Do It Yourself, Keep Your Money And Your Music

No matter how good of a musician you are, to support yourself as one. My paper speaks to people who have a strong belief in the power of music and are sickened by the direction it's moving in. Major labels pick and choose what music is heard by the masses-not according to any dimention of musical quality, but by its ability to maximize profit. The worst part is that bands are forced to give in and conform any sincere expression or intent within their music if they hope to be successful. In recent years though, the internet has made recording, advertising, publishing, and distributing music independently a process, attainable by anyone. Once a band gets signed by a major label, they have all of those things taken care, but the amount of effort it takes to get discovered by one equals the amount of effort it takes to promote yourself independently in my opinion. Though major labels may make it possible for an artist music to be heard by a larger population, the music being heard is not a reflection of their identity, but simply a reflection of patterns the labels believe will maximize profit. If an artist approaches the independent method, there will be more work up front, but it's very easy to expose a large population to their music, and the music is the music that the artist intended to be heard. Though an album published through a major label will probably sell more copies, the artist will receive less of the resulting income and the reason the extra sales come from extra advertising, which in the end, is often paid for by the artist. If you want to see more sales from an independent release, you simply have to pay more for advertising. I'm not going to deny the fact that major labels are the best bet for making it big. I simply want to make it clear that the independent system is becoming more successful and as it grows, the major labels will lose power. My main concern is that people who care about music refuse to buy into the system of music for the sake of business and promote music for the sake of music.

If you want to get an idea of independent record labels go here