So a netlabel is interested in releasing some of my stuff and I was wondering if any of you had any experience with netlabels? Are there any particular things I should know? Any tips? Is it even worth it?
edit: so after reading the comments, I thought about it and I think I’ll go through with it. We’ll see how it goes. Thanks guys!
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It depends on how much work the Netlabel is doing to promote material, or if the label has a following.
If it doesn’t promote or have a following you may as well just post your music up on Bandcamp and try to get it heard on your own.
I’ve released on indie labels (physical release) on Netlabels and on my own - the best experiences were with self release and with an actual label promoting. With the netlabel I was in good company in terms of peers/other artists but there wasn’t a whole lot of promotion happening.
I’ve had quite a lot of shit released both physically and digitally on netlabels and honestly it’s just like throwing another piece of material on top of an already overflowing stack of shit. It can be a lot of fun if you’ve never done it (so definitely do it once) but it’s not going to enhance your life or really do anything meaningful for your music.
There are always exceptions, but you did say ‘netlabel’.
When I discovered netlabels in the mid noughties I found it so exciting. Here are a bunch of amazing electronic artists releasing great stuff for free (amidst some pretty average music). It was like searching for free gold amidst other average rocks.
I feel like streaming has kinda eliminated netlabels. Why trawl through loads of average music and spend time downloading releases when you can just stream the latest albums from Warp or Ghostly.
I still really like IDMF and check out netlabels like phonocake every now and then but I find streaming so easy. I also found this with sites like noisetrade. I used to spend hours finding that one free album that’s amazing. Now I can t be bothered I just stream an artist I love and then quickly look through the similar artists until I find one that I don’t know.
Kinda sad but streaming has really changed bandcamp, noisetrade and netlabels.
In saying this it will get your music to a wider audience than if you just self release.
Sad truth. With news on the horizon that Spotify might open the gates to allowing artists to upload their own music without an aggregator, chances are bandcamp will take a massive nosedive.
That being said, I hate hosting my music on Spotify, as I can’t control the presentation of my music. The banners, colors, creative casing on letters, etc. Call it old school, but it’s cool sto stumble on a random page that has the aesthetic all designed and akin to the music.
Occasionally ill listen to some stuff on other platforms, but youTube is what I primarily use to listen too music, and I even use it as a backup to my backup, just basically an archive for my experiments, tbh honest I don’t even care anymorr about how many hits I get, being that after years of practice I’m able to somewhat translate the music that’s in my head into reality, and I realize that some of my ideas aren’t always objectively good, I’m just having fun with it, better than getting into trouble on the street or wasting my time playing call of duty or any other video game, I’m just happy knowing that sometimes i’m capable of making something halfway decent musically speaking…
Making music is the best video game of all 
I hate ‘em
Just an alternate thought–BC and Spotify are pretty different services. I feel like Bandcamp is aimed primarily at an audience who wants to buy music. Spotify is, by its basic nature, the opposite of that. And the entry point to Spotify is already really, really, low. A single artist Distrokid account is super cheap (does that get you on Spotify?).
I dunno, I don’t see Bandcamp as competing with a streaming service really.
I agree regarding th different services for bandcamp and Spotify but I feel like streaming is clearly going to win and downloads will be like CDs are now. I do youth work and no young people download music they all use Spotify or Apple Music. I guess some people still buy CDs but they are kinda a hassle.
Very true. I still buy some music, but 90% of that music is for DJ sets. Downloads only cost you data once to download, but data is so cheap now not sure how much of an issue it is.
I like bandcamp because usually buying a physical gives you the digital version as well, in any format you want (or is available).
90% of the physical music I buy is vinyl as I’m an artwork junkie, otherwise I rarely shell out for digital unless it’s an artist I really want to support.
Critically beneficial in “getting heard” for niche styles of electronic or otherworldly music that otherwise would not fall on targeted ears. For example, Many people may not know of an artist but they sure as fuck know about the label.