Questions And Answers About My New "Record Label"

I’ve been getting a lot of questions about my plans for my first ever digital music compilation that I’ll be releasing this fall.  Since most of the questions have been more or less the same, I thought the easiest thing to do would be to address them all in a blog post.

Here goes…

Why are you doing this compilation?  What’s the point?  
Well, the simplest answer is that I want to help promote some of the amazing music that is out there that isn’t being heard.  As a part of my “job”, I have the great fortune of listening to a lot of indie music, and there is an enormous amount of really great music out there that isn’t really being heard.  I want to do my part to help promote some of the great artists out there that deserve recognition but aren’t really getting it.

What styles of music are you looking for?
I envision this first release as being fairly eclectic, with a wide range of styles.  I’m really open to anything as long as it’s great and well done.  With that said, I’m leaning towards songs with a modern and fresh sound with vocals.  However, if the right instrumental track or track comes my way, I’m open to including that as well.  The main thing I’m looking for is great music, regardless of the genre.

Is there a deadline for submitting?
There’s not a specific deadline per se.  I’m going to keep accepting submissions until I find a collection of tracks that I feel strongly about.  With that said, my plan is to release the compilation in the Fall, so I’m hoping to wrap things up in a month or so.

Are you doing this to make money?
I hope this project makes money, but I’m not doing it primarily with that motivation.  I’m well aware of the challenges of monetizing recorded music, so I’m going into this with eyes wide open.  With that said, I want to be as transparent as possible at the outset of this project and let everyone know that any money that is potentially made will be split equally with everyone who contributes to the project.  If there ends up being ten people involved (including me), the money will be split ten ways.  It’s as simple as that.  

I have some really unique ideas in terms of how to promote the project that I’ll be sharing with everyone a little further down the road.  For now, just realize, this project is free to participate in and everyone involved will get an equal share of any money made.

Will I keep the rights to my music? 
Yes, 100 percent.  By participating in this release you won’t be giving up any of your rights to your music.  You’ll still own your tracks and can continue to license them, sell them and give them away elsewhere as you see fit.  This won’t be like a traditional record deal/record label where you give up the master/publishing to your music.  Our deal will be completely non-exclusive and you can work with other people and companies concurrently if you choose to do so.

Where will the release be distributed? 
Spotify, Itunes, Amazon, Youtube, etc.  Wherever digital music is bought and sold.

When is the release date? 
I don’t have an exact date. It depends on how long the process of screening, selecting and compiling music takes.  I plan to release it, tentatively, sometime in early Fall 2017.

When will you notify the artists you’re interested in working with?
I’m going to start contacting artists that I’m interested in later this week.  My plan is to Skype with everyone I'm interested in initially to go over details of the project and to make sure we're on the same page about my vision for the release. If we are, then I’ll send a short contract that outlines the details of our arrangement (see above).

What about your licensing courses?  Will you still offer those?
I’ve been running How To License Your Music.com for nine years now and have put together an extensive collection of courses and products related to the music licensing niche.  I’ll be continuing to offer my courses on my website and will continue to offer training programs with coaching, like the 90 and 180 Day Music Licensing Challenge, as my schedule permits.

If you’d like to submit your music for consideration, you can do that here.

Let me know if you have any more questions or comments, in the comments!