David Silverberg is your typical music fan. The Toronto-based writer buys about seven albums a year and goes to shows every six weeks. Or at least that’s what he did until the recession forced him to take a hard look at how he spends his cash.
“I’m definitely buying less music and going to less concerts,” he says. “I can put my money towards more applicable things. Concerts are nice an enjoyable, but not necessary.”
Thousands of music lovers across Canada are dealing with the same financial dilemmas as Silverberg right now, and many are choosing to cut back on their music consumption.
Aaron Brophy, Chartattack.com’s managing editor, says the fans who will abandon their regular concert-going routine first will be people who have lost their jobs. “They won’t be purchasing tickets or albums or band t-shirts anymore,” he says.
Luckily, in the Internet era, cash strapped fans can connect to artists in ways other than buying albums. Silverberg has turned to MySpace, where many acts stream full albums, and he frequents a Toronto Blues bar Tuesday nights because the music is good and, more importantly, free.
Legal downloading is another way to listen to music relatively cheaply. Digital albums often cost less and buying a few 99 cent tracks won’t hurt the pocket book as much.
“Pursuing legal downloads is the way things are going, and you would think that might speed up,” says Paul Gagnon, who teaches financial strategies at Toronto’s Harris Institute, a music management school. “Hopefully people do capitalize on that idea. It only makes more sense now to focus on digital delivery for content.”
Clearly, people’s music buying habits will shift if the recession continues, but so will the way they find out about upcoming bands. At the beginning of the year Chart Magazine abandoned its print product to go exclusively online, MuchMusic cancelled The New Music in December, and now a funding shortfall at Canada’s public broadcaster could put indie music station CBC Radio 3 in jeopardy.
“Cancelling these programs affects the artists and the potential fan base for those artists,” says Gagnon. “Will they still get exposure elsewhere off of TV?”
The answer to that is yes, though it might become harder to reach that critical mass if music news is found on disparate blogs. However, while there are more music blogs than ever for fans to peruse, Brophy thinks people will continue to turn to brand name publications to get their music fix.
“(Blogs are) fun, but in the long run, actual reporting with depth and diverse content will win out,” he says.
Gagnon agrees. “It’s not too late for music magazine’s to build their brand online,” he explains. “They still have the best access to artists and have talented writers. They can capitalize on that.”
Silverberg was never an avid music mag reader, so the decline of Chart, Harp and others, hasn’t affected him too much. His method of staying in the know is not only cheap, it’s the main way music fans have been connecting to artists for decades.
“It’s about word of mouth,” he says. “I have friends that are inside the music scene, so I just listen to them.”
