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Weird Al Yankovic Says Digital Is a Raw Deal For Some Artists
Posted Jun 14th 2006 1:07AM by Grant Robertson


King of comic rock, Weird Al Yankovic says digital is a raw deal for artists like himself. When asked by a fan whether purchasing a conventional CD or buying a digital file via iTunes would net Yankovic more pocket money the artist answered on his website.

"I am extremely grateful for your support, no matter which format you choose to legally obtain my music in, so you should do whatever makes the most sense for you personally. But since you ASKED... I actually do get significantly more money from CD sales, as opposed to downloads. This is the one thing about my renegotiated record contract that never made much sense to me. It costs the label NOTHING for somebody to download an album (no manufacturing costs, shipping, or really any overhead of any kind) and yet the artist (me) winds up making less from it. Go figure."

It confuses me too Weird Al. I think you deserve at least an equal amount of compensation for each digital track sold as you would be entitled to for that same one track on CD.

As you said Al, "Go figure". I'm a big fan, you've given me a lot of fun music over the years, and I wanted to do what you said. So, I went and did the math.


Here's what I found out:

According to DownhillBattle, Apple pays the labels $0.65 (some say its as high as $0.80) of the $0.99 cents paid for your song.

So, for an album with the average 12 songs, like your current release "Poodle Hat" which has exactly 12, Apple takes in $11.88. Apple sends the label $7.80. That's $4.08 cents for the boys in Cupertino. And, it might be a pretty reasonable split if you then received the whole $7.80. Apple would take 35% of your work, for developing the infrastructure that makes you able to sell it to millions of people while you sleep, instead of selling it to 5 people out of your van in the parking lot of Stuckey's. That's what we call a value equation. Apple did work, and got paid for it. You did an arguably larger portion of the work, by creating something people wanted to buy in the first place, so Apple got a little money, and you got a good deal more.


Unfortunately, that's not how this version of the universe operates. So Apple sends the check to your record label.

The record label takes that $7.80. And, let's face it, they had something to do with your making the album. In some cases, you may have even been contractually required to make another album, whether you felt like it or not. So, you could say that without the record company, you'd not have made an album at all. They paid for the production, and some marketing, and now they should get paid right along side of you as the artist. You created the music, they recorded it and packaged it, marketed and distributed it. Right?

Well, not exactly. First, many artists can record fantastic music of very high quality in their own home studios. So, for some artists the record label is more marketing firm than recording technician(or, the guy who pays for one). But if the record label paid for your recording they will take 100% of sales until the recording costs are re-imbursed. They'll also keep taking money until paid back for promotional costs, packaging design and more.

If you manage to break even, here's where the money just starts rolling in. Right? The label got their money back (by taking $7.80 of every $7.80 that Apple paid them) so, now they're going to start sending you most of the $7.80 per record they are receiving.

Not so fast. According to widely circulated data from the coverage of The Alman Brothers suit against Sony BMG, you could expect something like $45 of each thousand songs sold to be paid to you in royalties. That's around 4% of the amount paid to Apple for your work, and around 5.7% of what was paid to the label. For The Almans', that works out to $24,000 when taking Nielsen SoundScan data of 538,000 Almans' songs sold as downloads since mid-2002. I don't have SoundScan data on your sales, but I'm sure you do. So the labels and Apple got 96% and you got %4. And as you said, there were no packaging, shipping or storage costs for your album sold though iTunes.

I went to Amazon.com and found that your album is selling for $14.98. That's $3.10 more than iTunes, but you get an actual CD, liner notes and a snazzy jewel case. And, you actually own the CD. You're really just kinda leasing the songs with iTunes, but we'll save that for another time. Suffice it to say that I think $14.98 is a totally reasonable price.

If your deal with your record company is like The Alman Brothers, then you're getting something like $315.50 for those same 1,000 songs (83.3 CDs worth). That works out to $0.31 cents per song, instead of the $0.045 on a digital download.

Ouch! It turns out you were being more than kind to that fan by telling him to buy either format he wanted, you're losing $0.265 cents per song! . If all of your fans bought through iTunes rather than buying CDs at the record store you'd be looking at an overall reduction in income of 85%!

Eighty Five Percent! If they cut my income by 85%, I'd be making soup from old shoes down by the railroad tracks!

My advice is probably similar to what your accountant's would be. Tell your fans to buy a CD, your retirement income may depend on it.

First of all, why are we dumb as donuts? We buy the music legally, cheaper than buying a whole CD for suck ass music.

Second, don't these musicians know they are gonna get fucked over with these deals? Why they sign them?

Al, get a website. Sell your own shit. End of story.

Romera said:

bingo.

No offense,but does anyone really buy Weird Al's music anyway?

DavidEye said:

i used to buy his stuff when i was a kid...from what i understand he's still got a bit of a cult following nowadays.

Romera said:

Because not only are you paying premium prices per song for an inferior end product, you are also killing the creators of the music you purport to love. Can you see how? Connect the dots and then cast those goddamn iPods and digital files in to the deep blue sea.

Jestyr said:

Jestyr, how is paying 99 cents for one song somehow worse than paying 18 bucks for a whole shitty album?

Do this artists themselves allow the music to go on iPod?

How am I to blame because said artist does not handle his business and signs the rights away to his art to make a buck?

Inferior end product? Not to me. MP3s are no worse than CDs to me and they both pale compared to vinyl.

BTW, Weird Al is the only artist I have seen to say don't download music legally.

Jestyr said:

Well,my dumb butt still buys cd's,unless I cannot find them,even at premium prices because I prefer the sound quality and artwork.Then,I load onto my digital music player.99.5% of the music I listen to came from a cd source that I paid for.

So, you can't afford an iPod, is that it?

RipHer2Shreds said:

Either that or he just doesn't have any idea how they work.

al needs to ask himself if he'd be able to make the same amount of money (or more) if he was doing his work independently. if the answer is yes, he's a bad business man for not doing it. if the answer is no, he needs to shut up and eat his pie.

Can't fault Al for speaking up (since he was asked)...I'd never realized the potential disparity for artists between the different types of media.

This is pretty interesting stuff. Being the novelty act he is, he's probably getting purchases he would never get from iPod users. But what Apple is taking off the top for this is pretty huge.
bc

Buying downloaded music makes no sense to me. You know that at some point, most iPod users (sheep) are gonna have a hard drive crash and lose all those songs, and Apple is gonna lose track of who bought what, when, how many machines the licenses were for, etc. It's a mess. Buy the fucking CD and then rip it.

CuntOMatic said:

if your hard drive crashes you still have the music on your ipod. you can just upload the music back to your hard drive once the problem is fixed and, viola, your music is where it should be. no biggie.

i should add, with musicians/artists i really like i always buy the tangible cd. i like the liner notes and art and blah, blah, blah. but why do i need to have pet sounds in a physical form? if i only want the music and nothing else, if i have no special affinity towards the group, why take up space in my home?

sallysassalot said:

Not if your iPod crashes or gets stolen or stomped on her flushed down the toilet or stuck in John Tesh's butt.

First of all this is not our Fault!
This is the record companies fault and Itunes and other related downloaders...
They charge for publishing songs, 1/2 of the sales
leaving the artist to starve...
...

they cost more than to put out a CD...
Weird Al needs to buy up his publishing
and set up his own website where his "cult following" can buy up his songs
and he make smore money...

Meanwhile they're giving out awards for the most downloaded ringtones

I ain't worried about Weird Al - he can get a job for all I care. The shit will balance out somehow... or not, but it's not gonna stop. Muthafuckas are just gonna have to get with it & cut new deals or something

CuntOMatic said:

yes, and if you have physical cds and someone breaks in your house and steals them all, or there's a fire, or your house has a flood, or your house is built on a cliff and there's a mudslide...blah blah puke. shit happens, dude, and you'll have to deal with it.

if millionaire artists are too lazy to negotiate a deal that is to their liking, they need to step down off their high horse and look themself in the mirror. it isn't my fault they can't work it out. when i make 8 bucks an hour with a college degree and have no health benefits it gets real hard to worry about wierd al's poor business sense.

Romera said:

Yeah.

...I have a real hard time givng a rats ass about Al's (or other artists for that matter) financial dealings or well being... It isn't my fault that technology is constantly changing everyday life..artists, like many other members of the work force, need to find new ways to preserve their earnings...were musicians sticking up for automotive workers when they were being replaced by robots on the assembly line??...did they protest when live telephone operators were replaced by automated recordings???...lots of folks have lost wages and jobs because of a changng world...so, please, spare me the song and dance of how digital music is bad for your finances..here's an idea...wanna make some money the old fashion way???..go on tour, sell a few tee-shirts...sounds crazy but its a tried and true method for presenting your "product"...but it does require work, are the artists willing to do that??...the people buying their music have been doing it for years...
[Edited 6/24/06 19:29pm]

iPod users != iTunes Music Store users

I happen to use both and I'm actually intelligent. I also backup all of the songs I download.

roodboi said:

post of the week!

I'm getting really,really sick of artists whining and bitching about money.There are much bigger,more important things going on in the world today than their own personal finances.If they don't like the way the music biz works,simply become an independent artist and release their music on your website.Cut out the middleman.If Al is against the idea of fans downloading his shit,he shouldn't be making deals with iTunes,period.As an independent artist,he could simply release his CDs on his website.It's really that simple.
[Edited 6/23/06 5:17am]

Moonbeam said:

Furthermore, how dumb IS a donut really if it can make a bitch get outta bed & into the car @ 3 in the morning?? HUH???

So Weird-Al renegotiates a record contract in which he makes less $$ from downloads.

Exactly who is the idiot in this scenario?

DavidEye said:

And there's the dumb as donuts proof right there.

Did you even read the tiniest bit of the fucking article? Al does not even come close to whining, you clueless dolts - he is answering a question! And politely pointing out that he gets more income from physical sales. And for those of you with the 'no simpathy for the rich' attitude, you better self-check, because you know nothing about these people's finances. Nothing! Your assumptions are hilarious!

"_____ is famous - so they are rich!"

Also, the 'negotiations' with major distributors are not yard sale transactions; you either play the record company's game or nada. I'm amazed at the lack of empathy for artists on the part of people who claim to appreciate them so much. But the truth is, you don't really appreciate them at all, do you? It's all just wallpaper to an iPod user and that's the whole problem in a nutshell.

Jestyr said:

You just have to play the game or nada huh? Exactly how much of Prince's new music is on iTunes? Only that small amount that he allows.

CalhounSq said:

Good point. Maybe it's a compliment in disguise!

Moonbeam said:

I'm gonna take it as one

Jestyr said:

..I don't think anybody thinks famous equals rich..just as 40 hours a week doesn't equal rich...My appreciation for most musicians goes only as far as the music anyway, so forgive me if their financial status isn't at the top of my list of concerns...I'm sure if money was that big of an issue to them, they would find another means to support themselves...Artists/musicians "playing the game" are like any other joe-schmoe working for a living...When artist start caring about my finances and if I got that raise I'm up for, I'll see if my attitude can change...You know, it seems to me the mindset here is they're famous, so I should care more about their issues...that doesn't fly with me...If the career path you choose is not working for you, it's time for a change, that goes for singers/artists/musicians, the CEO of a Fortune 500 company or for the sandwhich artist working at Subway...