I know that Kenny (Dixon Jr.) and probably Jeff give away a bunch of records to other DJs, friends, promoters, etc. so that they are probably not making quite as big a profit as it might seem on these limited pressings. I don't see that as greed but just part of the game; for the people who can afford to support this game by purchasing these releases great; for the rest of us, we have to resort to hearing the music some other way. That's life.
Scott Ellis -----Original Message----- From: Matt Chester [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2004 11:48 AM To: 313 Detroit Subject: Re: (313) axis Well, Jeff can get paid upwards of £5000 for a two hour set - I think he's doing pretty well financially. And as for making money off a label, even the biggest majors don't just jack up the price by 50% per release to make a bigger profit (though of course they DO inflate prices - and we all bitch about it). I've absolutely nothing against the man making a living off of his art - more power to him, he definitely deserves it. But there's a difference between making a living and ripping off people whilst demanding their support. I'm not accusing him of selling out, I think that's a whole different kind of attitude - I just think the pricing of this series is very greedy... ----- Original Message ----- From: atomly To: 313@hyperreal.org Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2004 5:00 PM Subject: Re: (313) axis [Matt Chester <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>] > At the moment, if I press up 800 copies of a release it costs about > ?1200 (less in N.America), and on a standard price to distributors > (which = about ?5.50 in the stores) it takes about 500 sales to break > even. So to double that price and claim it's to cover costs is > ridiculous. Whilst the figures for a small independant label are > tight as hell, I seriously doubt raising the prices will help - > distributors and stores would take an accordingly higher cut, and > sales would probably drop a bit as people find their addictions harder > and harder to sustain. But the man isn't trying to just break even. You're forgetting about packaging, press, etc. costs, overhead for the label (employees and such) and the fact that Jeff Mills actually wants to make a living off of this. If he sold them for cost, it wouldn't get him anywhere. That's one thing that always struck me as odd. I don't know how many times I've heard people grumble about labels or promoters making money off of music (not to say you were saying this or that Axis is charging any sort of a fair price, this is just a tangent)-- I know I even did as a punk teenager. After throwing shows and releasing records, I think it's absurd to ask people to put that much of their money at risk and to devote that much time and effort to something and only be able to barely break even, otherwise they're a sellout. -- :: atomly :: [ [EMAIL PROTECTED] : www.atomly.com ... [ atomiq records : po box 805319 chicago il 60680 : 312.804.5389 ... [ e-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] for atomly info and updates ...
