Loose Cannon
Posted: 12:23PM, Wednesday 3rd February, 2010. Updated: , Wednesday 3rd February, 2010.

What's Become of the Music Industry, Music Business & Music Network

There is so much conjecture about the music business, record sales and the future that it's almost impossible to make any accurate guess about what's going to happen other than sales will continue to decline, it won't ever be like it used to be and that an expert is someone who's made three correct guesses in a row, once.

I read an interesting article from CNN titled "Music's Lost Decade: Sales Cut In Half" which sums up the numbers pretty accurately for the US. That will never happen here because each time ARia comes out with a bouyant press release on sales, they try to cloud the issue, gloss over the losses, point the finger at piracy and the ISPs and come up with some convoluted set of figures that the media seems to gobble up without doing their homework.

Not so the US where extremely accurate figures are easily at hand through independent means. The article I'm referring to starts off with the comparison between 1999 when music sales and licensing was US$14.6 billion and 2009 when it's plummeted to US$6.3 billion. It's an average of about 8% a year. And it's not slowing despite the upturn in digital sales.

I know I'm buying more music than ever and spent about $5000 between iTunes US store and Munck Music's live recordings facility (legal and you can buy with Australian credit card--FLAC Lossless, or DRM free MP3 at 256K for $14.95 a concert which is often up to three CDs worth at http://www.munckmusic.com). And I know my staff still buy CDs from the three stores within two blocks of us in Newtown--So Sounds, HUM and Fish--the latter one managed by the recently departed charts manager of The Music Network, Liz Thomas, who knows a thing or two about sales. I went into Fish the other day to catch up and also see what the inside of a CD store looks like since I haven't been in one more than a minute that it takes to pick up Drum Media.

Not much has changed except there is less stock, fewer catalog items, more collectables, about the same number of people browsing but not as many buying and a lot of table stock--schlock releases, compilations, cheap imports, etc. A lot of these recordings that don't go through the majors or major indies are never counted in ARIA figures or are reflected by charts.

There certainly aren't as many hit records or artists selling high numbers with the exception of Andre Rieu, Susan Boyle that aren't exactly kids music, and Pink whose sales are directly related to her phenomenal run of shows. And there are a lot more discount records being sold as consumers feel the pinch but want music and maybe don't opt for free.

Getting it digitally is anotehr story. It's becoming easier though iTunes here at $1.69 is a ripoff compared to the $1.10 I'm paying at the US store for six times the number of titles. Like not going into a record retailer to buy product in the past two years, I've never bought from iTunes here, but there is another new kid on the block that getting traction. Bandit from the house of Sony has launched its extensive download library of major and indie product, DRM free and at a higher bit rate than iTunes and you can bet that they are poised to offer a subscription model shortly. I've got to hand it Gavin Parry and his crew, despite a few glitches in launching it through newspapers, it has kicked off in a hefty manner.

Does the name Guvera mean anything to you? Well, they are an Australian company that is currently beta-testing about 2-3000 users here with a model that gives free downloads in exchange for the consumer tolerating advertising. It may not sound like a handsome proposition, but I think it is going to be an interesting model and they are far ahead of the next contender, Qtrax. Look for them launching in the first quarter or early second and go to Guvera.com to get an idea of what's happening.

There is a subscription model that is working which is the Nokia Music Store, primarily geared to music capable handsets of that brand. It's taking time to bed in but it's working partially because Nokia has so many handsets and also because it's easy. We remember the last subscription service, Stripe, by Glenn Wheatley, which tried but failed to meet the market.

I've got to wrap this column up fast because I'm going to meet with a fellow publisher of directories about physical vs digital, the changing landscape of trade publications and using technology to increase sales. In going to this meeting with him, as a potential buyer, I just saw the flash figures on our AMID from last March and last September's issues and at the time of the worst financial period in the industry, our advertising sales increased 25% in revenue and sales of the directory increased $22% while listing income rose 40%.
A lot of this is due to the sales of the digital version which has also dropped our costs per sale. By using digital means of collecting data over the old listing form mailout and return, we've saved about $100,000 a year in wages, eliminating one staff member and the mail and printing expenses.

To us, digital data-drug dealing has been our salvation and not a threat. We have made some major changes this year which I am happy to share with you because it shows how new formats like the AMID App (which we will be expanding to Androoid and Symbian for non-Apple phones) the new iPad, Kindle and other ebok readers have given us a new revenue stream.

I just got my first sales cheque from Apple with them taking 30% and despite them saying to allow 45 days, it actually took about five. And both myself and our developers of the App, Chance Media, are very happy with the results that only account for maybe 40 days of sales.

What it's doing for us is increasing our monetisation of Music Networks that we have created through cross-marketing to new and existing customers. Like today, we got close to $6000 in orders for directories for music business schools and they are the older copies. Kinda like selling Greatest Hits packages.
Here's the info we revealed through Christie's Column on where we are headed with our business model and perhaps you can get some inspiration to try and create new avenues of revenue for yours.

With the 44th biannual edition of the 152 page AustralAsian Music Industry Directory due out March 1, some changes in content will cause controversy while pricing has been made more attractive for digital users. AMID has expanded and enhanced some sections while eliminating others that have become superfluous or redundant. There is a new section of approximately 30 crucial Australian music bloggers or tastemaker sites followed by more than 30 critical online music magazines, the key music communities on the Net, social network contacts, online retailers of CDs and downloads as well as a range of mobile music content providers. Eliminated are CD shops, not because they are disappearing but due to so few submitting their updates for free listing and free directories. Also gone is AM Radio because it's really not a music medium anymore though digital radio still has a long way to go beyond only a few listings.

The print edition is increasing price to $55 a copy by mail though all listings get their choice of a free print or online version per listing. This compares to the Encore Film Directory which is $149 annually and the UK Music Week Directory which is $150 a year.

The online AMID version price will remain unchanged at $40 for six months with fortnightly updates by email alert to those subscribers as well as the changes, deletions, additions and revisions being updated online. This compares to the Margaret Gee's Celebrity Directory which is no longer in print and $395 annually for a one user license. The B&T Yearbook for the advertising and marketing industries has also ceased physical production with the 09 issue $149 and a digital version available.

And after little more than a month on Apple iTunes around the world, the AMID iPhone and iTouch app-which is the word's first music directory on a phone-- has been selling in several countries such as Japan, UK, US, Canada, Spain, France Brazil and even Romania and exceeding sales expectations in its own home country. It's $19.95 in Australia and an equivalent amount in Apple's iTunes stores in other countries currencies.

The new version of the AMID App comes out March 1 with the new directory fully integrated and buyers of the previous version will get the upgrade free. It features instant dialing of all phone numbers, instant emails at a touch from email address on the phone, instant download of websites from listing hotlinks and is searchable as well as able to have data be made into Favourites. The price remains under $20 at all Apple iTune stores. Viewable here http://www.immedia.com.au/amid/app/

Other changes include the end of interstate distribution from outlets in Melbourne (Inpress), Perth (WAM), Adelaide (dB) and Brisbane (Rave) with all physical orders now by mail from IMMEDIA!'s offices at 20 Hordern Street, Newtown NSW 2042. The price of pickup from the office will be $50 starting March 1.

But new technology changes are set to revolutionise the way the Directory's listings are assembled and updated. Starting in April, all current listings can be changed online and updated without paper forms for future print editions. New listings will be able to be entered online before being checked, qualified and approved for both the online and new print version which comes out September 1. Paper forms will no longer be used as an online database replaces the 22 year system of listing submissions.

But the AMID will also be available on the new iPad and Kindle as will also be the case with the IMMEDIA! published book "When the Writ Hits the Fan" by lawyer Phil Dwyer with Phil Tripp http://www.immedia.com.au/writ which is being published through Amazon this month after being an eBook and physical book since its first edition in 2004. As Tripp remarks, "Getting our intellectual property across all potential monetising platforms has always been integral to our innovation, survival and growth. These are simply natural progressions from when we started in the physical world in 1987, went online in 1988 through a bulletin board and then onto the net in 1994. Our next step will be Android and Simian versions of the AMID for Nokia phones, Blackberries and other mobile devices."

For those people who wish to subscribe online now and get the current edition 43 as well as the next edition 44 when it automatically clicks over March 1, go to http://www.immedia.com.au/amid/order.php

What I Learned From The Music Industry--And What I Didn't Want To Know

Posted: 5:03PM, Tuesday 5th January, 2010.

I had a lot of time over the holidays to think about the future of the music business and my place in it. I’ve been in Australia for 29 years now since emigrating from the US where I served as a tour manager, festival producer, production manager and music business teacher for another eight years. But I didn’t want to reminisce or dwell on either past victories or failures. And as for predictions, I’m out of them. They say an expert is someone who made three correct guesses in a row once.

I had a lot of time over the holidays now that I don’t really have a family. All of my relatives are dead, my ex-wife went to New Zealand to see her folks and left the dogs in a posh pet resort, leaving me and my parrot Jackson to hang out, watch videos, eat exotic fruit and hopefully not get bored. I didn’t go to a single music business Christmas party, didn’t want to hang with industry folk and contented myself with doing a couple of barbecues with real friends as opposed to getting pissed with music acquaintances. I didn’t want to waste time because there is never enough left in life and one day, you’ll get cut short.

So I decided to busy myself in doing things that I really didn’t want to do but had to be done. If there is any secret to my success other than learning how to type in high school, it’s been the discipline of starting each day with the one task you least want to do and getting it out of the way. If you do that—it might be firing someone, organising your desk, catching up with expense receipts or else household duties like washing second story windows, cleaning out the man cave (shed) or tightening all the loose screws on doors and electrical outlets. So I set out to do them.
I set up reward systems. Bought a dozen bottles of fine pinot noir, one for each of 12 days gruelling tasks—and one of them was to update my personal website with a treatise on pinot noir, tequila, cognac, bourbon and coffee—kind of a beverage blog at http://philtripp.com/wine.php. Then I wrote down each task of drudgery and matched a wine to it.

One was to clear out at least three van loads of shit including office and personal and take them to the tip. I laid down the rule that if I hadn’t touched it in six months or used it in two years, it had to go. And with few exceptions, they did. I learned a lesson doing this that there is a time to collect, a time to store and a time to discard. I was amazed at the boxful after boxful of music business shit I got rid of. It was a weight off my shoulders. And the wine at the end of the day with a cracked crab was ample reward.

There were others like completely clearing out the pantry of old spices, expired cans or packages and rearranging all the Tupperware and cleaning the fridge (boring). Another was washing the car, the front of building, pressure hosing the doors and windows and then cleaning the upstairs windows with a 20 foot ladder (scary). Doing the yard, cleaning the fountain and rotating the worm farm (smelly). It did remind me of the tasks one has to do in the Biz.

But the most daunting wasn’t the most physical, it involved a lot of thought, consideration and had a lot of finality. As I was doing this over three days to split it up, I talked with some friends in the business about it casually and it pained them that they hadn’t done it nor even thought about it. In all of their spreadsheet work, strategic planning, marketing and media plans or other things, they hadn’t thought of two things which are vital to either an exit plan or succession strategy.

In the place that I’m at looking toward selling the businesses, websites, publications and doing this thing called early retirement that will see me doing a DVD, writing a book, ripping a couple of thousand vinyl LPs and finishing off the 3000 CDs I’ve already converted, I have to have a plan. But like my music biz mates found out when we talked about this, it’s not just about what you do with your time. It’s what happens when you run out of time.

One of the questions I asked my mates was “Would you want your mom to program the music at your funeral and choose an Italianate pricy box to plant you in when you really wanted to be chilled and charred, not embalmed and boxed?” And that was followed by “So you have these things that you’d like someone else to get if you no longer use them—body parts for donation, the music collection, guitars, books, money if you have any).” I’m being specific here about the need to have a will and also have last wishes in some form that that your loved ones (and in my case, staff) are able to make sure that your exit from this world is that way you want it.

Now I’m not getting morbid here and don’t worry, I’m not planning to top myself or die of some disease. Matter of fact, I’m planning a lot of travel, working on my health, biking every morning it doesn’t rain in Centennial Park, working less, worrying less, consuming less and hoping that my time here will be a lot longer and more pleasant than I’m entitled to. At the same time I decided to uncomplicated my life by retiring earlier than many people think I should, I also had to remove any complications from those who have to sort out my affairs when I’m not here to finalise them.

So the first thing I did was the Last Wishes. That’s a couple of pages that outlines that there is no casket, no time in delaying cremation but at least ten days to plan a party (service or wake, you make the call), with catering, entertainment rather than mourning and a plan including the music and a short video that I recorded. This may have floored you as a concept, but you only go out once, why accept a second rate event.

And let’s face it, there has to be a guest list. So I made two lists—the primary guest who are friends and long time associates or friendly acquaintances and the secondary who are people that I either felt obligated to invite or who be pissed off if they weren’t. Sounds like a promoters list at a gig doesn’t it, but your funeral is a gig, your last one. And you have to have party favours too though in my case it won’t be drugs. Some good wine, you bet. Some spirits, oh yeah. And some food that will make it memorable. After all, I don’t have kids to leave it to. My body won’t be there in the physical form because I’ll have been converted to ash before the event but to let you in on the fun, I’ve commissioned a Tiki carver to create about a metre high Tiki caricature of me with a cavity where the ashes go. Before the event it will age gracefully in the garden, but when the time comes, it gets oiled, packed, and placed on the front of the party table. It won’t be dressed nor will there be a fertility woodie, but for those who attend, each one will get one of my XXL vintage (or non-vintage) Hawaiian shirts to wear and keep. It’s kinda like an Aloha Yarmulke comparing this to a Jewish service where the head has to be covered. I just want to make sure no one wears black.

That fun stuff out of the way (and it was fun excluding some people) the serious part of making out the will that divides up the loot was thought out. You know, if I go down in a plane or get hit by a car, at least the last moments won’t be the dread of “What happens to my bird” who will definitely outlive me since he’s seven and has a life span of 40+ years. And it won’t be wondering about what happens with my stuff, or thinking, shit, without a will the state decides where it all goes.

So I started making lists. All those music business books in the library go to the National Film and Sound Archives library. My guitars and musical equipment goes to a mate who can use them and play them and take good care of them. The CDs go to one friend, the vinyl to another who can use them. The collection of cookbooks goes to a foodie friend, the cooking gear and appliances to another. Whoops, I just realised I forgot the Texas Mountain Smoker and Weber!!!! That’s the fun part, like remembering you forgot to add so-and-so to either Primaries or Secondaries and then updating that file.

Once all that paperwork got done, I had the luck of speaking to a close lawyer friend and we joked about it as he had a heart attack two years ago like I did 22 years ago. He offered to convert my files into the real deal of a proper updated will (my previous one is 15 years old) and in the spirit of the music business that we both know and love, I promise to do some PR for him as he could use the favour.

I even discussed it with the girls yesterday when they came in, not to alarm them, but to put the thought in their mind that they didn’t want their mothers to have “I Will Always Love You” as the exit song. Or to have them in a open casket when it was going to be a real bad hair day!
And now, I give to you guys, my readers, a bit of mirth, some thought provoking maybe but also a message. Do it now. Don’t leave your parents, partners or other folk to clean up your mess and try to guess what you wanted to have done if you pass away. It’s not morbid. It’s not a self fulfilling prophecy. We’re all dying… it’s just a matter of what time you have to go. Getting that out of the way means you have more living to do!!! And that’s what I learned from the discipline to do what I didn’t really want to do, but felt a sense of accomplishment at everything from the paperwork to recording the two minute video and programming the music.

With that out of the way, I decided to make a Cioppino for the staff lunch and go back to the business. What a relief!

Til next fortnight.

Laughing my Ample Ass Off At The Expense of the Industry

Posted: 4:16PM, Tuesday 8th December, 2009.

I must admit I was pretty distressed and depressed at times over the past couple of weeks, coping with the loss of a being close to me, but a lot of great things have happened since then and I'm back on my cynical view of the industry and the idiots that inhabit it.

My staff and I were sitting down to lunch today (Cajun Chicken and Sausage Gumbo and fresh guacamole) and sharing stories of some of the dummies we have to deal with at this time of year. There are three camps of these pinheads.

The first is the group of industrial strength idiots who believe we work for them and are obliged to do things for them because they either can't read or choose not to. I am referring to those mini-minds who demand that we look up in our records if they have submitted their listing for renewal, usually on deadline day. And coupled with them are the ones who believe that they are entitled to more than one free listing and an extra free directory because they have two hands... I mean they do two things.

I should regale you with tales of these losers but we were too busy laughing at them where others would simply be furious. There is no reason to lose stomach lining over other people's stupidity, lack of manners or consideration. So I told them that anyone who asks if we can look up their details, tell them there is a $10 fee and we'll take their credit card details right now and run them through the EFTPOS and call them back with the answer.

What that does is put the shoe on the other club foot and it pisses them off to think that we're not going to do their bidding for free. Now maybe you think that's cruel, but what it does is educate them that we don't operate a charity or a sheltered workshop when it comes to the music industry. If we offer a free listing and a free 152 page directory to those who have the brains and ability to submit their listing within a month's deadline, that should be enough.

If they believe they are entitled not to pay a late fee because they didn't have the brains or ability and it puts us out and takes our time to cover their ass, well, so be it. We laugh it off. They don't, but after 22 years of this, we understand why.

God knows we've heard every excuse why they didn't get their form in on time,every rationale as to why they should be treated better than their peers, every guilt trip that they could lay on us cancer, death in the family, divorce, sixk baby, etc and we just have learned not to believe them. After all, if there is a God, we think She has a Master Plan and applies it equally.

The next group of dummies we have to deal with this time of year are the bands (or their labels, managers, agents and 'representatives') that didn't get chosen in the first set of invites to play showcases at South by Southwest. It's unfair some of them say, they are so much better than the ones chosen who have accepted. I get offers of bribes, cajoled, pled with, played with and threatened if the band is not granted their God-given imperative to play SxSW.

Some of them, when told that when they applied, they never uploaded their music or supporting material (or both) to be evaluated, are shocked that we aren't telepathic and could find their Myspace page, listen, dig up the outdated crap material on them in between the messes of their sites and see (and hear) them for the masters of the Universe that they are. Sheesh!

I'm cursed by those who assume I do all the choosing (I don't and never listen to their music since I have no say in the artistic judgement), I am told how I am letting the industry down or not supporting the indies by not holding their hands, wiping their noses and changing their undies in their career path.

Then there are those real powerful people like a well known manager with an exaggerated sense of self importance and a one hit wonder band who demand that we take their snivellling lame up and coming band and give them the support for this year's Metallica show, because the manager is so powerful.

Now do you see why we laugh so much?

It gets better though. There are the bloggers who expect a full VIP media pass to all three festivals- Music, Film and Interactive because they have the power to make people come. To our event that is... We get a load of people claiming media accreditation because they are taking photos for Triple J, shooting video for Rolling Stone or writing articles for MTV. We get the worst written request for not one, but two tickets (and sometimes hotel rooms) from fourth rate hacks who couldn't even get a posting on Mess and Noise.

See why we howl with laughter? It's almost as funny as the email I just got from Particpate Film Academy asking me if I want to be an extra as a pallbearer in a film. They do offer this course which sounds right up my alley.

Are you over 55 and keen to make a movie?
Participate has new courses and workshops in development, and will be launching a feature film course specifically for people aged 55-plus shortly. Please contact us to register your interest.

Maybe they want me to invest.

I finish this column with a phone call I got at 8 am this morning.

Ring Ring...

"Phil Tripp here, how can I help you?"

(In a voice that sounds as though the gentleman doesn't have all his own teeth and not much above them) "Is this the music thing?"

"We publish the Music Industry Directory, yes."

"Do you have my songs in it?"

"No... "

"Well how come you're so rich if you're not making money from my songs?"

"I guess it's because I don't waste time on the phone with losers and get to have a healthy breakfast and read the papers, leaving me time to work happy."

*Click*

See you in late January or so...