Hi! I'm Michael Donaldson, and I write about music on 8sided.blog, license and publish music through 8DSync, and make music as Q-Burns Abstract Message. I think about music all of the time. My guess is you do, too.
This is the thirteenth episode of Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care, a newsletter loosely about music-making and music-listening and how technology changes the culture around those things.
Each episode of this newsletter has a theme song. These days we’re chilling out — though with a solid touch of tension — and the appropriate accompaniment for that feeling is a little number I’m calling “Eight Matches En Route.” Have a listen as you peruse this weekend’s ramble … enjoy!
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I had the feeling that 'Bandcamp Friday' on March 20th was a tipping point for the platform. On that day, Bandcamp waived the 15% take on sales of music from the artists and small labels on the site. The day was a significant event in indie music-land, with bands and fans enthusiastically promoting 'Bandcamp Friday' throughout the day. Bandcamp ended up bringing in $4.3 million, distributed in full.
I called this a tipping point because I was sure many would discover Bandcamp through all the noise generated by 'Bandcamp Friday.' Artists who never thought about the platform would now consider it. And music fans, looking for a satisfying way to support artists, would finally give it a try, too. The ensuing #BrokenRecord movement also added to the motivation to embrace something friendlier to a musician's livelihood.
May 1st introduced another 'Bandcamp Friday.' Something seemed different as soon as I woke up that day. A pre-sunrise glance at my email inbox noted already a dozen messages from artists and labels I followed on Bandcamp, alerting me to new releases and special offers. This activity continued throughout the day as artists' email announcements kept coming. The chatter on social media was overwhelming — at times, my Twitter feed was nothing but fans, artists, labels, and pundits talking about Bandcamp.
My feeling right away was that the day would be more successful than March 20th. But I had no idea. I don't think anyone did. By mid-afternoon, Bandcamp had already eclipsed the previous haul. And then the final tally: $7.1 million.
Could this expand the tipping point even further? I guess we'll find out. Bandcamp has announced follow-up 'Bandcamp Fridays' on June 5th and July 3rd. Though inspired by a need to help artists during The Strange Times, I wouldn't be surprised if 'Bandcamp Friday' is now a regular thing. It endears the community of musicians to the platform, brands Bandcamp as an artist-supporting alternative, and creates awareness and user growth.
Most importantly, the attention shows that there is an option other than Spotify and its streaming peers. Before The Strange Times, streaming seemed set in stone for the music industry's eternity — it's now the only way to get one's music out there, so deal with it. But suddenly, streaming's miserly payment model seems even more unfair when income from touring is no longer an option. Bandcamp shows there are other ways. As Navin Johnson proclaimed in The Jerk, "Well, if this is out there, think how much more is out there!"
In his fantastic First Floor newsletter, Shawn Reynaldo wonders if the door is open to go all-in on Bandcamp. He's blunt:
Barring some sort of major shift in its business model, Spotify simply won't be capable of paying artists more, and other large platforms are unlikely to take that initiative on their own. Knowing that, there's only one option that makes sense for independent artists and labels: removing your music from streaming platforms.
I don't think I'm ready to advocate the same. But, for a recording artist, I believe there's a lot to be said for shifting one's energy to Bandcamp. I'd suggest keeping one's music available on streaming for discovery and accessibility but treating that as the top of a marketing funnel. You want listeners-converted-to-fans that find your music on Spotify to end up on Bandcamp. That's where the exclusive stuff is, the downloads that include liner notes, PDF booklets, shareable GIFs, and artwork. Where releases appear two weeks (or more) before they hit streaming. When you're posting about releases, you're only sharing links to Bandcamp. The audio players on your website are Bandcamp players. And so on … you get the idea.
(Proposal: maybe on your next album, include a short 'interlude' track that's only on streaming services. Title this track "Please Check Me Out On Bandcamp.")
However, we need to be careful. I don't advocate making Facebook your band's main website and conduit to fans. I don't think that Spotify should be the thrust of a label's release strategy. And, at the same time, I advise against solely relying on Bandcamp as the outlet for your music. Seriously — Bandcamp could get bought by someone who doesn't share their artist-first philosophy. Things like that have happened before. And remember all those bands that invested everything in their MySpace pages? I hardly remember them, either.
Streaming's had us stunned like deer in headlights for the past decade. It's not, in itself, a bad thing. I love having so much music at my fingertips. Who doesn't? And playlists have their place. I've got this one on in the background as I write this. But streaming as the absolute model is not as inevitable as we thought. The opportunities for innovation are still out there, locally and globally. So much more is possible, whether it's paid livestream concerts on an artist's website, releasing songs weekly through a newsletter (hello!), hand-printing bespoke packaging for a limited cassette release, or resurrecting the 'dead' practice of downloads with Bandcamp. Once the independent artist is free from assumptions about how music delivery is supposed to be, almost any idea is on the table. It takes some brainstorming, some risk-taking, and looking beyond expectations.
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I dislike the phrase 'thinking outside of the box.' Using the cliché is, in action, the opposite of its meaning. But the phrase’s accepted understanding does describe what I'm proposing above — an inventive, first-principles approach for coming up with bold new solutions for music distribution, promotion, and discovery.
Handwash Jukebox nails the 'outside of the box' approach to discovery. Realized by creative director Daniel Bremmer while brainstorming in the shower (recommended!), Handwash Jukebox creates opportunities to discover bands while washing hands. Daniel thought about how to help out in the crisis — how to inspire families to wash hands, how to help flatten the curve, and how to support musicians in a challenging time.
We know that to help fight COVID-19, we should regularly wash our hands for 20 seconds. This imperative led to the widely shared suggestion to sing "Happy Birthday" twice — or the alphabet song — as a simple timer for reaching the 20-second mark. One can only take so much of "Happy Birthday." In response, hand-washers looked to the amusing 20-second lyric generator and other short song choruses that might fit the task at hand (sorry).
With Handwash Jukebox, Daniel and his team created an Amazon Alexa skill that — upon the command, "Alexa, open Handwash Jukebox" — will pull from a random selection of cool 20-second songs to accompany the soapy action. And there's some great music there, made to work for kids and adults alike. I hooked up my friend Shana Falana who contributed the chorus to her appropriately titled "Everyone Is Gonna Be Okay." And, at each song's finish, a voice-over announces the name of the artist and where one can find more music.
That's what I'm talking about. Six months ago, who would've thought hand-washing would become an avenue for music discovery? It goes to show that these innovative ideas are out there, ready to get dreamed up and executed. And don't underestimate a good brainstorm session in the shower.
I interviewed the team behind Handwash Jukebox on 8sided.blog. Be sure to check it out.
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The trope is that these things always come in threes. A celebrity's death precedes the demise of two more, and then the challenge is figuring out how the three fit together. Sometimes making a connection is stretchy, and sometimes the linking thread is uncanny.
Last week I wrote about the passing of Tony Allen. As I write this, the news came over the wire (i.e., Twitter) that Little Richard has died. And earlier this week, we learned that Florian Schneider — arguably the main music-brain behind Kraftwerk — departed for 'ohm sweet ohm.' (Though in the latter case, Schneider may have departed as long as a month ago, as my friend David writes about here.)
The link here is astounding and makes their passings even more tragic. These three titans each immeasurably changed the sound (and, in some cases, the look) of music from the 20th century onward. Tony Allen created the rhythm of afrobeat, which permeates popular and underground music with greater frequency every year. Florian Schneider and Kraftwerk brought electronic music production — previously relegated to experimental artists and fanciful Moog demonstration albums — to the mainstream. And Little Richard is why rock n' roll is still around — his influence trickles down to all your musical heroes. People forget that both The Rolling Stones and The Beatles would open for him in the early '60s. And it's no coincidence that you can easily put performance photos of Little Richard and Prince side-by-side.
Kraftwerk is the closest to my heart, so I'd like to talk more about Florian Schneider. 2020 is the 50th anniversary of Kraftwerk's formation, an event celebrated by an extensive 3-D concert tour. I was shocked that one of the July stops would happen about 5 minutes by car from my house here in Orlando. Unsurprisingly, the tour is now 'postponed' due to COVID-19. But, even though Ralf Hütter is the only original member participating in the concerts, it feels like the tour's absence this summer is a mourning.
The coverage of Schneider's passing, though respectful of Hütter's undeniable contribution to the group, mostly takes a tone as if the Kraftwerk era is over. This impression is not an implication that Schneider was the sole mastermind behind Kraftwerk. Instead, it shows how the 'band' successfully crafted themselves as a single unit, all one Man-Machine. Even more than most bands, once one part is removed, nothing else is the same. As Florian explained in a 1975 Rolling Stone interview, "Kraftwerk is not a band. It's a concept. We call it 'Die Menschmaschine,' which means 'the human machine.' We are not the band. I am me. Ralf is Ralf. And Kraftwerk is a vehicle for our ideas."
One evening I decided to watch the BBC music documentaries Krautrock - The Rebirth of Germany and Synth Britannia. It turns out the main subject of these two docs, together and when viewed back-to-back, is Kraftwerk. The first builds through the '70s kosmiche music movement in Germany, resulting and culminating in the ascendancy of Kraftwerk. Then Synth Britannia begins with OMD seeing Kraftwerk play in Liverpool. Afterward, the young band sell all their guitars and buy synthesizers. The rest of Synth Britannia is basically about Kraftwerk's growing tendrils on the popular music that followed.
Bonus material: You should read The Quietus's memorial for Florian Schneider — there's a lot of history I didn't know. Here’s Simon Reynolds shedding tears as he zips down the Autobahn. I enjoyed this story (and the anecdotes) from Kraftwerk's 1981 concert in India. And you should probably read about how my aforementioned friend David (supposedly) changed his name to "Kraftwerk" and then had a Kraftwerk wedding. After that wedding, we took some Man-Machine-ish photos that ended up in unexpected places. And then there's this Tweet which I really really really hope is true:
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This week Substack (the fine platform that hosts this newsletter) added Bandcamp embeds to its features. Huzzah! Of course, that means I should embed something. I choose the newly remastered reissue of Jon Hassell's debut album from 1977, Vernal Equinox:
I'm posting this for two reasons. First, it's a stunning and stunningly weird album, especially in the context of 1977. It's beautiful and evocative, too, which is a common way to describe Hassell's music.
The second reason I post this is more unfortunate. Hassell's not in the best of health right now, and the present dangers have made his situation direr. Friends and family have set up a GoFundMe page to help Hassell get financial assistance so he can receive the care he requires. [link]
Alternately, Ndeya is Hassell's label, releasing the album above as well as other fantastic music from his career. His latest album of new music, 2018's Listening To Pictures (Pentimento Volume One), is also excellent — a delicious fusion of his unique trumpeting style with experimental electronic production. Give it a listen. And I imagine any purchases on the Ndeya Bandcamp page go directly to Hassell, so that's another reliable way to support this influential artist in these hard times. [link]
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In a recent blog post, Robert Fripp ruminated on 'quiet moments':
A Quiet Moment is how we experience a moment: the moment which is here, now and available. Quiet moments are when we put time aside to be quiet; and also where we find them. Sometimes quiet moments find us.
A Quiet Moment is more to do with how we experience time than how we experience sound. A Quiet Moment prepares the space where Silence may enter. Silence is timeless.
These musings accompany the announcement of Music For Quiet Moments. This is a 50-track series, with one installment released every Friday. These are ambient songs drawn from Fripp's "fifty-one years of being a touring player." He explains further:
[These] Quiet Moments of my musical life, expressed in Soundscapes, are deeply personal; yet utterly impersonal: they address the concerns we share within our common humanity.
Defying a theme of this newsletter episode, you won't find these moments on Bandcamp. Instead, they're on all the streamable places and available to purchase as a less-than-a-dollar download on Fripp's Discipline Global Mobile site. Someone should tell him about Bandcamp, though, as the downloads from his website are a little wackadoodle.
Here's the latest from Music For Quiet Moments:
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I hope you enjoyed this episode of Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care. I finally feel like I’m settling into the newsletter routine. I also have some new tools that are helping to organize this. It’s starting to get fun. As always, let me know if you have any comments or questions or need someone to write to in this challenging time. I'd love to hear from you. You can learn more about me, what I do, and contact me with your comments here.
If you can think of someone wonderful who would like this newsletter, then, by all means, please pass it on. And, yes, sharing Ringo on your favorite social media swamp monster is also appreciated. There are some cool moves planned, so I'm into getting the word out. Your help with that means a lot more than you know.
Thank you so much for reading. This lockdown thing has gone on for a while but I’m feeling okay. I hope you are, too. Hang in there, don’t forget to reach out to your friends, and I’ll see you next week! 🚀