Also no offence but weren’t you decrying the expectation that musicians should also be content creators only very recently? I don’t really see the difference between that and a lot of what is being suggested here.
Could they? All those things are a major driver of revenue. I don’t see how any streaming platform puts artists at the top without massively hiking its subscription price, and I don’t see how it survives long if it does that.
Same. And from a manager / label point of view, I’d like it to be more useful to connect to listeners.
One of the reasons artists like The Anchoress love Bandcamp is because you can alert fans to new releases and send them little notes. And invite record buyers to your newsletter and Patreon.
Whereas, I have 25k followers on Spotify and no way to let them know about my podcast or label releases. It’s not like I wanna spam them daily but a one off notification or even a way to pay 5p per click to get them subscribed to the pod would be great.
There are acts with millions of listeners a week on Spotify and huge amount who are following, no way to let them know about about a new release or show without taking out an ad (Marquee pop up ads are 45p a click so not an option for most acts). Even YouTube subscriptions don’t feel like connecting to an artist you follow on there, just a signal to the algo to give you their videos sometimes.
A lot of artists are making things for their fans already. Newsletters, insta posts, liner notes, etc. This wouldn’t be expecting them to run a Discord community or become a YouTuber, but to find something that works for them.
Artists want to engage with their fans or at least broadcast their thoughts to them every so often. Even if that’s just sharing an interview they’ve done.
With artists I’ve worked with, in 10 mins I can get months worth of stuff to post from a quick off camera interview. Venues could have somewhere set up in dressing rooms to do quick 2 min tour diaries or have a prompt to send a voice note answer to.
I don’t remember artists ever saying they felt burnout by MySpace or SoundCloud
Currently, Bandcamp, Kickstarter, Patreon, etc all focus on the artist. Substack focusses on the person writing and artists are increasingly using it as an income stream (Patti Smith’s is a good example). Collectively, across a few acts this would cost more than a streaming subscription. As do tickets to see most acts.
Obviously Bandcamp offers the streaming component for free and pays no royalties. And I’m not suggesting Tidal does that but there could easily be tiers of access to a music service or curated jukebox, that isn’t just £120 a year / £10 a month. Or the endless ads, upgrade for a better service model of YouTube and freemium Spotify.
Also to clarify, I think there’s a big difference between speaking to an algorithm hoping you reach existing fans or new fans. And talking about your record or music you like, to your fans or people browsing a music service. If anything, I would want a music platform to restrict expectations to a post or two per week. Limit the noise. Lower the expectation.
Is Tidal actually for sale or is this just speculation?
Love how you always get an Anchoress reference in
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Don’t think so but they’ve been cutting staff again and seem to be in some kind of trouble
I’ll be annoyed if I have to go back to Spotify, I finally finished moving all my playlists across…
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I only see this being possible through a community buy-out, to run it as a co-operative endeavour. Which doesn’t seem all that likely to me, but more so than someone doing so philanthropically.
Mostly what I want is something that gives me a large library of music, with good sound quality, that pays the artists who I’ve been listening to. Tidal ticked those boxes best when I jumped ship from Spotify. I wouldn’t want it to lose focus on that core experience to add a bunch of other stuff, especially anything that might lead to me getting spammed with notifications.
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It’s because it’s the most first hand experience I have. The strange duality of working with an artist who can do two headline shows in London at Queen Elizabeth Hall and Union Chapel last year, but can’t quit her various day jobs so making a record takes years. Streaming doesn’t work for her at all.
I linked to the story in my post but it’s currently being defunded, which is happening quite publicly and there’s a lot of speculation that it’s for sale
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I really hope more platforms like this arise. Really curious to see what Austin does with this (he was involved in Metalabel, which is doing some high end release things, like a new Brian Eno collaborative book)
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I love bandcamp but i just can’t imagine any big mainstream streaming service offering that sort of listener engagement. Bandcamp does that and will hopefully survive but 99% of Spotify users are just sticking on playlists - it’s more of a radio alternative than a music curation service. We just aren’t typical music listeners on this forum.
I could be misunderstanding though, obviously there is a lot of room for improvement.
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Wasn’t Tidal artist owned at launch anyway? Did they all sell up?
At the New York event, the assembled artists took turns ceremoniously signing Tidal’s “manifesto.” That reads, in part, “Tidal is an artist majority-owned company with a mission to reestablish the value of music and protect the sustainability of the music industry rooted in creativity and expression. …
Yeah, Jay-Z owned 80% and sold up to Jack from Twitter’s company
I think some of these musicians have sold their shares since this report in 2021
TIDAL’s artist co-owners would make up its remaining stakeholders.
Those artist co-owners include the likes of Alicia Keys, Arcade Fire, Beyoncé, Calvin Harris, Chris Martin, Daft Punk, Damian Marley, deadmau5, J. Cole, Jack White, Jason Aldean, Kanye West, Lil Wayne, Madonna, Nicki Minaj, Rihanna, T.I. and Usher.
Wiki said Kanye was gone
On July 1, 2017, it was reported Kanye West left Tidal as co-owner and shareholder, after a financial argument with its board of directors[54] regarding compensation for his contributions to the company. West later demanded payment from Tidal of $3 million for his inclusion on marketing efforts, video production, and claiming the release of his 2016 album, The Life of Pablo , being the reason for Tidal’s 1.5 million subscriber increase soon following the release.[55] In response, Tidal stated West failed to deliver the videos he promised on his contract.[56]
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I’m on Tidal as am boycotting Spotify, more of a means to end than anything else. It’s fine.
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I might buy Tidal and turn it in to substandard student accommodation for a tidy ongoing profit.
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Genuinely think most people want to bang on a tune they like and don’t care about the other stuff tbh
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Yeah. Always feel like this stuff is good for artists but not for listeners.
As I said, I just want Tidal to work better. To return search results I type in. To not go to shuffle randomly. To let me listen to downloaded playlists in offline mode. To not randomly pause all the time.
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