Record Labels

Spotify is now over three years old but the debate rages on in some quarters about whether it’s a “good thing” for artists to have their music available for streaming. Has is moved enough music fans from illegal torrent sites? Does it cannibalize physical and download sales? Do the marketing and promotional benefits outweigh any potential loss of sales? Over what period of time should album profits now be measured? Each record label [...]

UK independent music distributor [PIAS] suffered a massive blow when their warehouse was destroyed by lunatics during the London Riots. My favorite band The Human League are on Wall of Sound records, whose stock was among those that went up in smoke. PIAS have been great supporters of Spotify, making all their content available for you to listen to. If you put on some music this weekend, give some of the PIAS-distributed artists a go, as [...]

British electronic music label Warp Records have recently been adding a large chunk of their back catalog to Spotify. Boards of Canada will be a welcome addition for many, but as a long-time fan of the label there are several other new additions from the Warp archive that I think are well worth checking out. Boards of Canada – Geogaddi Edinburgh’s finest IDM band Boards of Canada finally arrive on Spotify, with both Twoism [...]

Following on from the results of his online music survey, Leeds University music student Richard Pilkington asked me for my own opinions on Spotify, online music, and the future of music distribution. I spent some time putting my thoughts together and composed the following replies to his thirteen questions.

Richard Pilkington is a music student at Leeds University. His final year paper is on the future on music distribution, where he discusses peer-to-peer downloading, online music streaming services and how musicians are affected by how people access music. Richard’s main case-study is on Spotify and its crusade against illegal downloading. While completing his final paper, Richard has kindly allowed the Pansentient League to share [...]

Electronically Yours is one of the longest-running synth-pop websites. Originally a Human League fansite, EY has since grown to encompass all-things synthpop and electropop, focusing on both established acts as well as up-and-coming bands. Site owner and editor Orac is ably assisted by his team of contributors, chief of whom is the enigmatic Babooshka. As well as running the website, Orac masterminds the Electronically Yours record label [...]

Electric Fantastic Sound is a Swedish record label that specialises in synthpop, electro, and alternative music. Pioneers of digital distribution (and Spotify-friendly), their roster includes such artists as Flux, Basswood Dollies, Quelles Paroles, and Diskodiktator. If you’re new to these bands a great place to start is the recently-released label sampler Electric Fantastic Sound No.6 2010, or the new summer releases from Garland [...]

Electro Arc is an independent German label specializing in industrial dance and oldschool EBM (Electronic Body Music). They were featured on this blog last year and since then label boss Intrendent has been busy putting out more of Electro Arc’s showcase compilations, as well releasing artist albums such as the brilliant Brutpop from First Aid 4 Souls. I asked Intrendent what his ten favourite tracks were: here’s his list.

Have you listened to a Spotify playlist recently and found that some of the songs are greyed out and don’t play? That’s because the track has been removed. Artists (or more usually their record labels) sometimes decide to pull their content from Spotify and other streaming services. This might be unintentional (for example, because a publishing deal expires), but more often than not it’s due to the band’s label deciding [...]

This is how the Spotify money flows. Spotify is a business that offers streaming music to its users. Spotify gets its money mostly from advertisers and premium subscribers. Like any other company, Spotify has costs such as staff wages, rent and rates for the offices, and server costs for all the computers that deliver the music. Spotify also needs to pay the record labels and publishers that provide the music in the first place. The record [...]