It may take me quite a while to put my team together, but I am currently talking to people, seeing what their time is like and where their interests lie. As I said in my earlier article, music can be a long term proposition. It's true that everyone wants the big hit and immediate rewards, but that's like hitting the lottery. There are others ways for a music career to pay off in the long run, as long you have planned for survival in the short term.
I found a band about 23 years ago sitting lonely in the cut-out section of the record store. Cymande as they called themselves broke up in 1974 and as far as I knew this vinyl had been sitting there since then. It was called second time around. I am always up to explore something unusual, so I bought it. It was an awesome little album that fused a lot of elements that I liked. Some people called it funk, but it had all kinds of odd meter grooves, like you find in prog-rock. It had a horn section. It's members were all in the UK from the West Indies, which reminded me a little of Osibisa who were half from Africa and half from the Carribean. I enjoyed the band, but since they had already broken up, it was clear find more albums was going to be tough. And from the band's perspective, they had their moment in the Sun.
But we never know what imght happen in the future. Who else might dig up and old album in another cut-out bin or how popuklar music would develop. The first thing that can happen to a song is another band might choose to cover it. And although your original may not have been popular, there is always the chance that people who cover it are and include it on a popular album. I have a couple friends who have managed to do exaclty that. And such was the case with Cymande in 1988 (15 years after they broke up), although I am not sure that the cover version sold any more than the original, it was the beginning of a new life. In the 90s, rap acts began sampling bits of tunes for their mixes, digging old school grooves. And suddenly all those albums sitting in all those cut-out bins were being scoured by Rappers and hip-hop artists for grooves to sample. Cymande suddenly was making money from their music again, probably more than they made in the first place. They began releasing records again in 1999, recording a couple new albums and releasing some anthologies. Their music has made it onto video games, into films, been sampled for hip hop, and must certainly be considered a minor success. But it wasn't a straight line and it wasn't the classic rock star arc.
I am not sure how much of that was by accident, luck or planning. But I do know that if they hadn't had a catalog, nothing would have happened. Artists have to create. And an artist who eventually wants to make money has to maintain his ownership of his creation. But he also has to have the access to the business means to exploit any opportunities that may arise. Which may involve forming a company that doesn't really do anything for years at a time, then suddenly an opportunity arises and the pieces are in place and one opportunity usually gives rise to another and etc. We don't know what the future holds, we do know we need to be prepared.
Interested? I am still looking for a team.
I found a band about 23 years ago sitting lonely in the cut-out section of the record store. Cymande as they called themselves broke up in 1974 and as far as I knew this vinyl had been sitting there since then. It was called second time around. I am always up to explore something unusual, so I bought it. It was an awesome little album that fused a lot of elements that I liked. Some people called it funk, but it had all kinds of odd meter grooves, like you find in prog-rock. It had a horn section. It's members were all in the UK from the West Indies, which reminded me a little of Osibisa who were half from Africa and half from the Carribean. I enjoyed the band, but since they had already broken up, it was clear find more albums was going to be tough. And from the band's perspective, they had their moment in the Sun.
But we never know what imght happen in the future. Who else might dig up and old album in another cut-out bin or how popuklar music would develop. The first thing that can happen to a song is another band might choose to cover it. And although your original may not have been popular, there is always the chance that people who cover it are and include it on a popular album. I have a couple friends who have managed to do exaclty that. And such was the case with Cymande in 1988 (15 years after they broke up), although I am not sure that the cover version sold any more than the original, it was the beginning of a new life. In the 90s, rap acts began sampling bits of tunes for their mixes, digging old school grooves. And suddenly all those albums sitting in all those cut-out bins were being scoured by Rappers and hip-hop artists for grooves to sample. Cymande suddenly was making money from their music again, probably more than they made in the first place. They began releasing records again in 1999, recording a couple new albums and releasing some anthologies. Their music has made it onto video games, into films, been sampled for hip hop, and must certainly be considered a minor success. But it wasn't a straight line and it wasn't the classic rock star arc.
I am not sure how much of that was by accident, luck or planning. But I do know that if they hadn't had a catalog, nothing would have happened. Artists have to create. And an artist who eventually wants to make money has to maintain his ownership of his creation. But he also has to have the access to the business means to exploit any opportunities that may arise. Which may involve forming a company that doesn't really do anything for years at a time, then suddenly an opportunity arises and the pieces are in place and one opportunity usually gives rise to another and etc. We don't know what the future holds, we do know we need to be prepared.
Interested? I am still looking for a team.
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