this post was submitted on 15 Jun 2025
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Music should just be free, because if I'm not paying for Spotify, you'll be damn sure I'm not paying $20 for an album either. Sorry not sorry.
For any music streaming service, artists pay to a distributor ala distrokid/cd baby etc. to host their music and get back practically nothing, while listeners also pay Spotify/etc., so we all just enrich Spotify, direct wealth transfer style, and now they're just investing into AI to cut the tiny costs they have as-is and they're using artists to do do that, extracting more and more value.
But music is just too plentiful, even Spotify feels like a lot of money for just... music, not that I don't love music and treasure it dearly, but because it just doesn't feel scarce. It's not good and it's not fair.
It feels like every other person can make music at this point, and artists that are good even in the microgenre niche I'm into at any given moment seem endless, I could never listen to it all, it comes out faster than I could even listen to it.
Even the signed big artists make their money touring, not selling records, because most people don't actually see it as worth their money given the other entertainment options available, even if those more musically-inclined may balk at that, it's the truth.
Supply massively outstrips demand because of a global market we're exposed to now, and there ain't no way in hell most of these folks with 1k monthlies make any money from it at all that outstrips expenses.
So maybe it should just be free. That way we don't give all our money to the rich, and everyone saves their money, the artists and the listeners alike. Maybe bandcamp should charge like a dollar for higher quality downloads, so that once you know you like it, you can tip the artist a dollar for the FLACs instead of 320kbps mp3s, but other than that I see no other way forward.
And nowadays it feels like many people don't even bother with music at all because they all just watch endless brainrot on tiktok and random podcasts that are just people chatting about their grocery store trips or whatever and occasionally grifting for the alt-right funkopop or ponzi scheme or whatever, so if that don't tell you the value of music to the less musically inclined, then I don't know what will.
You can call me a jealous amateur who wants to make it worse for others because i haven't "made it", but I'm just echoing this dude's points: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVY7-Ti77UQ
I buy albums if I really l Iike them since I enjoy listening to the same thing multiple times, especially so as I'm getting older and have disposable income. But the amount of 50cent* albums on Bandcamp would probably keep me content for a long long while.
*You need to pay at least 50 cents for a "name your price" album to get it downloadable in the Bandcamp app
Yeah, I actually spent a good amount on bandcamp over the few months I've cancelled all streaming services, but I saw an album I heard on a web radio that I wanted to check out from a tiny artist, too small for piracy, like 2k listens on their most popular song, but it was over $20 on Bandcamp.
It's their right, and for the first time in a very long time - I just had no real alternative to get it, it was weird having heard music and not been able to acquire it, but I wasn't gonna pay that much money, I could buy groceries for the week with that! So I just... didnt get it. And to my shock - I was fine, about an hour later i just forgot all about it and listened to something else.