Can Filesharing Help New Artists?

[Unsueable Davey Brown]

The first time I ever saw the name Dave Matthews was on a fellow filesharers hotlist. I downloaded the song, listened, and said to myself, "Hey this guy is good, but you'll never hear him on the radio"

I was using the original Napster at the time, I believe. Later I discovered AudioGalaxy. I remember one, or possibly both services began doing promo give-aways off their front page for Dave Matthews. I downloaded a couple of them, thinking to myself, "I'd better get them while I can, because he'll be gone from view soon."

A curious thing happened. Dave Matthews began appearing more and more on other user's hotlists. One day I was shocked to turn on the TV and see a Dave Matthews song playing, and it wasn't just that the video existed, it was being played on the top 30 countdown.

I got the impression filesharing helped Dave Matthews get recognition. I think it's very possible (probable in fact) filesharing has helped other artists up the ladder. The problem is the only evidence I have to support such a claim is annecdotal.

Does any better evidence of this phenomena exist?

[alliercollins]

Dave Matthews was big before. Other groups though, especially Independant groups are getting increased sales thanks to file sharing. It's not to say that it didn't help that you learned about Dave through file sharing. That is the argument we use when we argue that it should be legal.

I personally learned about a lot of groups through file sharing long before they got big, such as Jimmy Eat World and Autopilot Off.

File sharing allows us to listen to groups that we would normally never have heard of or at least never would have access to their songs. We can then determine whether we want to buy it or not. Without filesharing we wouldn't even have heard it to know if we wanted to buy it or not.

I think that file sharing is the biggest advertisment method that their is. They blame it for declining sales, but we all know that when file sharing was starting up that the biggest seller was Pop music and that died off because all the groups/artists either broke up or matured (they tend to sell less when they stop appealing to the 12 year olds). No one ever mentions that when Pop died, all the top sellers dropped dramatically and it had nothing to do with file sharing.

[moneoa]

The first time I ever saw the name Dave Matthews was on a fellow filesharers hotlist. I downloaded the song, listened, and said to myself, "Hey this guy is good, but you'll never hear him on the radio"

I was using the original Napster at the time, I believe. Later I discovered AudioGalaxy. I remember one, or possibly both services began doing promo give-aways off their front page for Dave Matthews. I downloaded a couple of them, thinking to myself, "I'd better get them while I can, because he'll be gone from view soon."

A curious thing happened. Dave Matthews began appearing more and more on other user's hotlists. One day I was shocked to turn on the TV and see a Dave Matthews song playing, and it wasn't just that the video existed, it was being played on the top 30 countdown.

I got the impression filesharing helped Dave Matthews get recognition. I think it's very possible (probable in fact) filesharing has helped other artists up the ladder. The problem is the only evidence I have to support such a claim is annecdotal.

Does any better evidence of this phenomena exist?
Well see Dave Matthews is not new, he's had a few albums in Canada. Though without filesharing giving him more exposure ouside canada
that might be a pretty logical reason he's turning up other places. By hearing him online there is a new market for his music depending on location and popularity of download.

I think its a good place to expose new artists for that reason.
Interesting to note there are other famous "american" musicians that were famous at home before abroad "Ace of Base", "Alanis Morrisett" <-- this chick has one or two funny pop albums before Jagged little pill, would not think its the same person.
so on and so fourth..now if only the record companies could see this potential

[Unsueable Davey Brown]

I guess I could be confused about the timeline. I should double-check with you guys.

From 91 to 98 Dave Matthews was known primarily as a touring band. He had an album that had limited success in 98. I got Napster when it first appeared in 99. Matthews first double-platinum album appeared in 99.

Here's the thing though. Getting music off the internet did not begin with Napster. The creation of Napster was a reaction to how difficult it was to find music online. It was difficult, but not impossible.

OK let's switch stories here, so you'll understand what I'm getting at. It's generally accepted that Metallica's larger popularity began when fans began swapping concert tapes via snail mail. So if that worked, is it a great leap in logic that Dave Matthews fans were probably swapping his music digitally around 96? Could that have contributed to his popularity among the masses shortly thereafter?

Speaking of touring bands. I had another theory maybe Phish was also connected to a whole new audience by filesharing. Do you think that's possible.?

[alliercollins]

I guess I could be confused about the timeline. I should double-check with you guys.

From 91 to 98 Dave Matthews was known primarily as a touring band. He had an album that had limited success in 98. I got Napster when it first appeared in 99. Matthews first double-platinum album appeared in 99.

Here's the thing though. Getting music off the internet did not begin with Napster. The creation of Napster was a reaction to how difficult it was to find music online. It was difficult, but not impossible.

OK let's switch stories here, so you'll understand what I'm getting at. It's generally accepted that Metallica's larger popularity began when fans began swapping concert tapes via snail mail. So if that worked, is it a great leap in logic that Dave Matthews fans were probably swapping his music digitally around 96? Could that have contributed to his popularity among the masses shortly thereafter?

Speaking of touring bands. I had another theory maybe Phish was also connected to whole new audience by filesharing. Do you think that's possible.?

First off, Dave Matthews Band was well known before 1998. They had two hit videos on MTV for a while called Ants Marching and What Would You Say, both in 1995. 1996 brought Crash Into Me. Those are three of their biggest hits to date and 3 of the 4 that you hear non stop on the radio still.

When you say your little blurb about music sharing not beginning with Napster, are you trying to educate me? I go much further back than Napster. I thought we were having a discussion on only Napster and after. You were the one who brought it up.

Everyone who file shares knows that it helps music by promoting artists. You need to pick better artists for discussion though since they were MTV/radio staples from 1995 on.

Pick a group like Jimmy Eat World for example. They were dropped from their label and force to fund their own record. They put it together and then got promotion on Audiogalaxy by giving out Bleed American for free before their album was out. They had a whole writeup about how they were the next big thing. Well I downloaded it, loved it, and then bought the cd. They then had three consecutive hits and a lot of people actually had known about them prior to that due to their little writeup on Audiogalaxy.

File sharing has allowed me to discover Independant and Foreign bands with a greater ease. Bands I would never have normally heard of and if I did see somethign about them, I would never have actually heard their music had I not been able to download it.

And Moneoa. It goes both ways. Think about how successful Bush was in the mid 90s. They were a UK band that didn't get a record deal in the UK, instead they got one in the US and never became that big over there. Yet they went so many times platinum on each album that I have lost count.

[Unsueable Davey Brown]

When you say your little blurb about music sharing not beginning with Napster, are you trying to educate me?

Not at all. I'm requesting you and other users more knowledgeable than myself educate me. I want to get the details straight. To be honest, you're fast becoming my hero. :heart

That was interesting about Jimmy Eat World and AudioGalaxy. I remember those AudioGalaxy promotions too. They had to have helped up and coming artists. I can't think of anything as effective that's around right now where the promotion is connected to the filesharing app. Can you correct me on that?

It brings up this other theory you hear from time to time, that goes, the real reason the RIAA is stepping on filesharing so hard is because services such as the original AudioGalaxy would evolve into services that would allow new artists to gain greater personal control over their chances for non-industry reliant success,

Does anything like support for that theory exist?

[alliercollins]

Djs are the success story of file sharing. The support you need revolves around that Beatles/Jay-z remix album. I think it was the grey album. That became huge online and it upset the RIAA. There have been others to.

[Unsueable Davey Brown]

On another thread Janett 999 directed me to that story of how Steve Winwood allied himself with Access Hollywood to use filesharing for Promotional purposes.

Steve Winwood Filesharing Story (http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,64128,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_3)

It's interesting that the RIAA declined comment on that story. I want to start collecting stories like that one, the Danger Mouse story, and the Jimmy Eat World story.

Another thing just popped into my head. Do you remember when Lindows (now Linspire) was offering a file through filesharing services. Did anyone ever hear any results about that. Did it increase sales, or hurt them? Did Microsoft protest? Has anyone else used filesharing to their advantage? Did Michael Moore inviting people to fileshare Farenheit 9/ll hurt sales? Is their any evidence filesharing the movie affected it commercially one way or the other?

[alliercollins]

Farenheit 9/11 outsold his last documentary on the first week it was out. It is the top selling one ever.

Lindows gave their OS out for free from the site... So I don't think they are that worried about sales anymore.

[Unsueable Davey Brown]

Lindows gave their OS out for free from the site... So I don't think they are that worried about sales anymore.

Yeah I remember that. I actually downloaded it. I get newletters from them now telling me how wonderful everything is going, and claiming Microsoft is out to get them, but I have no way of knowing if it's all hype.

The Linspire torrent promo thing though. Seriously? Am I wrong about that? I was almost positive they went to filesharing apps after the popularity of the give-away. I think I got the idea from sites like the following:

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=15366

OK, it's not the most trustworthy. So stop me before I link again LOL. Is there any truth to that Linspire as torrent story?