Bandcamp

Alright well since a handful of us have been talking about Bandcamp in the Four Star Revival thread... I figured I might as well start a thread specifically for Bandcamp.    I figured it'd be fun to share our profiles so we can "follow" and see what other fellow Christian metalheads are buying.    Here's mine:

https://bandcamp.com/kerrickking

Didn't know about having a profile there... I did however download a serious amount of mediocre power metal from there.

I never looked at my profile...I've downloaded a lot!  Most of it I haven't had time to go back and listen to again...whoops.  I'm going to have fun checking all yours out and finding more stuff to download, though.

https://bandcamp.com/twospies

Xid wrote:https://bandcamp.com/dczmess

This link didn't work for me.

My profile is https://bandcamp.com/musicme

New Creation wrote:

Xid wrote:https://bandcamp.com/dczmess

This link didn't work for me.

My profile is https://bandcamp.com/musicme

It looks like that because I haven't uploaded a photo or anything yet.  My 2 music accounts are:

http://joshuascreed.bandcamp.com

http://derekclose.bandcamp.com

I have never had much traffic on bandcamp...maybe I havent figured it out enough.  Same for SoundCloud.

I've avoided BandCamp like the plague since the last horrible incident I encountered. While 2 of my releases are still there, I've since learned that 3rd party software allows for any paid song to be downloaded for free.  Its little more than just a haven for pirates and it fuels blogs and torrents sharing illegal downloads.

ThomasEversole wrote:I've avoided BandCamp like the plague since the last horrible incident I encountered.  While 2 of my releases are still there, I've since learned that 3rd party software allows for any paid song to be downloaded for free.  Its little more than just a haven for pirates and it fuels blogs and torrents sharing illegal downloads.

One CD sale does the same thing.  In this day of music lovers who have always gotten their music for free, having your music on a torrent site is bound to happen.

As I understand it, any stream (like bandcamp provides) can be ripped to a digital file by 3rd party software, like Thomas says. At least with a CD, somebody has to buy it once and then actively upload it to a torrent site, while a streaming service like Bandcamp can be taken advantage of for completely free music.

That said, as a customer, I love Bandcamp. It at least feels like I'm supporting artists/labels more (if it's not on Bandcamp, I use Google Play or Amazon MP3 or buy used CDs) and I like having lossless backups of my music (other than CDs which mostly just take up space).

Yeah, I love it as a customer too.  It's pretty much the only way I buy digital music.  I also buy vinyl.  No CDs, so if you're only selling your music via CD I sadly won't be hearing it.  I'm guessing it's the same for most music consumers these days.

Thomas -- as a black metal musician and a Christian, you pretty much have to be doing it for the love anyway, right?  It can't be anything more than a hobby or a mission, given the tiny audience.  I mean, you're never going to make more than a few hundred or thousand dollars if you're really successful.  Why would you care if anybody is downloading your music for free?  It might be the main or only way people hear it.

Thomas -- as a black metal musician and a Christian, you pretty much have to be doing it for the love anyway, right?  It can't be anything more than a hobby or a mission, given the tiny audience.  I mean, you're never going to make more than a few hundred or thousand dollars if you're really successful.  Why would you care if anybody is downloading your music for free?  It might be the main or only way people hear it.

Except for the radio driven CCM market, I would say that most forms of Christian music outside of that have a tiny audience worldwide when compared to their secular counterparts.  Getting your music out there these days is important.  To help fuel my latest album, I actually gave away downloads for a couple of days but allowed people to give money if they so chose at Bandcamp.  I did better financially than selling the downloads.  I picked up 46 new fans, too!

strangerhoncho wrote:
Thomas -- as a black metal musician and a Christian, you pretty much have to be doing it for the love anyway, right?  It can't be anything more than a hobby or a mission, given the tiny audience.  I mean, you're never going to make more than a few hundred or thousand dollars if you're really successful.  Why would you care if anybody is downloading your music for free?  It might be the main or only way people hear it.

The bottom line is, piracy is ILLEGAL.  Not only would turning a blind eye to this be condoning sin, but it defeats the entire purpose of copyright law.  

Of course I don't want my music to be just for people with money.  I'm perfectly fine with ME giving away MY music on MY own terms - I always have and I always will.  Every second of produced Orationem music (and some exclusive extras) are on my YouTube channel for the world to see - for free.

What I'm not fine with is an ARMY of other people sharing FILES (that they again obtained ILLEGALLY) however, wherever and whenever they please.  Looking at piracy of your music as "good for free advertising" is like looking at a mugging as "good for giving to those in "need"".

Sure.  Got it.  I guess if it was me I'd think it's the same difference (and I'd rather others do the work of giving the music out, lol!), but I see your point.

I see that point as well, but I want my music to be shared in high quality uncompressed audio formats from my own pages... not as dumpy 256kbs compressed MP3s from a spammy file sharing domain.

YouTube actually has just as big an issue with stream ripping that Bandcamp does.  There's been 3rd party software to rip an audio stream since pretty much day one of streaming.....and it's not even necessary.  Almost any audio capture software is pretty much capable of it without even needin to be purpose built to rip from a specific site.


Once you've provided a digital stream ANYWHERE with popularity, "control of quality and distribution" is something you've given up to a large degree, regardless of the ethics/legality involved. 

I'd be asking myself "why NOT Bandcamp?", personally.  At least with THAT site, there's a truly easy option for folks to throw some cash at you should they be so inclined.  Just food for thought.......

exo wrote:YouTube actually has just as big an issue with stream ripping that Bandcamp does.  There's been 3rd party software to rip an audio stream since pretty much day one of streaming.....and it's not even necessary.  Almost any audio capture software is pretty much capable of it without even needin to be purpose built to rip from a specific site.

Yeah, no matter what site streams the music, as long as someone has an audio recording software the music can be "ripped" by just clicking the record button on the audio software and clicking play on the streaming site. And there is absolutely nothing that can be done about it ever. So the only possibilities to deal with it is to offer your music to be downloaded for free or to let people pay for it if they want to.


I have my own electronic music on Bandcamp:
http://ramiairola.bandcamp.com
While I could set it up so that people could only listen to it for a few times before having to download to listen more, I've chosen to offer unlimited streaming as I think limiting streaming wouldn't make the possibility of ripping the music go away and it would mostly just make people listen to the songs less times. But I've also given the chance to pay for the songs for those who want to do so, and nowadays you can also sell physical copies through Bandcamp so I made it possible to buy my newest album on vinyl. It doesn't hurt to have more options for people to both listen and have a chance to purchase music and support the artists.

Bandcamp also lets you download the music in lossless quality so there's no problem of getting a "worse" quality mp3s from that site.

In my opinion Bandcamp is the best, easiest and fairest digital streaming sites for music in both if you want people to be able to hear your music and if you want to try to sell it. But it is true that it is extremely easy to rip music from there, but it's as easy as it's anywhere else and you don't even need any special ripping tools or ripping web services to do it as it can be done by just having record button being on in any audio recording software while you listen to the music. It's quite like that with videos nowadays too as there are free video capture software around that will basically let you capture whatever video you are watching.

That's just how it is in today's digital world and I don't see any ways to really fight against that. However, I love that even though it should drive people into just offering everything they do for free there still are services that let you ask for money along with offering the music for free. In the worst case scenario the world would just be filled with only free music and videos and no money exchanged at all because people have been forced to give everything for free. But as it is today, I love the fact that while most of the services now let people watch and listen for free, the services still offer a choice for the artists to ask for money and the viewers and listeners to give money if they feel like they want to support.

Yeah, I agree with all that above.  That's how I feel.  As a consumer, I'm generally technically inept and don't have audio recording software so I'm not going to go out of my way to get any free mp3s.  Especially since I can and want to support music I like financially.  I'm also probably not going to download from a band directly through their own site or whatever if it requires me to jump through any hoops of any kind -- even something as simple as having to create an account or put my credit card info in is a hassle.  I'm too busy for that.  I'm a hundred times more likely to use Bandcamp or Amazon or iTunes where the payment and download procedures are already set up and I can get the music with minimal hassle or know-how.

The number one rule in retail is to eliminate hassle for the consumer.  Paying customers will spend money if you make it attractively quick and easy for them.  Low cost is important too but not as important.

Most people who gravitate toward "free" illegal downloads are not people who would pay for anything even if that was the only option (they just wouldn't listen), so you're not really losing much by their activities, IMO.

I have two:

http://indarkestdreams.bandcamp.com

And...

http://anemiamusic.bandcamp.com

strangerhoncho wrote:Most people who gravitate toward "free" illegal downloads are not people who would pay for anything even if that was the only option (they just wouldn't listen), so you're not really losing much by their activities, IMO.

Several polls of people that illegally download have found that the more a person downloads illegally, the more they buy legally. Some say this means the real issue is people wanting more than they can afford. But others studies have found these people always tend to buy the music they end up liking. Its a weird area that is hard to pin down, but mainly because those that do download illegally don't fit into the typical criminal mold.

It is also incorrect to say that BandCamp is just a haven for illegal downloading and pirating. Their goal is to support musicians, and their numbers back that up. They release a year end report every year, and it shows that sales are always increasing each year on BandCamp, not just from selling digital files but also on physical product as well:

https://daily.bandcamp.com/2017/01/24/everything-is-terrific-the-bandcamp-2016-year-in-review/

https://bandcamp.com/nullandvoid

I will say my purchases seem to be relatively popular compared to those of others in this thread, so congratulations you musical elitists

Bandcamp is my favourite source of music since I gave up needing physical copies..  I can't give myself over to renting a la Spotify etc., and bandcamp provides lossless, unlike the major stores, and gives the artists more control.

One thing that creeps me out is how it always knows my account (and did so even before I added the login to the ad hoc account).  Possibly it uses browser fingerprinting.