www.kurb.co.nz: New Zealand music industry funding whinge fest

http://dubdotdash.blogspot.com/2008/04/fade-to-gray.html
http://opdiner.blogspot.com/2008/04/welcome-to-my-world.html

This obviously amusing to me because he's whinging that NZ on Air, New Zealand Music comission, Creative NZ etc. are not doing enough to support NZ's top earning and most marketable artists such as his client, Hayley Westenra.

Auckland club culture icon Simon Grigg argues on his blog that the government has an obligation to foster the cultural expression of the nation through its funding support and that Hayley Westenrta is not of unique cultural significance to New Zealand.

Not to mention well . . . she doesnt really need the money does she?

Is it more a case of . . . well with the major labels on their knees, who's going to pay for everything??? The government?

My sore point was one bought up by departing NZ musician editor Melanie Selby, why does the lead singer of Steriogram get 50k for a band that doesn't exist? This band has no recordings. Why are they being funded for a radio hit?

One of the few key criteria to receiving one of the $50,000 album funding grants is that artists must have “two current radio hits” to their name to even compete for one of the refundable packages. Previously a radio hit was defined as "a RadioScope NZ Airplay Chart Top 30 song", but recognising the market degradation this was extended in July last year to include the published Top 40 chart songs.

Now, I know that the feelers have had more than a couple of radio hits over the past year. And I can probably name two songs released by The Rabble - so I can fathom both their $50,000 allocation.

But can someone tell me who the Ivy Lies are? They’ve received $50,000 - under the very same criteria. And I struggle to understand how Brad Carter’s “new” band Pistol Youth have gathered one radio hit, let alone two, especially given Brad has been busy touring foreign parts with Steriogram the last few months.

And despite a serious think I can’t recall hearing anything on the radio by ex- D4 Dion Palmer. He's been back in Auckland doing a few DJ sets lately but the last I heard he had left New Zealand and relocated to the US.

My argument of course is that we need a forward looking approach to funding and the thing is that the online environment not only supports a platform for many distinct voices in the community to be represented but also the opportunity for everyday creative new zealanders to actually create a supplement to their personal income by creating global opportunities to export digital products and services.

Andrew Dubber pointed me toward the white paper done on the subject done by Russell Brown which was excellent and gave me some hope.

But to me, I would hope for the kind of inspiration that put government money into developing the online tools to create income. Creating communities and facilities online for expression, involvement, development and international commerce.

Here's a link to my vision for a NZ music online community I did over new years. Lot of reading if your keen.

Choice As Business plan

GRAY BARTLETT WHINGE IN NEW ZEALAND HERALD

Musician and talent scout Gray Bartlett is preparing to celebrate a 50-year career in the entertainment industry and he is angry.

A number of issues have got Bartlett's goat but, in a nutshell, he is angry at what he sees as a waste of taxpayer money on failed government policies to promote New Zealand music.

"The government agencies haven't kept pace with the music industry. They have been more reactive than proactive; they've missed the boat over the last six or seven years."

Bartlett - a former National Party candidate and ex-Auckland city councillor - says the Government's policies are "hopelessly out of date".

Bartlett is about to embark on the first leg of a nationwide tour celebrating his career.

As well as performing, Bartlett has acted as a talent scout in recent years, with Hayley Westenra, Will Martin and Elizabeth Marvelly among those he has discovered.

He is doing a job, he says, using his own money, which the Government should and could also be doing.

Instead taxpayer money is being wasted in New Zealand music, he says.

"Why should someone who wants to finish an album in Hokitika get taxpayer funding?

"It's great for the community interest, but let the councils look after it."

Bartlett is also critical of Mike Chunn's Play it Strange, a trust to encourage young New Zealanders to develop interests and skills in music. While charitable, it does little for creating markets or promoting musicians, Bartlett says.

Bartlett concedes Chunn succeeds where he has failed - by getting government support - because of the politics of the music industry.

"I am angry because when the opportunity is there to apply for something to help an artist, I can't. I'm angry because they will waste money on absolutely ludicrous things.

"They will give grants to friends of the Labour Party - I find it disgraceful."

Bartlett says he wants to see taxpayers' money well spent, "not on policies that allow this mob to keep perpetuating rubbish".

"I would never dream of taking a grant now if I couldn't back it up with facts. The music side of it is really a shambles at the moment."

Bartlett says while he is angry about this issue, he is optimistic and positive about other things including his music and his audiences.

His anger comes in part from seeing how those audiences are largely ignored because the music they like is classified as country, a genre Bartlett says is not supported by the Government.

Bartlett lives in hope New Zealand will one day have the mindset to embrace all music on merit and not politics, like Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who named country and western singer Lee Kernaghan as Australian of the Year.

Kurb is a media promotions company providing a regular blog on digital music promotion, marketing digital content and artists creating revenue from new media online. ..:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

Kurb also provides online promotion and revenue management services for musicians and artists internationally And the best value fast turnover physical media services in ..:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />New Zealand including CD / DVD printing and duplication and poster printing services.

Here's a post I grabbed off NZ musician for more critiques on the national funding programme - again, along the lines of what I've been saying - the industry has changed, it's about the long tail, not the tall head, and technology has afforded new opportunities for everyday - "mum and dad" even - musicians and creative people to create and realise value around digital products and services, and for NZ on air to address that by creating platforms that we can all participate in, rather than selected profile acts - Hayley Westenra or otherwise - that are merely calculated on commercial success.

From NZ Musician observation post - anonymous source:

Many bands look forward each year to the possibility of a $5000 New Recordings grant from NZ On Air. This money is intended to be spent on recording one song in a professional studio to be suitable for commercial radio airplay. They offer four intakes a year and have recently changed it to include a $5000 video grant for the same song - but in doing so have cut the numbers to 5 songs per intake. This may seem like a good deal, but with over 200 entries each round, it doesn't seem to help many bands.

I am from a band based in Auckland. We have been going for about five years, had good press, featured plenty of times on the radio, played countless live gigs, pushed ourselves musically, worked hard to promote ourselves and just released an album.

The album was self-funded and made in one of the many home studios popping up around the country, (drums excluded). These days with this sort technology becoming far more versatile and cheaper for everyone it has become much easier for bands to record good quality stuff without spending heaps of money. Our album has received top reviews in good publications and never once was the quality of the recording under question. Indeed we know it's as good as it was when we made our first one at a professional studio.
All up we were able to record the whole album of 13 tracks and master it for under $5000. Sure we spent heaps of time making sure it was right, but the point is you don't need to spend anything like $5000 on just one song to make it radio worthy if you know what you're doing.

This is also true with videos. We so far have shot seven videos with two still in production. All good enough to be shown on music TV and one of them featured .. on C4. None of these videos actually cost more than $1000 to make. I admit I have some contacts and like to write and direct them myself but I have no real gear of my own. With sheer resourcefulness and some keen up and coming film people we can achieve the results without a budget of 5 to $10,000. Obviously they don't look like a Britney Spears video but the point is that they are good enough to be aired, and when we are facing the reality that no matter what the quality we may only get played four times anyway, it seems like a much safer option than nothing at all.

I think that NZ On Air is somehow missing the point of the current music market reality. We don't want or need $5000 to spend on one song. We don't need to use the big studio. Why would we want to waste that sort of money on a song when we can do a whole album made for that? Give me a $1000 to do a new song and keep the video a separate issue.

I am not sure what they are thinking but it sure doesn't seem to be about the average indie band that is looking to first have success on the bNet stations. Instead it tends to the consistently commercial side of things. This seems to me a waste of public money and doesn't really seem give the support that creative artists need. Instead of giving 5 artists $10,000 they could be giving 50 artists $1000 to record a song fit for the radio - or 25 songs and 25 videos.

They might even be better thinking about the bigger picture and trying to get a greater amount of music heard on the radio. If you are in Kaitaia or Whangarei and turn on the radio you are not going to hear any NZ music apart from what's on commercial stations (besides National Radio on Sat afternoon and 11pm Mon). If Kiwi FM or any of the bNets were able to somehow increase their network, that would probably do us all a lot more good. Hamilton can't even get their student radio stations into the bNetwork cause of a lack of funding. Hamilton's a big city by our standards.

So anyway, NZ On Air, as much as I love them and what they stand for, to me seem not really in touch with what is really going on in the music business at ground level. They are too focused on commercial success of commercial bands on commercial stations, the safe bets, and don't really do enough of the job they set out to do. No one often knows why a band suddenly gets big as it can happen for all sorts of reasons and it goes the same for those that don't make it when we all think they should. Some bands you can pick, others just come out of nowhere. Lets be open minded and let the public decide. It's time for some fresh ideas and some fresh faces in NZ On Air. They seem to be stuck in their own world and not in ours.... and then there are the radio stations themselves. But that is another story.

Kurb is a media promotions company providing a regular blog on digital music promotion, marketing digital content and artists creating revenue from new media online.

Kurb also provides online promotion and revenue management services for musicians and artists internationally And the best value fast turnover physical media services in New Zealand including CD / DVD printing and duplication and poster printing services.

Our physical media services come with free graphic set up and support, free delivery, and free promotions advice and support for musicians.

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All the best with your project, from Kurb
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