Goa trance vs the labels and music industry... A big article from the Suntrip point of view! :)

[HappyHorse]

Well, there is a very interesting shift lately... As you know we are organising a ten years Suntrip goa tour, and we have had many organisations out of non typical goa countries, who are willing to step into the project...! This means these organisations believe to have break even at least with only modern goa trance!! This is the true revolution imo... ok, they still prefer the big names (Filteria, E-Mantra, Ra, Khetzal,...) but that's logic in the end as they need enough people... For now we have parties planned with only goa-trance in: Germany, UK (!!), Sweden, Norway, Belgium, Japan, Brasil, Spain, Croatia and probably also Macedonia and Israel)! This is crazy, don't you think? So this means a broader/wider crowd is willing to listen to goa trance for real now! The more people here it, the more they will search for it, and the bigger the movement becomes!

 

On all the other points I will react in a few days... Finally vacation

 

 

True, we also had bookings this summer in Germany, Belgium, Russia, USA, Georgia, etc... But the point is: main organizers at "big" festivals (and I'm not stating smaller festivals aren't worth as much , cause I adore'm a lot!!!) won't take a risk, even the music is as good as "old" acts can bring the public. Nothing more...

 

... it's a struggle we shall have to unite as goa labels, and not seperate cause of ego and stuff; Work tougheter to make goa grow: be more coherent,...a social structure that feeds itself to grow.

The goa scene is fragmented, also the "old skool" scene.

When I played in some parts of Germany, the Netherlands, or the US in the past years...and this year, some even never heard goa, even attending a "psy" party

 

We'll have to unite more in some sort of way to create a more positive vibe. And selling CD's is nice, but it's not all...it's also about receiving honest chances to promote yourself, to be able to get a chance to play,...it's all in the package...

 

But I keep positive: nothing will drive me away: goa lives in my hart!!!

[laik]

 

And overall digital download sales boomed like crazy around 2007 but oddly enough USA is the major player in digital sales. Statistics on Beatport show that 75-80% of all sales are from USA. This is interesting and show we Europeans lack way behind embracing the digital way.

 

 

 

 

just to quote a communication from EC (2011)

 

''The development of the digital single market is hindered by lack of consumer confidence, the

prime causes of which are payment security and the enforcement of consumer rights in crossborder

transactions, particularly with regard to product safety and counterfeiting.This lack of consumer confidence and the problems encountered in shopping on line in other Member

States explain why e-commerce represents less than 5% of retail sales and why only 9% of

Europeans have shopped on line in another Member State.''

[Padmapani]

''The development of the digital single market is hindered by lack of consumer confidence, the

prime causes of which are payment security and the enforcement of consumer rights in crossborder

transactions, particularly with regard to product safety and counterfeiting.This lack of consumer confidence and the problems encountered in shopping on line in other Member

States explain why e-commerce represents less than 5% of retail sales and why only 9% of

Europeans have shopped on line in another Member State.''

 

i'm not sure if that can be a factor here. product safety and counterfeiting aren't that big an issue for music. but more importantly goa trance isn't sold in any retail shop. most of us have to shop online in another member state if we want to buy the cd. actually these conditions should favour digital sales instead of physical media in our case, digital downloads are also offered on bigger, more reputable webshops than the cds, which you have to buy from the labels directly or from specialised psy-shops.

[laik]

how about this

 

source:communication 2010 (digital agenda for europe)

 

quote:

 

''Consumers expect, rightly, that they can access content online at least as effectively
as in the offline world. Europe lacks a unified market in the content sector. For
instance, to set-up a pan-European service an online music store would have to
negotiate with numerous rights management societies based in 27 countries.
Consumers can buy CDs in every shop but are often unable to buy music from online
platforms across the EU because rights are licensed on a national basis. This
contrasts with the relatively simple business environment and distribution channels
in other regions, notably the US, and reflects other fragmented markets such as those
in Asia (Figure 2).''

 

[Padmapani]

still, it's not really applicable to psy, simply because there are no real life shops that offer any psytrance in most places.

[Taika-Kim]

Also, we are missing something here: I know psy people around their 20s who don't even download mp3s anymore, they just listen to streaming music exclusively, there's a lot of stuff in youtube only, not to even mention the proper music sites.

Me too, don't find much point collecting mp3s (stopped years ago in fact) when any tune can be usually found online in seconds.

 

How to transfer THIS logic into income?

[BraneFreeze]

Also, we are missing something here: I know psy people around their 20s who don't even download mp3s anymore, they just listen to streaming music exclusively, there's a lot of stuff in youtube only, not to even mention the proper music sites.

Me too, don't find much point collecting mp3s (stopped years ago in fact) when any tune can be usually found online in seconds.

 

How to transfer THIS logic into income?

 

In a very broad sense, there are two categories of listeners: hard core fans / collectors and casual listeners.

 

The hard core fans / collectors are more likely to generate revenue than casual listeners (eg, CDs, downloads, merchandise, performance, etc). The casual listeners are probably more likely to embrace streaming without ownership. Since casual listeners don't generate very much revenue from CDs and downloads anyway, the income loss from streaming will probably be small. At the same time, streaming music maintains "visibility" for producers / musicians that might lead to performance income or other income at some future time.

 

However, this doesn't negate the fact that goa / psy trance is still a small genre, and even the hard core fans / collectors don't really generate large revenues for anyone.

[FatKidWitAJetPak]

Some people love CDs. Some don't care. I think all outlets should offer both CD and Digital downloads. I would gladly support anyone who did. I personally find a large amount of energy in a CD, and couldn't imagine a world without them.

 

Piracy is what makes this industry so difficult. Sites like Ektoplazm have banded together passionate collectives who have the opportunity to give music away for free. Not everyone can do this, sure, but its beautiful when you think about what the purpose of music, culture, and art REALLY is. We are all a community, coming together to celebrate diverse sound. Even though we all have different opinions on this sound, we love dancing the night away next to each other at some point.

 

The industry probably won't make as much money as it use to... but hell, WE will still come together to celebrate the beats. Music is a part of my journey. It is a part of my life. I do my best to support the producers by buying the music, and I am sure all of us here would be proud to do so. When you think about it, our community is quite large and spread out. There are still many, many outlets we are expanding into. Don't give up on the industry just yet, there are many ways to make money. Spread the love and support your scene! I just purchases 30 sun trip and Arabesque Distribution CDs from a friend. I now have a wonderful box of exploration

[draeke]

@Taika-Tim the streming online won't maybe be for long, youtube is applying a very restrictive policy sometimes and some channels who had a lot of rare old vinyl rips of, for instance with techno from the 90s, were targeted and forced to close. So I wonder how long before they will ask us to provide proof that we are authorized to publish the music we upload.

 

Or the other option is that they turn it into a big spotify where labels uplaod the music themselves and get a small reveue from clicks and streaming play. They have the advertising button but let's be honest, nothing comes out it, I don't know, maybe for commerical tracks with over 100k views there is a revenue from clicks and streaming but not from a goa track which has, in the best case scenario, 1000+ cliks/plays.

 

I think it still makes sense to archive digital releases because I don't trust the internet and it can all change suddenly , so for me streaming is always a preview and either i get the physical media or the FLAC/MP3.

I wish there were more vinyl only tracks on youtube though, especially of techno-trance-acid of the 90s.

 

@laik I think the graphic shows that in the US people actually fear copyright agencies and law enforcement and I met more than one person in his 20s from there that told me he wouldn't dare risking downloading mp3 illegally because "they catch you here, and then it's a lot of money to pay..." so that is something different. Also, there may be a reflection of consumers in the US buying a lot of commercial music from itunes /whatever because it's simple and the only way they know to get it.