The Monday Mix - Indie Bands Selling Out Part II - Art For The Sake Of Art or Crass Commercialism?

Last week we talked about ways to fund your efforts through corporate sponsorships.

Let's discuss the ramifications today.

We quoted an article authored by Jessica Hopper last week which I think is an incredible read. Maybe take a look at that before we trudge onward.

These days, getting a song placed on a commercial, in a movie, in a video game or on a television series has proven to be a career-defining move for a wide variety of performers, from Lou Reed and Nick Drake to San Cisco, the Black Keys and Arctic Monkeys.

Music placement in film, television, and advertisements has quickly become a significant revenue source for musicians and the music industry. Most importantly, it has become a new platform for A&R and allows the opportunity for relatively unknown artists to break. Any genre of music has a place on film and TV, but the most licensable music tends to be of the indie, electronic, rock, singer-songwriter, and pop varieties.

As far as fan management, it used to be that hardcore fans cringed when they heard thirty second samples of their favorite band’s music in a television ad.  It's almost as if being commercially viable completely removes the indie vibe from the equation or excludes indie artists from some imaginary underground fraternity. These days, a song in a commercial is more likely to attract fans than drive them away.  In fact, many fans actually discover music through television ads, film and television soundtracks and popular video games.

Indie purists are vehemently opposed.  One need only peruse the comments sections of some of the more popular indie music blogs to see the distaste associated with ad placement of their favorite songs. And that presents a conundrum of sorts. You never like to lose a few fans, but you have to eat, too. The whole starving artist thing doesn't seem so underground hip and indie cool when you're the starving artist.  And, it's fair to assume that fans who do love your band for the purity of your music tend to forget that a band is a business with real expenses, real profit and loss margins and a real need to fund a very expensive entity that more often than not costs a lot more to run than it returns.

The underlying question remains - art for art's sake or crass commercialism?  And apparently (and unfortunately), it's a fine line with no filter. Some purists even scoff at music videos that are anything but recorded, live performances.  How dare you feed yourself?

You can find songs from Lust For Life by Iggy Pop in dozens of placements.  Nick Drake, too. Does that mean they've sold out? Nick Drake has been dead since 1974 and in 1974 most advertising campaigns, if not all advertising campaigns, revolved around fifteen second jingles designed to earworm the listener into buying their products.  You may remember "Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz, oh what a relief it is...... " or "Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun......." yada, yada, yada.

An aside here:  The Alka-Seltzer jingle, "Plop, plop, fizz, fizz......." was written by Paul Marguiles, father of actress Julianna Marguiles.  You may use that bit of trivia to win yourself a beer next time you are out among friends.

Continuing.......

I may be wrong, but the first commercial placement of a popular song that I can remember is Anticipation by Carly Simon for Heinz Ketchup.  The Hillside Singers recorded an expanded version of I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing (In Perfect Harmony)after it originally found success as a 1971 jingle for Coca-Cola's Buy The World A Coke campaign.

The best of the very few ad jingles still running include ads for State Farm, Empire Carpets and those Free Credit Report (dot com) commercials. We've come a long way, baby, to get where we've got to today.  I guess indie musicians put a lot of jingles writers on unemployment. Maybe those jingles writers are the ones who started the "selling out" smear campaigns directed at indie artists.

It wouldn't be that shocking. A jingle creator can make as much as $180,000 for a single song, or more than $500,000 if the tune is a hit and gets repeat licensing, according to a profile of one jingle production company in The Los Angeles Times.

Maybe you need to hold out for more dough if you are approached about synch licensing.

"And what do you say about Irving Berlin and Cole Porter, and all the other songwriters who wrote songs specifically for movies, or worse (from a purist’s point of view), rewrote songs so they would fit a particular movie scene? They were engaged in a commercial enterprise; if they also created art, well, that was a happy byproduct. Even Franz Schubert, creating his art-songs in early 19th century Vienna, meant for those songs to get his name out there, so he would both have something to play at parties (his Schubertiades, as they were known) and something that could be published and perhaps bring in a few shekels, because god knows the symphonies weren’t doing it for them. "
[Quote via David Dye of WNYC Soundcheck]

In the end, what does commercial placement ultimately mean?  It means three things:  New audiences are discovering your music, you are getting paid for licensing of your music, and you are ultimately selling more music.  Selling music, therefore, must equate to selling out.  As I said, how dare you feed yourself?

THIS WEEK'S TOP FIVE LIST

Top five earwormers (commercial jingles) of all time.

1. Empire Carpets --"Just call 588-2300, Empire......."
2. State Farm Insurance  -- "Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there."
3. Bain de Soleil -- "Bain de Soleil for the Saint-Tropez tan."
4. Oscar-Mayer Hot Dogs --"Oh I wish I were an Oscar-Mayer Wiener......"
5. Alka-Seltzer --"Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz Oh what a relief it is....."

THIS WEEK'S FACEBOOK FRIENDS



I know it's shameless advertising, and sorry, we have no catchy jingle, but it's us.  It's Cyber Monday. If you want to do something nice for the holidays, why not buy your favorite band a Jivewired Digital One Sheet or give your favorite indie fan a Jivewired T-Shirt?

In the meantime, Facebook Friend us right here, please and thank you.

VIDEO OF THE WEEK

Where Not To Look For Freedom by The Belle Brigade



ABOUT THE MONDAY MIX

The Monday Mix airs from Noon to 5:30PM CDT each Monday and is designed to help you get through that brutal after-lunch, energy-sucking span that kicks off every work week. This particular show will be a mix of old, deep album cuts and new indie music with a lot of genre crossover. No Adele. Sorry.

What else does The Monday Mix do? Well, it helps you discover new indie music by combining some really great under the radar tracks with more established songs that were, once in fact, under the radar as well. The hope here is that the culture shock of discovering your next favorite band won't be so enormously imposing if we surround the new stuff with some of your old, familiar friends.

Jivewired supports independent musicians by paying royalties for airplay on Jivewired Radio. Please help us support indie artists by listening to our station and by purchasing indie music. Thank you. The links on the radio player will give you download options if you really dig on the music and some of the songs are offered for free.

To listen, just press play on the radio widget to the right or use this link to open in a new window that will allow you to listen when you navigate away from this page:

Launch Jivewired Radio

MONDAY MIX PLAYLIST FOR 25 NOVEMBER 2013

1. The Paper Trench by Admiral Fallow
2. Losers by The Bell Brigade
3. Hold That Thought by Ben Folds Five
4. Breakers by Local Natives
5. Ain't No Stranger by Lee Bains III & Glory Fires
6. Remember Last Time by Avi Buffalo
7. Strange Transmissions [Chillout Mix] by Norah Jones & Peter Malick
8. Still Left To Roam by Grazzhopper
9. Hello Narwhal by TAUK
10. Tetop by The McLovins
11. I'm Writing A Novel by Father John Misty
12. The Only Place by Best Coast
13. Busted Up by The Replacements
14. Catch Me Now by American Dreamers
15. I Believe In You by Sinead O'Connor
16. Man by Neko Case
17. Curtains Drawn by Crown Point
18. Sacrilege by Yeah Yeah Yeahs
19. Laid by James
20. Where Not To Look For Freedom by The Belle Brigade
21. Heart Of Colifax by Andy Palmer
22. Way Down Now by World Party
23. Maria by Dr. Pants
24. Wrapped Around Her Finger by Mikey Ohlin
25. Christmas Katie by Widespread Panic
26. Good Change by The Big O Trio
27. Caledonia Blue by Chloe Johns & Justin Cooper
28. Everything Is Embarrassing by Sky Ferreira
29. Crying Tree by Fiawna Forte
30. Do I Wanna Know? by Arctic Monkeys
31. Calm Before The Storm by The Bats
32. Sunday by Jet West
33. No Control by Pepper
34. Justice by Burning Slow
35. The Hard Way by Massy Ferguson feat. Zoe Muth
36. Between You & Me by Cary Morin
37. Good Spirits by Jakob Tovar & The Saddle Tramps
38. Strangers by Rache La Vonne
39. She Will by Savages
40. Yellow Red Sparks by Yellow Red Sparks
41. Other Side [Stuck Together Remix] by Atoms For Peace
42. Downpour by Lovebettie
43. Looking For You by Lannie Flowers
44. Sick by Sneaker Pimps
45. Be Your Own Machine by The Bourgeois
46. Handbag by The Imperial
47. Honky Tonk Devil by Craig Plumlee
48. Folk Singers by Chris Lee Becker
49. Reflektor by Arcade Fire
50. Sun by Two Door Cinema Club
51. Sinking Ships by Don Gallardo
52. Wakin' On A Pretty Day by Kurt Vile
53. Does She Know Yet? by Tae Phoenix
54. Merry Go Round by Shani
55. Wait by Colin Gilmore
56. Sorry About Last Night by Wally Dogger
57. Uh Oh by Super Water Sympathy
58. Before We Run by Yo La Tengo
59. Birdhouse In Your Soul by They Might Be Giants
60. Here Comes Your Man by The Pixies
61. Awkward by San Cisco
62. Sitting Still by R.E.M.
63. Just A Ride by Jem
64. Trip On Love by Abra Moore
65. Eyeoneye by Andrew Bird
66. Big Love by Matthew E. White
67. Hey Hey Hey by The Quick & Easy Boys
68. Santa Cruz by Foreign Talks
69. This Is Not Love by Well Hung Heart
70. Lying To Myself by The Can't Tells
71. Part Past Part Fiction by The Chills
72. Coming For You by von Grey
73. Me & My Guitar by The David Castro Band
74. Riot Rhythm by Sleigh Bells
75. Dear Madam Barnum by XTC
76. Put The Message In The Box by World Party
77. For Anyone by Star Anna
78. Evil Girls by Escondido
79. Little Song by Shauna Burns
80. Body & Soul by Goldenboy