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Comment by notefaker | Hacker News Reader

This is factually incorrect. If you own your master recordings, you stand to make $3,500 to $5,500 per million streams on Spotify. Apple Music and Tidal pay even better. This is why Taylor Swift is re-recording her entire Big Machine Records catalogue. While Spotify did shift consumers away from buying singles and albums as individual items, they also opened a new revenue source for independent artists.

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Can you point me to a current-day independent artist which hasn't been signed to a label that is pulling this amount of money just on streaming?

If you're already big enough that, i.e., XL Recordings can ask you to make a record without getting rights on the master, I wouldn't count it as a good example of "indie artist".

Russ

EDIT: Not making Taylor Swift money, but not many are

are you sure he’s doing 5k/month just by streaming? No syncs nor shows? Also if Wikipedia is right he’s signed with Columbia Records. AFAIK the only artists making that kind money just by streaming while having no strings attached EVER (No label distro, no label A&R, no big tent agencies) are Macklemore and Chance The Rapper. Just two guys over millions of artists on Spotify.

I can’t find the article from before he signed with Columbia (might’ve been a YouTube interview with him, can’t remember for sure), but yes, I’m fairly certain he was doing well over 5k per month with no major label.

Also note the terms of his deal with Columbia are unlike most major deals in that he has a 50/50 profit split after his advance payment got recouped, retains either full control or 50/50 control of masters, etc.

Here you go, he mentions it in the first 30 seconds of this video. He says roughly $100k per month before any label involvement: https://youtu.be/OebNTkTfzHU

I make about $4,000 per million streams on Spotify for the tracks I’ve released independently. For label releases I make less, but the label promotes them so that sometimes results in more net revenue. I have a bit over 10M Spotify streams over the last 3 years.

Also, Spotify promotes my music via editorial playlists and algorithmic (eg Radio or Discover Weekly), so I’m probably making a lot more total revenue than I would have on iTunes.

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