i thought this article from guardian website was interesting, it gives you a good breakdown of costs involved in lauching an act nowadays (the example they are using is for a band with 4 members)

here it is:

 

 

You've got the band, you've got the talent (or you'd like to think so) - all you need now to make the big time is that killer hit ... and about half a million pounds. Dave Simpson reports on the price of fame or, more realistically, the cost of squandering money on a lost cause

 

Advance: £150,000

An advance is the money a record company gives to the band when the contract is signed - it's cash the label plans to recover from the earnings the band will make from future CD and download sales. It is meant to cover the band's living expenses over the cycle of a recording, releasing and promoting an album (which is usually around 18 months). The advance is split between the four members, and the manager will take 20% off the top. That works out as less than pounds 35,000 each over a year and a half, which isn't enough to make throwing TVs out of hotel windows a viable financial option.

 

Recording costs: £100,000

A hundred grand, staggering as it sounds, is an average figure for a band to spend on recording an album. They'll have run through the recording in a decent studio with a reasonable producer - for that kind of money they can't afford to spend eight weeks rerecording one tom-tom. A chunk of the money - around £30,000 - will go to whichever whizz kid producer is entrusted with the task of turning tuneless reprobates from Rugby into a collision of the Beatles and the Stones. More will go to recording engineers, remixers, as well as towards studio hire and the costs of mastering the record.

 

Videos: £90,000

In 1995, Michael Jackson's record company spent more than $7m making the video for Scream ($53,000 alone was spent on breaking guitars), but a band can now make a decent promotional tool for as little as £5,000, though a major label will spend more than that to get a shot at rotation on MTV2. A new act would ideally be partnered with a hip promos director, such as Wiz (who shot Kasabian's Empire but charges a minimum of £80,000), but it's more likely band and label will reach a compromise, maybe £90,000 for videos for two songs shot by someone who'll work for less.

 

Advertising and posters: £95,000

The age-old industry tool of a "blaze" of publicity has not got any cheaper. A half-page ad in NME might cost £5,000, while an advert on MTV2 or Kerrang! TV costs £10,000 per single (that's the price of airtime plus the costs of making the ad). A good poster campaign costs £10,000 per single and £15,000 for an album, but posters can be wasted money, as our expert explains: "All Saints had a massive comeback campaign but the record bombed. You can't take those posters down, whereas if they'd booked TV airtime they could have switched it to a different act."

 

Clothing: £200

Many rock bands don't spend money on stylists, at least until they're in contention for glossy magazine covers - they're scruffy blighters because their fans think filth looks cool. Generally, the only time a rock band will shell out on outfits will be for a certain look for a video, and that's covered by the video budget. "Bands like Hundred Reasons or the View have not spent money on clothes," says a music industry expert, "although we recently had to give one band's manager £200 to get them some new trainers, because their feet smelled."

 

Touring: £40,000

Bands start to make money from touring once they're successful, but before that the record company must pay to send them round the country, with a sound man. Rising bands typically lose around £20,000 over three UK tours in a year this way. Bands seeking to get major exposure as support to an established act may even be forced to pay to get on the bill, depending on how unscrupulous the headliners' management is. More money - another £20,000 - goes on travelling to TV and radio sessions and hiring equipment. Bands claw this back through merchandising: a £10 T-shirt makes six quid a time for the group.

 

Retail and displays: £53,000

Not many people know that those eye-catching window displays in record shops are actually bought and paid for. Getting the likes of HMV and Virgin to stock and put up instore promotion for a CD costs around £10,000 for a debut single, £18,000 for a higher profile follow-up and £20,000-£25,000 for an album. Similar deals are done for piles of beans in supermarkets, although you wouldn't put them in your CD player.

 

Photos: £10,000

It will take a top rock photographer to turn the four former butchers and builders from Plymouth into four budding and brooding Johnny Borrells. A master of the moody image such as Kevin Westerberg (famed for shots of the likes of REM and Thom Yorke) won't take the lens cap off for less than £10,000, and that's before the cost of hiring studios, lights and so on. Luckily, a lesser name can do the whole package for under £5,000, while for those on a particularly tight budget there's always the photo booth in Boots.

 

Conquering the internet: £20,500

It costs around £3,000 to create the band's website, but you've also got to hire a publicist to bring the band to the attention of music websites, make tracks available digitally and pay someone to update a band's MySpace site. Another bare minimum of £4,500 (£500 a month over nine months) goes on paying a firm to set up "street teams" - armies of highly motivated whippersnappers who promote a band because they love them. Street teams themselves don't get paid, but they get to meet the band at the soundcheck, get a T-shirt and a copy of the album. Flyers and other tools for these pesky kids add another £3,000.

 

Creating a buzz: £36,000

Around £12,000 goes on retaining a TV plugger for six months to take your video to the TV stations. That is vitally important when a show such as Later with Jools Holland can massively raise a band's profile. "Later's not easily pluggable, but you wouldn't get on the show without a plugger," the Guardian is told. "They'd never put a band on who they stumbled across in the pub." You need a different plugger to get you on to radio, and another publicist to deal with the print media - and you'll be paying them the same as the TV plugger.

 

Total cost: £594,700

Launching a band is ludicrously expensive, but it's not all dead money. Of the expenses quoted above, the label will generally recoup around 50% of video costs once the band starts to sell records, and they can also claw back some of the costs of touring, recording - and, of course, the advance will come back once the band have earned that much money from sales. But the rest is lost, and as our expert puts it: "Obviously, if the band flops, all is lost." And that's the key point: most band are destined to fail. So, goodbye, half a million quid.

 

 

i have noticed its getting quite ruthless nowadays many pop acts under performing chart and sales wise and don't seem to be making profit for their record company, some are getting dropped quicker too, is it getting harder to make it?

absolutely. it's hard getting into the music industry, but it's even harder to keep your place in it. you have to fight for your place (rightfully so, too) in the charts. uk r&B diva Jamelia has had her high points aswell as her low ones in the music industry. she's fully aware of how difficult the industry is, but because she's in the right frame of mind (i.e. she knows that this is a business and it's not all glossy) and works extremley hard at what she does. she's been able to forge an ongoing eight year career in the music industry and earned respect from many people. luckily for jamelia, she was with a really good label who took care of her (up until her latest release 'walk with me'), so she also had the proper guidance which i think is very important, also.

 

the artists that come out today really don't think about the business side of things, and just look at the glamourous side of the industry (tv shows, radio interviews, magazine shoots, etc, etc. they aren't prepared to work hard at it - putting hours upon hours on end in the recording studio, rehearsing for numerous days, not being able to see their families and friends for long periods of time, etc, etc. you see it everytime on these talent shows like "the x factor" and "american idol". the artists that come out today aren't innovative either. they don't have a look/sound that sets them apart from what's out there. US r&b trio TLC were very innovative in their looks, sound and even their message in songs when they came out. there was no one around like them back in 1992 and that's a huge reason why they were so successful with their music. it was different from the rest.

 

i think originality is missing from the industry. it's why people like lily allen and amy winehouse are doing so well, because they came out with a different sound and look from that which was already in the charts.

Edited July 22, 200718 yr by Off_Da_Endz

i agree you need so many things to make it nowadays, the talent of course plus to be distinctive i think is so important! to have a strong unique identity that sets you apart from the competition, credibilty too....it helps if you can write and or produce your own music to make that effort, songs coming from your mind, your heart and soul so the public get to know what the artist is going through or has been through. also the visual part, image is important too madonna being the best example of how to use that

 

reality shows are about hype and getting an emotional connection with the singer's journey, getting that huge tv audience sucked in and spending, its a form entertainment, its just a tv show its not about music thats why so many reality tv acts struggle in the music business and get dropped. if you are going to get into the business for the lifestyle for the money, for the superficial aspects like fame then you have a bigger chance of failing your credibilty will be affected

Edited July 22, 200718 yr by perfecto

Not sure how much this relates but apparently with Natalie Imbruglia's last album, Counting Down The Days, the label made £200k available to her and said 'you can have a 3rd single or a mini tour'. And she went with the tour ^_^

thats interesting that sounds like way too much money for just a mini tour. her last 2 albums under performed didn't they? those days are gone, times have changed cause £200,000 is plenty for a 3rd single!! the only way you can justify that kind of amount for a 3rd single is if your album is selling really well and the first 2 singles were big hits. i don't think even amy winehouse's record company would spend that much (unless the video had many effects) even though they made a ton of money from the massive sales of her album cause"back to black" and "tears dry on their own" are simple low budget videos. nowadays record companies need to find ways to cut down costs, they know album sales are falling.

 

unrelated but an interesting fact timbaland charges $500,000 for producing one track and thats what madonna is paying for her new album but she can afford it her budget must be huge!

unrelated but an interesting fact timbaland charges $500,000 for producing one track and thats what madonna is paying for her new album but she can afford it her budget must be huge!

 

Madonna makes a lot of her money through touring. Her ticket prices are insanely high and in just four months doing 60 shows, her "Confessions" tour earned $193.7m.

Nirvana went out and sold 10 million copies of "Nevermind", I seriously doubt that the production costs were anything like that amount, and the "clothing budget" was probably non-existant as well.... :lol: :lol: Kurt, Krist and Dave just rolled out of bed unshaven and put on the first ratty T-shirt and pair of old ripped jeans that weren't too dirty..... :lol: :lol:

 

Too much image/PR-obsessed bollox in music these days, howabout actually, y'know, concentrating on the actual music???? Creating a buzz at a grass roots level???? Or is that a bit too much to hope for nowadays.....?

Nirvana went out and sold 10 million copies of "Nevermind", I seriously doubt that the production costs were anything like that amount, and the "clothing budget" was probably non-existant as well.... :lol: :lol: Kurt, Krist and Dave just rolled out of bed unshaven and put on the first ratty T-shirt and pair of old ripped jeans that weren't too dirty..... :lol: :lol:

 

Too much image/PR-obsessed bollox in music these days, howabout actually, y'know, concentrating on the actual music???? Creating a buzz at a grass roots level???? Or is that a bit too much to hope for nowadays.....?

You're so right, its very rare these days for an unknown artist to have a low-budget debut and just blow up the charts. No Doubt's album Tragic Kingdom in 1995 did that :wub:

the clothing budget of £200 does seem pretty low in the first place :lol: you can imagine if it was for someone like j-lo with her bling look it would be very high and more money put into image making, where as her touring costs would be low as she doesn't tour, i'm sure the budget is tweaked around

 

Madonna makes a lot of her money through touring. Her ticket prices are insanely high and in just four months doing 60 shows, her "Confessions" tour earned $193.7m.

 

whoa look at that profit :o her ticket prices were outrageous, so spending half a mill on a track is chicken feed to her

 

 

Is that Timbaland thing true though? Half a mil sounds like a LOT per track...

the clothing budget of £200 does seem pretty low in the first place :lol:

 

I'm pretty sure there's at least one "zero" missing from that amount actually..... :lol:

 

Is that Timbaland thing true though? Half a mil sounds like a LOT per track...

 

I've heard that he does charge $500,000 per track, too. It wouldn't suprise me. He's one of the top producers in the music industry and is practically a hit-maker. Just look at what he's done with Nelly Furtado. She was never this huge. She owes a lot of it to him.