noizemagazine - Index

noizemagazine - Spring 2008 Issue # 55 - Index

A New Way To Masterbeat
The premier dance music compilation label is pioneering a
new online downloading service
by D. Michael Taylor
Being a record executive used to be glamorous. Crisscrossing the world in company
jets, wining and dining celebrities on an expense account, living out the
rock-‘n’-roll dream in high style. But after years of steadily declining album sales,
the multi-billion dollar music industry is having a crippling identity crisis.
In a dramatic sign of change to this
once lavish executive lifestyle, EMI’s
new chairman sent out a memo
late last year detailing many of the
former regime’s excesses. Notable
offenses included a $10 million
London penthouse that was used
only one night every two weeks,
and $40,000 spent on candles for
an LA apartment used to entertain
artists.
In May of last year, Warner Music
Group, home to heavyweight labels
such as Atlantic, Sire, Bad Boy, and
Elektra, laid off 400 of their employees.
In January, Alicia Keys had the
#1 selling album in the world, yet
it sold a little more than 60,000
copies—the second-worst sales of
all time for a #1 album, after the
Dreamgirls soundtrack a year previous.
In the heyday of the pre-digital
world, a #1 album was expected
to sell hundreds of thousands of
units. In 2000, the Top Ten albums
sold 60 million copies, but by 2006
that number dropped to 25 million.
Total album sales declined by 16%
in 2007 alone. It’s enough to turn a
once-coveted career into a fate you
wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy.
The major labels tried to blame Internet
piracy and file-sharing sites like Napster
for this depressing spiral, but evidence
seems to point away from a direct link
between illegal downloads and plummeting
album sales. Certainly the iPod
revolution has made one of the largest
dents in the traditional music market,
but even accounting for digital purchases,
there is still a general decline
in consumer activity when it comes to
album sales. There are larger trends at
work that no one seems to be able to
fully comprehend yet, but it is becoming
increasingly clear that the old methods
of distributing and promoting music are
on the way out, and if you snooze, you
will lose in a big way.
One major player that definitely hasn’t
fallen asleep at the wheel is Masterbeat.
As the clock struck midnight on New
Year’s Eve, Brett Henrichsen and his
team launched the beta version of
10
‘People go out, they hear a
track and they want to download
it that night—not wait for
the CD to come out.’