Why sign on to a record label?

[Klopjob]

Do they get artists interviews? Pay for production expenses?

[Friendly Foil]

I guess they promote your music and gets you live dates and such. If you have a good label in your back people are more likely to take you seriously.

[Silent Member]

Yeah, basically for the promotion muscle.

[Soloman Tump]

Increases your fan base

[psn]

A record label can neglect your career in a professional manner.

[MisterE]

its like an instant +25 pts charisma and gives u a random chance of instant no strings attached sex with every npc encounter, along with additional 20-70% chance to impress and charm, depending on the label

 

or so i imagine it that way, anyway

[peace 7]

In order of importance for me (and my IDM Superstar Dreamz):

 

-Promotion-- get your choonz out to those who are interested, but more importantly, to those who you don't even care about or dislike. Reach new scenes, etc.

 

-Physical media distribution-- because physical, iz gud. Plus, this connects with the promotion angle, because labels with good distribution channels get their releases in major + indie shops. I've seen signs (and even mini-mini-billboard type signs) up for new releases in record shops for most old and new school labels, most recently for hyperdub, planet mu. But back in the day, even rephlex got signs put up for their new releases.

 

-Networking-- this is highly important to get places you couldn't dream, and actually tied at #2. Just through networking and making friends in the scene, new projects and opportunities open up, that couldn't be offered to you, otherwise. Like imagine you get signed to Planet Mu and are having a coffee with Mike P one Saturday afternoon, and next thing you know, 5 years later you release a self-designed, Mike Paradinas signature series eyebrow groom tweezers. This gets your industrial design skills noticed by Gucci, who then licenses your designs for their label. Next thing you know, you've been living in Hollywood for 5 years producing shitty films, and the next moment, you're at some Illuminati world domination meeting, exchanging trillions of dowlaz amongst elite conglomerates, deciding on how you should turn the core of the Earth into a McDonald's drive-thru. And this all happened because you thought squiggly sounds were cool and decided to give it a shot.

 

-Mastering-- golden ears to get your proper shit sounding like proper proper shit.

[MisterE]

think of people who get signed as the ones who scored 5000pts by landing on the top of the flag in super mario bros and eventually rescued the true princess

and all the rest of us as the goombas those ppl stomped on

[Candiru]

Watch out for those 360 deals fellas. They'll getcha. Like being a superstar with Micky Ds income.

[Guest RadarJammer]

getting signed to a successful label should probably ignite a firestorm of confidence in creativity. it's a good for some people to keep their game up.

[awepittance]

just so the board is aware, 95% of the stuff posted in the 'Upcoming Releases' forum is either on a label or is from an artist who had previously been on a relatively known label. If in theory there was no such thing as a record label and most of those artist were left to fend for themselves on bandcamp, watmm's listening habits and 'best of the year lists' would look completely different. Labels with money dictate our tastes just as much as taste makers dictate our tastes.

one of Watmm's favorite idm albums from the 00's, o9's 'church of the ghetto PC' while very memorable, probably would have remained in complete obscurity had it not been released on Schematic records. This is not to say that just because something *is* on a label means that it will automatically get more exposure, sometimes great music on relatively popular labels gets totally passed over as well. It just increases the chance of exposure.

[Berk]

also for the rush, the adaptation and the general backwardness of the act