Emilie on DKD and Seligman

At the beginning of his presentation, Donald K. Donald drew a distinction between the recording industry and the music industry, the latter of which he referred to as “alive and well”. As a concert producer, Donald seemed able to take a more detached look at the mistakes made by the major labels, even criticizing some of his own business moves. Donald not only seemed conscious of the thriving local music scene, but went as far as to commend the indie movement for its creativity and innovative qualities, comparing it to the jazz of the 20s. I found his attitude to be refreshing, considering it was coming from someone who spent his career promoting massive mainstream artists. Yet toward the end of his presentation, Donald made a comment about no indie band ever reaching “stadium status”. This presumption that stadium status is somehow indicative of success and is what all bands strive for, quickly shattered my hopes that the lecture would be more than a display of the “generational gap” between old and new business models.
What is interesting about Dan’s business model, however, is that it does not function very differently from Donald’s. The main difference seems to lie in the size of the events. This distinction is not insignificant, however, as it gets at a major difference between the ethic of alternative and mainstream cultures. Huge stadium shows sell out year after year because of fans’ attachment and loyalty toward an artist, while concert goers in the independent music scene are motivated not by their devotion to the people behind the music, but to the music itself. While there are “Beatles fans” and “Bruce Springsteen fans” who proudly identify as such, you will be hard-pressed to find a “tUnE-YarDs” or a “the xx fan”, and yet many people will claim to love their music. In short, the “indie ethic” is based far more on the appreciation of individual tracks or albums than it is on personal attachment to the creators. This focus on music over image, as Dan pointed out, was a reaction against the big overly-marketed stadium bands of the 90s.
To the outside world, this perceived lack of loyalty, for example, upon an artist’s return into town or the release of a new album, makes indie fans occasionally look like traitors with short attention spans who are too cheap to actually purchase their “favourite band’s” CDs. It is also the lack of personal/emotional identification with the creator that perhaps partly explains the resistance toward paying for music.
Still, there seems to be an inherent contradiction between the anti-image, anti-marketing ethic of indie culture and what Dan does, promoting and managing emerging artists. Dan seems to toe the line quite effectively between aiming for larger, long-term success of artists and maintaining an authentic, grassroots aura to his business. This clever balancing act is probably the reason Dan has been so successful and also the reason that he will not be producing stadium shows any time soon.