Home

Indie & Unsigned artist

The term "unsigned artist" is used in the music industry to refer to a singer, songwriter, musician, or band that has no affiliation with a record label. Many unsigned artists sell their music and music-related merchandise without the financial support of a record label, while often seeking a recording contract through the recording of demos. The difference between an unsigned artist and an aspiring artist is that aspiring artists in most cases do not sell their music commercially. Recently, the internet has helped promote independent artistic material. Artists tend to post their music on websites such as MySpace, ILike and yourdub, and sometimes have their music played on podcast shows like Kooba Radio, Tom Robinson, Indie Launchpad and Low Slung. In recent times, artists such as Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead, who once had major label record deals, have started to release their music independently.

In popular music, independent music, often generally abbreviated as "indie", is a term used to describe independence from major commercial record labels and an autonomous, Do-It-Yourself approach to recording and publishing.

Independent labels have been known to strive for minimal influence on the artist they represent, avoiding the artist-cultivating behaviour of many major labels. Artists represented by Independent labels have been known to be focused more on producing music than becoming wealthy and/or well known.

Independent record labels

Independent labels have a long history of promoting developments in popular music, stretching back to the post-war period in the United States, with labels such as Sun Records, King Records, Stax, etc.

In the United Kingdom during the 1950s and 1960s, the major record companies had so much power that independent labels struggled to become established. Several British producers and artists launched independent labels as outlets for their work and artists they liked, but the majority failed as commercial ventures or were swallowed up by the majors.

The punk rock era saw a plethora of independent labels. The UK Indie Chart was first compiled in 1980, and independent distribution became better organized from the late 1970s onwards.

In the late 80's Seattle based Sub Pop Records was at the centre of the grunge scene. In the late 1990s and into the 2000s as the advent of mp3 files & digital download sites such as Apple's iTunes changed the recording industry, an Indie Neo-soul scene soon emerged from the urban Underground soul scenes of London, NYC, Philadelphia, Chicago & L.A., primarily due to commercial Radio & the major label's biased focus on the marketing, promotion & Airplay of Pop & Hip Hop music during this period. Independent Labels such as Dome Records & Expansion Records in the U.K. and Ubiquity Records in the U.S. and a plethora of others around the world as well as various "online stores" such as www.dustygroove.com, www.soultracks.com, etc, support the Nu soul movement today.

More Info 1