Thread for awesome stuff on Bandcamp that costs money but is still awesome

I also wrote for eMusic from 2007-2009 and am angry and depressed.

holy shit i wrote stuff for emusic. i had no memory of it until now. i don't know who asked me to. or what i wrote.

I reviewed Jon Meacham's Andrew Jackson, among other things.

Resonate looks promising but it's balls-achingly slow.

Honest question, is there something cost prohibitive about specifically shipping to the U.S. from Belgium? I've ordered plenty of things from foreign countries through Bandcamp - from Poland, Italy, England, India, Japan, France, etc etc. But the shipping costs I've been seeing from this Belgian label are on a whole different level:

for a single CD:

that’s $13.70 USD, plus $21.07 shipping for United States.

that’s $23.18 USD, plus $23.18 shipping for United States.

i just shipped a single CD from the UK to the USA and was charged £18.80 which is $22.75 at the post office which seemed crazy to me but i never normally send CDs so maybe it is right.

Belgium's postal service seems very fucked up. I have a guy who buys CDs from my label, and when I send them to him not only do I have to send it using my personal address, not my business address, as the return address, I have to specify that it's a gift on the customs form, and send him a separate email telling him that I've sent him a gift, otherwise they'll charge him like $30 for customs duties. And it costs close to $20 in postage from the US to Belgium, but that's typical — it's about $20 for a single CD anywhere in Europe or Asia.

Tom Hawking on it all:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/27/epic-games-bandcamp-acquired-sondtradr

Bandcamp doesn’t seem particularly clever or hard to replicate. If they fail and the business model is sound (do you see what I did there), then someone will come along and do the same thing. It has a really dumb name anyway, it could use a rebrand.

maybe, but getting every label to jump to a new platform is easier said than done. there have been loads of soundcloud replacements but nothing ever managed to really replace it. i like the name fwiw.

name is kind of dumb, but has managed to overcome the american pie association, imo.
and i'm assuming it's less annoying than what would replace it, eg rcdstr or vinlhvn,

bndcmp

There’s no association beyond actual band camp for those of us who went to band camp.

lol yes, american pie does not own that phrase in my world

bndcmp feels a little out of date tho, now it would just be bands.ai

the name sucks and fuck you for this weakass criticism

Ok overstated sorry

lmao

I doubt Bandcamp’s business model was sound.

Idg this...investors aside, their cut of every record sold (except for Bandcamp Fridays) didn't outweigh the operating costs of servers, salaries, and freelance writer fees?

i do wonder how bandcamp Fridays skewed sales, possibly away from them.

In that case I think going back in time and eliminating Bandcamp Friday and never getting into bed with Epic Games and Sontradr would be an acceptable compromise

Bandcamp Friday is still going. I also think they benefited in myriad ways from those Fridays. They massively increased awareness of BC and reinforced in a lot of minds that this was a site about more than just making profit. there is definitely a type of BC customer and this fed right into their values. it was a shrewd thing to do as well as the right thing to.

I doubt Bandcamp’s business model was sound.

― Allen (etaeoe), Friday, October 27, 2023 4:08 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

??? how was it not

I took it as a pretty good dad joke

Important story at RA here -- Bandcamp United has filed an Unfair Labour Practice complaint against both Epic and Songtradr.

https://ra.co/news/79756

Some details:

Last month, Epic Games sold Bandcamp to Songtradr in the midst of lay-offs, and in the process also terminated at least 50 percent of Bandcamp's staff. None of the eight members of Bandcamp United's Collective Bargaining Committee received offers....Earlier this week, Bandcamp United also shared some stats about the Bandcamp lay-offs. The company's Black employees went from 19 to four amid the cuts, meaning the number of Black people at the company had been reduced by 79 percent overnight.

Last bandcamp Friday I got Speedy J's remastered 1990-2010 discography at 50% off and it's like 95% amazing (including two FAX ambient records I didn't know about & lots of classic singles too) - https://speedyj.bandcamp.com/

very nice

I'm not taking my BC page down, but I am creating a stand-alone website for my label so people can order CDs directly.

This may not be the right forum for this type of question but hopefully someone can help. I placed an order for a record on Bandcamp early last month. The platform gave an expected delivery date of mid month to the end of the month. I didn't receive so dropped a message to ask where it was and the guidance was to wait a 'week or two'. Then it would be a PayPal dispute. I haven't heard anything. The label has messaged me with new releases so I tried to do the same message again but not sure it's sending anything. I don't want to dispute.. and I'm happy to wait a month if that's the challenge. Perhaps I'm being impatient..

Have you emailed the label directly — like, at the email address they're using to tell you about their new releases — or just used Bandcamp's system? Try contacting them directly via their website or something.

Take those expected delivery dates with a big pinch of salt. If you go to your Purchases page, does it indicate that it’s been shipped at all?

Post from the union announcing a health solidarity fund to assist those who were laid off:

https://www.instagram.com/p/Czt2jLKu5SJ/

Fuckin' jeez.

https://aftermath.site/bandcamp-just-trying-to-keep-the-lights-on-following-epic-sale-layoffs

holy crap ned that’s a lot summary ha

my personal biz model is apple music never ever spotify as soon as i like it but on bandcamp. this covers a lot of shit i like. but for months now i don’t wanna go to spotify

btw i’m open to any better model for sure that’s reasonably accessible (?)

thanks for the link. so depressing - what a world!

very minor but nevertheless annoying Bandcamp design flaw: you bought the LP elsewhere (ie direct from a label or distro, discogs, real life) but wanna listen to the digital while you are doing something that requires you to be away from your turntable, and when you try playing the album on the site it keeps interrupting to tell you it's time to open your wallet. I keep wanting to reply with a photo of me holding the record, like "I have opened my wallet! There are other places to buy things other than Bandcamp!"

sounds like what you want is a kind of Ultraviolet scheme for music - https://www.theverge.com/2019/1/31/18204943/ultraviolet-locker-shutdown-date

This is why mp3s are your friend, but I hear you I've been in that situation when my files weren't handy

Not following why Bandcamp owes you that bandwidth for nothing. I have gotten Bandcamp download cards inside LPs (like bought at shops) and wonder how much small-time artists are paying Bandcamp for that arrangement.

xxxpost The way it works makes perfect sense, but I have always wished you could input some unique number on an album you bought elsewhere into Bandcamp and get streaming access there. That would be really nice. Not sure it makes sense on the Bandcamp side, though.

Anyone who expects any type of consistency for across-the-board listening solutions in the streaming age is fooling themselves

I have gotten Bandcamp download cards inside LPs (like bought at shops) and wonder how much small-time artists are paying Bandcamp for that arrangement.

― maf you one two (maffew12), Thursday, December 14, 2023 11:55 AM (twenty-five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Well if they're already paying bandcamp to host their digital downloads on the website, all they gotta do is print out the corresponding code link and put it inside the LPs regardless of where those LPs are sold

a nice thing about YouTube music is you can upload albums to listen to wherever you are , that are not on Youtube Spotify Tidal etc..

This is why I support artists but rely on soulseek for any corresponding digital download holes in my collection.

I still use streaming services to essentially play the albums I bought and lost, destroyed by accident, or can't currently dig up. I don't have a cd player except in my car, but I buy every album digitally, usually on Bandcamp. mostly because if I buy a physical product i'm just going to get glue and cheerios on it because I'm a slob and it will be unplayable in a month.

on the plus side, now that my turntable doesn't work, I have about 100 good condition vinyl I can use to make some money lol

you should clearly label your glue and milk containers, sounds like

Per Goldmine® Grading Guide:

Good (G),
Good Plus (G+)
or Very Good Minus (VG–)

These records consist of 10 to 15 percent glue and cheerios

labels are for posers

Bandcamp has announced that Bandcamp Fridays will resume in February 2024.

It's honestly perplexing how many free downloads Bandcamp gives you. Seems to be based somehow on sales, but I've only sold about $1,500 over three years, yet they've given me something like 2,000 potential free downloads to offer up. I' e printed them and included in CDs I've given people, and put maybe 50 up on social media.