Marillion.com – turning the record industry on its head

2000-09-01

It is no secret that the music business makes a fickle bedfellow. Marillion may be thought of today, if at all, as the prog-rock group that had a brief string of folksy hits in the eighties before losing its hydrophilic lead singer and fading into obscurity. This popular perception is not shared by the ever-loyal following that the band still enjoys, however it has been proving increasingly difficult for Marillion to make any mark on the music mainstream. That is, until last month, when the band proved it still had something to sing about by using the power of the Web (sic) to leverage a major recording deal.

This is how it works. A band wanting to make an album gets an advance from recording company, to be set against estimated royalties. When the CD hits the shops, the first tranche of income is used to pay back the advance. Inevitably less popular bands have less negotiating power with the recording companies, hence advances (and good percentages) can be hard to come by. In addition, such contracts give very little flexibility in terms of how the music is released, or even what should be included on the album.

Even bands with a good following still need the advance – to cover the production costs, not to mention that the musicians have to eat. Like many bands that are fed up of living hand-to-mouth, Marillion has been puzzling over this conundrum – how to make an album that it knows it can sell, without putting itself at the mercy of the recording industry? The answer is as simple as it is profound.

In June this year the band members put out an appeal on their http://www.marillion.com web site}, and emailed their fans. The question was this: “If we asked you to pay in advance for the next album, would you do it?” The response was staggering – nearly five thousand respondents said they would, leading Marillion to take a leap of faith and go ahead with the idea. Estimates suggest that over £50,000 of advance orders have already been taken.

The benefits are clear. First of all, Marillion has been given the wherewithal to record an album, with the only commitment being to deliver a CD early next year. Marillion have no obligations to any record company, so there are no licensing issues and no limitations to what the band can do artistically. This leads to the second point. Effectively, what Marillion have done is shown that the album will sell – effectively, it already has. This puts them in a very strong position to negotiate for its distribution. According to Lucy Jordache, Marillion’s marketing manager, most of the major labels were keen to accept Marillion back onto their books before EMI won the deal. This time, without the shackles of the advance, the band has been able to put together a very nice package indeed.

In using the Web, Marillion’s goal was not to miss out the corporate middlemen, but to give themselves some security and a stronger negotiating position. This reflects the stance taken by Stephen King, whose recent publication of “The Plant” at $1 per instalment threatens to be “Big Publishing's worst nightmare”. King was quick to agree that, though this might knock the publishers off their laurels, it would not completely destroy the publishing industry. At the same time it was seen as trailblazing for “midlist … and marginalized writers who see a future outside the mainstream,” according to the author. At the time Stephen King’s move was accused of being more hype than substance. However, few could deny that Marillion have managed to get tangible results from their online strategy.

In the words of the Marillion song King, “they call you a genius cause you’re easier to sell.” With bands and authors selling themselves over the Internet, the recording industry looks set for interesting times ahead.

(First published 1 September 2000)