As our year has progressed and our career focuses begin to take shape, I recently came across a scene from the film “Artifact”. This documentary is about 30 Seconds to Mars and their struggles against their record label for creative control and delves in to the importance of understanding the intricacies of record contracts.
I implore all students at SAE (and in fact any aspiring artist) to take the six minutes watch this clip as it definitely re-alerted me to the cut-throat side of the business in what is supposed to be a fun and creative industry. This expands on some of the ideas we touched on in CIU in Trimester 2, when we went through the details of a record contract. This gives us a modern day analysis of the structure of record deals, and how easily the artist can become a slave to the label, indebted for a lifetime both morally and financially (or as long as the record label wants them to be).
The structure of the contract easily distracts the budding artist with flashy figures and promises at the start of the deal, but its the finer print, things like recording, promotion and distrubition costs that the artist may not be aware will be deducted from their agreed figure.
I feel my attendace so far at SAE has added a credibility amongst the industry that I feel now gives my name (or the perception at least) to promoters and record label owners around Melbourne that I more than merely a punter. I'm excited to continue to learn more about the industry through real life experiences and associating with an array of artists, club owners/promoters and the owners of record labels. Through this clip, as well as our in class discussions that relate to this topic, I've learned that it's just important on who you do business with rather than just chasing the almighty dollar.
We must make sure we have proper knowledge of companies and events of which we will associate our name. Ones that we respect and trust and to know that we do not need to just sign the first big figure that's flashed in front of our faces.
Creative control is as important as any dollar, an ideaology that 30 Seconds to Mars enforce and I'm glad I have made this aware to me and that I can share this knowledge, to implement it into our bigger pictures before we too become victims to the industry.
Now let's enjoy my most thrashed song of the past week, Cliff De Zoete's remix of Oxia's "Domino". It's beautiful really.