The music industry needs a cohesive body to represent its collective interests. That was the conclusion of Doug D'Arcy of Songlines who delivered the key note address at Music Tank's Think Tank event in London last night. Posed with the question "should the music industry grow up", D'Arcy asked: "what and where is the music industry? We can estimate that some 150,000 are employed in the music business in the UK, but it seems to me there is no cohesive industry at all".
"The music world is structured around its functions," he continued, "the labels, the promoters, the managers, the artists. Each function has a representative body, but all too often functions become factions, and that means there is no body representing the wider music world's interests in a holistic way - to government, to other industries, and most importantly to the public at large." D'Arcy felt that a good starting point would be for a industry wide report to be produced on an annual basis that could summarise what, where and who is the British music industry, and what needs to be done to tackle the issues of the day.
Robin Osterley, as chairman of the National Music Council, said that both his organisation and the Music Business Forum provided the seeds of such an industry wide body, but added: "recent successful collaborations between different parts of the industry were generally concerned with non-contentious issues. The current debate on extending copyright is an interesting one, because it is an issue where there are different opinions across the business. A long standing fear at the NMC has been that if you have a cross-industry group that tackles tricky issues the organisation is in danger of imploding. However, I reckon that the Music Business Forum in particular is making some progress in this area."
John Glover of the Music Managers Forum disagreed however. Having recently resigned from the MBF, he reckons: "you will never have a successful organisation that involves all groups in the music space. The fact is the creatives [artists, management, songwriters] and the copyright owners [labels, publishers] can never be represented by the same body because their interests are so often in conflict. That doesn't mean the two sides shouldn't meet to discuss issues - but it is madness to think one body could represent both sides."
However, the overall mood of the event suggested there was a desire for an effective industry-wide body. Whatever the internal disagreements within the music space, without some cohesion everyone loses out. For example, many felt it was the lack of any holistic group representing the music industry which allowed Apple to become so dominant in the digital music space that they can dictate what price artists and labels can expect from download sales.
More info on MusicTank at http://www.musictank.co.uk