The Shins experimenting with release and distribution business models
Posted by: in Marketing and AdvertisingFiled under: Products and services, Management, Consumer experience, Marketing and advertising
Billboard revealed Friday that American indie rock band The Shins is apt to leave long-time label Sub Pop and release their next album via frontman James Mercer’s Aural Apothecary label. The band’s manager Ian Montone told the trade magazine that the record deal the band is currently seeking “will be more of a [pressing and distribution] deal than a traditional record deal” and that the band could remain with Sub Pop is some capacity. Sub Pop’s management revealed as well that the label would “love to continue working with them.”
Unlike other major bands that leave record labels because of displeasure with the industry or the management of the company, The Shins are not unhappy with how Sub Pop has marketed the band’s records. The band’s last album, Wincing the Night Away, debuted at number two on the Billboard 200 and has sold more than 538,000 duplicates to date. The band’s hopes for the new deal include ownership of the album masters and an infrastructure to successfully market the new record and cover costs.
A separate digital deal is also reportedly being considered, but what this change for The Shins indicates is that while they’re a successful band and have sold a lot of records, they are not so established that they cannot mandate what they expect from the industry. So many of the bands and artists to leave labels in the past year have done so because they were solidly established in numerous markets and with many fans, but also because they were displeased with the industry. There’s nothing wrong with The Shins or this tactic, it’s just nice to know that large bands and longtime artists aren’t the only sources looking for the best alternatives to the problems in the music industry.
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