians in this country and more world wide charging each other for everything including the kitchen sink. Now, don’t get me wrong. I love to make money just as much as the next guy. But, my question is, how can a group of people who are working so hard at trying to make it in life and building a career with little to no money, afford to charge each other? Yes, I can almost hear you all screaming at me right about now. Don’t hit the unsubscribe button until you’ve read the rest of this article!

Allow me to clarify.  A full time working musician needs to make a living. I believe he/she is an exception to the rule.  But should consider working out a win-win agreement when dealing with musicians who are not full time, yet.

Seriously, this is the first time in history (I think) that I’ve seen non-full time musicians charging each other “crazy” money for projects. Then I’m hearing everyone complaining because they can’t afford to pay one another. The guitar player is charging $350 per song, the drummer is charging $325 per song, the bass player gave the best deal at $200 per song. Just using the above example, without the keyboard player, you’re already up to $875 and that’s one song! The average album has at least 10 songs on it. Simple math coming up, $875 times ten equals $8,750.00! That’s not including studio time, the recording engineer, post production mastering, etc. There are some skills, talents and services that you just don’t mess with. You need a good studio, recording engineer, mastering engineer and you should always put money aside to further your knowledge and education. Find the best and pay them! 

Now I know your music is only as good as its weakest link. Meaning if you don’t pay for great musicians then what’s the point of a great studio, recording engineer and mastering engineer. I agree, but think about it, it’s crazy for an independent artist who for the most part is financing his/her music with money from their 9 to 5 job to expect to fully achieve recording goals and pay domestic bills all from a single income.  Businesses don’t operate that way. They get loans and investors to finance their business and their salary is a part of the bank/investor’s loan!  Unfortunately for us, the music business is another beast all together. No bank or investor is going to give us the capital to record our next album. They know as well as we do, it’s not a good ROI (return on investment). Who do we turn to? In my opinion we turn to each other. We work together. 

Stop focusing on the money part initially and look at a bigger picture. Let’s first look at the old “so called” broken music industry. To me the only part that’s broken are sales and distribution (for the most part). The old music industry made it easier for us not to charge each other for everything. Why? Because we were all working towards a common goal. That goal being signing a record deal. That being the case, everyone involved in the project had a level of commitment even without being paid because everyone was looking at the long term goal of getting a deal. The hope was, if the record deal went through, you were a part of the package. It did not work that way all/most of the time but it did foster a “team work” environment! And if it looked like a deal was not going to happen, you either moved onto another project or the existing situation would reorganize their efforts in hopes of getting that record deal. Plus, just like now, we all had jobs so we were not as concerned about making money with our music. Money from gigs was a bonus until the band started gigging on a regular basis. Once that happened, it created a whole new working relationship.

Years ago, with this “team work” practice in place, band leaders, musicians, artists and band members were able to work together in building a project. Everyone was on the same page working towards a common goal. The biggest problem was raising the money to pay the studio, recording engineer and mastering engineer. Most of the time, the creator of the project paid those expenses but many times band members chipped in to cover those costs as well! 

Today, it’s totally different and I can’t say I like it very much! It’s funny to me. Everyone is charging everyone for there services but no one has money. Those looking to make money are charging those who don’t have money to pay them. Those who don’t have money are charging those looking to make money but they don’t have the money because they’re looking to you to get paid. No one has money! Does that sound confusing? Good, because it is. Now translate that confusion into the real world and that’s what we’re doing to each other! I call it financial confusion. Because of the still developing music industry model, we don’t know what to do. 

My grandfather taught me a good lesson once. He said when a monkey swings from the trees, it NEVER lets go of one tree branch before grabbing another one first. So here goes another approach. Instead of focusing so much on making money by charging each other like mad!  Why not say to your self, “I have a job, let me go out and record on as many projects as I can with other artists for “free” first. Let me gig with other artists, musicians and bands. I can make some money there. Let me write songs for other artists and let me produce other projects.” Do this for one year, put yourself out there 100 percent free! Your phone will begin to ring off the hook! Your work will be on many recordings. You will be seen at tons of gigs and you will begin building a name for yourself. I’m sure you’ve heard of viral marketing. What better way to market yourself. You will have so many artists who will praise you and be so thankful that you did work for them at their favorite price, “free.” Don’t you think they will talk about you and refer you to their friends and colleagues?

Now, there is a method to my madness. Instead of charging, you negotiate with them a piece of the pie. You say look, I’m willing to record, produce whatever on your songs for “free as a one shot deal” But, I want XYZ percentage on each sold single and XYZ for each album sold and a guaranteed first choice pick for your gigs and tours. You also include in the deal that they provide their talents on your project for free. This will help keep your project cost down! Now you have a vested interest in their project. You and the artist who’s project you worked on become partners, a team working towards a common goal. Now, with the job done, they begin promoting and marketing it with your work in the mix! 

Further, I think if you are going to make money and get gigs out of the project as per a contractual agreement, you’re going to be more motivated to promote the songs, gigs and tours via your channels. Why? Because you’re going to make money! It’s not going to be a ton initially. But it does begin to add up. Ten percent of something beats one hundred percent of nothing. Unless we can all say that we are making a killing in music sales and are working full time at our music by charging each other, then it’s pointless.

Keep in mind, if you were to build this type of working practice for yourself, you are creating residual/passive income. If you contract on enough projects, you start seeing those percentages come in from all of the projects. Once you’ve reached the point were people are consistently calling and asking for your talents and skills, that’s when you start charging. Or do a combination of agreement and a lower up front price for your services. That would be the best way to go in my opinion as you build. There will be those who will expect you to do it for free all of the time. Maybe charge them a little less if they cry the blues too much, ugh! You will begin to weed them out over time. If not that’s when you just come out and say, “hey, I have to charge you, I’m a full time musician.” There’s no exact science to this. It will be trial and error.  

Just understand that most start up businesses grow their business by partnering with other businesses that need each others services. The partnership allows each business to benefit by receiving and providing such services until they both begin to build their cash flow from customer sales. Until that time, it’s done through partnerships and contractual agreements. Their loan money and investment capital usually goes to the day to day start up expenses. At times those funds don’t cover much of what’s needed to keep the business going! It has to be leveraged via partnerships. As an entrepreneur working your music “business”, what makes you any different? You’re a start up, you can’t afford to pay everyone. 

You’ve heard of business partnerships, well welcome to the age of artist partnerships!

Ok, I’ve gone on enough on this! I’ve expressed my thoughts. Now tell me what’s wrong with my idea, other than most of you are probably saying to yourself “I’m not going to make any money.” The truth is most independent artists are not making “real” money with our music. 

We are still dependent on our 9 to 5’s. Those of you who attended Music Talks Sessions over the years. You always heard me say, “we are not really independent artists as long as we depend on our jobs!” 

What’s wrong with my idea?

David