Bands would need 11 BILLION Spotify streams to match the value of their vintage merch

There’s a huge demand for original, vintage band t-shirts, with over a quarter of a million people (276,200 in January) searching for band tees every month. But why? And what puts certain bands in such favour for the real deal? 

Well, for starters, the industry has changed. Merch’s role within music has become more important, as smaller artists need more support than just a stream to make a profit.

To take a deeper look at the changing state of music, Everpress has sourced monthly search volumes for band t-shirts (for example, ‘nirvana t-shirt’) and multiplied this with the t-shirt selling for the highest price (for that band) on eBay.

Which bands could be making the most from selling vintage t-shirts?

Nirvana could be making the most profit off of their vintage t-shirts, with potential earnings of up to £32,110,620, thanks to the 8,500 monthly searches for ‘nirvana t-shirt’ and their high resale value.

Following closely is the Rolling Stones, with their potential earnings coming in at over £27 million. Despite a far lower monthly search volume for their original merch (3,600), the potential resale value was much higher, with the highest item selling for just under a whopping £8000.

While the top two are definitely in a rat race for the highest potential earnings, the gap grows considerably beyond this point. 

Rounding off the top 5 are Metallica, Led Zeppelin and Iron Maiden, with potential earnings of £5,543,454, £4,533,264 and £3,625,000 each. 

How the money-making machine has changed in music

With CD sales reducing by 27% annually between 2018 and 2020, artists can no longer rely on sales to make a profit. 

Streaming services like Spotify don’t help either, with artists only making 0.0028 pence per stream on average.

Nirvana, the table topper, would need over an astounding 11 billion streams (11,468,078,571) a month to match their potential earnings from their vintage t-shirt resale.

This is closely followed by The Rolling Stones, needing 9,714,137,143 streams to equate their potential earnings.

The rest of the top five bands would also need over a billion streams, too. Metallica, Led Zeppelin and Iron Maiden all needed 1,979,805,143; 1,619,022,857; 1,294,642,857 respectively.

Are modern artists missing out?

Streaming culture means modern artists rely more on merchandise as a money-making scheme, with some charging hundreds on the initial sale.

The highest potential earnings of a modern artist from merch resale is Eminem, with £576,000 - still over £31 million (31,534,620) lower than that of Nirvana.

This is followed by Billie Eilish and Travis Scott in second and third place, with potential earnings of £530,000 and £323,840 each - 5032 and 1611 per cent lower than their silver and bronze counterparts, the Rolling Stones and Metallica. 

Is there a ‘gender pay gap’ in music merch?

Out of the top 50 groups (with the highest search volume for band tees) only two included female musicians - Fleetwood Mac and Bikini Kill. 

Everpress’s findings show that the ‘gender pay gap’, in terms of music merch is, £30,732,508 (126% difference)(Fleetwood Mac v.s Nirvana).

Amongst the women, only one group could earn over £1 million from vintage t-shirt resale. Second place Blondie, were only able to earn £304,000 - barely chipping at the armour of their silver podium counterpart, The Rolling Stones (who could make as much as £8,8155 per cent more).

No other women-fronted group reaches the £100,000 mark, with third-place ABBA able to earn just £45,000 from their vintage t-shirt resales.

Alisha, music sales lead at Everpress, commented:

“Anyone can become an ethical listener. By using more fairly weighted streaming platforms, you can help artists keep creating things for you to enjoy. 

“Right now, the music industry (like so many others) operates under the might of late-stage capitalism, leading to unethical streaming platforms and bootleg merch skimming the money that artists need to make music and huge corporations sliding in to take whatever they can too. 

“At Everpress, we’re partnering with Bandcamp. This means smaller independent artists are now able to sell their merch through Bandcamp, cutting out the powerful organisations that profiteer from creative minds and giving the control back to the artists.”

Bands would need 11 BILLION Spotify streams to match the value of their vintage merch

Olivia Rodrigo Dominated Pop Streaming in 2021, Beating Adele and Taylor Swift

There were many resounding album releases in 2021, but few dominated the media headlines more than those of three Pop heavyweights: Adele’s “30”, Taylor Swift’s “Red (Taylor’s Version)” and Olivia Rodrigo’s “SOUR”. But which release brought its author the most attention in terms of a growing Spotify fanbase? Music research and analytics platform Viberate looked into the data to settle the dilemma once and for all.

For unbiased results, Viberate examined how many new Spotify followers each artist gained in two weeks following each release (the surrounding hype usually brings in new fans within that time period), and looked at spikes in monthly listeners after the release. To see if the artists have fans among their peers (other artists and festivals), Viberate additionally checked out how many notable social media mentions each artist got throughout the year.

The results show Olivia Rodrigo was the overall winner.

Olivia Rodrigo brought the most attention to her profile, as she gained over 14M new monthly listeners and 969K new followers in just two weeks. Her top-performing track was (and still is) “drivers licence”. It was clocking in almost 800M daily streams at the time of album release and has already amassed 1.2B streams so far.

Taylor Swift placed second with similarly incredible numbers. She gained 11.9M new monthly listeners and 759K new followers in two weeks. “All Too Well (10 Minute Version) (Taylor’s Version)” was streamed the most, averaging 50M streams per day.

Adele came in third. She gained 7.4M new monthly listeners and 694K new followers in two weeks. “Easy On Me” was streamed the most, with 385M plays at the two-week mark.

All three artists were mentioned on social media by their peers and music festivals a lot, with Taylor Swift being mentioned the most.

What can we learn from all this?

It’s interesting to note how different release strategies impact the streaming numbers. Adele’s biggest leap corresponds to her announcing the album and releasing the “Easy On Me” single, meaning that she brought in the majority of new fans in the promotional period. Taylor Swift released two albums in 2021, so she was omnipresent throughout the year. Her releases were placed on a ton of Spotify playlists (her current reach surpasses 390M Spotify listeners), and the steady growth suggests she’s been successfully converting listeners into fans along the way. Olivia Rodrigo is the Pop newcomer of the year not only because of the industry awards won, but also because her strategic releases (hit single first, album second) increased her Spotify following 50 times over in 2021.

For more data insights such as these, visit Viberate.

Olivia Rodrigo Dominated Pop Streaming in 2021, Beating Adele and Taylor Swift

How To Release Music As An Independent Artist (Infographic)

I was asked to do a presentation for Fort Lewis College in Durango, CO on How To Release Music As An Independent Artist. It’s mostly from an EDM/Rap perspective, but I figured it would be beneficial for everyone to learn from. Some of the details are missing since I explained it to them in person, so if you have any questions or anything here needs to be corrected, please post them, and I’ll be sure to reply to all of them so we can disuss further.

Click to read more ...

Artists Have Had Enough: Music Needs Valuation

Apple’s statement that they would not be paying artists and the consequent backlash from performers like Taylor Swift has been generating a great deal of commentary regarding revenue from music streaming services in general. This article examines some of the issues relating to streaming, piracy, and the difficulties associated with profiting from recorded music in the digital age.

Click to read more ...

SoundOut, TuneCore Track Smarts, ReverbNation Crowd Review, AudioKite, and Music Xray Compared

This is the story of a mediocre song. An objectively mediocre song. My song. Curse you, data!

If you’re looking for unbiased feedback on your latest track, you’ve got five options. Well, five-ish.

There’s SoundOut, which I wrote about way back in 2010.

Then there’s ReverbNation Crowd Review and TuneCore Track Smarts, both of which are powered by SoundOut.

Are all three SoundOut services the same? We’ll find out.

I reviewed AudioKite earlier this year, gushingly. A new and improved version launched just this month.

Finally, Music Xray offers a diagnostics feature, which presents your track to 5 music professionals and 20 potential fans.

Which is right for you?

Time for a good old-fashioned market research shootout!

Click to read more ...

How to Make Money Selling Recorded Music

I’ll tell you the secret to selling music:

Being a musician who sells music is like being a restaurant that only serves sauce. Music is most valuable when paired with something else.

— Dave Hahn (@davidjhahn) March 17, 2013

Click to read more ...

What Does an Indie Get Paid? #1: iTunes

I’m doing my taxes this week.

If it helps you maintain my “image”, imagine I’m A.) really sad about it, philosophically pondering how Western Civilization and Capitalism got to the point that I, one whose job it is to write poems and sing them so that we can momentarily forget about these things, am sitting at a computer figuring up royalties to the .000000000000001th decimal point. (this part is actually true.) and B.) Not wearing glasses and my hair looks super cool. (this part is not true.)

Click to read more ...

Pairing Music with Tangible Products

I released my most recent album called “Tea for Tyrants” under the following three guidelines: 1) Music is free 2) Music is everywhere and 3) Music needs context. The price tag of free makes it unrealistic to expect strangers will pay to consume my music through standard channels - iTunes, bandcamp, etc.  Similarly, the ubiquity of music reduces the likelihood that my music will attract large audiences at live events to generate significant revenue. 

Click to read more ...

You Bought It, You Own It, You Should Be Able to Do What You Want With It.

The US Supreme Court is hearing an appeal that could change your ownership rights to music.

If you purchase music as physical media or license-free downloads, you are protected by the so-called First Sale Doctrine of the US Copyright Act, which gives people the right to lend, resell, or give away the works that they’ve bought, even if those works contain copyrighted elements.

But the case of Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons, currently being heard by the US Supreme Court, could undermine First Sale Doctrine, making ownership feel more like licensing. How could you be affected?

Click to read more ...

How To Sell Your Music On iTunes - The Important Facts Some Leave Out

Hey guys, this is a follow up to my guide on how to sell your music on iTunes and Amazon MP3. In that guide I looked firstly at the process of digitally distributing your music online, and secondly at what you need to do once your music is on there. This second point I don’t think I looked at in enough detail however, so want to talk more about it today.

While getting your songs and albums on to these big online stores is a good feeling in itself, if you want to actually makes sales of your music, getting your music on iTunes is only a small part of what you need to do. Let me explain.

Click to read more ...

Can You Recover From Free Music?

I’ve lost count of the number of articles I’ve read that insist bands and artists should give their music away for free.  Personally I believe, unless you have the benefit of on-going PR support or are reaching mass audiences through radio airplay, giving away your core product might just be a mistake you’ll never recover from. Here’s why…

Giving away your music might be a prudent strategy for artists like Prince that have successfully established, genuine, alternative income streams (EG tours) to sustain a living. However, for the average DIY, or unsigned musician who barely covers costs when they play live, is it really a smart strategy to remove your most obvious and immediate income stream?

Click to read more ...

How Vinyl and iPods Ganged Up to Kill the Audio CD

NPR reported that CD sales tanked in 2010, particularly among younger buyers. The trend suggests that vinyl and iPods are sinking the audio CD into the so-called “fidelity belly,” where mediocre products go to die.

In his book Trade-Off, journalist Kevin Maney wrote that a truly successful product provides either the richest user experience (fidelity) or the greatest convenience. Less successful products fall into what he labeled the fidelity belly, “the no-man’s-land of consumer experience,” characterized by commercial apathy, insufficient fidelity, and insufficient convenience.

Apple succeeds in the consumer computer market by providing the richest pre-sales experience in its retail stores. Dell and HP succeed by providing an ultra-convenient pre-sales experience online. Who is in the belly? Everyone else.

Sinking into the fidelity belly is essentially the fast track to obsolescence. Staying out of the belly is never assured, because customer expectations for fidelity and convenience constantly evolve.

Click to read more ...

What Artists Should Know About ReverbNation's Promote It

Running a Facebook ad campaign is confusing. You bid for ad placement, but the price you pay bears little relation to your bid. What’s the difference between reach and social reach, connections and clicks, CPC and CPM? More importantly, is there any way to tell how many people played, downloaded, and shared your song, or signed up for your mailing list? (answer: no, there’s not)

ReverbNation’s new Promote It tool addresses those shortcomings, and then some. You pick a song, photo, and budget, and it automatically generates dozens of optimized Facebook ads based on past Promote It campaigns, and continually optimizes your campaign based on the performance of those ads. New fans click through to customized landing pages that track not just clicks and likes, but plays, downloads, shares, wall posts, and mailing list signups. As I’m quoted as saying in the press release, “It’s the ultimate ‘set it and forget it’ fan-making machine!” I was invited to try it out and provide feedback during the beta period, and I’m flattered that some of my suggestions made it into the final product. So far I’ve run six campaigns. Let’s walk through the creation and performance of my latest and most successful one.

Click to read more ...

How Can You Drive Your Fans From Offline to Online?

To get someone to visit your band’s website, they need to have the intent to do so – put in other words, they need to get something out of it for it to be worth their time, which is why “check out our website” is about as effective as saying “we don’t have a website” as there really is no incentive offered for them to do so.

However, assuming you’ve got that one covered (ie. you have some free downloads,  or some awesome photos of your crowd from last nights gig, or maybe even some exclusive videos etc.) here are some techniques to get them to view that content from offline.

Here I’ve suggested five effective methods to take your fans from the real world to the virtual world of the net. Please chip in with your best tips on driving fans online from offline in the comments beneath this article!

Click to read more ...