Pop Music, Steal This
People involved in pop music often look to the dance music scene to see what’s going to be next. They look at fashion trends, hair styles, industry moves, and of course, the music. (Madonna had her ear to the ground when she hired on Stuart Price to produce her latest album.)
In dance music, it is widely accepted (preferred really) that producers release 2 or 3 tracks at a time. No waiting around for a full album to be completed. EP’s are released every 2 months or so keeping the fans & DJ’s happy, and also allowing the artist to release timely music. The industry changes so fast that a track written a year ago could sound dated by the time it’s released.
The pop music world should adapt this trait and labels should make their artists release a couple tracks at a time, every 3 months or so.
Another fascinating aspect to the dance music scene is that producers are able to release their music on a multitude of labels. This is unheard of in pop music. Sure it may make sense for a major artist to stick with one major label, but the indie scene should put some serious weight to this possibility. Some of the advantages to this include a) having a multitude of labels’ infrastructures working to promote you, b) label climbing; associating your name with different labels, c) affiliations, having your music on the same label as other popular bands/ artists.
The dance music industry is ran by some pretty innovate individuals. We have to be quick thinking and ground breaking to forge ahead, to break ground, to survive really, damn. I’m proud to be part of a culture that is constantly looked at for future forward ideas. It’s Ok if the pop world borrows our ideas, remember, being copied is the ultimate compliment.