Is Lucinda still on the Lost Highway label?

It’s been pretty quiet around here recently so I figured it’s time to answer some of these questions. The answer to the above question is no. Lucinda’s current contract with Lost Highway, which started all the way back to the Car Wheels album, expired on 11/21. I have had conversations with a few labels including LH and after the first of the year those discussions will increase, and hopefully we will be able to make a decision fairly quickly about direction we will go in.

Stoger said: I assume some sort of in-house label (for lack of a better phrase) is still an option

Following is a coincidental mention of Lu in an article about Louis CK actually making money by selling his own stuff from his own website. It certainly is a changing world in how business is done, and isn’t it nice when the artist actually gets to reap the rewards of their work?

http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/12/diy-video-pays-off-huge-for-louis-ck-are-you-listening-google-amazon/

DIY Video Pays Off Huge For Louis CK: Are You Listening Google, Amazon?

By Steven Levy
December 24, 2011 | 11:32 am | Categories: Entrepreneurs, Media, Video

My prediction (not particularly impressive since it seemed pretty obvious) that Louis C.K. would find DIY Internet distribution to be more profitable than traditional means proved out. But what strikes me is one statement he made to Jimmy Fallon earlier this week. That was that the million dollars he made so far from creating a website and selling his special for five bucks (no DRM) was the biggest haul by far that he had in his life.

Thank about this. He is probably the hottest entertainer in the comedy business now. His show is a runaway hit. He has had several HBO specials, all of which have been successfully repackaged as DVDs. Yet he earlier said that he didn’t see any money from those (presumably beyond a nice upfront fee).

And by bypassing a traditional distributor, he has now made a million bucks in ten days — and will make lots more as he owns the master tape. (Unlike HBO specials and just about everything distributed by big media companies.)

So by going internet direct, Louis CK has the biggest payday of his life. Fans are happy. Everyone is happy, of course, except the powers that have benefited from the previous business model where artists generally get shortchanged. Even the most deluded executive can understand that a class of artist that used to depend on those companies now has the option to cut them out.

Of course, a lot of things went right with this. Louis CK says he spent $250K to make the special and set up a website. Whatever he did pay for the site itself, it was a bargain. I bought the special and found it a super smooth experience. Considering he started from scratch this is amazing. I can’t count the number of times I have had horrible problems simply trying to buy something online from a multi-billion dollar company. Even some multi-billion dollar technology companies routinely botch this experience. I think Louis CK might have a nice business simply licensing his site to other comics.

And of course, Louis is incredibly hot right now, so much so that people won’t hesitate to spend five bucks to see a show of new material.

But people are generally hungry for fresh stuff from their favorite artists, and there are a lot of artists who might so well by this. If Steve Martin wanted to do another comedy special, here’s his chance. Bill Cosby has been killing audiences for years and a taped (or live) long-form show is overdue. Jerry Seinfeld? He can become cool again!

There are also plenty of musical acts that could benefit from this treatment. Instead of a big arena, super groups can do a small club and sell that special experience to their fans. Not just superstars but established acts with strong fan bases can also reap life-changing paydays. What if Lucinda Williams did a show in someone’s living room, filmed by some famous director who loved her music? I’m typing my Paypal password just thinking about it. (Note to Lucinda: my living room is available.)

A few years ago, Roger McGuinn (formerly of the Byrds) testified before Congress that he hardly made a dime from the royalties of his many gold records. Of course, he has had (and I hope is still having) a wonderful career. But if the Byrds were recording now at their peak they would have an option that wasn’t available in the 60s, 70s, 80s, or 90s — in fact, probably not until now. Big stars now have an audience they can reach directly who will be happy to pay them direct.

So here’s another unsurprising prediction. Watch for many shows, of all sorts, to be available by the Louis CK model.

Note to Google: wouldn’t it be cool to make YouTube available to those artists, streaming shows or allowing downloads with your payment infrastructure? Also an opportunity for Amazon. Just sayin’.

@tntracy wrote:

While I would certainly love to see digital downloads of live shows, I would NOT want to see studio work released via digital download as the sole source of distribution UNLESS it is made available in uncompressed (i.e., lossless) form. And even then, I would miss the physical CD & especially the liner notes, lyrics, etc.

I very much want to have the future flexibility of re-ripping & re-encoding at higher bit rates as storage amounts increase on my portable players. Purchasing a digital download at say 256 kbps as an example, on the other hand, locks you in at that level of audio quality forever, taking away that flexibility…

Oh, and in the “for what it’s worth” department, fourth post of 2012… 8)

Tom

Count me #1 and #6, Mr. Moderator. Have we heard from our north-of-the-border and Golden State pals yet this calendar year?

This Golden Stater welcomes 2012 and wishes it the very best.

I look forward to seeing some of the intrepid travelers 3 weeks from tonight in Ventura. If no other plans are made, I will be found at The Watermark, across the street, before the show.