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you need fans in order for that to work...
just ask Talib ..
https://medium.com/cuepoint/why-i-left-the-major-label-system-a0ecfa06ae91
"Ryan and his Disruptive Multimedia team built a website, RyanLeslie.com, where Ryan’s fans could buy music directly from Ryan, no middle man, as long as they provided their contact info. Any artist can use a service like Tunecore to sell digital music on iTunes, or go thru a distribution company to sell physical products to stores, but you are giving up a hefty percentage to do that, and you will not have access to the emails of those who spend money on your art. At Ryanleslie.com, Ryan is retaining 100% of the profits he makes from his art, and he can contact each person who spent money with him directly. In fact, as he was explaining this to me, I watched Ryan receive a sale direct to his iPhone and then call the fan up and thank him for his purchase on the spot. It was revolutionary. Isn’t this what we all say we want?
In the fall of 2013 Disruptive Multimedia set up a similar site for me, Kweliclub.com. Even though I had just dropped Prisoner of Conscious through Caroline Distribution, the excitement of cutting out the middleman was too much for me to bear and inspired me to record an album called Gravitas. Recorded mostly in amphitheater locker rooms around the country while I toured with Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, Gravitas was an album that spoke directly to the freshly-independent mind state I was in. Seeing Macklemore and Ryan Lewis’ incredible success as an indie act was also a motivating force, and by December of 2013 Gravitas, featuring Gary Clark Jr, Black Thought, Big K.R.I.T., Raekwon the Chef and more, was available for digital sale at one place in the world, Kweliclub.com.
Gravitas cost me about $30,000 to record, but the demand for the physical was so high that I ended up doing a deal with Fat Beats Distribution that gave them the right to press up CDs and vinyl. The advance I received from Fat Beats coupled with the pre-orders of Gravitas on Kweliclub.com covered the initial recording costs, and all monies made from release date on was profit. To not have to wait months to profit on my art, to see profit the day of release, was a first for me. It was like a high, I felt unstoppable. As liberating of a feeling this was, it soon became clear to me that without marketing dollars or some sort of incredible marketing idea, the majority of my fans would never know the album existed. I filmed a couple of videos for promotion and I tour constantly, which gave me an opportunity to talk the album up in front of audiences all over the world, but there are so many artists competing for the eyes and ears of music consumers that it’s hard not to be swallowed up by all of it." Double 0 DJ/Producer/Artist Producer in Kidz In The Hall ------------------------------------------- twitter: @godouble0 IG: @godouble0 www.thinklikearapper.com
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