While Spotify has objectively been paying more artists more money, there’s no doubt that relying on streaming payouts alone isn’t enough for thousands of bands and musicians. Many artists, are now looking elsewhere to cash in, with one tried-and-tested method proving particularly effective in recent years.
Play to the crowd
While performing live is obviously no new thing, it’s never been so crucial to the earnings of many musicians — and that’s playing out at the very highest levels within the business too, with Taylor Swift’s recent addition to Forbes’ Billionaire List largely attributed to her record-breaking Eras tour.
Industry publication Pollstar revealed that the top 100 North American tours, thanks in no small part to Ms. Swift and Beyoncé, grossed $6.6 billion in 2023, the highest on record. And, that’s not just down to “funflation” either, with entertainment giant Live Nation reporting record concert attendance and ticket sales for last year too.
Changing the game
Bands and artists haven’t just switched up how they make money because of streaming: the very way that many now write and construct songs is changing as a result of the medium too. Indeed, recent reporting from the Washington Post highlighted how Spotify’s monetizing methods, like its pay-per-play system or needing a listener to stick around for at least 30 seconds of a song, as well as the desire to go viral on TikTok, have led artists to write shorter, sharper, more attention-grabbing tunes.
Looking at some of the biggest songs on the Billboard100 for each year since 1960, we observed a similar trend, with top songs released in the last 5 years clocking in at 2 minutes and 55 seconds, compared to the 3 minutes and 59 seconds average throughout the 1990s during the golden age of CDs and the music industry more widely. When you get paid per stream, shorter is sensible.
