SellABand changes hands... and business model

As I told you in the lastest blog post, SellABand went bankrupt.

Soon after, aquisition rumours started. Then, it was official. And a couple of minutes ago, the website was back online.

Business as usual, right? Wrong.

Users trying to log in SAB again are greeted with a notice of some new Terms of Service - which you agree or you have to cancel your account. The new Terms of Service have a funny clause, one that radically changes SAB business model. In 4.5, they state that a believer can't take back his money if it's on SAB for more than 15 days. OUCH!, this is more than a change, this is not acknowledging the real SAB problems, while failing because they take out the incentive to actually be a believer... What an huge #FAIL: this new SAB is, automatically, a lot worse than what it was.

When canceling (because I don't accept the new TOS) my accounts,  they said to me:

Dear Merankorii,

We would really like to hear the reason why you do not want to accept the new Terms and Conditions and stop participating on SellaBand.

Here's my reply:

The new 4.5 clause makes believers being forced to loose their money, even if the band they wanted to succeed abandons the project or otherwise doesn't reach its goal. With the new terms, believers stop having the ability to be "believers of some specific artist(s)", and are thus forced to be "believers on SAB". While that might work to some believers and bands, that radical change of concept doesn't work for me both as an artist and a believer. Thus, unless/until you change the TOS again, I want to withdraw my money on SAB and quit both my artist and believer accounts. I don't count on coming back to SAB as an artist until this 4.5 changes to something I feel more fair for me, as a band, to purpose to my fans, and I count to get back to being a believer *only*if* I find a band that I like so much that I'm willing to bet with my money in, taking into account that I might never see that money again -- which doesn't happen with any SAB artist at the moment.

SellABand goes bankrupt

I've written about SellABand in the past:

2006/09:

[...]SellABand, a German startup that tries to act like a record label for registered artists. I also intend to do a full review on this later, and to sign Merankorii there, but I have to confess that I don't believe it's business model will make this service survive. Anyway, the fact that startups like this are starting to appear just show that there's a need to do something into the new music market reality, and Web 2.0 might be a key tag on that future. I also think I'll talk more about that in my presentation on BarCamp Portugal.

2006/09:

When I talked about the actual music industry scenario with the technological advances we're seeing on BarCamp Portugal, I said that new stuff was needed, and that some webapps are walking towards the solutions needed (like Amie St. or SellABand) but we weren't there yet. Well, yesterday I knew about Treemo, the next step towards what we need.
[...]
While new features are surely going to appear, their model business will hardly change - but will, perheaps, evolve. Yet, and under the actual stance that, I don't see them as being a viable way for artists to earn money with their art, but it's a good step towards it.

2007/02:

SellABand - I promised a full review of it that I never did (shame on me). To give you an example... I have a musical project and I've used the internet to promote it - and even to get the label that released my last album. Of all those music services my music can be heard, SellABand is the one where I probably have less people listening to it - but in the other hand is the one that possibly granted me more fans. Also, Last.fm and SellABand were direct creators of revenue: I sold at least one CD thanks to each of them. What's SellABand? What makes it so different? No better than this page to explain it, but basicly bands, for free, create their profiles there, with (at their choice) free-to-listen music. "Believers" (the name for listeners) may "believe" in an artist by buying one "part" of the band ($10 per part). Then, "Together Believers have to raise $50,000 to get their Artist of choice in the studio. At any point before your Artist has reached the Goal of $50,000, you can withdraw your Parts and pick a different Artist. You can even get your money back. It's your music. It's your choice." If one band reaches $50,000 (in four months two already did), a CD is released, you get a copy, 50% of the profits go to the band, and the other 50% are distributed to their believers.

2007/05:

SellABand also keeps going on, and are, at least, a very successful case of an indie label - after all in less than an year they've managed to launch several bands albums and compilations, besides organizing events - for instance. Here listeners pay to give the bands a chance to release an album, and after they can make money out of it.

2007/09:

But the big question here remains: what's the really good way of doing this? How to create the "Record Label 2.0"? Every one of the three concepts for music have problems (SellABand, Launch A Label and the $100 label), and while ideas can and should be taken from stuff like Open Source or examples like Swarm of Angels, there's still no idea of how to create the "killer record label", that which is fair to everyone (from the artist to the public). I wrote my ideas of how to create the perfect record label [6] in the past, even if it was just a collection of loose thoughts in a way that seemed to make sense. There's no answer yet, but it's definitively something interesting enough to make me think.

In 2007/10 I actually interviewed SellABand. All of it is relevant, but let me highlight this part - more interesting when we think about it's state of bankrupcy:

When it comes to SellaBand I am very confident that it is a sustainable business model. The relationship of the artist with his or her fans is a unique one that is very difficult to break. Imagine seeing 50,000 dollars roll in on your account. Imagine realizing your dream because thousands of music fans believe in you. Imagine seeing an artist you supported on MTV. All of this magic is happening and will happen a lot more for a very long time.

In 2008/07 I interviewed Equal Dreams, a SAB competitor. This is what they had to said regarding SAB:

Compared to the other services Equal Share provides the artists with more flexibility in defining what he or she is actually selling to the audience and for what price; first of all, there are no pre-set target goals, but the artists can define their own funding needs; after all the quality of the produced music does not necessarily correlate with the amount of money spend in the project. Nowadays this is true more than ever as the prices of digital recording equipment have come down so drastically. Artist could also use Equal Share together with a record label/producer to gather a partial funding for the production. Secondly, the co-funding, which works with a pre-order concept, can be flexibly assigned to even just one song, and the pre-order price can be set as low as 0.50 EUR. We think this is more attractive from the customer’s point of view than being prescribed to invest tens of euros. Fans can be updated about the progress of the production project using the internal messaging system in the Service.

In 2008/11, I wrote:

They're changing for better, but they're still too far from where they should. Let's see how this goes...

In 2009/06, I questioned some bands decisions regarding their editions, based on SAB figures, and questions that should also apply to SAB themselves.

...

Today SellABand's website gives us this message:

On Friday February 19th, SellaBand AG requested provisional suspension of payments (moratorium). This was granted by the Court in Amsterdam on the same day. Yesterday, Monday February 22nd, this moratorium was changed into bankruptcy, with appointment of, Mr Paul Schaink, an amsterdam lawyer, as trustee. The trustee wishes to inform the 'Sellaband community' that, apart from a few technicalities, the completion of a transaction with a potential buyer of the business, is to be expected soon, in order to make a fresh start, safeguarding both the rights of Believers and Artists. More news will follow shortly.

I don't know what "shortly" is, but I'm sure I want to know about it. In the meanwhile...

• artists and believers are talking about it on SAB's "Get Satisfaction"
• an old SAB forum (before there was an official one as reactivated and old users are talking there
• An artist from SAB decided to create a site dedicated to SAB's bankrupcy

There's one thing I know for sure - this bankrupcy is not SAB's business model fault, it is their management fault - just ask anyone from its community.

Personal Top 20 decade bands

Sorry for the lack of propper formating and links, this is a blog post being written in a rush, via cellphone.

I've seen more than one hundred "top music lists" in the last month: being end of year and end of decade (spare me the math, people *act* as this was an end of decade, and that's what matters), it is no surprise that we get so many lists, and, well, all of them (the music ones) are subjective and kind of personal, so not only I'm not going to comment them, but also I'm not going to hide it: this blog post is highly personal, and lists what were, for me, the 20 most important music acts of this decade. Personal, I insist.

Black Metal band ColdBlooded (and probably also Death Metallers NecroSlaughter, but those won't be a part of this list since they ended up never going public, with music released or gigs played) is a really personal choice: they are a part of the reason that made me understand what it is to be a musician today, what can you achieve by yourself, the reality of Portuguese small labels, and several other things. Not only their "Sangue Barbaro" release is great, but their existence was, by chance, an important piece in my path as a musician. Heavily related with it (specially with NecroSlaughter) is Mordor, my "old Metal band". It was an important experience and step for me, where the process was more important than the result. Now defunct, its track "Dystopia" is what's worth listening of it, and the example of what Mordor could have been if it wasn't just a process, the path that led me as a musician to try something else... and what ended up validating my steps as a musician by myself... and so, the third in my list, Merankorii, my experimental one-man-band. Writing about Merankorii would be a project by itself (maybe one day I'll write a book or something about it), but for this post I'll just say that Merankorii is... "the musical me". You can listen or download lots of free tracks or albums, or buy some of its records. Merankorii is a pretty active musical project, and disregarding compilations and similar collaborations it has released 9 albums, with the 10th comming really soon. Another inspiring Portuguese one-man-band, and the fourth of this list, is Ambiance, unfortunately virtually unknown and yet one of the best Portuguese acts we have and one that, for me, mark the Portuguese music history of this decade. Personally I think that "As Dez Esperas" is its best album, and if you're willing to know this band you should grab that album. My story with Ambience's M. Is once again a proof that the era of rock stars is over, and that bands have to be more accessible than ever. My interaction with him was so good that we ended up creating a musical project and an album together: that is the story of the creation of "Ambiansu", considered by some as "better than Merankorii or Ambiense alone". Only time will tell what the future reserves for this project, but I believe that you'll hear more about it, even if not a lot more. Anyway, it was already worth it, and its record will always have a very special place in my music collection. +ko+ko+, another Portuguese one-man-band, is a musical project created in 2009, when its debut album was released (by Noori Records), and it is important for me in many levels. It is, IMHO, a great album, which I helped producing, and it is for me the proof that nowadays anyone can create great music, if they have the will to do it. The seventh is being announced in this post: kokori. I don't have any clue about what's going to happen to that musical project, but kokori is yet another experience, and yet another example of how different things are in the music world nowadays. It appeared almost by chance, and it is a musical project created by me and the guy behind +ko+ko+. If nothing else, the only track we've done is going to be released soon in a compilation. Then, a triple: Empyrium, Tenhi and Neun Welten. These three neofolk bands play the type of neofolk I enjoy and inspires me the most. Heavily linked with Mother Nature, they are different but complement themselves. Empyrium was an exercice of perfectionism. Album after album, its work was getting more and more defined, until their last, the perfect album, was done and released. After that, the work of Empyrium was done and the project disbanded. A great collectors package was released with every Empyrium work and a book explaining it all, so grab it if you get the chance. Tenhi is darker, colder, more introspective. A different take on the subject, they've been aweing me (and its fans) album after album, and I'm sure that I won't be able ever to think about this decade about reminding them. They're making something beautiful and new from what's ancient, and they work as a proof that there's evolution in music. Neun Welten, a relatively new act, is for me something as a bridge between Empyrium and Tenhi: its recently released second album surely sounds more Empyrium-ish than the first, but... It's not really a good time for me to talk about N.W. since I still need to have more contact with the new album. DVAR and Caprice, needed to be introduced together, are 11 and 12 on this list. DVAR is simply the most "inovattive" band there is, and Caprice a DVAR-ish (in mood) introduction to the neoclassical faerie world. Grab DVAR's complete discography, if you can (being released by Russian labels add to their mistery an "hard-to-grab" factor), and the latest Caprice works.

Sunn O))) was great in the decade, introducing drone to the mainstream. Ashram is the proof that simple can be beautiful, showing us the future of neoclassical music. Current 93 proves that indie bands can make it, with its legion of true fans and Tibet's non-stop work making new and different albums in a breathtaking pace. The decade begun with Jack Off Jill's latest album, and a prelude to Scarling.: less shock rock, still grrl rock, this is simply what indie rock should be. Jessicka from Scarling. created another musical project "The Ingenues" (only one digital single released so far), let's see if they make into the 10's list. Speaking of shock rock, it's no news that I consider Marilyn Manson a genious musician, but this decade was my "departure" with his works: despite Holy Wood and The Golden Age of Grotesque being excelent albums (totally different, but both really good), I didn't really followed his works after that (and from what I've heard I didn't miss much), nor even went to his latest concerts in Portugal: my boycott to major labels includes Interscope since it is a subsidiary of Universal... but the great news about Marilyn Manson came already in the last month of the decade: Marilyn Manson's contract with Interscope expired, so now he's free and working on a new album... may 2010 bring us a great new MM record. And, well, talking about MM I had to talk about #18 and #19: Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead are two bands I don't actually musically enjoy enough to buy them an album, but they surely marked the decade, to the point that if this list had only two name, they had to be these. Their message is clear: stop whining, music is more alive than ever. Some of the lists I've been reading come with rants telling us that this decade was not a particulary good one on music (OK, some of those who wrote about it can never be taken seriously - yes, I'm looking at you Belanciano), but these two actually gave us, more than music, or business models, a message: the next decade, regarding music, will be brilliant if we let it go that way. Finaly, the #20: Astra Autisma. This one is hard to explain, go listen to it yourself. A warning tho: it's something that won't last...