There has been a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth about the state of the music industry – much of it, I should say, coming from inside the music industry. But even casual observers have to worry – if only to wonder whether their favorite musicians will have to go back to stocking shelves in order to make ends meet. CD sales are down again by double digits in 2008; illegal file-sharing dwarfs the impressive gains made by iTunes and emusic.com and Amazon’s digital download service. The favorite analogy to use for the big record labels is the dinosaur, and for good reason. With the dawning of a new, digital age, EMIosaurus and Warner Brothers Rex and Universalceratops couldn’t or wouldn’t evolve, and the ones looking most likely to survive are the small, agile labels that have been running between the dinosaurs’ feet for the past few years. They’re just not likely to survive on the revenue from CD sales.
As we head towards the second decade of the 21st century, music seems to be shifting focus; CDs and other recorded media, including the mp3 file, are now a calling card, not the end product. The calling card is what will get fans to the clubs when a band tours (we’re seeing this with indie rockers, with string quartets, and almost everything in between) – the live concert is once again becoming the way musicians earn their living. This may scare the remaining major record labels, but if you think about it, the whole concept of music as a physical commodity is a bizarre one to begin with. For most of human history, music has been experienced as a live performance – or even better, as a communal act. I wonder if, 200 years from now, people will look back at the age of the record industry’s supremacy as a kind of weird blip on the screen.
Recorded music will not disappear, and in fact will probably become more widespread than ever. But except for a tiny percentage of top-selling pop artists, it is unlikely to become the type of revenue stream that will sustain the excesses of the 20th century music industry.
Tell us: What do you think? Should the record labels ask for a government bailout a la the car makers? Or should we just say good riddance? Leave a comment.
John Schaefer has hosted Soundcheck since the show’s inception in 2002. He has also hosted and produced WNYC’s radio series New Sounds since 1982 (“The No. 1 radio show for the Global Village” – Billboard) and the New Sounds Live concert series since 1986.
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