So, over the past 24 hours, an idea has been brewing in my head for a type of new musical product that we can collaborate on in developing. This idea is based on recent ongoings and changes in the music industry, consumer habits, and my experiences at Best Buy.
My concept is for a new type of musical audio product that functions as a cross between prerecorded album, old-time radio, and soap opera.
In my opinion, the reason that album sales have been falling isn’t just due to file sharing. It’s due to a couple other reasons as well , including 1) Lack of good product and 2) A shift in consumer dollar spend to other cost-like software entertainment products (DVD, games). File sharing does make an impact because the music industry’s primary sales target has always been 18-34, and those are the techies who are now burning and sharing, of course. However, if you’ve got $20 are you going to window shop it on an album or on a movie? Right. So here comes the new idea.
The concept is to create an ongoing story, full of characters, situations, and compelling conflict that is set to music. A rock opera in a sense. Except that between the voice overs, music, and singing are a subtext of arias. Arias, for those unfamiliar with the term, are the hit songs in Operas. So, individual radio-format tunes are built into the works but it’s not complete without hearing and collecting the works in its entirety.
The product format would require actual screenwriting for plot, characters, and development. The music would be the feature, but the music would be built into the screenwriting format. Whatever the format is, be it magical sci-fi, historical, present-day romantic comedy, etc. it should be flushed out so that there can be endless streams of new characters and plot developments. Thus, the story never ends and it’s meaningless to hear the individual hit songs outside of the entire context.
The physical delivery format would be something like 45-60 minute installments on CD. It would be entirely done in audio, no visual or software add-on elements embedded. In my mind, installments would be released every other month. Any artwork placed on the external packaging wouldn’t brand the individual artists or the performing bands, but the larger concept instead.
I think it would be compelling because there would be a dramatic component involved. This would evolve the music from a simple stand-alone “hit” function to a broader theatre-like stance. We would serialize pop music. People would be waiting for the next installment to follow their favorite characters and wait for the next string of songs. Also, because multiple bands and artist could get involved, we could have a wide range of musical styles, which would open up appeal to a larger audience base.
Let me know what you guys think.
Sam
Chewing on the idea…
The idea sounds interesting. And could probably be quite profitable for a niche. I’m thinking of something along the lines of the “Wheel of Time” book series — really popular, making a lot of money for the publisher and author, but in the greater scale of things, it’s not really that huge of a seller.
However, there are a lot of people making a lot of money in niches 🙂
If we were to do something like that, I’d volunteer for the producer role, if I could 🙂 I was just yakking with Justin last night, and he mentioned that he could see me as a producer, and I realized that, in the scheme of things, although I enjoy performance, I most enjoy composition and writing, shortly thereafter followed by the technical stuff. Performance is actually a bit below that… I’d rather tweak an imperfect performance digitally than re-record to make it perfect, you know?
So, what if to get the ball rolling, we each chucked a tune idea or two into the pot? I’m certain I could wrap a plausible story around good music… then again, as “Anything Goes” reminds us, sometimes it’s the thinnest of stories that hold together hit music…
—
Matthew P. Barnson
Other way around
Can’t start chucking tunes into the pot until there’s a concept in play — got to figure out the storyline and overall framework first, understand characters, think through the frame before moving forward. Concept first, music much later basically.
Personally, I’m not so sure a fantasy sci-fi backdrop is best, I was actually thinking more modern-day comedy?
Also, don’t think “smaller niche” because then it’s limiting to the listener. It should be open for all ages.
Anyway, let’s see what other people think of my idea first!
Yeah, wasn’t specifically talking about fantasy…
I just chose the Wheel of Time thing because it’s a “trilogy” that is actually a rather lengthy series. It’s turned into a serial-type story, often only covering very small portions of the lives of those involved.
And a modern-day comedy would have much more appeal, particularly if priced right for the “latest” ones, and giving pretty good deals on older editions bundled together.
I’m thinking specifically of how hot-selling DVDs of popular television shows are…
—
Matthew P. Barnson
Forgot an important piece
In my mind I wasn’t thinking about mass-marketing through large box retailers but sort of “underground” channels. Clubs, internet, coffee shops, posters, etc. avoid the cost and burden of getting stuff stocked in shelves! It’s got to grow organically as we say in the biz 🙂
Sounds like a great plan…
I think this is a great idea. I would love to volunteer with the art / design aspect.
An interesting idea i had (going with the not imbedding video on the cd idea) would be to have a rough story board type of layout in the cover. Might give an aide to follow the story line.
Have a Great Thanksgiving !
~Jon~
Lyrics
Hey, i’ll give you some lyrics..
The trick has to be that the songs work as individual songs too. What about a theme that is simple… Maybe a breakup or something.. a bitter divorce.. and there needs to be an elephant involved.
Rock Serial
This may seem simplistic, but there are two things you need to have to make this work: 1) A good story. You’ll almost need to write a short story or serial first, and then adapt it to music. A good story usually has two main theme which are disparate but create the drama and tension and story when they come together. For example, in the LOTR, you have the big, good-vs-evil battle for Middle Earth played out in the context of simple hobbits and their friendships. Shawshank Redemption had the friendship of Red and Andy developing in the corrupt prison and wardon situation.
2) Good music to bring out the drama, tension, and feeling of the above story. And this is important, because great music would overcome any shortcomings in #1 (see Van Halen lyrics w/David Lee Roth). If you rock out, you could sing about turtles mating on the beach and it’ll sell. Rock out to a great story, and you might develop your niche Matt wrote about. And Sam had a good point it should be for everyone. Anyone 8 to 80 should be able to get something from it.
My $.02 Weed