A tale of two statements
I literally laughed out loud when they said it. Not because it was intended to be funny but rather because “I bet you guys pull in like $5,000 a week from iTunes,” was a stark contradiction from the actual number on the bottom line of my recently received internet sales statement. After an apology for my outward display of hilarity I went on to explain the harsh reality of music sales. How, that while there are a few artists who still kill it on record sales, overall, music purchases are down. Way down.
To start, people are just less apt to purchase a complete album. Preferring instead to just purchase single songs. However, now with the rise of streaming from such companies as AppleMusic and Spotify you more or less ‘rent’ the music. While some of these ‘all access’ sites require you to pay a monthly subscription fee what is not commonly known is how much they pay the people who make the music they are renting out. Which turns out is a fraction of one penny.
A far cry short of $5,000 a week is the 1/10 of one penny or 0.001 of a dollar we received every time our song is played through a streaming service that people pay for. If it’s a free service, we only get paid something if the listener clicks on an add while our song is being played. So for some quick math that’s 1,000 streams on a paid subscription to equal $1 (the purchase price of one song). While it certainly could add up over time it remains significantly less desirable than actual sales and it is also miles apart from covering the cost of making the recording.
Professional recording ranges in expense greatly. This is based on who you hire to produce (person who records the music), who plays (the instrumentalist) on your project, who mixes your song, and the costs of mastering etc. But a fair range is $1,500 – $5,000 per song. So to make back $1,500 you would need have your song stream one million five hundred thousand times. At $5,000 it would take 5 million! Not that it can’t be done, but it’s rare. Also rare is to have more than one song generating that many streams. Which if you paid to produce more than one song (which most people do) you have to add that into the mix. Oh and by the way if you have more than one person in your group or you don’t own all the rights to the song you are then dividing that 1/10 of a penny amongst everyone.
While the accounting is disturbing, I think the biggest disparage is the gap between what people think musicians make and what they actually make. Which in this case is the difference between $5,000 a week to $5 a quarter. That gap creates a mentality that puts a mental block to supporting something they love. Which in a shrinking market flooded with content it is more important than ever to support what you want to see continue. Which is really how the music industry works. They will make/promote/provide whatever you spend money on. So if something is a blessing to you, don’t just assume they’re raking it in, help ‘em out.