Blog - Traxploitation

Distribution: Why “Keep 100% of Your Royalties” is a lie.

You have probably seen the promise that you will “Keep 100% of your royalties” when taking up a subscription-based distribution…

Welcome to Meeksville: The Incredible World of Joe Meek.

Robert George “Joe” Meek was a song-writer, producer and sound engineer. He was also an independent label, publisher and studio…

Record your next release in Iceland and get 25% of your costs reimbursed by the State Treasury!

Several countries around the world offer incentives to get movies and TV shows filmed and produced in their country. It’s…

The Lion King’s Ransom: The story of “Mbube”, “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” and the 70 years struggle to get the writer, Solomon Linda credited.

I’m sure you’ve heard at least one of the versions or adaptations of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”. It has been…

Mime & Punishment? The rise and fall of Milli Vanilli

On the 21st of July 1989, during a “live” performance for MTV the playback device failed and began to skip.…

PledgeMusic goes bankrupt, other sites in decline. What is the future for crowdfunding in the music industry?

In early May 2019 music crowdfunding website PledgeMusic announced it was officially entering bankruptcy. Most of the artists who were…

Bittersweet Victory: Why The Rolling Stones owned 100% of a song they didn’t write and how the writer got it back.

At the 2019 Ivor Novello Awards, Richard Ashcroft announced that after 22 years the dispute over his song, “Bittersweet Symphony”…

Who should you join? (In order to make sure you are paid everything you are entitled to)

Aside from the distributors and retailers of music, there are a huge number of societies, organisations and companies that collect…

The Possible Effects of Brexit on Independent Artists from the UK

As March 29th, 2019 approaches, with no Brexit deal in sight, it’s still unclear what will actually happen if the…

UK Distributor dumps independent labels with “Dear John” style letters (that in some cases they forgot to even send).

A well known UK distributor early last year starting dumping independent labels, sending some the following letter.
“Dear “label name here”….

The Truth About Spotify. Part 3.

Summary and conclusion

The Truth about Spotify. Part 2

In part 1, I went over the basic principles of how Spotify works and addressed some of the talking points…

The Truth about Spotify. Part 1

Streaming accounts for 37% of all the revenue from recorded music and with over 220million subscribers and a market share of 36% Spotify are by far the market leader in music streaming.

Picking a Distributor

One of the most important decisions you will have to make as a self-releasing artist and/or independent record label is…

Trump Signs “Music Modernization Act” but the USA is still decades behind the rest of the world.

On the 11th October 2018, President Trump signed the Music Modernization Act (MMA). It’s being hailed as groundbreaking , and while it certainly is for the USA and performers from that country it is not an example of the USA leading the way, far from it.

Bandcamp: 9 Reasons every self-releasing artist should have one.

In the 10 years, or so, that Bandcamp has existed, over $312million has been paid to artists via Bandcamp. Oddly though, about half the artists I speak to don’t have a Bandcamp, so it seems you may need some convincing.
Here are 9 reasons why every self-releasing artist should have one.

PPL and PRS for Music launch joint venture

You may have seen in the music press that PPL and PRS for Music have launched a joint venture, PPL PRS Ltd, to bring public performance licenses under one roof, but what does this mean for you, the composers and performers.

Unhappy with your PRS and PPL royalties? 6 Things you can do today to increase your future payments.

0n June 29th, PPL made their main annual distribution of royalties to its members. More than £150million was paid out,…

Self-Release Checklist: 8 Essentials you must have before you release your music yourself.

So you’ve finally finished mixing your latest project and you’re ready to release it, or are you?I’ve met a lot…

You are not just a self-releasing artist, you are an independent record company… here’s why that matters.

One of the mandatory questions on the PPL rightsholder registration form is “label name”. Quite often people would get stuck…

The $25billion question…What is music copyright?

When a song is written, and then recorded, there are two copyrights involved. The owners of these copyrights get control…

The lowdown on plagiarism in the music industry, and how to protect yourself.

A question I get asked a lot is how to “copyright” your songs, or generally protect them. The question isn’t…

Why self-releasing artists shouldn’t always trust music industry information from the USA (…and why performers from the USA should be angry).

More often than not the information you find online about the music industry comes from the USA. The assumption is…

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