Need info on Japanese music industry/contracts.

[jdm-justin]

[kamome]

I was wondering if anyone here knows of a good place to get info on the Japanese recording industry.

Any info or links would be greatly appreciated.

Asskissinger on this board might have somer insights.

[jdm-justin]

[DrP]

Alot of it depends on your genre, audience reach, discography and of course talent. It costs more to do music in Japan than just about anywhere else - so labels are critical and careful in their approach to signing. Japan is a mature and saturated market. J-Pop reigns supreme and is very walled garden. Other genre like Club, Hip Hop, R&B, Jazz, etc have a little more leeway for the foreign artists.

As far as contracts go, it just depends on the deal. You may want to find out about joining JASRAC if you plan to self-publish and distribute in Japan
(http://www.jasrac.or.jp/ejhp/membership/index.html)

Japan still has a large, viable CD market and label support is important to getting good distribution. Other media you need to consider are the digital rights which affect internet and mobile downloads. This is oftentimes glossed over or neglected altogether. In Japan, especially, mobile digital rights are important given the high adoption of music capable phones and the billing and drm mechanisms to leverage.

Also, look into signing up with an independent artist agency like Dag Music. They can help you get some side work doing voice overs, cm's or special gigs.

As always, have a performing arts attorney review any and all contracts you consider.

Good Luck!

[Taro Toporific]

This topic has been touched on several times..

PAY TO PLAY? NO WAY!

[INDENT]My band has been pretty lucky. We've been gigging regularly (once or twice a month) for a little over a year now and always get drinks on the house. And not to brag about it but I can put down some fucking beers yo. We've even picked up some cash here and there if you can believe that. We're just a little two man folk outfit and we don't have a drummer so we don't need much. We sometimes play with no amplification at all. But anyway, I got a strict motto: Pay to play? No fucking way!

I don't care if we can cover the costs or not. The system is bullshit I will not partake. The club owners can go to Hell. FUCK THEM! In college, I played live a lot. Back then I played punk and experimental stuff and we often opened for national acts when they came to town. We almost never made money but we sure as fuck didn't lose money at shows. That's insane. And America used to have a big problem with pay to play. But the bands in the 'Seattle-sound' scene led boycots against clubs that did that to minor bands and the practice really declined a lot. I've been out of the American music scene for too long now but the last I knew LA was the only place so fucked like Japan. A band I was in in Aomori, SumoSuperstars, did a pay to play gig once. The only time in my life and I was disgusted by the whole thing and I'm sure the club owner still hates me and he can go get fucked for all I care. I was a kind of honorary member of the Hirosaki University Music Circle and I fucking went on and on and on and on to all of them about banding together and stomping out pay to play. But they were like, 'Well, that's the way it is in Japan...' Yeah, that's the way it is until people get together and do something about. I told them how we did it in America. We just rented out old warehouses charged people three bucks to come watch us in what was really just our studio place but we also had shows there and called it a club! This place had the coolest name. The Word. Oh God did we have some good times. Those kids up in Hirosaki could have done the same thing but they were just too chickenshit to create a real scene.

Anyway, here's a fair deal. Headlining band gets half the door. Club gets half the door. Club sells lots of beer and keeps all that cash. Bands sell three t-shirts and one cd and keep that cash.

And another thing you're talking about going on at 7. How fucking retarded is that? It's called use your fucking brain. (... I mean the clubs). Here's what you do. Tell everyone the show starts at 9. Get people in there get them buying beer. Band goes on at midnight. Club makes money, band gets paid (or at least doesn't have to pay), folks go out get drunk and have a good time. The only thing is that in Japan people need to go before the last train and stuff so that has to be considered but I know that the clubs in big cities have allnighters and people just grab the first train in the morning.

<snip>Nothing about this post is meant to be hostile ... I just want to say that new bands will never have a chance, with the costs of instruments and all with having to actually pay to get up on stage.

PAY TO PLAY? NO WAY! [/INDENT]


See also:
Music career in Japan - possible?

[jdm-justin]

Thanks for the responses! It's past 1AM over here in L.A. and I've been working all day, so I apologize in advance if I sound a little scatter-brained here...

I'm already a member of ASCAP, so I believe that they will work with JASRAC to handle the royalties earned from any public performances/broadcasts in Japan.

Genre is Japanese pop/punk with a girl singer. We've done a lot of licensing for movies and video games, but we have yet to ink a real record deal.

For the labels, they approached us. Supposedly they will be handling distribution to retail chains and possibly digital distribution for iTMS Japan. We've already signed a deal with a U.S.-based digital distributor (not iTMS), so of course we'll have to negotiate if that conflicts with any potential deal.

This is the first I've heard of Dag Music - I'll check them out! Thanks. I'm assuming that I can find them via Google.

Any word on a place I can find info on rights ownership and royalty rates per song per CD? Again, I have all this info as it pertains to the U.S. market, but from people I've talked to (and have since lost contact with), Japanese companies really try to skew the numbers in their own favor. (From what I hear, the Japanese music industry makes the U.S. industry look saintly in terms of payout and rights to the artist.) I'm really looking for more detail on that - especially how the burgeoning indies scene is responding to the "old way" of doing things.

My day job is pretty awesome, so I won't be relocating to Japan unless my band magically blows up over there... I just want to make sure we won't be getting screwed over too badly - especially as we'll likely still be using our own master recordings... We want to hang on to as much of our rights as possible yet still be able to work with a real company.

(I'm reading this back and just noticed how odd I sound. I'll try to make my next post more reader-friendly... Thanks again!)

[jdm-justin]

It seems to take hours for my posts to pop up here, so if it seems like I'm responding to posts that were up hours ago, that is why. I again apologize in advance...

Just to clarify: I am a part of a somewhat "established" band in Los Angeles. Japanese companies are contacting us regarding possible record contracts/distribution deals for my current band for the Japanese market. I'm not looking to move to Japan, hopefully find some musician friends and then try to make it. I'm more concerned with the ins-and-outs of record contracts and rights issues as they pertain to the Japanese music industry.

Taro, yeah pay to play sucks. I live in L.A., so we "have to" deal with it all the time. We just skip over the "pay to play" places (we've never done it) - we have a lot of promoters/clubs willing to book us "just because".

I've read the "Music Carreer in Japan Possible?" thread a while ago. We worked a bit with Joey Carbone - he tried to help us get a deal. However at that time, all of his label contacts were interested in REALLY young idol-types - not a mid-late 20's punk/pop band from L.A. (They even passed on a hot 19 year old girl from Hawaii!) We've lost contact with him as our schedules could never quite sync up... Given our genre (and the fact that we can't exactly relocate to Japan), it's probably best to start with a more rock-based indie-type label.

I really appreciate the help and comments. Hopefully I was able to clear things up as to what I'm looking for. Thanks again!

[DrP]

I'm always surprised about the animosity towards the 'labels' when 99% of the bands signed by the labels couldn't exist commercially without their support. The primary difference between the major and the indie labels is just the overhead. You may get slightly better 'deal' with an indie label - but they may not be able to provide as extensive support, promotion and distribution as a major label. In Japan, the major distribution deals are 'owned' by the majors. It's a small country with a largely homogenous market. Produced music works. The indie thrives and in some cases does really well.

The scene is changing thanks to the internet. Japan is one of the few markets that CD sales are not declining at record rates. And also one of the few places that has a coherent mobile music market. There is a cost associated with that. So, even if your 'deal' has lower values attached to it - you may find yourself actually making more money.

I know personally that major labels are in serious discussions on how to better serve the artist group and maintain a reasonable market share. Some of the majors are migrating to a more VC methodology whereby they provide investment support for the artist, and then encourage the artist to essentially become their own label.

In the end, it's all about 'good music'. Case in point. In China a virtually unknown artist released a song called Mice Love Rice. It rose to enourmous popularity through the internet. Millions of copies were downloaded freely. Millions more were pressed on 'pirate CD's'. What was Yang Chen's 'deal' ??? NOTHING!! Except that BECAUSE the song was a bonafide HIT -- he got instant cred AND real label deal resulting in several hundred thousand dollars of return. Not bad.

Look at Def Tech. They released their first album on Ill Chill, went to pretty much No.1 on the indie charts in Japan and haven't stopped since. Whats up? They write HITS.

I don't think most labels have any intention of 'screwing you'. That's a throwback. They are more concerned about managing the risks associated with signing relatively unknown bands/artists that may or not have enough potential to sell and provide a return on THEIR investment.

Joey is great. He has more experience as a foreign composer/artist in Japan than just about anyone. Hell, he has probably written more hits than all the top Japanese composers combined! Yet, you'll never find him bitching about contract deals, royalties and distribution rights. He has massive trust developed with the artists and labels and always an open door to any music business in Japan. Spend a little more time with him to learn the ways, grasshopper.

My 2yen.

[DrP]

Anyways - to answer your question more directly... Why don't you check out:

1) Creativeman (http://www.creativeman.co.jp/index.html)
2) Village Again (info@v-again.co.jp)
3) Vagrant (they are working on deals now in Japan)
4) Fat Mike (you're in LA, right?)

[jdm-justin]

anks again for the responses.

I don't think that record companies are inherently evil and trying to screw artists over. I am aware that, here in the U.S. anyway, record companies do spend hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars to try to break an act that may or may not make it. It's a huge risk for them.

At the same time, record companies do know that there are thousands of people that will take ANY type of deal based on the faint promise of potential fame. The more info/realistic ideals the artist has going into the negotiations, the better the chance that both parties can come up with a contract that they are both happy with.

One of the Japanese record companies that contacted us said that the potential record contract would be based on a "standard Japanese-style contract". I've read dozens of books deatiling the inner-workings of the U.S. industry and such, so I have a good idea on what a "standard" U.S.-style contract is (in regards to royalty splits, publishing rights, etc.). I really want to find a place with more info on what a "standard" Japanese contract is like.

It's good to hear that the majors in Japan are working on ways to be more artist-friendly. Everyone in my group has heard "horror stories" on how poorly some Japanese majors have treated some of their artists, so we just want to make sure that we have as much info as we can.

We know that it's best to have a laywer look over any potential contract, but all of the music industry people we know are American. Even if they could read the Japanese contract, they may or may not know if the contract is good/bad by Japanese standard.

I'm not sure we're punk enough for Fat Wreck Chords (off subject, I'd love to work with Fat Mike - I've been a huge NOFX fan for years), and I'm not sure we're young or emo enough for Vagrant - but we have thought about contacting those labels. It may be worth looking into again if they're making bigger pushes in Japan. Given the fact that we are a "Japanese" band (half the band members were born/raised in Japan and our lyrics are in Japanese), it is much harder to sell our "foreign" sound to U.S. labels... That's why we're focusing more on Japanese labels.

Again, all of this info is very much appreciated. If anyone else wants to chime in, please feel free to do so. I've learned some new things here, and I'm really eager to learn more. I'll be in Tokyo next week, so perhaps I can buy some of you FGs a beer or two as thanks!

Justin

[AssKissinger]