From Buzz Charts To Bar Codes - Finding Out What Will Be The Future Hits In Drum And Bass  - Why Promos are needed:

The global music market worth over $38 billion a year is controlled by a hand full of American based company executives who could all fit in a double decker bus (almost). Almost every label that has acts on MTV is licensed to a major label. From Rock to Hip Hop, Gospel, Classical to Jazz, Indie to UK Garage, the American executive faces behind the scenes have been responsible for deciding what music gets major deals. [The record company executives to the right are named in photo order, top to bottom: Don Ienner, Sal Licata, Dave Glew, Al Teller, Clive Davis, Tommy Mottola].

The idea of getting a record deal is based on understanding that if a band/artist/producer is to sell product on a national or global scale then the need for a business that is involved with the industrial process of mass manufacturing and mass sales is needed.

5 years ago the Drum And Bass World was the buzz of the Major Label industry. New acts, artists and producers were signed to major deals but the success of the major labels involvement with Drum And Bass to take it mainstream didn't get off the ground.

The DJ Producers in the Drum And Bass field still have great careers but one of the major reasons for Drum And Bass not becoming even more successful is a lack of adequate distribution of Promos that create underground buzz.

The launching of an act by a major label can cost $/£millions but without a good Promo Service tracks do not get any underground Buzz. Many underground labels have ceased to give out Promos because many of the lists are filled with DJs that do not play out. What Depth Charge has done however is set up its Promo Service for music loving DJs. All Promos are sold for a price that is slightly lower than retail price with the usual postage charge. The Promo Service is designed for DJs that want to be Up Front who want to develop a career as a DJ. All Promos will be limited editions but by releasing the Promos prior to any release it is hoped that the Promo support will be enough to get a good track that much needed buzz.

Any DJ that uses our Promo Service will be eligible to enter our regional Depth Charge DJ Competitions, (visit the Competitions Page for details.

Mass Media, Mass Marketing And Drum And Bass :

To the left you will see pictured Billboard, Entertainment and Music & Media magazine. These Magazines are industry publications which are either UK or USA based that focus on the amounts of money spent on selling an artist with descriptions of the campaigns and money that will be spent by a company to sell an artist.

In America and Canada alone their are over 300 million people. Madonna, Brittany Spears and Erykah Badu all appeal to different markets (Teen, Urban, Pop) that have big enough buyer audiences that will guarantee sales in the millions. If a new artist is launched and fails then the company can always launch another act to recover the losses made from the ones that don't make it. If a campaign is not a multi million selling campaign then there is no Billboard Chart listing or recognition.

Before the Billboard chart started in 1956 the music industry of America was predominantly live. Artists like Louis Jordan sold massive concerts (like today's DJs) and was a famous TV personality. MTV is chart only and does not focus on either the independent scene or the innovators in dance music unless they are making a Cross Over track. The term crossover in the world of Drum and Bass means that a track has sold enough units to get a chart entry

Understanding The Charts, The Future Of Drum And Bass In Europe And The Jazz Parallel

Over 80% of acts signed to major labels fail to sell enough units for a major label to keep an act on its books. However charts have nothing to do with how good a piece of music is. In and before the days of Louis Jordan (the inventor of Rock and Roll), Jazz and its BeBop and Rock N Roll offspring were the Hip Hop or RnB of its day. The music played in all of the clubs across America was Jazz (then BeBop to Rock N Roll). The best musicians in the world, those on the cutting edge dance culture of 60 years ago were never assessed by the public by chart status - in fact chart status pre 1956 did not exist.

The development of Drum and Bass in Europe is much like that of Jazz in America. The music has a status, the music is recognised as good by those that follow the scene. Jazz gave us Miles Davies, Charlie Parker and Louis Armstrong etc and Jazz is with us today but Jazz in the main does not chart. There are some Free Jazz albums that sell 5,000 copies and some contempory albums that sell 1 million. The point is that the Jazz scene produces some great artists today like Cassandra Wilson or Quincy Jones.

Drum and Bass in Europe has evolved like Jazz. The music has its own following, and the scene is part today's big out door festival scene but the problem for major labels is they can't find a way to sell it on mass like the do Brittany Spears, Madonna or Erykah Badu and this is a problem common to Jazz in America.

Quincy Jones (Buy the video - "The Lives OF Quincy Jones") is a man of ideas, he is more than just music. As a Jazz musician Quincy Jones was nothing more than a very good trumpet player, but he was not a Miles Davies. As an arranger (Frank Sinatra), a producer (Michael Jackson - Thriller/50 million sales), a maker of film music, a TV show Producer and magazine publisher (Vibe), Quincy is legendary.

Drum And Bass is the first UK based Art form to develop in the history of music that is not a copy of some other country's music and it has produced some truly innovative music makers. Jazz started to be influenced by other form (Miles Davies - Sketches Of Spain/Dizzy Gillespie - Afro) to expand its sound like Hip Hop absorbed Reggae influences. Drum and Bass is starting to take on influences from other countries as new producers from other parts of the world start to add their expression.

We have seen many action movies (like Blade) use Drum and Bass but all of this music has its roots in the club scene.

In America two of the most important Jazz Clubs were Bird Land and the Blue Note. Verve Records wasn't set up to make money, it was set up to be a platform for musicians/music creators with ideas.

As a result of having creative platforms in the form of clubs and labels the art form of Jazz evolved.

Genius minds like Theoloius Monk hated the major label industry because the record execs of his day wanted to tell him what to play. It is because of the purely experimental attitude of all of the pioneers of Jazz that the music sounds the way it does today.

The year 2000 for Drum and Bass saw the new beginning for the music as many labels started making music for the scene. Creative Drum and Bass is very experimental. What all of the Jazz pioneers found out was that money from major labels does not make a great idea.

Right up until the creation of Rock and Roll by Louis Jordan (which was then picked up by Bill Hailey/Elvis etc), almost all American night clubs played Jazz. at the dawn of the mass sales of music in America most of the music bought by teenagers and adults was by Big Band Jazz. The problem for the music industry was that their were not enough skilled musicians like Glen Miller or Herbie Hancock. When the Beatles came onto the scene in the 1960s record labels switched from skilled musician based music to paining by numbers music. The ultimate extension of this idea is seen in programmes like Pop Stars and Pop Idol.

Drum And Bass at its best, whether it is a track by Shy FX, LTJ Bukem, Marky (Brazil) or 4 Hero is a creative art form like Jazz, it is not a paint it by numbers music (Pop Stars). In America most of the music scenes are credible, Rock, Blues, Country and Western, RnB, Hip Hop. What makes these scenes work is that you have literally tens of 1000s of producers making music in each particular style and out of these 1000s you get the best that may number in the 100s. From 60s Stax to Berry Gordy's Motown to Gamble and Huff to Teddy Riley or Dr Dre.

With all parts of America making Rock, Country, House, Techno the best producers evolve and set the trend for future buying habits. Once a nation has a style of music that it is accustomed to, a major (or large independent) can step in and start to fund mass sales of an artist. The main reason for Drum and Bass not taking off in England, Europe or America in a bigger way is simply down to their not being enough great producers to make the sound even more common place in UK Club Culture. Because UK Garage is essentially a hybrid of American Garage, it has more in common with Roger Sanchez or Armand Van Halden with D&B B-Lines and so the sound is easier to sell on mass.

The likelihood of Drum and Bass dying is slim but it will go one of three ways,

1. The labels/music creators that are around now will develop into the Drum and Bass versions of Jazz labels like Verve and Blue Note. In the music industry in America because of the sheer size of its niche market these two labels are respected institutions.
2. Enough new Drum and Bass Producers and Producer DJs from Europe and America expand the number of people adding to the creative input of the music to duplicate what happened in America in any niche scene like RnB to Country & Western. With new local venues run by promoters expanding the music's impact in its area, the likelihood of Drum and Bass impacting a nation is enhanced.
3. Drum And Bass will produce new innovative music creators like Guy Called Gerald who will turn a spot light on Drum and Bass and be the big seller of the scene internationally (read below and go to both the TV and Research Pages).

Anyone who buys Drum and Bass is buying history in the making. The Promos you get from Depth Charge will be backed by a Specialist Market Analyses Trends Newsletters.

Jamaica the rise of labels that gave us Bob Marley are common knowledge to everyone. Studio One Records is Jamaica's Motown. We in Britain are yet to see a Drum and Bass equivalent of Motown, Studio One or Verve (but it could be on its way).

Jamaica has in it the biggest concentration of record labels and producers making one style of music in the world. in this climate all producers seek to out class one another and their productions are tested on the sound systems. Studios became known for producing the best dance tune. So if you think of 1960s Motown then you will understand 1960s Studio One.

In terms of competitive production, Jazz musicians across the states always looked to try and make better records than their peers. Louis Armstrong would challenge other trumpet players for the right to be a resident in a night club Jazz was pushed to develop. If you use Jamaican Reggae and its development or American Jazz, what we can see is there simply have not been enough labels or producers coming in with enough different ideas to push drum and bass to its limits. As more labels come onto the scene and DJs locally play cutting edge Drum and Bass, well, just as in Jamaica or America we will see the emergence of a style of Drum and Bass that makes international careers for it's chief exponents.

In the mid 1990s two things happened to Drum and Bass to halt its progress. 1, Independent Distribution companies (some) tried to hold a monopoly on the labels that they sold and 2, some actively participated in ensuring that some labels never sold more than a specified number of products.

As a result of this action, new ideas were not allowed to get a foothold in the market and DJs never even had access to some of the brilliant ideas that were created. When the major labels started to try and invest in the Drum and Bass scene, well, because of the actions of distribution personnel who will remain nameless, the major record labels investment was premature.

In America selling 1 million Erykah Badu albums may be easy because there are a percentage of the population that have been exposed to good RnB and therefore they will buy any new singer in that field that is good.

When Jazz artists like Theolonius Monk refused to do what record companies wanted or Charlie Parker went to smaller independent labels to release music that his major would not, it was actions like this that gave Jazz the ideas that formed the many turning points in its history.

The patterns that show how any style of music becomes culturally relevant or accepted by a large part of society go back as far as Mozart selling sheet music across Europe and things haven't changed since then.

In light of America producing Stax, Motown, Verve, Blue Note or Jamaica giving us Lee Scratch Perry or Studio One we can see that the future of Drum and Bass is yet to be developed by the independent labels and producers.

During the late 1980s the UK had international media attention because of the Rave Scene (read Research Page). Internationally Britain had the music business press and international tabloid press looking at a music scene that could possibly take over the world. the big outdoor festivals were seen like Woodstock of the 60s.

Against the backdrop of Rave Jungle/Drum and Bass started to evolve. A Guy Called Gerald put Rave Music on its head and made an international classic "Voodoo Ray" which also became move sound track material.

 The hype in the UK was so strong that the American Music Press could not make head nor tail of the speeded up vocals in the music. when an independent track by a group called Soul II Soul came out, like A Guy Called Gerald, they produced something innovative. the American Press hailed Jazzy B and Soul II Soul as the musical saviours of the UK.

All new producers need a platform to start from. whether that platform is based on going against an established norm or being the best in a field of production. what we know is this, with the new openings for internet TV, the strategic use of promos will assist new DJs to become the names of the future and New producers to develop a name  internationally.