NEW RECORDINGS IN THE WORKS
Against all odds and better judgement, I continue to write new songs and record them, it’s in my DNA. When I first started, record companies financed everything. It wasn’t a perfect plan as many artists were underpaid to put it nicely, but at least we didn’t have to get a bank loan to make records. When I started recording again in the early 2000s, things had changed dramatically as Indie artists were making their own records without a record company. It was nice change as we were able to support ourselves and make new music because we sold lots of merchandise that financed the recordings. Things were going great until iTunes was launched and fans could buy one song at a time which reduced CD sales dramatically. It wasn’t great but at least we made approximately half the money on mp3 sales. None of us liked it but we championed on. Next nail in the coffin was when cars and computers no longer installed CD players.
Man we thought we were pissed then!!! Along comes Spotify and the rest of the streaming companies which basically pay us Indie artists nothing. Years earlier Napster started doing a similar thing but were sued and put out of business because it was illegal to give artist’s songs away. What’s the difference and why is it OK now. Then came all of the fan supported platforms like Kickstarter, Pledge Music, Go Fund Me etc which gave fans a chance to support artists with recordings, touring, advertising, paying for outside performers, mastering, artworks and all the other stuff we were happy to pay for in the past but could no longer do in today’s biz. Again, these platforms took a big cut of the donations and eventually enough was enough. Most of us release music because it’s all we’ve ever known. The best was to support artists today is to pay it forward by donating money to help with all the expenses and another is if you love streaming, pay the artists you love directly for what you used to pay for CDs.
And that brings me to today. I have been recording two new songs for a few months now and it’s time to hire some outside talent to make the recordings be as good as possible. Next will be mixing, mastering, distribution and advertising.
If you’d like to help, it would be much appreciated. If not, I’ll find a way. I can’t help myself!!!!!
Thanks for all the support.
John Batdorf
