Member Since: 8/12/2012
Posts: 13,665
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Lefsetz take on Mumfords sales in US
Quote:
The revolution has begun! And it will not be televised!
You’ve waited a long time, ever since 1999, when Napster reared its ugly head until a year later when everybody found out about it and shortly thereafter when everybody else got a high speed connection to play. We’ve heard the doomsayers prognosticate, music is finished, but as the Carpenters so eloquently sang, we’ve only just begun.
Credit Daniel Glass. Someone without a private plane who shows up in more places than Coran Capshaw, who has one. Wanna learn a rock and roll lesson? Daniel started out as a DJ, at Regine’s! Do you even know what Regine’s is/was? If not, you’re blowing it. Music is all about history and influences, read up.
And skipping a few chapters he was then a promo guy at Chrysalis. Ditto at SBK, ultimately morphing into head of EMI. And then he went to work for Doug Morris at Universal. Then indie. Then with Danny Goldberg he ran Artemis, until that ran out of steam. And now he’s triumphant, when his hair has finally turned gray but he can still run a marathon. And you expect to be successful before your pubes grow in? And what is success? One and done? If you want to last in this business, you’re gonna have tons of ups and downs. It’s about character as much as skills. Can you build relationships, learn the game, adjust to change, continue to risk?
But to give Daniel all the credit would be missing the point. Because we all know it comes down to the music. And that’s where Mumford shines.
They don’t dance. They don’t wear designer clothing. They don’t do beer commercials. They underplay and undercharge. They do everything the complainers say you cannot.
And then they blow up the chart.
The big story has been that the album was available on Spotify yet still sold a ton. That’s missing the point. If you think digital sales are the future, you’re still watching TV on a cathode ray tube. It’s not only music that’s in the cloud, everything’s on demand all the time. Ever notice that laptop storage is getting smaller? You used to want a big hard drive, now you just want a modicum of speedy flash.
But Daniel and Mumford have it right. In truth, this number is irrelevant. It’s all about mindshare. Being available. For far too long the music business has been like a carnival. Pay first, get screwed second. You’ve got to trust your audience. You’ve got to be available. If you think being on Spotify hurts your sales, you’re completely missing the point.
But this is not about Spotify. This is about music. That sounds nothing like the Dr. Luke/Max Martin fake drum Top Forty drivel. Turns out there’s a huge market for an alterna-sound. Before the Net, if you couldn’t sign to a major label and get on the radio or TV, you were finished. Now MTV is not about music and if radio were so powerful, a different album would have racked up these sales.
This is only the beginning. Careers are now in the hands of the audience. That’s who spread the word on Mumford. It wasn’t a top-down media campaign, but a grass roots thing. People bought the album because they needed to belong, it was a badge of honor. Remember that, when you defined yourself based on musicians?
How can you define yourself by someone who’s beholden to corporations and puts music second?
You can’t.
Which is why music has been heading for the dumper.
But no longer…
(“Babel” is the biggest SoundScan chart debut of the year. One out of ten Spotify users played a song from the album in its initial week, for a total of 8 million streams, a record.)
That’s what you want. People so rabid to hear it that they spread it. That’s what broke Mumford. It wasn’t their tweeting or social networking, it was the honesty of their music and message, in a phony world, their fans couldn’t stop spreading the word.
But to follow Mumford you have to give up everything you know. You’ve got to stop going on singing shows. You’ve got to stop angling for a major label record deal. You’ve got to stop haranguing gatekeepers to give you a chance. It’s only you and your music, in a world that doesn’t need it. We need food and water, we don’t need your music, it’s a luxury item. But can you somehow make it necessary? Can it stand alone?
Advertising doesn’t sell ice cream, it’s the experience itself. It’s just so damn good…
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source
http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.p...-ending-93012/
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who are they? what are they famous for? which are their biggest hits? I really don't know about them. 
who are these people?! I've never heard of them and their songs and album are all over the iTunes and Spotify charts. Congrats tho.