MIDEM 2014
This year 20214, Midem was smaller in size, smaller in
attendance but much more intense with business deals. The smaller floor size
made it much easier to find company booths, easier to find executives and much
easier to have private meetings.
The announcements at Midem were ground breaking to say the
least:
Will.I.Am in his opening day speech, delivered via Skype
said: “The state of the music industry is delusional… our music is seen more
than it is heard… They’re showing you music rather than you’re hearing music… I
try my hardest not to dwell on how delusional and dysfunctional and splintered
the industry is. I surround myself with mega super geeks, so we can make and
market hardware and things like that. Maybe I’m chasing something I would
probably never catch, but I’ve been here before when I was in the ghetto
chasing the dream of starting a band.”
“I really encourage every single person in the music
industry to try and compete not with other record companies, but compete with
Samsung, compete against LG, compete against the big ones! Why is Sony
competing against Universal? As a matter of fact, HOW DID SONY LOSE? THEY HAD
THE CAMERA, THEY HAD THE RECORD COMPANY… How did you lose to Apple?!”
Will cited Dr Dre and Beats as inspiration that the music
industry can go into the hardware game and compete. “Boom. How do you like that
shit?!”
In the panel debate on whether streaming music can be a
sustainable platform for artists things got hot. After a year of criticism of
services like Spotify from musicians including Thom Yorke and David Byrne
streaming was directly accessed.
Radiohead’s manager, Brian Message, spoke more positively
about the impact streaming had on the last album from another of his
clients, Nick Cave. “We put streaming right at the forefront of everything
he did, right the way from developing Spotify apps through we then used lyric
cards and all that kind of stuff, in order to drive an awareness campaign
without him having to do too much promotion. And that worked very well for us,”
he said.
Meanwhile, Deezer’s CEO Axel Dauchez talked about
the way the industry can’t just make music available to stream – it has to
think hard about how people will discover new music through these services, in
order to convince artists that it can pay off for them.
“If the platform is just a jukebox, people will only listen
to the tracks they already know. If we do that, no money will finance the
creation of new music,” said Dauchez. “We have a common responsibility to
generate discovery: to force people to try new artists, new songs… Investing in
new artists is not a marketing tool: it’s an industry need… if 70% of the
streams are done in the back catalogue, there will be no new creation.
In a session on new frontiers for music videos, The Collective
Music Group’s Jordan Berliant noted that in 2014: “What has changed is the
video isn’t a promotional thing: the video IS the thing… It’s not
something to promote something else.”
Berliant said that labels criticizing YouTube for not making
them enough money were missing the point: they perhaps haven’t mastered what
fellow panelist Brandon Martinez described as the “12-month content cycle” of a
successful channel. ““It’s not a place to make money right now, but it’s not
primarily because of YouTube or Google in my mind, it’s because the people
representing the content primarily don’t understand the marketplace,” said
Berliant
Lyor Cohen Unveils 300,a New 'Content Company' with Atlantic
Deal, Google Backing and Ex-Warner Brass which has just signed an
interesting deal with Twitter’s music division.
“We’re going to create A&R tools to find artists early,
and help develop them,” he said. “I’m really happy to be working with them.
Certainly the modern A&R business, we all are looking for talent in various
places, and certainly Twitter is a terrific place to look at talent, just
like YouTube. If you want to get signed, I think you have to engage with
Twitter, and of course YouTube. And we’ll be looking and trying to develop
tools that the rest of the music community can utilize. That’s super-exciting
for us.”
Cohen also threw his weight behind streaming music as the
future for the industry. “I think this is an amazing opportunity for
entrepreneurs to be independent, especially in the music business. I see
macro-business models that are not on some chalkboard, but actually
reality. I certainly believe in streaming as being the future of very
healthy business, and so the tide would rise.”
“In the modern A&R business we are all looking for
talent in various places, and certainly Twitter is a terrific place to look at
talent,” Cohen said. “If you want to get signed, you have to engage with
Twitter, and of course YouTube, and we’ll be looking to try and develop tools
that the rest of the music community can utilize.”
“The mission statement is to create a lasting reputation for
high quality and artist development,” Cohen told the audience.
I see 300 as a massive effort to organize and utilize
independent new music, energy, creativity and acts for the financial gain of an
already “FAT” executive cadre.
Developing a system that will find the “crème” of the Indies, nurture
them and gain financially off their concepts has been the way of the major
label since majors were created. THIS IS
JUST THE FIRST PHASE OF A NEW USERY SYSTEM.
The greatest NEW service and system made available at this
Midem hands down was MUSIC KICKUP
Music Kickup is a 100% free
digital music distribution service to major
digital music stores, coupled with their new services Career Path
and Music Kickup Foundation.
This company has the potential to become a music internet behemoth. Their concept is simple enough, Digital
distribution with ALL of the major digital storefronts (iTunes, Amazon, EMusic,
etc...) for FREE
“Our disruptive technology enables 100% free and super fast
distribution. This combined with Career Path creates great platform for artists
to develop.” Antti Silventoinen, CEO Music Kickup
Every artist and musician wants a 100% free
digital music distribution service to major digital music stores,
but the Career Path service is truly what makes the difference. Career Path is a groundbreaking artist
development toolset and service that pushes the artist forward task by task.
Building on Music Kickup world leading analytics and their
partner network, they build human curated artist pathways for regions, artist
development and genres. The qualified and quantified data makes sure that the
artist will always be presented with the right next steps and opportunities.
Career Path will be online March 4th 2014.
This allows for the ability to have a virtual consultant online who will
give the artist specific tasks to accomplish day by day allowing them to
market, promote and sell their music.
Additional marketing partners include manufacturing, marketing,
promotion, design and video all ready to assist the artist in having a winning
Career Path.
“The combination of career development tied to actionable
distribution solutions based on analytics and data is a smart marketplace
solution. I'll be watching closely what this company can do for artists
of all sizes around the world.” Jay Frank, Owner & CEO of DigSin and
Author of the bestseller Futurehit.DNA Also expanding Career Path
is Music Kickup partners, such as 3plet,
Radar Music Videos, Band App and MusicXray. Career Path gives them
unique a unique platform and access to artists, who through Career Path can be
reached at the right time.
Adam Perry, CEO of BandApp and drummer of Bloodhound
Gang comments: "We are super excited about the BandApp partnership
with Music KickUp. The platform allows artists to really manage their
careers like never before online and BandApp will play a big part in that.
Providing both artists and fans with powerful, free tools is what we are all
about, and so are Music Kickup. We are delighted to be onboard a cant
wait to see the results!”
“Since we started Music Kickup in 2011, we’ve
been working with thousands of artists to produce the most complete service for
artists to build their careers and sell their music”, Perttu Sutinen,
COO of Music Kickup explains. ”After two years of development,
we’ve finally nailed it!”