Steve Albini on the state of the music industry
by Chris Singleton
It's been a little while since I posted in The Prescription: many apologies for that, I've been very preoccupied with the build of the new Prescription PR website (we hope you like it).
We're still beavering away on certain aspects of the new site so actually, you're not going to get a series of useful tips from me today. However, what you ARE going to get is a very interesting speech from Steve Albini - the keynote address at the 2014 Face the Music event in Melbourne - where he ruminates on the 'surprisingly sturdy state of the music industry.' In the speech he discusses the changes that the internet has brought to the music industry, and how he feels they've been overwhelmingly positive in nature for bands:
“In short, the internet has made it much easier to conduct the day-to-day business of being in a band and has increased the efficiency. Everything from scheduling rehearsals using online calendars, to booking tours by email, to selling merchandise and records from online stores, down to raising the funds to make a record is a new simplicity that bands of the pre-internet era would salivate over. The old system was built by the industry to serve the players inside the industry. The new system where music is shared informally and the bands have a direct relationship to the fans was built by the bands and the fans in the manner of the old underground. It skips all the intermediary steps”
You can read the full text of the speech over on the Guardian website or watch the video of it below. Regardless of whether you agree or disagree with Albini's optimism for the future of the music industry, the way he describes its past, present and potential future amounts to a fascinating read and I'd recommend that any band or artist currently working on a music project check it out (unless you're a Prince fan, for reasons which will become clear towards the end).