Wednesday, January 27, 2010

An Opinion of Media in the Music Industry

A question has crossed my mind a lot lately, how do musicians make it big? Is it pure talent, or is luck a factor? Does their individual style have anything to do with it? The more new music that I discover and listen to, the more I wonder why these smaller unknown artists haven't been found and made big. A lot of these bands have sounds that fit into contemporary musical categories. I feel as though the media plays a huge role in this. My personal belief is that in a competition between two acts, the act that is more marketable will be the one that is offered a bigger contract and all those bells and whistles. Even if you are extremely talented and your music sounds great, I feel that the people in charge will pay you no mind unless they can use you for their own profit. Now maybe this is a narrow minded view but its just something that I thought up and found interesting. Please let me know what you think, I'd love to hear it.

2 comments:

Melissa Ellard said...

I agree that I have gone to many shows where really good bands or singers perform and I wonder why they didn't get a record deal yet. I think sometimes it has to do with luck but also who you know. I agree that the more marketable band will succeed. I can think of so many artists that I would love to just not ever listen to again and replace them with someone better. But, I agree the media plays a big role in promoting certain icons.

Take_cover327 said...

Well first off, the music industry has changed dramatically over the past few years. With such sites as myspace and facebook, artists are now able to freely distribute their music without the use of a label. Look at that 15 year old boy (Ryan is it?) Who posted videos of himself singing. It got a ton of hits, and now hes on MTV making it big. All from posting homemade videos! The same thing goes for bands. The band "Breathe Carolina" started making electronic music in their basement in Denver. They made a myspace site, and now their touring around the country.

Without the labels, they are free to make whatever kind of music they want. No one can tell them what they can and cant sell. Also, all of the money goes back into their pockets instead of just cents and dollars. I feel that soon major music corporations will start to struggle to make the same kind of money they've been making in the past. Indie labels are doing better and better everyday, because they allow more freedom. So overall there are more chances for bands to make it big with these new technologies. But it still takes talent, and even perhaps, a bit of luck...