Release an album - how?

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irthlingz
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Re: Release an album - how?

Post by irthlingz » Fri Oct 08, 2021 9:51 am

Later on in that same "Insider's Guide" video (after around 102:30), there's some encouraging ideas, including the "thousand true fans" theory -- namely, that if you can get 1,000 really enthusiastic fans, they can sustain you.

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Re: Release an album - how?

Post by cosmicdolphin » Fri Oct 08, 2021 12:26 pm

irthlingz wrote:
Fri Oct 08, 2021 9:51 am
there's some encouraging ideas, including the "thousand true fans" theory -- namely, that if you can get 1,000 really enthusiastic fans, they can sustain you.
Yeah..Good luck with that :shock:

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Re: Release an album - how?

Post by Casey H » Fri Oct 08, 2021 12:36 pm

funsongs wrote:
Fri Oct 08, 2021 7:47 am
Thanks, Casey...
as cliché as the saying is - it still holds true for me:
"I didn't get into music & songwriting because I wanted to make money."
I got into it... and have stayed with it... because it's how I'm wired, and creating music is what I enjoy doing with most of my awake hours.
I thought it was for the groupies! :lol:

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Re: Release an album - how?

Post by funsongs » Fri Oct 08, 2021 12:48 pm

Casey H wrote:
Fri Oct 08, 2021 12:36 pm
funsongs wrote:
Fri Oct 08, 2021 7:47 am
Thanks, Casey...
as cliché as the saying is - it still holds true for me:
"I didn't get into music & songwriting because I wanted to make money."
I got into it... and have stayed with it... because it's how I'm wired, and creating music is what I enjoy doing with most of my awake hours.
I thought it was for the groupies! :lol:
Well... it coulda been... but since I tend to Like A Girl with all her teeth... and much of my music being Bluegrass... well, "slim pickins", you might say.
:? :shock: 8-)
Peter Rahill - aka "funsongs"
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Re: Release an album - how?

Post by eeoo » Fri Oct 08, 2021 4:37 pm

Yeah, unless you're a gigging band/artist it's hard to justify making physical product other than for the love of the material, which in a lot of ways is as it should be, right? I don't even think my band is going to bother with streaming platforms with our next release, just vinyl and maybe cd's and high res files downloadable on our bandcamp page. Streaming is so insulting in so many ways but I realize it's necessary for a lot of folks. Through gigging we've managed to pay for all the recording we've ever done and gone on to make a profit. Without gigging, not a chance.

But like I say, if you love the material and want product in hand to show for it, that is the noblest of all reasons!

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Re: Release an album - how?

Post by funsongs » Fri Oct 08, 2021 5:38 pm

eeoo wrote:
Fri Oct 08, 2021 4:37 pm
Yeah, unless you're a gigging band/artist it's hard to justify making physical product other than for the love of the material, which in a lot of ways is as it should be, right? I don't even think my band is going to bother with streaming platforms with our next release, just vinyl and maybe cd's and high res files downloadable on our bandcamp page. Streaming is so insulting in so many ways but I realize it's necessary for a lot of folks. Through gigging we've managed to pay for all the recording we've ever done and gone on to make a profit. Without gigging, not a chance.

But like I say, if you love the material and want product in hand to show for it, that is the noblest of all reasons!
Thanks, Ethan - all good perspective.
Congrats on your own 'public' success.
To be able to have your music and creativity PAY FOR ITSELF is a noble & financially smart goal.
Everything else is icing on the cake.
Peter Rahill - aka "funsongs"
NOW, back on YouTube (2022)
https://www.youtube.com/@peterrahill9263/featured
https://soundcloud.com/funsongs-1
https://peterrahill.bandcamp.com/

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Re: Release an album - how?

Post by RPaul » Sat Oct 09, 2021 11:41 pm

funsongs wrote:
Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:23 am
Nobody's making/buying/selling CDs much anymore - maybe with the exception of traveling/performing artists who offer those along with other merch.
So - here I've got a collection of stuff we've done... with another pending, when Get To Heaven gets completed.
My experience is that CDs mostly sell at live shows, more as souvenirs than anything else, I suppose. I mean I've got a bunch of CDs, but, if I want to listen to any of them, I'm more likely to just fire up Spotify to listen to the albums there as it's more convenient. The main thing I use the physical CDs for is when I need a compatible reference mix as those have the full resolution, without any streaming service changes (e.g. to "normalize" LUFS and enforce True Peak standards for any given service).

That said, when I make albums, I do make up a limited number of CDs through Kunaki. Their costs are very reasonable, and you can make as few as one (but then the shipping cost will be more than the media cost). I've also used them to drop ship to CD Baby to make available via their physical CD programs (e.g. through Amazon), though I didn't bother with that on my most recent album. You can also make those orderable to end-listeners, for example via a link on your website or via the Kunaki store, but their store is pretty limited since it doesn't provide audio previews. Just to give an example, here is the listing of my most recent album on Kunaki:

https://kunaki.com/Sales.asp?PID=PX00ZNWVNK

One cool thing about the Amazon via CD Baby thing is they consolidate listings for streaming, downloads, and CDs, and you can at least preview via the downloads page. For example, here's my previous album there (I didn't bother making my most recent available that way):

https://amzn.to/3lrwunN

The real downside, though, is it makes the CDs very expensive, so you end up with less money *if* someone buys one that way. (I think I've sold exactly one via Amazon, though I think it was via the earlier CreateSpace program instead of via CD Baby inventory.)
funsongs wrote:
Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:23 am
How might these get released? Is it still a 'thing' to put out album/collections?
Or just the 9 songs as singles? I do have a bandcamp account, too. :? 8-) :)
I do albums when I have a coherent collection -- or at least a semi-coherent collection. With my most recent album ("Moments of Insanity"), I'd released 5 of the songs as singles exactly as they appear on the album. 3 more are ones that had been previously released as singles, but I remixed them for the album to take advantage of my production quality improvements since the the original singles were released (upwards of 10 years back in one case). 3 more were songs I'd released before in very different recordings (e.g. two were country versions of songs previously done in other genres on earlier albums). Only one song was brand new on that album. The coherence wasn't a musical style thing -- there are four 3-song "mini-sets", with one being pop/AC, another being country, a third being 60s-oriented in some way, and the final one being a bit more of stretch -- maybe a bit folky??? Rather, there was a very loose lyrical theme related to one form of craziness or another, though that was a pretty big stretch to rationalize with a few of the songs. (That album was really an impulse decision. I think there were only about 4 months between deciding to do it and its being released. Just kind of a 2020 craziness thing.)

There are actually some benefits to releasing an album after releasing most of the songs as singles since they provide a new opportunity to promote the songs. Also, if you're not changing the recordings from the singles, the album starts out with the stream counts from the singles.

That said, though, I mostly do albums as an artistic statement. All five of the albums I've got out there (4 of original songs and one of public domain Christmas carols) have some degree of (lyrical) theme, and two have somewhat unified musical styles. Most activity is streaming nowadays, though I've sold a few full album downloads -- I think mainly on iTunes/Apple Music. (I also have Bandcamp, but I've had extremely low activity there. Most of my activity these days comes from Spotify and Pandora, then probably Amazon Music and Apple Music. I really don't do Soundcloud to any degree, though I do have a profile there.)

I should have 13 new singles by the end of this year, but there's not any coherent thread to make another album at this point, even if I added a few songs that are ready to go but not yet released or planned for imminent release. (Also, 5 of those are covers, initially recorded for TAXI listings. One of those got forwarded, but I never heard anything from the library, so I finally put it out there.) I like to have albums have 12 tracks so that there is a cost break to buy an entire album ... *if* anyone actually buys downloads. :)

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