rickwebb:

petervidani:

adamisacson:

perpetua:

1. Animal Collective Merriweather Post Pavilion 131k
2. Dirty Projectors Bitte Orca 48k
3. the xx xx 35k
4. The Flaming Lips Embryonic 75k (estimate)
5. Raekwon Only Built For Cuban Linx Part II 141k
6. Grizzly Bear Veckatimest 132k
7. Bat For Lashes Two Suns 36k
8. Phoenix Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix 205k
9. Fever Ray Fever Ray 23k
10. Girls Album 19k

I don’t know the economics of this at all, but it’s hard to imagine an indie band even paying its grocery bills with such measly record sales. If we assume Animal Collective cleared $3 per album, then each member of the band would have got about $100,000 from US sales of Merriweather Post - less than what a mid-level Senate staffer makes.

And we can safely say that no mid-level Senate staffer made anything nearly as great as Merriweather Post this year.

I wonder what the Pitchfork Effect looks like and what the sales numbers will be a month from now.

Well… for starters, $100k a year is no slouch. Then there are sales in the rest of the world - figure another $100k each. Then there are the live shows. Say 50 shows in a year, say $5k per show, that’s another $60k each (they actually played 58 but a few were probably promos). Then another $10 or $20k each from radio royalties (let’s assume they share songwriting credit), and another $10k for some moderate, modest, indie-acceptable amount of advertising and soundtrack licensing (in Japan and indie films only, natch). Then let’s say they sell… what’s reasonable? 1,000 t-shirts? 2,000? Let’s say 2,000 shirts - that’s only 40 a show. high but not impossible. Let’s say 1,000. 20 per show (and none on the internet). $12 margin on a $20 sale - $3,000 more each. This would add up to just under $300,000 a year. That’s before… um… streaming royalties. Sales on previous albums. Festival headlining slots. Publishing advances. Royalties from covers. DVD sales. Remix fees. Production fees. Panda Bear gigs. Artists can still make money, don’t kid yourself.

agreed. artists/bands don’t make a living off of record sales. also - if i made $100K a year doing what i love that would be just fine by me!