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Sunday 3 June 2012

Working for an Indie Record Label, Part 1


Hello Chaps & Chapettes.

As some of you may know, I work for an Indie Record Label. It’s a blast, but not what everyone thinks it is. So, I thought it would be interesting to do a little blog about what the day to day is like working for an Indie Record Label because as much as I make it sound like gigs galore and nights out in reality, its really not!

Paperwork. Data entry. There’s lots of it.

Before this job I thought getting a record made meant going to the studio, getting the tracks done and then sending them off for mass production. If only.

So, we’ve got the music. Great. Then you need to get it Mastered. Which is fine. So long as you remember to deliver the relevant ISRC codes (Unique, trackable numbers for each track) with it. Oh, and the correct track listing for the Redbook/DDP (final format for delivery to manufacture). Forgot to write “feat. Blah blah blah”? That’ll be an extra £40 to get it amended.

Then, you enter the lovely world of Metadata, or the spreadsheet of doom as I like to call it. You enter ALL the track/album info into a spreadsheet. Title, artist, feature artist, release data, catalogue number, publisher, composer, producer. Everything. 10 track album? Not to bad. 5 formats? Not so easy. CD, LP, Digital, iTunes Exclusive, German Exclusive? Yup, need to write a separate one for each. And make sure you get a new barcode for each. And the right catalogue number. Did you know Scandinavia cant take iTunes videos? So an exclusive with video means a separate entry all together.

Oh, and the price. Easy you think? “We’ll sell it for £xx”. But then you have to talk to separate countries about their price, and if you don’t, it wont show up on their system. And they don’t tell you till the last minute. Handy.

And between all that, you’ve got the Label Copy. Label Copy is a document that holds all the information about the release. Contributors, publishers, copyright holders. 9 guest artists? Better get all the separate publishing information for them, ASAP!

Whilst all this is going on, you’ve got artwork. Pricing for artwork. Working out the unit cost of each product. Did you know you can’t release a CD in Europe if its not shrink-wrapped?

*Breathe*

That’ll do for now I think. For me, its fascinating to see what goes into actually getting a CD released to the public, and how it works. Above is just a teeny part of what goes on. There’s also marketing, sales notes, picking singles and remixes, track ordering and much more.

I might do another one like this about a topic if someone asks, or if I feel like it.

Enjoy x