On Spotify I discovered a song of which I can’t get enough of: “Surprise yourself” by Jack Garratt. The song starts a little weird but after the introduction it becomes extremely powerful and melodic that is almost surreal. It’s a song to put on your good headphones, sit down and relax, close your eyes and press play. Amazing work by Jack Garratt – an impressive surprise!
2Sxmmer on Spotify
I’m proud to announce that my tracks “wet summer”, “path to present” and “dripping atmosphere” are now on Spotify, iTunes, Apple Music, Google Play and Amazon Music. Enjoy!
Typically Seeb
After the single “Breathe”, Seeb is once again climbing the German charts with the song “What do you love” feat. Jacob Banks. For example at 1:06 min you can hear the typical Seeb signature. Great work, once again, keep on going!
Fifty Scientists
Coldplay’s song “The Scientist” from 2011 has now just been re-vitalized in the movie “Fifty Shades Darker”. Corinne Bailey Rae is singing a very nice cover of “The Scientist”.
This is the original.
On her Soundcloud page, Corinne Bailey Rae offers a preview of her cover version.
Self-publishing: DistroKid vs. Feiyr
This article is about my personal experience with the digital music distribution services DistroKid and Feiyr.
versus
I’m a passionate musician, doing my first steps in music production. This is my home production setup.
If you want to get a better exposure of your music and if you want to have your songs available on Spotify, iTunes, GooglePlay, Amazon, etc., you need a partner for digital music distribution. There are many of them out there with big differences in pricing models and conditions. Especially in the beginning, I don’t want to have high initial cost or even increasing cost, like it is the case with Tunecore. I want to start with constantly low or no costs, therefore I signed up with DistroKid and Feiyr and I’m sharing my own experience in this article.
Sign up process & discount
Sign up itself is free on DistroKid and Feiyr, like with other music distributors, however, you can take advantage of a discount on your plans already during the sign up process!!!
DistroKid
Before signing up with DistroKid, you can get a 7% discount coupon on your DistroKid plan by using this link: https://distrokid.com/vip/seven/650916.
You should see the yellow referral notice on top of the page: “The link you clicked entitles you to 7% off your first year membership…”. Then if you sign up on this page, you will see on the following page that the 7% discount has been applied to all plans. Just make sure to use this referral link before you sign in, to create your DestroKid account – the discount will not work if you already have an account at DistroKid.
Feiyr
Feiyr currently offers a promotion for free account activation. Looking for the term “Gutscheincode für kostenlose Anmeldung” in the EBOOK “der selfpublisher 4: Deutschlands 1. Selfpublishing-Magazin“, you will see the promotion code (valid until July 2017) which can be used during the initial sign up process. The promotion code is basically a registration voucher of 10,00 € which completely covers the account activation one-time fee of 9,90 €.
Subscription plans
CD Baby charges you a one-time fee for each published track. Tunecore even has an increasing cost model, with them you pay even an annual fee for each published track. Basically with these distributors, the more music you make, the higher your costs will be.
DistroKid
With DistroKid you pay a fixed annual fee for an unlimited number of published tracks. The fixed fee depends on your options and starts at 19,99 $ per year for one band name. If you need more band names or if you want e.g. daily sales statistics, the annual cost will be higher. If you have a discount link, like mentioned above, you will get 7% off the first year membership on all plans. I chose the simple plan and used a discount so I end up with a fixed fee of 18,59 $ for my first year and 19,99 $ for the following years. This is a fair price for starting digital music distribution with an unlimited number of songs. Now it’s up to me to provide content. 🙂
One very important point: The payment will automatically renew every year on the date of the first payment, unfortunately without prior email information! Therefore it is important to keep credit card information up to date at DistroKid (when your credit card is close to its expiration date, make sure you register the new card), otherwise all your published songs will be taken down!
Feiyr
With Feiyr there are no monthly or annual costs but there is a one-time account activation fee of 9,90 €. Once the account is activated, you pay 2,36 € for each published bundle. A bundle can e.g. be an album of multiple tracks but also single track (Maxi Single). Just keep in mind that deleting a bundle, e.g. if you want to change the distributor, will cost 29,99 €!
Conclusion
It quickly turned out that there are three major disadvantages with Feiyr:
– The big surprise comes at the end: If you change the distributor, Feiyr charges you 29,99€ for taking down each bundle.
– During the final registration process, after sending a letter to your home address, Feiyr actually ask you to agree to their terms which allow them to publish your personal data in the internet. This is the German version of the terms: “Der Lizenzgeber erklärt mit seiner Anmeldung und Einstellung der Files seine ausdrückliche Zustimmung und Genehmigung zur Veröffentlichung der Files und zur Veröffentlichung seiner personenbezogenen Daten im Internet,…”. So make sure to carefully read the terms before you sign up with Feiyr. This generic statement was unacceptable for me.
– There is no reply at all to support requests on info@feiyr.com. I have sent three emails asking them to delete my account application – no response at all within five months. At least according to my personal experience, the Feiyr support is miserable / not existing. DistroKid support is completely different, with a response time of most of the times less than one day they clarified every question so far.
My decision was clear to go with DistroKid. Excellent support, a fair price and no hidden charges/surprises, simple and efficient. So far everything went very well with DistroKid, all my questions were answered, all my music uploads arrived well in the music stores and they send interesting news with updates or new features once in a while, not spamming. The only thing to remember with DistroKid is to keep credit card information always up to date to avoid that all songs are suddenly taken down just because of a credit card renewal. For me DistroKid is the perfect start to do my first steps in music production.
Payphone comparison
It’s worth to compare payphones – not only the prices but also the quality. 😉
I first recognized Michael Lynch in the cover of One Republic “Let’s hurt tonight”, which I really like. Then I started browsing his other videos and I’m really impressed. Check out the “Payphone” cover by Michael Lynch…
…and the original “Payphone” by Maroon 5.
Drone photography
Drone photography fascinating me. I’m love sunsets and soft (low) light atmosphere, therefore I’m still trying to find a consumer drone which will capture nice images at low light.
Ozzo photography at ozzo.is has solved this low light problem in a professional way by hooking a Sony α7S II (12MP in a Full-frame sensor) below a Dji Matrice 600 Hexacopter. The result is this absolutely stunning low light video of the northern lights.
Not only the video is spectacular but also the music which was selected for it. This is the original track “The Spectacular Quiet” from Lights & Motion.
There are not too many consumer drones with a satisfying image quality and convenient portability for traveling. I now ordered the Dji Mavic Pro in favor of the GoPro Karma. I expect the Mavic to be super portable (drone, as well as the controller) and the picture quality should be nice as well (the small camera will technically of course never reach the quality of a full-frame sensor, however, it’s a compromise). The Mavic seems to have better flight capabilities than the Karma. This is a detailed review of the Mavic, I can’t wait to try it: https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2016/12/dji-mavic-pro-in-depth-review.html. Drone photography will also be a new challenge for shooting and for post-processing, so there is a lot to learn: http://fromwhereidrone.com/8-tips-better-drone-photography/.
Love around the block
Just found this (almost 3 year old) video from the Berlin artist “SIDO” and saw that it was recorded around the block – many places are very familiar :-). The video is about how love can be recognized.
New Year’s surprise
It was irritating to see Maria Carey having trouble singing her own songs at the New Year’s Eve party in New York. She already looks quite distracted in the interview which she gave prior to the show. During the show she sings in sync sometimes but then also just stops singing. The strange thing is that all her dancers (without earphones) seemed to be able to hear the music, the audience as well.
Let’s hope that she is not following the example of Amy Winehouse.
Looking back on 2016
Looking back on 2016, the highlight of this year was the Coldplay concert at Rose Bowl, Los Angeles. Due to the Xylobands it was also an amazing show.
In 2016 several musicians became popular like Alan Walker and Iselin Solheim.
Philipp Poisel mentioned “Zweimal Sommer” twice in his song “Erklär mir die Liebe“.
Also I discovered that Sebastien, a DJ from Hamburg, Germany, is one of the few musicians who is producing remixes which are better than the original, like “Almost Home“.
Finally in the Advent season, I managed to produce “dance” cover versions of traditional Christmas hymns on Soundcloud and on Youtube, each Advent Sunday and on Christmas eve. These are my first steps in music production, hope you like the songs.
Thanks to everyone supporting me on 500px and Soundcloud with likes and follows!
Happy New Year!