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Did you know that on the Aria end of year charts last year - there was not one Australian act that made the top 30? Interestingly, last year was also the first year streaming was included in the calculations.
Now I’m totally not saying that one equals the other, but it’s got me thinking: is there more we could be doing to support Australian music conquer the world of streaming services?
Turns out I’m not alone – both ARIA - the guys who give the awards - and APRA - the guys who pay artists when radio stations play their music - are campaigning for streaming services to do more to support Aussie music. APRA says that could involve requiring at least a quarter of the music in curated playlists to be Aussie acts.
Streaming services like Spotify and Apple Music are dominating the way Australians consume music. ARIA says in the first six months of last year, the industry made almost 97-million dollars from streaming services. That’s more than half the total revenue, and a 57% jump from the year before.
ARIA boss Dan Rosen says quotas are difficult to implement, but streaming services should be doing more where they can. ‘The streaming services need to educate the labels and the artists and the publishers, and we need to educate them on what we need’.
Digital Export Producer Dom Alessio agrees there’s an appetite for more Australian music here and internationally. He says local artists like 24 year old G-Flip have seen their careers go from releasing a song to performing at SXSW in the space of months. ‘G-Flip has already got a fan base, because she’s been featured on these playlists internationally”. (She’s now also just announced a bunch of local shows)
The Feed reached out to Apple Music - who declined to comment - and Spotify, who we’ve yet to hear back from.
Any rule/guideline/regulation has to be optional, which basically means streaming services could go about their merry way and choose not to comply. The global music industry is massively competitive, and keeping local artists in the game is a challenge. So as streaming becomes the new giant in the industry... are quotas the key? Or do we need to find another strategy?
