Crowdfunding Music : A look at crowdfunding as an alternative source of funding for independent creators within the recorded music industry

Abstract

With larger crowdfunding campaigns getting the media hype for crowdfunding going, crowdfunding is often touted as the future of creative project funding. With examples like Amanda Palmer always being presented, is crowdfunding the future and saviour of funding for recorded music projects? This is what this thesis is trying to answer, to see if crowdfunding is a suitable alternate way of funding projects. The subject is an oftendiscussed one, but a subject that has not seen much academic research. The success of Amanda Palmer can often be put down to her already having fans from previous work with The Dresden Dolls. But that is exactly what you need to be able to crowdfund a new release: fans. A crowd. Through interviews with three subjects in different points of the music industries and/or the crowdfunding industry, and some interesting statistics this thesis concludes that there is a future for crowdfunding as an alternative way of funding music, but not in hundreds of thousands to a million dollar range like with Amanda Palmer. Most successful campaigns live in the $1000 to $10,000 range, which is a pointer to the true power of crowdfunding: smaller artists being able to activate the small fan base they have acquired through gigging and other releases to get them to fund new projects, from albums/EPs, to tours, to books. Crowdfunding is a tool for smaller artists to fund new ventures without record label support and doing it by themselves.