Win The New Edition Of Passman’s “All You Need To Know About The Music Business”
Share your favorite music industry advice and win 1 of 3 copies of the updated edition of this industry bible.
For nearly two decades Don Passman’s All You Need to Know About the Music Business
has been regarded as an essential guide to the music industry. Nw in its 7th edition, the book covers a wide array of topics, including picking the right team, negotiating a record deal, publishing and copyrights. It also addresses current topics like digital downloading, piracy, and 360 deals, as well as:
Copyright Royalty Board’s latest decisions regarding online transmissions- Music downloads, webcasting, streaming and podcasting
- Video streaming services
- How royalties are computed in the digital age
- Developments in deals with independent labels , including upstream deals
- The latest on royalties, advances, video budgets, and copyright laws
WIN 1 OF 3 COPIES
Passman's book is filled with practical advice for anyone navigating their way through the tricky waters of the music industry. What is the best you ever given or gotten (practical or not) about the music business? Share it in the comments below. We'll reprint the best and name the winners on Friday.
One of the frightening facts that I’ve uncovered from his previous edition is the built-in complexity at deriving royalty fees after each line item costs are taken out by the record labels. Furthermore, the industry players continue to use unfair tactics like charging old packaging fees when cds are extremely cheap and developing new cost centers to charge back to artists. Artists are able to audit how labels count actual units sold, however the costs to find an auditing company are borne by the artists.
The best thing I learned about the music business is that you should include reasonable release and review clauses within any contracts you enter with entities in which you relinquish control over your career. These clauses will allow you to release material within a reasonable amount of time (recommended 6-9 months after completion), force those hired to promote you to actually do so, and give you recourse to review their accounting to keep them in check. Without these, you’re subject to their will and have little to no control until your contract expires which could be years.
The best advice I ever got about the music business (or any business, really) is to be nice. No one wants to work with a jerk. And you have to be nice to everyone! The door guy could be booking the club soon. The intern could become the A&R guy next year. The receptionist at the radio station might be the Music Director some day. You can’t pick and choose.
The music business is a people business, but far too many artists lack the people skills to navigate it successfully. I’ve benefited greatly countless times because of my ability to be nice and make people feel good. You can’t under-estimate people’s need to feel good!
The music business is all about who you know.
Best advice a teacher has ever given the class was “we are all stupid”. He said it loudly, wrote it on the board and made us repeat it. He said this industry is always changing, and don’t ever try to predict it. No matter how much this industry is our lives, we should think as though we don’t know it as well as we do. It is the only way to be completely innovative. While we know this industry, our people don’t. All they see (or hear) is our product and our goal is to get them to hear it. Don’t ever forget that.
Never think you are above getting someone coffee.
You have 2 ears and 1 mouth so listen twice as much as you talk. Always use contracts & don’t be afraid to work for FREE.
If I were to give advice to someone wanting to break into music today I’d say to get a strong understanding of direct marketing & social media.
-Danny
An agent once told me “If the date is right, the price is right, they eat well and they sound good…nothing else really matters” (in reference to booking/negotiating a band)
The best = my mantra to help me get through my last semester of law school & become an entertainment/music attorney (page 87):
“Music attorneys do more than look at contracts &advise clients about law. They are key in structuring deals & shaping artists’ business lives.”
The best I’ve ever heard: “if someone keeps name-dropping, they’re full of shit”. Haven’t found it to be wrong yet.
The best advice about the music business that I’ve gotten is from producer Terry Wendt who said that “You don’t just have one shot at ‘making it’ in the music business. It’s more about hard work and building a fan base than getting ‘discovered’ anymore”.
If I had to boil down 15 years of music industry experience, including six years running a digital marketing firm, into one piece of advice…
Success in this industry boils down to three core elements: passion, common sense, and relationships. And if you have enough of the third one, the first two are moot.
The best advice I’ve ever gotten, in all of 6 months of trying to find a niche in the music business after four years as an environmental attorney, is: Take advantage of your own particular strengths, and use those strengths to distinguish yourself from the rest of the pack.
Advice for business generally, of course. But particularly true in an industry that is very crowded and competitive.
Hhmm…isn’t structering deals the same as looking at contracts and shaping artists’ business lives the same as advising clients about law. You sure sound like a lawyer.
Your secret weapon is what people don’t know that you don’t know/can’t do.
A friend gave me this advice, say for example he couldn’t do or wasn’t too sure about a job he was offered, he’d take it on anyway, then he’d bust his balls and learn what he needed.
However he wouldn’t let his clients know how flustered he was, to them he was fully calm and confident.
He has a good reputation now, and is more than capable as a musical director, performer and studio engineer, but if he hadn’t went out on a limb a few times and went outside his comfort zone, he wouldn’t have had the same opportunities.
Don’t be afraid to wade in sometimes, who knows where the current will take you
This business isn’t for those with aspirations to be rich. It’s about relationships and enjoying what you do. (…and hopefully you will be rewarded in time.)
I know that may sound cliche, but this business is ever-evolving. The internet has made music, arguably, more niche than ever before. If you’re not enjoying what you do, than you probably aren’t going to be willing to adapt.
Luckily, learning helps fuel my (and those around me) desire to remain in this business.
After 30 years in the business, an early aphorism still holds valid : if you think you’re getting 50% of what you are owed, you’re streets ahead in this business; the flipside being you’re lucky to get 10 cents on the dollar when you are being ripped off.
“Quality goes above quantity”
Alway’s promise what you can deliver….And deliver more than you promise.
The best gift I’ve gotten in the music industry is timing. I know that sounds crazy, but I’m currently a music business student at the University of Georgia and the music industry is changing so rapidly that I feel it’s an incredible opportunity for young, innovative minds. I think that being able to learn from my classes and from Passman’s book from such an early age is an experience all in itself and we’re all working together to build the foundation of a new music industry.
Connect sincerely, directly and interactively with your fans. Make them part of your project : have them help you, and reward them in return. Never dump them, but surprise them everytime you can !
The Music business is not the same as the record business … the record business is only a fraction of what makes up the music business.
“It’s the Music Business, it’s not Music Friends, it’s not Music Hang Out, it’s a business. Treat it as so.”
The Mechanical Reproduction Kingdom lasted from 1877 (phonograph invention) to today. Now, the possibility to monetize this form of music exploitation tend to slowly disappears. This short period of 132 years pasted on the 1.8 million years Human Being history is kind of… futile.
My advice : Be as imaginative as Thomas Edisson was in 1877. Use today’s technologies to reinvent the music history. Never stop questioning the established way of thinking or doing things. Use your imagination to create new business models and, as soon you think you made it, start over reinventing yourself in business.
If you spend your time keeping your achievements, then you start loosing your time to reinvent yourself.
(Sorry for my written : French is my mother-language)
Hum… Not sure of that. You would have been maybe right in 1990. But today with the Web, kids from the other side of the world can reach your friends, your son, you daughter or your own Idol. Everybody can get in touch with everybody in this industry… as long as they’ve good content and they keep being nice (as Jason Parker said, up your comment).
😉 I like this one.
In French, we say : «When you go up, smile. Cause you go down, you meet the same ones».
«Quand tu montes, souris. Parce que quand tu descends, tu recroises les mêmes.»
the best advice i can give to an artist is to take a true fan by fan approach to building there base. I think that a lot of people look at the past and try to think of a way to get a lot of people all at once. with the technology available now you can truely get people engaged in your music and your brand. once you do this you will be able to work with them to spread your message further and further. this also requires that you make real music with a real message…which is actually the best advice “make music with your heart”
that’s what lawyers and negotiations are for.
The very best advice I never received, but always give, is to keep as many of, and as high a percentage as is possible, the rights to your songs, recorded performances, and all associated licensing (merchandising, images, video, artwork, website/blogs, etc.) to your works.
And don’t give away anything in perpetuity – always set a time limit for any contractual agreement or exchange, whether it’s a deal to record demos and get a label deal, or to license a song for some product/ad.
In the old days, unfortunately, this was virtually impossible (see Billy Joel, Artie Ripp, and ripoff, and thousands of others), and parting with (at least some percentage of) those rights were the currency required to get any deal. Today, you should not be in this business (or probably any self-owned business) if you can’t make at least a 50-50 partnership deal and receive major assets/givebacks/support in return.
If you want to always be happy with your product, your art – or at least as responsible as you can be – then maintain control of as many aspects of your career and your art as you can. The more you do yourself, the more honest your career and art will be to your hopes and dreams and vision.
After that, it would be:
– Surround yourself with quality – in every facet. Musicians/singers, other songwriters, studio, studio personnel, website, fanclubs, everywhere.
– Always have legal representation or, at least, legal advice (if you think you’re that smart – which almost nobody is, even (or, especially) veterans). And always get a second opinion when it comes to legal documents.
– Be prepared for this as a Business. It’s not “high school/best friends/let’s start a revolution” once you’re in the game, which is not a game but a “money talks-or else go away” business. That means, there will be many times, when you have to take a deep breath and do something that isn’t nice, or what your heart wants to do in order to make the right business/career decision.
– Be prepared to be disappointed. By your manager, your agent, your label, your promoter/s, your club/s, your gig, your fans, your friends, your bandmates, yourself. That’s true in any walk of life, including any form of the music business.
– Be hard on yourself, be demanding of your abilities, don’t settle for “that’s good enough” – that’s usually a kiss of death. Go for greatness.
– Try to figure out your strengths, and then maximize them. Figure our your weaker characteristics and try to minimize them.
The best, and most perplexing, piece of advice I ever received was this:
“It’s more important to sound new than it is to sound good.”
It sounds insulting to most musicians at first, but damn its on point. And it forces artists to try and sound both “good” and “new”. Especially with today’s overload of artists trying to get attention. If you don’t stand out you’ll be lost in the crowd.
^good one Jacob!
“if you need ten million people to justify your existence, maybe your life is in the hands of fools”
I once asked a successful small-biz president why he spent so much time at trade shows. He laughed and said “Making the product is the easy part.” He went on to explain that of course, making the product had not been easy at all, and had in fact taken years to research, develop, test, and manufacture. But all that was nothing compared to what he had to do to actually sell the product.
This guy was an engineer with no prior interest whatsoever in sales or marketing. But he’d realized that no matter how great the product was, it wasn’t going to sell itself. And what good is a dark warehouse full of dusty, untouched product?
It’s no different for a musician – writing the song is the “easy” part.
Hardest lesson I’ve learned over and over again is, “know what yre getting out of it.” We often end up doing things for free or cheap. The only way not to feel ripped off is to decide for yrself how yre being compensated – fame, experience, money, connections, an owed favor, charity…