Remember Itunes? yeah… me either, it feels like there is now an entire generation that does not understand the struggle of convincing your mom for some Itunes card so you can buy your Favorite artists album, later in Itunes life you could convert a link from YouTube. but past the fact that it was illegal, I always wanted to support artists that I liked. that all changed in about 2014 when Spotify started to gain a following.
Now all you need is ten dollars, a family account, or maybe even somewhere closer to five dollars a month if you are a student for unlimited downloaded music with nearly every artist and every artist’s song are at the tip of your fingers at almost any time you want it. this did not happen without consequence though, both positive and negative, Spotify and other streaming services seem to be here for the foreseeable future, and are not going anywhere, this has caused something I like to call the “Spotify Effect”. The Spotify effect is just how streaming services have affected the music industry. it has shifted the music industry, and in many ways, it has shifted a lot of the power in the music industry from the large record companies to the artists instead.
Let me take you back to the early 2000s, the music industry was suffering heavily due to pirated music and have cut the music industry by nearly 66% due to this, in the 2000s there was not much experimentation in the music industry, many artists that were considered “middle of the road” artists that played music that was already very well established, such as Adele, Ed Sheeran, and Mumford & Sons, I love these artists, but you can tell their early 2000’s music is playing it safe, although still very good music and very well put together. But now with Spotify, that has become a thing of the past, obviously, artists still make music that is defined by genre, but much more experimentation can be used and the labels are okay with that, why? because with Spotify royalties, the record label gets more of a cut (and has rebounded from the early 2000’s record label recession.) this has also given artists who are not well-known opportunities to put out their music on Spotify and other streaming services (such as SoundCloud) and they can become viral, and put their songs on the charts, artists like Alyssa Clara, Post Malone, Swae Lee, and nearly every artist that has “made it” since 2014 had something to do with some kind of streaming service that gave them a platform to put out their music onto the internet.
If you are an artist today, take advantage that has been given to you, you have the luxury of doing everything that is done in a high-end studio in LA right in your room in the computer, this is prime time for musicians, put your music out there, and be heard. Good luck, and strive to create.