[fmc] A State of Independents: The Changing Definition of Indie-Saturday Oct 7th

More news from the Future of Music Summit at McGill last weekend.

A State of Independents: The Changing Definition of Indie

Jenny Toomey Executive Director, Future of Music Coalition

Molly Neuman Director Label Relations, eMusic

Ian Ilavsky Co-Owner, Constellation Records

Jeff Waye Label Owner, Ninja Tune / Big Dada / Counter / Third Side Music

Jeff Remedios, Arts and Crafts Records

Neuman: Retail channels have narrowed into highly specialized genres changing the way music is marketed, even within the “giant stratosphere” of the internet. Majors (major record labels) and large indies (independent labels, or labels representing independent artists) are both becoming more selective with who they represent.

Toomey: “Legacy” (established) artists are having to return to indie methods by necessity. They’re returning to the distribution modes of starting out.

Myspace is a decentralized mode of distribution. Many bands use it as their first place for promotion in the same way as 80s indie bands started self-distribution, but myspace is owned by the same company as Fox News.

Ilavsky: The old meaning of indie as punk, diy, queer politics, girl power, organic, collective, self-starting, self-regulating, alternative ethics. Indie now is just the shadow of these values. The promises of the 80s and 90s indie punk scene have been unfulfilled in the last 10 years. It is now easier than ever to record and produce music with digital technology getting people’s attention. Can indie values hold fast in the face of digital technologies? Artists making music in their bedrooms and creating an archive of their music with that of friends then building a structure to support it.

He believes that labels should assert their policies and values even though it will create a natural ceiling on sales. He hopes to have music viewed not as just another arm of the entertainment industry, but in its relation to other aspects of culture. We need to value and examine the production, dissemination, and exchange of cultural artifacts, considering “how broken the things around us are.”

Toomey: Each label has a taste, a flavour, an aesthetic, and a sound whether or not it contains an overt political statement through lyrics or emphasis on underground methods of management.

Remedios: Arts and Crafts was not formed as label, but as an idealistic 360 degree partnership in which he and his partner help with every aspect. Although artists have different needs and wants relating to the types of distribution they use, such as selling online songs individually or as albums, labels can bring intelligence to the artists’ ideas about what their band wants. He described the process of starting with a kernel of friends and bringing new people in with skills as the group’s needs grow, which sounds a lot like Indyish to me.

Waye: He only holds his own label to his standards and sees the use in letting other labels work within whatever framework they see to be most relevant.

Neuman: Mentioned labels who maintain such a fiercely independent stance that they don’t even want to join with other indies.

Paying Mechanicals (artist is paid out for usually 10 tracks of an album) and Profit Split (after the record is released, artist and label split sales 50/50). Profit split is a 90s development and most labels now pay mechanicals in a profit share agreement.

Ilavsky: The rules which labels create for their artists are based on specific local conditions and the needs of bands in specfic urban locations. He discussed keeping things on a human scale by sharing the knowledge and experiences of indie labels with other people. The playbook by which the indies operate was passed down from the majors and didn’t evolve out of indies.

If labels don’t carry an overt political stand and provide no analysis of the system (alignment with a cultural ideology), they cannot be defined in that way and are instead defined by how much money they put into marketing, whether or not they use a publicist, which radio stations they sell to. The industry is well mapped out for indies to access except in terms of scale.

Labels will sell less copies of an album on principle. They can spend less on marketing and still have artists make enough money to survive if they use the Profit Split model.

Any indie label that has managed to get a foothold has been mainly on the back of one good band.

Toomey: There were the original punk rock, anti-commericialist movements, but labels like Matador and Subpop which were deemed indie were actually overtly commercial in their attempt to bring unknown artists to the forefront.

Remedies: For him the act of subversion takes the form of Matador and Subpop style labels of getting indie music out into the major channels. This means valuing cultural expression for itself and not necessarily for the values it carries.

Audience question from member of Monkeyclaws, a music collective: Indie record stores, bands, and their labels have always had a strong personal relationship. What is to be expected from indie music stores online?

Waye: Does the exercise of making an album even exist anymore? The creation process has changed to the point where songs stand on their own. He also emphasized the discrepancy between online sales and retail sales in the number of people downloading versus those buying at stores.

He ended the discussion by suggesting that the way in which the Canadian government supports cultural production, development, and maintenance is something to be thankful for, but it simultaneously creates a sense of entitlement to be able to put art out there.