06 February 2010
05 February 2010
04 February 2010
02 February 2010
28 January 2010
Demo wars
The topic of music demos isn't as sexy as, say, the launch of the new iPad. However, even though the topic of demos is overlooked, they are the lifeblood of the music industry. They are also the bane of many an A&R person…and can often be outright jokers.
Most labels spend a great deal of time outlining submission policies: how to submit demos, what format demos should be in, the information required from acts/artists/producers in supporting their demo submission and specifically who to send demos to. The reason for this is simple – or at least I would have thought it obvious. If an aspiring artist/band/producer wants to stand any chance of having their demo listened to and considered, it’s in their best interest to follow instructions. Otherwise the chances are good a demo not submitted according to a label's policy will be binned. This is especially true if an A&R person is having a bad day. And we tend to have bad days on a surprisingly regular basis. It's just the nature of the business.
On average, the dance music side of Aardvark (which I run) receives around 10 to 12 demo CDs and 30 emails about demos per day. The Pop and Rock music side of the business receives around the same number. More often than not, our email server groans under the weight of the audio file attachments that bombard it like George Bush’s "Shock and Awe" bombardment of Baghdad. This is despite the fact that we clearly state "do not send audio files as attachments, please send us links".
And more often than not, I'm on the receiving end of all demos submitted to the label. Regardless of genre. I'm not exactly sure why this is. Maybe aspiring artists like the sound of my name. Or perhaps it's just a case that my name appears in the press more often than anyone else at the label. Or perhaps it’s just sheer laziness. Whatever the reason, I find that on top of running a label, I'm also expected to be a mailboy and distribute demo emails for genres I quite expressly don't oversee to those in the label who do.
So you can imagine that on a day when I've already shouted and cursed at an aggregator for not doing their job, one of our artist’s managers for not doing his job, a sales partner who hadn't paid us sales revenues and royalties for two quarters, a royalties collection agency for bungling our latest statement (again), a video producer who decided to stroke his ego with a promo music video and not follow our brief (and then wondered why I wasn't going to pay for the video) and a mastering facility for butchering an album – I wasn't going to be best pleased when a manager for a hip hop/urban act killed our email server by blasting me with 15 mp3s weighing in at around 12mb each. We don't handle hip hop or urban music. We never have and we never will and this is quite clearly stated on our submission page.
Now I normally don't feel compelled to answer emails about hip hip/urban/RnB/Nu soul demos. Our website states that I won't respond to these submissions. However, I felt compelled to reply in this instance. I felt quite proud that I responded in a manner that was far more calm and polite than I actually felt. My exact words were "You're lucky. If I was the usual label executive b@stard, I would tell everyone I know in the business that you're an idiot." That sentence came after I outlined the number of ways that his demo submission to this label was inappropriate. I didn’t expect him to phone in response to my email. Nor did I expect to be told that 'any respectable dance music label should handle urban/hip hop/RnB'. Long story short – after I hung up on him I became one of those label executives who phoned round telling the story to just about everyone and saying what an idiot the guy was. So his card has been well and truly marked.
And the day didn't end there. No sooner did our email server come back online when another mp3 hits my in-box. This one, at least, was in a genre that I do handle. Reading through the hype, certain words like 'original' and 'fresh' appeared. The mastery of the producer was dutifully extolled. It's then I clock the name of the track: "Now that we've found love".
Now remember, I've spent half of my day yelling and cursing at people for seriously winding me up through silly and avoidable reasons. I've also been told to change the label's business model. And now I'm seeing the name of a track that makes me deeply suspicious. But I tell myself to suspend disbelief and approach this with an open mind.
The first line of this track is sung in a manner that not only mimics the O'Jays (who made the track famous in the first place) but takes more than a nod at Third World's re-released version. Then that track segues into a style that smacks of Basshunter. And this is supposed to be an 'original' and 'fresh' track? A pithy email from me outlining copyright law results in an unexpected phone call from the manager of this producer. I'm told to forget about the O'Jays and Third World. He tells me to listen to the originality of the mix. I put the phone down while he's in mid-sentence, wondering what Basshunter would think about the originality of the production.
So what's the point of this? Well, if people try to assemble furniture from IKEA, Argos, Homebase or wherever without reading the instructions, they should expect to make a complete hash of it. Or at least they shouldn't be surprised if they do make a complete hash of it. The same goes for submitting demos.
And if you phone a label executive and he or she is sounding a bit 'off' on the phone? They've probably had a day very similiar to this one.
Most labels spend a great deal of time outlining submission policies: how to submit demos, what format demos should be in, the information required from acts/artists/producers in supporting their demo submission and specifically who to send demos to. The reason for this is simple – or at least I would have thought it obvious. If an aspiring artist/band/producer wants to stand any chance of having their demo listened to and considered, it’s in their best interest to follow instructions. Otherwise the chances are good a demo not submitted according to a label's policy will be binned. This is especially true if an A&R person is having a bad day. And we tend to have bad days on a surprisingly regular basis. It's just the nature of the business.
On average, the dance music side of Aardvark (which I run) receives around 10 to 12 demo CDs and 30 emails about demos per day. The Pop and Rock music side of the business receives around the same number. More often than not, our email server groans under the weight of the audio file attachments that bombard it like George Bush’s "Shock and Awe" bombardment of Baghdad. This is despite the fact that we clearly state "do not send audio files as attachments, please send us links".
And more often than not, I'm on the receiving end of all demos submitted to the label. Regardless of genre. I'm not exactly sure why this is. Maybe aspiring artists like the sound of my name. Or perhaps it's just a case that my name appears in the press more often than anyone else at the label. Or perhaps it’s just sheer laziness. Whatever the reason, I find that on top of running a label, I'm also expected to be a mailboy and distribute demo emails for genres I quite expressly don't oversee to those in the label who do.
So you can imagine that on a day when I've already shouted and cursed at an aggregator for not doing their job, one of our artist’s managers for not doing his job, a sales partner who hadn't paid us sales revenues and royalties for two quarters, a royalties collection agency for bungling our latest statement (again), a video producer who decided to stroke his ego with a promo music video and not follow our brief (and then wondered why I wasn't going to pay for the video) and a mastering facility for butchering an album – I wasn't going to be best pleased when a manager for a hip hop/urban act killed our email server by blasting me with 15 mp3s weighing in at around 12mb each. We don't handle hip hop or urban music. We never have and we never will and this is quite clearly stated on our submission page.
Now I normally don't feel compelled to answer emails about hip hip/urban/RnB/Nu soul demos. Our website states that I won't respond to these submissions. However, I felt compelled to reply in this instance. I felt quite proud that I responded in a manner that was far more calm and polite than I actually felt. My exact words were "You're lucky. If I was the usual label executive b@stard, I would tell everyone I know in the business that you're an idiot." That sentence came after I outlined the number of ways that his demo submission to this label was inappropriate. I didn’t expect him to phone in response to my email. Nor did I expect to be told that 'any respectable dance music label should handle urban/hip hop/RnB'. Long story short – after I hung up on him I became one of those label executives who phoned round telling the story to just about everyone and saying what an idiot the guy was. So his card has been well and truly marked.
And the day didn't end there. No sooner did our email server come back online when another mp3 hits my in-box. This one, at least, was in a genre that I do handle. Reading through the hype, certain words like 'original' and 'fresh' appeared. The mastery of the producer was dutifully extolled. It's then I clock the name of the track: "Now that we've found love".
Now remember, I've spent half of my day yelling and cursing at people for seriously winding me up through silly and avoidable reasons. I've also been told to change the label's business model. And now I'm seeing the name of a track that makes me deeply suspicious. But I tell myself to suspend disbelief and approach this with an open mind.
The first line of this track is sung in a manner that not only mimics the O'Jays (who made the track famous in the first place) but takes more than a nod at Third World's re-released version. Then that track segues into a style that smacks of Basshunter. And this is supposed to be an 'original' and 'fresh' track? A pithy email from me outlining copyright law results in an unexpected phone call from the manager of this producer. I'm told to forget about the O'Jays and Third World. He tells me to listen to the originality of the mix. I put the phone down while he's in mid-sentence, wondering what Basshunter would think about the originality of the production.
So what's the point of this? Well, if people try to assemble furniture from IKEA, Argos, Homebase or wherever without reading the instructions, they should expect to make a complete hash of it. Or at least they shouldn't be surprised if they do make a complete hash of it. The same goes for submitting demos.
And if you phone a label executive and he or she is sounding a bit 'off' on the phone? They've probably had a day very similiar to this one.
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