Is This the Future of Record Distribution?

On October 4^th, a tiny little record label named Really Records may have quietly but radically changed the way bands finance and produce records in this increasingly digital musical marketplace. In a manner similar to that of recent Kickstarter projects, the label is crowd-sourcing the production of an album. While this isn’t a completely new idea, the actual details of the project and the end result are unique. This could be the new template for struggling musicians to put out physical copies of their work.

Album art via Really Records

Really Records’ project is beginning with the band, Hard Girls, and their new album, Isn’t it Worse. Like past Kickstarter projects, the label is asking for donations so that the record can be produced physically on vinyl and cassette. The big distinction between this and popular Kickstarter projects like the kind led by Amanda Palmer and Five Iron Frenzy is a difference in donation philosophy. For both the Amanda Palmer and Five Iron Frenzy projects, pledges could not receive the record on vinyl until pledging $50 or more. Along with the record, there might be a couple goodies thrown in that amounted to something like $3 in value. These projects seemed a bit like cynical cash grabs focused more on bleeding fans of as much money as possible rather than as an honest way to get fans involved in the production of a record. For Really Records, donating just $5 gets a digital download of Isn’t it Worse, while $8 and $15 pledges receive cassettes and vinyl respectively.

Really Records was born out of Jeff Rosenstock’s Brooklyn apartment in the summer of 2011. Rosenstock, a founding member of the musical collective, Bomb the Music Industry!, is also known for the creation of another record label: Quote Unquote Records. Quote Unquote was the world’s first donation based label, and it has put out over 50 releases since its inception in 2006. Ever an optimist, Rosenstock had hoped that kids would donate a little money here and there to help the bands on the label. In recent interviews, Rosenstock has noted that Quote Unquote has made very little money since it began.

Undiscouraged, Rosenstock hasn’t completely abandoned his free music philosophy. For every $1000 committed to the project, a new song from Isn’t it Worse will be put up for free download. If the record reaches its final goal, the entire album will go up for free.

With this new plan from Really Records, Rosenstock may have found the perfect formula between a donation based label like, Quote Unquote, and a more typical record label. At the time of this writing, Really Records has hit $2,000 of their $3,500 goal to produce the record physically.

To check out the project, donate, or hear a few songs head over to the project page at: http://hardgirls.reallyrecords.com/