Finally! After an entire week of technical hardships, the audio is done! π
I hope you enjoy it and I look forward to bringing you even better quality next time! - Jo
CONTENT WARNING: The word βs h i tβ is used a few times in the text and audio.
Dear Reader,
I hope this Love Letter finds you well and that you're having a great day!
Have you heard anyone lately say, that "Music is worth π© today"? I keep hearing this for years, now and the more I hear it, the more annoying it gets. Music might cost very little today, but deep down I think it is a statement that is actually π©! Here's how we got to that statement:
The first time I was exposed to a website called LimeWire was in 1999 or 2000; the exact year escapes me. I remember a friend of mine getting all excited about the fact that he could suddenly download all these famous bands' music - for free. Copyrighted music! And not just one song, but hundreds! One of those bands was Metallica, who have since become synonymous with LimeWire, as well as Napster. Both of those platforms breached musicians' rights and ended up with lawsuits that they lost.
Anyway, I remember listening in silence, while I watched my mate's face light up at the thought of all this free music. Then I blurted out three words without even thinking about them.
"But that's illegal".
He was taken a bit aback by my response. Realising I wasn't going to share his enthusiasm, he began to justify the platform.
"It's OK, don't worry! If it's on the internet, then it must be OK to download!".
Yeah, right.
I don't eat bread or butter, but if I did, my access to that bread or butter would depend on my music sales. Which is why I couldn't bring myself to entertain such a thought, because it's platforms like these that ended up spurring sites like Apple Music and Spotify to be created in the first place. These platforms offer music consumers the legal streaming of over 100 million songs a day for practically nothing.
Both Spotify and Apple Music promise to pay creators each time one of their songs is played. Sounds good, right?...
In fact, Ditto Music reports that Apple Music pays musicians $0.01 per song streamed in 2024, while Spotify pays half of that.
What part of an apple can $0.01 buy you? The stem?!! π
As a musician who gets paid by both of these platforms, I can tell you that Spotify pays an average of $0.0085 per stream! Thatβs what my distributor tells me, anyway. My music distributor delivers my music and also wants a cut of that $0.0085. Depending on your distributor, they may also charge an artist a fee of around $9.99/month. So to make any sort of decent wages from music streaming, musicians need miiillions of streams per month.
According to Hypebot Magazine, 87% of all music released today remains undiscovered. You'd better be releasing a song every two days if you want to be noticed at all, least of all be making any serious money from your music today as an independent artist.Β It's hard, but possible: if you have a large team behind you; if you have no family or nagging partners wanting to spend time with you; or if quantity is more important to you than quality. In my opinion, it's unreasonable for most indie artists, especially when it comes to producing quality music, which takes time.
Believe it or not, I know some people who started in music the same time as I did - which was pretty late in life - and they're releasing one, even two songs a week. These people's discography is MASSIVE - we're talking hundreds of songs! I just bought a colleague's entire discography the other day and I'm still downloading it, 'cause he's released so many songs. It's amazing how many of them are actually really good, but thatβs not the case for everybody. Like me, these people are recording artists and are making a living from their music. I take my pretty purple top hat off to them, because their discipline is out-of-this-world!
You have to wonder, though⦠where do they find time for their life?
Fact is, music IS our life. We don't have weekends off. While others are either watching Netflix or sunning themselves at the beach (nothing wrong with either of these!), we're indoors writing and producing songs.
I often write and record songs behind-the-scenes and I hardly ever talk about them on the socials. So why don't I release two songs a week, every week? Is it really because music is worth π© today?
Stay tuned to find out in Part 2!
Love & Decibels,
xx jo xx
Your $0.0085 per stream puts me in mind of the basic royalty structure for a book author...Funny how the content creator gets the downstream crumbs. Oh, but we're so "grateful" to be produced and distributed!
I'm not in the music industry but I've heard about artists in here (South Africa) who are trying to get their names out doing lots and lots of shows in small towns for next to nothing. It probably costs them more money to drive around than they make per show. And as soon as your album is released you only get a percentage per record sold.
I guess it's why so many musicians go into production to try and take away the monopoly the bigger studios have over these industries.