YouTube Premieres: Create a hype for your music video

Note: This is an updated version of the post from December 8th, 2020. There were some adjustments in 2021, which we have now added to this post. In case of any uncertainties, it is always advisable to contact the responsible collecting society first.

Many artists get a lot of attention by uploading their versions of well-known songs to YouTube, Soundcloud and so on. But it’ also possible to release cover songs officially. We show you how.

Releasing a cover song is tricky because you are neither the composer nor the lyricist of the song and therefore you have no rights to the track. But with a successful cover version you can quickly win new listeners. Fortunately you only have to consider a few points to release your version legally.

When is my song a cover?

Your song is only considered a cover if you stick very closely to the original. This means that melody, lyrics and song structure may not be changed. If your version differs too much from the original, it’s considered an adaptation and then you have to get the permission of the copyright holder in any case. It’s also not allowed to use samples or release a remix without permission.

Difference Streaming and Download / Physical

It also depends on which platforms you want to make your cover version available. If the song appears exclusively on streaming providers such as Spotify, Apple Music, Deezer or YouTube Music, they are obliged to take care of the licensing with the collecting society. You only have to consider these points:

• Enter the composers as well as lyricists of the original song when you add the song to your distributor.
• Also mark the song as a cover when you register it (but not in the song title).
• Register the song with the responsible collecting society
• The original song must be registered with a collecting society. If not, you must obtain the permission of the rights holders.

If you also want to make the song available for download, e.g. via iTunes or Bandcamp, or release the track physically on CD or vinyl, you need a separate license. You can obtain it from collecting societies. Important: If you want to cover the song of a British artist, for example, you do not necessarily have to contact the British collecting society. The collecting societies are all linked to each other, so you can simply contact the one you are already working with.

Furthermore, the points mentioned above for streaming must also be taken into account.

Revenue sharing

It is also important to know that the copyright share (publishing rights) is paid out in full to the authors and composers of the original. The sales revenue (master rights), however, remains with you.

If you follow all these rules, all you have to do now is find out which song would suit you as an artist.

After several months of work and many night shifts from our developers, we are happy to present you the Deals feature. From now on you have the possibility to share the revenue of your releases directly with your collaborators and set it all up directly from the mobile app. Creating, sending, and receiving deals has never been so easy and convenient!

How to set up Deals

You can set the splits for each song, both on the desktop and directly through the app. As soon as you have entered the splits, your collaborators will automatically receive a notification and also have access to their personal iGroove account and the iGroove app. Onboarding is faster than ever before thanks to our newly introduced Magic Code. With just a few clicks, you have your account and can find all the information regarding your splits, view the trend data of the corresponding songs and have your share paid out directly by us.

The advantages

• No more paperwork: deals are submitted once and then we take care of the rest.
• Anytime and anywhere: Whether from your desktop or conveniently on the go via the mobile app – you can access your deals or enter new ones at any time.
• Transparency: All spits are clearly listed for you and your collaborators. By accessing the trend data of the corresponding songs, your collaborators can also see how they are performing at any time.
• Automated payout: No more complex royalty calculations, the payouts are credited monthly by iGroove to the accounts of all participants. Each participant can pay out their balance independently of the others at a time of their own choosing.

In addition to these benefits, we also placed a lot of emphasis on setting up the tax situation correctly right from the start.

Withholding tax

We did not focus on the technical implementation alone, but also took the legal situation into account. In concrete terms, this means that you can define for each deal whether it includes withholding tax or not. This way, each of your collaborators is correctly registered from the beginning and you can save yourself a lot of paperwork.

Costs

There are no costs for those who set up the deals. Due to the large amount of work involved in paying out the collaborators, we charge them a small flat-fee per payout. Specifically, this amounts to 8 USD per payout. This fee only applies to artists who are not already iGroove customers, i.e. who only use iGroove as a partner without releasing their own music through us.

All participants receive a monthly credit, but they are completely free to decide when and how often to have it paid out. So, this can also be only e.g. every three months or once a year. This is a clear advantage over other providers such as DistroKid, which charge a fixed monthly fee of 10 USD per partner.

Try now

Use the demo mode of the iGroove app now and discover how the Deals feature works. If you have any questions, our support team will be happy to help you.

We know the feeling all too well from insurance companies or mobile phone subscriptions: You realize that a different provider has a better offer in store and you could save a lot of money, but it’s just too much work, so you end up staying with your current provider. A lot of musicians and record labels go through the same experience when considering a switch from one distributor or record label to another. Many shy away from the manual effort and are unsure whether the streaming numbers and playlist placements would really be retained after a switch.

In this article, we will show you what to keep in mind when it comes to a catalog migration and introduce the elegant solution iGroove has recently developed.

Metadata

We have already pointed out on multiple occasions how important metadata are in the music industry and why they represent an artist’s calling card. Everything begins with metadata – and a catalog migration is no exception. They ensure that your releases are shown on the DSPs exactly as they were before the distributor change and that your fans don’t even notice the migration.

So, first, you need to compile all the metadata for the releases in your catalog. You can find these in your distributor’s system (with some luck, they might even have an export feature) or you can get them from your record label.

After exporting the metadata from your old distributor, you then need to manually register the metadata for each release with your new distributor.

Metadata includes:

• Release and song names
• Song length
• Artist names/information about features, etc.
• Composers, lyricists, etc.
• EAN
• ISCRs

In addition, the WAV-files for each of your releases, of course, need to be uploaded again. Furthermore, in order to ensure that the releases end up on the right profiles, the Spotify and Apple Music artist IDs must be added, as well (provided your distributer offers this option). Only when all this information is stored on the database can your distributor transfer the releases to the different stores.

Delivery and takedown

Your new distributor might get in touch with the DSPs in advance to announce the migration of your catalog. Once you have gathered all your data, the distributor will forward them to the stores. About two or three days after that, they will check if all the releases were successfully and properly delivered. On Spotify, they also need to check whether the streaming numbers were transferred correctly. If this is not the case, your new distributor will contact Spotify and find out why.

Only when everything is checked and found to be in order, the takedown call is made to the old distributor. This means that for a short period of time, your releases will be show up twice on the platforms. But this only lasts about 2-3 days, provided that your old distributor immediately initiates the takedown. To make sure that your releases don’t appear twice for too long, it would be wise to get in touch with the previous distributor ahead of time to get information on the process and to announce the upcoming takedown.

If everything goes smoothly, a catalog migration should take about a week. But since a lot of different parties are involved (artists, new and old distributor, various stores), delays do occur sometimes.

iGroove’s solution

More and more artists are switching over to iGroove with their catalogs, and to keep the potential error sources, delays, and manual effort to a minimum for us, we have developed the catalog-migration engine. It is based on the following components:

Release importer

Instead having to laboriously gather the metadata one by one, the release importer will take over this task by automatically searching for all the important data in the different stores and directly importing them into your account. To do that, we only need you to submit a list with the EAN codes for your releases.

Once the release importer has compiled everything, all you need to do is upload the audio files and your releases will all be registered properly.

If your previous distributor is a major one, we also offer the option of directly importing all the data that was exported from there, including the WAV-files.

Metadata verification

If the data are delivered directly, our system will independently check whether all the listed metadata (e.g., composers, lyricists, info about explicit content, etc.) match the current data in the music stores. If it detects any discrepancies, a ticket is automatically created and will be handled by our team. If need be, they will confer with the client to get the differences corrected as quickly as possible.

The system also checks if the uploaded audio files have the same length as the songs currently available at the stores. The process is important for the retention of the streaming numbers, since this calls for identical audio files. If the system finds anything remiss here, we will ask the client if there might have been a mistake in the upload (e.g., two tracks got mixed up).

Compiling of artist IDs

Artist IDs guarantee that the releases (including future ones) end up on the correct artist profiles on Spotify and Apple Music. Since the process of searching and compiling all the IDs in a catalog can take up a lot of time, our system will take care of the job for our clients.

Transfer to music stores

Once all the metadata is compiled correctly and the audio files are uploaded, our system will transfer the releases to the selected music stores at hyperspeed and automatically check if they have arrived. To allow our musicians to always stay up-to-date, we have created a dashboard where you can follow the progress in real time. If an error occurs in the transfer (e. g., a connection problem), our system will automatically detect this, and the process will be restarted an hour later.

Review of streaming numbers

Before the transfer, our system saves the current Spotify streaming numbers for each song. Once the releases are transferred to Spotify, our system matches the numbers and verifies that they were carried over correctly. Artists can check the progress of this review in real time, as well, and see which releases have had their streaming numbers fully transferred. Thus, it is guaranteed that the streaming numbers carry over and the playlists placements are retained, as well.

Takedown verification

The dashboard shows the artist when a release is ready and the takedown can be requested from the old distributor. In addition, the system monitors whether this request was carried out, and most importantly, whether everything was really taken down. Sometimes, the old distributor might just take down 20 out of 23 songs, for instance. The system will detect this, as well. Thus, our users can always keep track of what releases can be taken down, which ones have already been taken down, and which ones are still pending.

iGroove Extra

As mentioned before, we save the Spotify streaming numbers for each individual song. This allows the artists to request the takedown of a release from their old distributor directly upon its transfer – without having to wait for the streaming numbers to be transferred over, as well. In case they are not automatically transferred, we can send Spotify a report with the saved data so that the numbers can swiftly be corrected. Thus, the duration of time in which the releases appear twice is minimized.

Conclusion

A catalog migration might not be a walk in the park, but if you keep a few points in mind, it doesn’t have to be a rock climb either. If you are convinced that you will get better terms and conditions from a different distributor, then the one-time manual effort is well worth it. If you decide to switch over to iGroove, most of the manual effort will be taken off your hands, many potential sources of error will be eliminated, and you will always remain up-to-date on the current status of your migration.

Musicians have been hit hard by the pandemic, and not just financially, but also in matters pertaining to mental health. On top of the lack of income, there is also a loss of perspective and a huge feeling of insecurity which lie heavily on the mind. According to a British study, 87% of respondents reported a decline of their mental health over the course of the pandemic.

Lack of perspective and financial worries

91% think the reason for this is the current and continuing uncertainty surrounding their music careers. 96% wonder how they can keep making a living in the future, 70% of those don’t even know how to financially survive the next 6 months, and 24% are considering a career change. This research is consistent with a survey conducted among musicians in Berlin, of which a third responded that they will have to find a different job or have already done so.

Considering that the business is generally very competitive, mental health problems have always been prevalent among musicians. Now, corona has only made it worse. A similar study has already shown in 2016 that 71% of musicians suffer from anxiety or panic attacks, while 68% have or had depression.

How to deal with the situation

Here are some suggestions that might help you cope with the situation:

• Talk about it – whether with friends, with other musicians, or with a professional. That way, you might also gain some different perspectives.
• You are not alone – if nothing else, this study has demonstrated that many others are fighting the same problems.
• Maintain your routine or develop a new one. Make sure your daily schedule includes different activities.
• Pay attention to your physical health: Go outside, exercise, get enough sleep but not too much, try to eat healthy, and don’t overdo it with the alcohol. Listen to what your body is telling you!
• Make plans. It certainly won’t be easy, but try to draft up and take on new projects. Set realistic goals for yourself.
• Remind yourself that things will go back to normal in the foreseeable future. You are still a musician and soon enough you will be able to show that on stage, as well.

In the first part of this post, we talked about how you can pitch your music to blogs and media outlets. In this second part, we’ll show you all the things that go into a so-called Electronic Press Kit (EPK). When you’re writing to journalists and bloggers, you should never send attachments, only links. Or better yet: one link. The goal should always be that the journalist can find everything right away and doesn’t have to ask again or look for themselves.

The EPK can be set up as part of your website (artiswebsite.com/press) or you can use many other tools like iGroove’s free PR page. But let’s get to the content:

Press release

The core of the EPK, since it talks up the music release. It includes all the information about the release, how it came about, as well as once again a few highlights of your career so far. Try to use the press release to tell a story. Especially when it comes to media outlets that don’t necessarily specialize in music, there needs to be a story that they can pick up.

The text should already have the quality of an article, not least because some lazy journalists will just copy your press release verbatim. If you don’t feel like you would be good at this, hire someone who can do it for you. Many artists write really good songs, but the same can’t necessarily be said about their press releases or bios. When someone is reading that text, they need to get the feeling they would miss out on something if they don’t give your music a listen. The text should be no longer than an A4 page and answer the 5 W and 1 H questions.

Biography

While the press release focuses on your current release, the bio talks about your background and career so far. You should limit yourself to the real highlights only and not write more than a page. If you can upload a short version, as well – even better. Tell your story, your influences, your milestones (releases, tours, festivals, awards, etc.). and include, if possible, some quotes from the media or other musicians.

What must not be missing from the EPK?

• Press photos: Always offer multiple photos as options and make them available in different formats. Also, make sure they are print quality and don’t forget to credit the photographer.
• Artwork: Blogs in particular often use the cover of a release in their posts. Upload this in excellent resolution, as well.
• Incorporated videos
• Links to important press articles
• Contact info (e.g., for your management)
• Links to your website and social media

But of course, we can’t forget about the music! People should be able to listen to the release, the center of your message, directly on the EPK. If it’s not publicly available yet, you can put in a private SoundCloud link, for instance. But you should always keep in mind that we want to make it as easy as possible for the journalists. If you are also writing to radio stations, don’t forget that the song needs to be downloadable.

Also add your discography and use the link site.

Keep the EPK up to date

Make sure that the EPK is always up to date and that it can thus be utilized whenever needed for the next campaign. It’s also not just great for pitches to blogs and media outlets, but can also be used to get in contact with playlist curators, DJs, or bookers.

Nowadays, most discussions about music are taking place on social media and most listeners discover new music through playlists. Nevertheless, you shouldn’t write off blogs and traditional media outlets prematurely. Curators, A&Rs, and other tastemakers continue to use blogs and media outlets to discover new artists, and there are also a lot of fans who could come in contact with your music in this way. Articles can help establish a connection with the fans, reveal more about the artist as a person, and attract more new listeners.

You should therefore never miss out on sending your new releases to bloggers and journalists. If you don’t have the budget for a PR agency or would rather take things into your own hands, there are a few things to keep in mind. What’s certain is that music journalists and bloggers receive dozens, if not hundreds, of e-mails. This means you need to stand out from the crowd – everybody hates spam, so you shouldn’t send out any either.

Putting together a media list

Before you can start, you need to know who you actually want to contact. Instead of buying a list of media contacts online, most of which won’t be a good fit, you should put together a handpicked list yourself. If you’re a rap artist, there is no point in writing to blogs specializing in electro or rock music. That’s why it’s better to get in touch with only 20 media outlets that actually fit your style, instead of wasting your (and everybody else’s) time.

Once you have your list put together, you need to find out how the outlets in question like to receive their submissions. Some list their e-mail address, others upload a form or use external platforms. Make sure to actually follow these submission guidelines!

When is the right time for a pitch?

Journalists like to have information in advance. So, it’s best to send them your pitch before the release. Keep deadlines in mind: Bloggers are flexible, but print journalists (especially if their publications only appear weekly or once a month) obviously less so.

Personalize your pitch

Now it’s time to send those e-mails. First rule: Send out a personalized message! That’s more work, but you’ll stand out from the crowd and you’re showing the journalist that you are genuinely interested in their project. Include something that lets the recipient know immediately that you’ve really researched their medium. If you don’t have enough time, pick 10-20 of the most important media outlets and spend time crafting personalized messages for them, while the rest can receive a more general e-mail. Should you not receive an answer (chances are high that you won’t), ask for constructive feedback, but don’t send more than one reminder.

Get to the point!

What’s really important is that the e-mail clearly states from the start what exactly it is that you want from the journalist/blogger. Would they be posting a track, are we talking about a video, do you want to get into a playlist or a certain column or are you asking for an interview? Are you perhaps even interested in having the blog launch the premiere of your song/video? Of course, you shouldn’t suggest a premiere to everyone in your e-mailing list – only those media outlets that you really want to be featured in.

The first thing the journalist sees is obviously the subject line. So, take time to come up with an eye-catching headline (mentioning your stage name and genre would not be amiss). The content of the e-mail should be kept short. Briefly introduce yourself and your release, mention important information like the release date, features, and a selection of past highlights. Also add a picture to the text. Everything else belongs in the EPK. You’ll find out what all is included there here.