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Selling out in the industry

In music the term selling out is thrown around a lot, but what does it mean? Selling out in music can mean anything from a band changing their style to their music being used in a commercial way. One band that was accused of selling out were Pop-Punk giants Blink-182. After the album Enema of the State was released long time fans of the band and genre claimed that the album started the decline of the Punk franchise. This caused such a stir in the punk community that Sex Pistol Johnny Rotten was asked to give his view on the band, to which he replied that “they should be a permanent feature on Saturday night Live” The rock legend also said they were a “bunch of silly boy” and that they were an imitation of a comedy act. When asked for his views on the subject Mike Dirnt of Green Day said “If there’s a formula to selling out, I think every band in the world would be doing it. The fact that you write good songs and you sell too many of them, if everybody in the world knew how to do that they’d do it. It’s not something we chose to do. Selling out is compromising your musical intentions and we don’t know how to do that.”

 When bands are starting out then they may get picked up by a corporate company to support an ad campaign or even a festival. This can often be the main source of income for that band. All sorts of brands can be sponsors for festivals such as Doritos, Monster Energy and Rockstar Energy drink. In 2011 All Time Low released the music video for I Feel Like Dancin , the video was sponsored by Rockstar Energy drink. The video features a lot of Rockstar banners and people wearing Rockstar merchandise. Warped Tour in america is footed by Vans and presented by Journeys. The list of sponsors for 2017 include: Riserecords, Skullcandy, Hard Rock, Fueled by Ramen, Fearless Records and Blackcraft.

 Starting out in a band can be one of the most daunting things that you can do especially when it comes to financing gigs and possible EP releases. If you don’t get signed by someone straight away then chances are you will be self financing everything you do from just a small bar gig to releasing an album. I spoke to Andrew Procter, the Milestones Guitarist and Brad Garcia, Safe to Say vocalist and guitarist to find out what it is like starting out in a band and how much they have had to self-finance:

 A: Everything in the first two years of Milestones was completely self funded from recording our debut EP, touring, shooting music videos, online promotion and printing merch. Luckily some of us were in university or had jobs so we just used the money from student finance/wages to pay for all of it.

 B: Literally every tour we do is self funded and being in a smaller band that’s still growing you’ll find more often than not that it’s VERY hard to make money. We have self funded every album or EP except our most recent, We had label support but still ended up spending some of our own money to afford doing it the way we wanted.

   Artists all over the world may have been told that they have to change their music style in order to sell more. Labels may often ask artists to change their style of music because it makes the label more money and not necessarily the band or artist that is being told they have to do this otherwise they might be dropped. I asked Andrew and Brad if they had ever been forced by a label to change their style of music:

 A: Our label has never directly influenced our music, when new songs are finished they want to listen to the tracks and will give us feedback both musically and lyrically but the majority of the creative control is ours.

 B: We’ve been lucky to sign to a label that lets us be as creative as we want even if it means selling less records for them (SideOneDummy records)

 The internet has become the biggest platform in the world for people to release music on. Whether it’s YouTube or Spotify there are new artists being discovered everyday by all kinds of people. There are many artists that have started out on the internet and gone on to sign record deals, they may have started out doing covers of their favourite songs and artists and then progressed to writing their own music. A great example of someone who started out this way is Patty Walters of As It Is, Patty started out creating covers on his own in his bedroom at home. He would film himself stood in the room with his guitar and a microphone and just sing the song, these covers ranged from classic Pop Punk hits like This is Gospel by Panic! At The Disco to rock versions of Disney songs. Along with his friends Patty formed the band in 2012 and consists of Benjamin Biss - Guitar and Vocals, Patrick Foley - Drums, Andy Westhead - Guitar, Alistair Testo - Bass and backing vocals and Patty Walters - Lead Vocals and Acoustic Guitar. The group started by posting up songs that Patty had written and Released four EP’s. They were signed to Fearless Records on October 2nd 2014, Following this the band released their first album Never Happy Ever After the following year and then in 2017 they released Okay. I also asked Andrew and Brad for their views on how the internet has affected musicians:

 A: I think the internet is definitely an enabler for musicians just starting out, with so many different platforms for them to upload their songs/music videos it is a lot easier for them to connect with people

 B:The internet is the best tool for musicians because you don’t NEED a label anymore to gather your fans and share your music. If you’re able to do it and go 100% into it via YouTube or whatever else, you’ll be just fine. You just need the non-stop content.

 For many artists mainstream chart pop and commercial music is their main and only source of income. Chart pop is a great way for artists to become very well known and a household name. Some artists will allow advertising companies to use their music and maybe their image in order to sell a product or service. This can cause the artist to become associated with that particular thing, the artist can earn more money by doing this. Sometimes a mainstream artist can receive backlash because of the nature of their music.This form of music can put very young people in the limelight and this can become very hard on them growing up. When asked about their views on commercial chart pop andrew and brad had this to say:

 A: Personally i love pop music, it has definitely changed and influenced so many new and upcoming artists for the better.

 B: There’s a lot of nonsense but for the most part i love it, People don’t realise that it’s actually way harder to write a top 40 pop song that is just seemingly a chorus over and over again. There’s a real science to it.

 When it comes to music the more experimental genres get so much more backlash from the public because of their controversial messages and meanings. Bands like Radiohead have received a lot of hate from the public due to their style of music. People hate on Radiohead because to them their style of music, for most, is not what they expect music to be, they aren’t mainstream their style is very experimental. The band do not fit into a certain box with in the music scene and they are a band that demand to be listened to and a lot of people do not like that. People often view music as a background track to their life and for most Radiohead do not fit into their ideal. I asked Brad and Andrew for their views:

 A: I’ve always found experimental bands fun to listen to, especially because there are no limits in that style of music with it not following typical pop structure. It makes great inspiration for songwriting.

 B: There’s also a lot of nonsense here but i’m usually most inspired by artists that challenge themselves and push (or try to push) boundaries.

Note: This was written way before the news of Andy leaving  AS IT IS surfaced hense why he is still in as a member of the band