What To Expect In 2025
The media will focus on a handful of pop acts when the true action will be in smaller acts outside the national consciousness who focus on touring and merch as opposed to bitching about Spotify payouts.
Country will grow and grow. Country is the new hip-hop, but the northern elite controlled media continues to look down upon it, hating the same people who they believe are ignorant and voted for Trump. Country is rock in sheep’s clothing. Rock devolved into Active Rock, a marginalized format that you need a decoder and a deep knowledge of history to understand while country took the big guitars of rock anthems, added choruses and gained mindshare. Furthermore, to this day country acts, unlike pop acts, are not dependent upon hits, they are building careers, and careers are forever.
Acts will continue to bitch about Spotify. Believing we still live in the physical era and everybody who makes music is entitled to a living. No one is stopping you from selling CDs at your gig, never mind overpriced vinyl oftentimes to fans who don’t even own a turntable. If few are listening, why should you get paid? There’s a lot to complain about with major corporations but they and their practices are not always the reason you’re unsuccessful.
Spotify will be forced to respond to Liz Pelly’s new book “Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist.” You know Pelly’s accusations are true by the lack of Spotify’s response. Spotify denied Drake’s accusations… When the book finally comes out Spotify…will have a hard time defending itself, and if the major labels come down hard enough they’ll eliminate the practice. However, never forget most people do not get turned on to new music via playlists, playlists are mostly used as background music, which is why Spotify can get away with this program. However, every bogus stream does take away money from the overall pool. But don’t believe if you’re a marginal artist the elimination of this game will show up in your bank account.
The public will still believe that Spotify pays a per stream rate. And will state that Apple pays more per stream, not knowing that’s because Apple subscribers are less active listeners. Once again, it’s a pool of money that’s divided based on overall listens. Everybody does it the same way, but Spotify gets the heat because it’s the dominant service, active listeners are on Spotify.
The public will continue to misunderstand ticket fees, believing they all go to Ticketmaster and that the acts are completely innocent. The business is built on faith in the acts, and almost nothing can undercut that. Having said that, acts need to beware of their image, one false move can hurt you, assuming it’s big enough. Then again, everybody is ultimately forgiven, except for maybe R. Kelly, but his music still streams! If the track is good enough, it doesn’t matter who the artist is or what they have done, people will listen.
Classic rockers will continue to die. If you want to see them, see them now.
Club business will continue to decline.
EDM is forever, but it’s just a very big niche, which will peak again, but not soon.
The acts selling tickets in the clubs that still exist and theatres are completely unlike the pop stuff dominating the Spotify Top 50. Despite all the hype for these charting acts, the acts winning on the road actually know how to play their instruments and don’t dance to hard drive. What sells at this level is skill, songwriting, credibility and an ultimate bond with the audience.
Billy Strings shows that the public is hungry for skilled players. Imagine if Strings could actually write a great song! It always comes down to the song, and no matter how good a player you are, sans a great song you will always be hobbled.
Writing the songs yourself will continue to grow and be a badge of honor. The public is looking for honesty, this is the essence of Zach Bryan. Songs written by committee will be for the pop charts, and unless you’re a pop act, if you use Jack Antonoff it’s going to work against you, even if your song has some success, fans are sophisticated, they want their act to be unique, not just the latest work by the producer du jour.
The major labels will continue to believe they can buy anything successful. But the tools in their box continue to decline. Radio, TV and print mean less than ever before. But, having said that, if you dangle a big enough check, artists have a hard time resisting this.
The major labels will have no new competitors. In recorded music, that is. Because the majors sustain on catalog, which represents not only easy revenue, but power. Sans catalog and the revenue it generates no new label can truly compete. Having said that, publishers are the major labels’ big competitors today. Primary Wave is better for legacy acts than any label. And Primary Wave operates like a label, with product managers, not even doing the administration like most publishers. This is the wave of the future. As for Merck and Hipgnosis… The problem was interest rates, they went up and the investment in Hipgnosis looked bad. When it comes to publishing you don’t want a hypesters running your business, but someone with experience as a CFO.
Acts will continue to sell their catalogs and then wake up one day angry when their song is used in a commercial and they don’t get paid. Revenue for copyright is only going up, if you’re selling you don’t believe in the business…and yourself.
Springsteen selling to Sony undercuts the essence of what built the Boss, truth, justice and the American Way. Music is about the rugged individual speaking truth to power. Once you sell, you’re just another business person, ultimately a victim of the corporation. We’ve seen this movie from Elvis Presley on… You sell your rights, thinking you won, and ultimately you find out you lost. As for Pink Floyd selling…that’s a bit different, the members couldn’t get along, and David Gilmour has not been coy in speaking his truth, so he gets a pass. As for Roger Waters..?
The touring business will never change. If you can sell out arenas, never mind stadiums, you can write your own deal. As you go to smaller venues the act’s leverage is less. If you’re complaining about the split in clubs…the onus is on you, you don’t have enough leverage, sell more tickets and you’ll get more of the money. This business is about growth. Always has been, always will be. Having said that, if you have one hit you can work forever, and even those without hits can do the house concert circuit, which can sustain an act.
Tour deals will only increase in number.
The business has exhausted the post-Covid euphoria, not every act will go clean going forward. Big dreams will oftentimes lead to big disappointments. But ticket prices will not come down. If people want to go to the show, they’ll pay the freight, they need to be there.
Terrestrial music radio will continue to decline. Will this be the year the industry admits it? I doubt it.
This is a music driven business. If more young acts are inspired by Zach Bryan as opposed to the paint-by-number hits in the Spotify Top 50, we could see a surge. We are waiting for that one act which will gain the attention of the entire nation, the entire world, that everybody wants to listen to. Having said that, Bryan still has runway. Your market is the whole world today, and most people do not know your music. There is money in niche, but there’s more money in conventional songs/records, with melodies the public can sing along to, hooky choruses… But this is seen as uncool by most of the artists and the business, they want false edge (real edge is something different, it grows up from the bottom and is always outside, even when successful), the formula is right in front of us, new acts should be forced to listen Beatle albums to get it. And not only could the Beatles write memorable songs with bridges, they could sing! Unless you’re Bob Dylan, the greatest lyricist of all time, you’re going to be hobbled unless someone in the act has a great voice.
