Should you give your music away ?

[davethedrummer]

Interesting points so far
I get that point about wanting it but not paying for it.
that was marks point exactly, and he said that as soon as he put his stuff up free it really started moving.
I gues the thing to do is ask if it has made any difference in any other areas of marks working life.
like has he got more paid work from it ?
because at the end of the day tracks take time to make, good or bad tracks
and you can't spend your entire life making tracks for nothing , it's just not possible.
unless you want to starve to death in your studio.

an to A X Cell yeah mate , I would just give it away if your very new to the scene
just to get an idea of an audience reaction.
forget the record deal idea for now, record labels are mostly crap anyway these days.

[crime]

Interesting points so far
I get that point about wanting it but not paying for it.
that was marks point exactly, and he said that as soon as he put his stuff up free it really started moving.
I gues the thing to do is ask if it has made any difference in any other areas of marks working life.
like has he got more paid work from it ?
because at the end of the day tracks take time to make, good or bad tracks
and you can't spend your entire life making tracks for nothing , it's just not possible.
unless you want to starve to death in your studio.

an to A X Cell yeah mate , I would just give it away if your very new to the scene
just to get an idea of an audience reaction.
forget the record deal idea for now, record labels are mostly crap anyway these days.

my 2p:

My experience of trying to sell my album made me re-evaluate everything- I took about 18 months out of making music after that experience as it depressed me deeply at the time - but in the end I really wanted to make music again, so I made music because I wanted to - this is the best reason to make music and the results are much better for it - When I was earning a living from music, I had a lot of time to write stuff, but I really don't think the quality was necessarily any better. You lose the hunger for it, and also you feel that you should be making music even if you have no good ideas, because it's your job. You make trax out of liveset trax which you had to write just because you had a live gig you had to do to pay the rent. You then try and sell the trax to a label as you need to maximise the income for the work. Then you meet the Artistic freedom vs market forces argument which often happens with labels, where the label is telling you "oh it has to be more like this or like that" to sell units. Changing your style, even slightly, just to sell records is the biggest mistake you can ever make as then you are diluting your own artistic vision - therefore diluting you uniqueness, which, if you have a lot of originality, is the card you are playing -

giving stuff away for free gives you the ultimate freedom to express yourself exactly the way you want to- no label saying "oh, make it more like this/make it more like that".. for the money that can be made out of mp3 or even Vinyl releases it's not worth diluting yourself just to get on this or that label. As Henry says labels can be a pain to deal with anyway.. and whilst it is a buzz to hear people playing your stuff out - if that is your sole motivation behind making music, to "get somewhere", I really think you should be making a style of music which is more popular - if you try and do it with techno/IDM you will be sorely disappointed.

People know my name, and I get a few gigs a year - but I still have to work 9-5 to live - many people are under the illusion that once you get picked up by a big label, that's it, you have no worries, your life is going to be like something out of MTV "Cribs". doesn't work like that. I guess giving some stuff away for free has probably helped in some way, but I think doing a weekly mix has helped me more as far as getting gigs is concerned - but it's hard to say, as these things come in waves, you might do no records and have an amazing gig year, you might do 10 releases and have a slack year...

[scott_robinson]

I am new to this forum and so far I am begining to feel at home here. After reading this thread I fealt I had to add.

I have been away from the 'music business' and recently decided I had to do it again. Simply to just be creative.

My job is boring, no suprise there we probably all hate our jobs however I make computer games for a living. I won't argue it should be the most fun in the world you can get paid to do. I thought it would be great but like everything else these days created on a computer there is no market any longer for computer games with any kind of plot or substance because people download so much. This means publishers just want a version of the biggest selling game that year. So I find that I had to get back to the music to vent my creative passion.

Mark actually talked me into it and I am glad he did.

Basically I started writing 'techno' in the early 90's and it was new and exciting the scene was alive. As the years went on it changed and morphed through many phases. The one thing that has always remained constant is the style I choose to do. No one could ever really put it into a genre and I used to hate that.

However. That is, irronically, why Iam now writing techno again. Because you can do what you want.

I have friends in the rock and pop worlds and they have to conform so much that it is upsetting. I don't. I can go home after a shitty day at work and hammer out some group of sounds and rhythms that capture that mood forever.

I released a song on Cluster once that I am really glad the Liberator boys released quite simply because it was pure punk. My boss had pissed me off at work I came home and wrote it in an hour. It was pure emotion. The song was ready from the night before and I came home and whacked all the levels on the desk up to overload and recorded it.

Anyway back on topic.

I dont think anything has changed since 7 years ago when I stopped writing to now when I have returned.

Yes we have more tools and yes we can get our work heard by someone in Austrailia minutes after we upload it. But in the early 90's it was just as hard for me. Take away the internet and software and roll back time and you have the same disadvantages you have today.

I had to post demos. I couldn't afford the equipment that LFO had. So it was harder to get together a good demo on a tight budget. But I never gave up.

Now it's the other way round. The sounds are easy to get and the equipment is far cheaper. So when balanced out all you have left is raw talent.

Make something good and people will listen, make something different and they won't forget.

In the past music was about capturing an emotion that could relate to others the great thing about techno is you can do that, anyone can.

To get back on point. I will happily let people have my music for free if they REALLY want it. If it makes them feel something then it has served it's purpose. If you crave fame then maybe that will only come through hard work as it always has done. I have always made sure I dont have to live on my music so that I can be free to do what I want to do.

People I know in bands are always saying to me 'must be great to just hammer out what you want when you want' and I say 'yeah but it can be lonely sometimes' :D. Everything has pros ad cons.Those people in that band got a 500 000 quid advance, which they are still paying back some 15 years on because the label dropped them.

I am sorry about the length of my first post here but the subject is an important one and I am extremely interested in peoples views having been away for a while. As Mark said 'my 2 pence worth'.

http://www.myspace.com/scottrobinsontechno

[rhythmtech]

nice first post scott... and man i remember your stuff from years ago! think i used to hammer out a tune of yours on cluster?

[tonyc2002]

I am new to this forum and so far I am begining to feel at home here. After reading this thread I fealt I had to add.

I have been away from the 'music business' and recently decided I had to do it again. Simply to just be creative.

My job is boring, no suprise there we probably all hate our jobs however I make computer games for a living.

I made a website using Actionscript!!!!!! Can I have a job!?? :cheese: