CHAPTER TWO
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN BAND AND LABEL...
Let's talk about how a band gets signed and how they conduct their business with a label as they strive to sell themselves and their music around the world. Obviously this is a very generalised view of how things might work out but will help us understand how videos get made.
EARLY DAYS AND THE FIRST ALBUM
1) Five guys get together in your home town and start a band.
2) They play gigs, make some demos and start to collect a following. Either word gets around about how good they are or they send their demos to their favourite labels.
3) Around this time they meet someone who wants to become their manager - he's from their home town too.
4) One day an A&R person (it stands for Artist & Repertoire but basically means talent scout) sees a gig or hears the demo and wants to sign the band.
5) The band signs a deal which is 'worth millions.' In reality it will certainly cost millions but the band will get but a fraction of the money. The dollars will go towards tour costs, wages, recording costs, picture sessions, hotels...and videos.
6) After some months of hard work the album is completed.
7) The Label Boss presides over a Marketing Meeting attended by the A&R guy, a Marketing Person, A Promotions Person (radio & TV play), a Press person and a Video Commisioner. At this meeting they talk about how they will market the band, what are the selling points of the record, pick a single and figure out how to promote it. You'd think the manager and the band would have some involvement in this meeting - but don't bank on it!
8) The Video commisioner, having taken notes at the Marketing Meeting, sends out the track to a bunch of video directors. She selects a treatment and takes it back to the Label Boss, A&R guy and Marketing Person who discuss its merits and request some changes.
9) Band show up to the video shoot having never read the concept! Video is completed.
10) After three videos of varying success the band sells half a million albums and gigs constantly for a year. The only person in the band making any serious cash is the songwriter - though his royalties probably haven't arrived yet. The label inform the band they're in the hole for about two million bucks.
THE SECOND ALBUM
11) While taking a month off the road to write new songs the band break up with their first manager - he's too small time for them and they sign with some heavyweight guy who's managed five multi-platinum selling bands.
12) While they record the new album the new manager goes to all the heads of department at the label (especially the Video Comissioner) and explains that things will be different this time around. The band will be consulted about the videos.
13) The A&R guy picks a single in the studio and the Video Commisioner sends out the track to video directors. The band hate all the treatments.
14) After The band complain to their manager they get their way and speak with some of the video directors themselves and new treatments arrive. They pick one they like but it's going to cost more money than the label wants to spend. The manager goes to the Label Boss and successfully blags more money.
15) The band shoot the video using their favourite treatment. They love the director, they love the video.
16) The video's a hit.
17) They make two more videos with their director and both are hits.
18) The second album has sold five million albums and the band have been on the road around the world for 18 months. They're now headlining and starting to get some serious cash from the gig money but are stunned to discover that the cost of marketing their albums, making videos etc. and the huge debt acrued by their first album only means that after 4 years of hard work there's about $800,000 profit. The manager skims his 20% off the top leaving the five band members with $128,000 each before tax. By the time they've paid tax they've got enough for a holiday, a new Range Rover and the deposit for a condo in the valley. Meanwhile the guy who writes the band's songs is a millionaire. (These figures are largely inspired guesswork -if someone out there thinks they know better - please let me know).
THIRD ALBUM
19) The band are now crucial to the label's financial well-being. The label adjust their whole business plan for the year around the arrival of the band's next album and the manager has renogiated the band's deal with the label. At this stage the band report directly to the Label Boss and get pretty much whatever they want. The A&R guy has been head-hunted away by another label - just as well because he'd have less control over the band's career now anyway.
20) The band's manager goes directly to the band's favourite video director who comes up with a concept. The Video Commisioner knows nothing about this until a demand arrives from the director's production company asking for a cheque so shooting can start.
21) On the set of the video the band play lip-service to the Video Commisioner who's now largely responsible for making sure the band's limos arrive on time to pick them up in the morning.
22) The next two videos are made in the same way and do well on MTV.
23) The band are now a major touring attraction. All that footage from the road is pulled together by an editor who worked on some of their recent videos to make the 'On The Road' video that will remind people what a huge and important act they have become.
24) A final single is released from the album. The guitar player wants to direct it - everyone at the label rolls their eyeballs and insist that the editor who did such a great job on the On The Road video is hired as a co-director. In the Marketing Meeting everyone from the label figures it's the last video off the album anyway so if it sucks no big deal. By now the lead singer is in the papers every day because he's hanging out with some hot movie starlet. The guy who writes the songs has houses in New York, LA, that town you all come from and is looking at a time share in Maui. While he's learning how to fly his Lear Jet the bass player and drummer are buying three bedroom houses in Woodland Hills and starting to feel very upset.
FOURTH ALBUM
25) The band agree to split all royalties equally and continue (U2) or the songwriter says, "Sod off!" and fires the jealous and miserable band mates (Oasis).
26) Anything could happen now. Perhaps a) The guitar player now thinks he's a genius and co-directs the next video. It goes way over budget and the video stiffs. Possibly b) the band have learned their lesson and hate videos because they cost so much and let the label back in to do the grunt work. Feasibly c) The band's next single is from a movie soundtrack and, though they erroneously and reasonably think it's all about them, it's all about the movie studio picking shots form the movie and the band are just standing somewhere miming.
Eventually one member of the band will become a bona fide star (e.g. Ozzy, Gwen Stefani, Sting, Fred Durst) while their four school-mates, who've been like family and stuck with him through thick and thin, become impoverished has-beens who periodically reform to do re-union shows to make the dollars to pay off those staggering alimony payments to that hot model they met and married somewhere around step 11.
Source: http://www.nigeldick.com/
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