Good rant.

That was the most informative blog I've ever read. Now I know..

i agree with Shema... that was super informative about the music business... i don't even bother with music channels anymore. it's sad to see the death.

I was around at the beginning so I saw what it was, and sadly what it could continue to be had it kept to its essentially anarchic principles.

I have some friends who are musicians, and have recently gotten a glimpse into where their careers are. They're scraping money together to pay for their own studio time, having to do final mixes on their albums themselves, coordinating CD production, and scheduling tours around their teaching jobs. Hell, I ended up with one of my photos in a recent CD case, and I'm just some asshole with a dSLR who happened to be hanging out in the studio one day.

that's a great journal entry, you should blog that somewhere. I'd like to pass this on to a couple of my friends in the music industry.

When MTV (MuchMusic here in Canada) started going away from playing music videos all day, I stopped watching, and it slowly affected my love and my consumption of music....I stopped buying DVD's and CD's. I still buy the occasional music DVD (concert, collection of videos), or buy the occasional video or track from iTunes, but it's not the same as it once was, sadly.

i still get new music all the time. its not the downloading. its the companies that charge way to much for music. downloading has hit sales a little. but not as much as they report. iv seen sales numbers for years in the industry and its all greed. lower prices and youll see a upswing in sales. things like mtv are all sad. M(music) TV is so far from what it was then it will never be back. i see more musicians starting up their own labels and getting groups together that are successful and the big labels dont get it. they are all about sales. sad. good music for low prices is what everyone wants. not 2 good singles and 10 other songs that are them same as the next band. and pls stop this re-release dvd combo crap 3 months later with a few extra tracks just to make us buy the same thing. again...greed.

It's true it is sad. I think a big part of my childhood memories and my relationship to music is based on music videos. All the iconic videos of madonna, michael jackson, the red hot chili peppers.....who can forget the crash test dummy's video.....lol It was what you talked about when you went to school the next day. It's what made you want to go with your friends to the concert and buy the albums. It's a dam shame that it's a dying era.

eMptyTV is a sad shadow of its former self, no argument there. Though I have no doubt that many in the music buisness are suffering from the decline of the industry, I feel the blame lies squarely with the executives running the industry, not with the developments in technology or the even betrayal of MTV.

The industry fought against technology when it should have been embracing it. The record companies shot themselves in the foot and a lot of innocent people will now have to suffer due to the arrogance (and ignorance) of a few.

Technology could have given them the world. Literally. YouTube broadcasts to a global audience at a fraction of the cost of airing a video on TV. People are more than willing to pay good money for MP3's, iTunes and NIN's Ghosts album proved that(just don't go charging the earth for them). It could have been a win for all involved. Instead it was an economic disaster. The industry took hits from downloading, increasing video game and DVD sales (which, let's face it, are their main market competiotrs) and can no longer continue to exist in the form they have chosen for themselves.

With the death of the big companies of course comes the death of the big money jobs. It isn't that there's no money to be made on them, there's no one to put up the money in the first place. But let's face it: 2 millon for a video was, even back in the day, more the exception than the rule. (And great thngs can be done on a low budget: OK GO?)

The industry needs to transfom if it's going to survive. Unfortunately those with the power, and the money, have so far failed to realise it.

I'm going to go a little higher than Taito7 and guess you got around 50K for the budget. Thanks for the inside view you've given in this blog. It really was a fascinating read and I would love to hear more.

I don't think it's the internet that killed the music industry so much as a lot of new media encroached on the wallets of the people who buy cds and go to concerts. Not to mention that costs are rising and money is tight. Forget MTV, look at Fuse and VH1. VH1 is worse than MTV now. Fuse has video take overs where all they do is play a single artist's ten or twelve videos. The music industry isn't dying, it's disowning itself.

I'm pessimistic, I think you got twenty to fifteen thousand for the video.

I'm going to guess $50K.

The music stealers (downloaders) definitely have done damage to the music industry. I'm sure most of them are convinced they are alternative and counter culture because they're downloading it for free. Did I leave out the logic that they are somehow entitled to all of it?

I was never a huge MTV/VH-1 fan. I grew up without cable TV. I'm curious if you think that a singles popularity drove interest and popularity of the video or vice versa. Was there a point where the two reversed?

Talking of all the folks spinning stories and creating buzz behind the scenes has me thinking of the Fad King from Wag The Dog.

MTV should change its name.

Great blog! I really appreciate the insight.

ah, the business we call "show".

Great entry, really interesting stuff.

Interesting

Oh I do enjoy a good rant

This blog is pretty insightful. The music industry should have embraced the internet for what it is waaaay back in the beginning - they still have the chance to do so because the internet isn't going away. I think they should completely embrace file trading but in a controlled manner (e.g. selling licenses on a per song basis where a user can purchase 10 licenses so they can trade or keep 10 songs at a time).

I'm going to guess 10K, if you're lucky.

I know this is going to sound crazy, but maybe this is all a good thing.

You know, eventually, these artists are going to give up, or there will be some left but they'll be talentless hacks. You'll see a rift from within. Music videos will start to dwindle down until they're almost extinct. Musicians and bands will start to see a huge drop in album sales, due to very little marketing. All these record labels will no longer be able to keep these musicians on their label, since they don't make enough money. Then you'll see a huge drop in musicians world wide, and you'll see a rebirth in talent, music, and the artists. It's a cycle. Well, hopefully anyways.

I guess... $2400.
I'm going pretty low because I've seen the same thing with wedding photography (which is why I refuse to do it).
Want pictures of everything, including the kitchen sink. Wants 5 photogs to be able to cover everything at once. A photobook of select photos, a copy of all the pictures in 4x6 and 8x10, the digital rights to all images, oh, and they want it all for $500.00
HA!

'm gonna say 65K and i hope those stories on american idol are true I really cried on a few of them...

I think you were probably offered a total budget of about 60K, which would make your 20% cut pretty paltry. Especially considering all the hard work that goes into making a video (or any creative piece, really). All in all, I'd say they offered you just over minimum wage, with out the hope for tips. It's bullshit.

I still buy music. I've actually never downloaded any music or movies that I haven't paid for. I don't buy CD's anymore, which depresses me, because I love the album art. The way an album was put together always gave me an insight as to what vibe the music was about.

Anyway, your work is badass, and if I had the coin, I'd pay top dollar for a piece of it. But alas, I am just another starving (traditional) artist.

awesome read, and very true.