That's So-nar

ireland's Mano and Ruari at the Sonar Dome

Two of our Thinkers were lucky enough to make a trip to Sonar over the weekend. It wasn’t all dancing in the sunshine though (although that was a major part!) as there were some interesting talks taking place too as part of Digital Music 2.0 organised by Business Development Service (SDE) of the Catalan Institute of Cultural Industries (ICIC) in association with Sonar. The conference looked at alternative ways the music industry can survive given the slow rate of growth of digital music sales in comparison to the dramatic fall in traditional income from the sales of physical units. Andrea and Chewy listened to Jack Horner of Frukt Music and Ben Turner of Graphite Media speak on ‘the exploitation of music brands’, a very interesting look at the best practices when aligning musicians and music brands with consumer brands and how the merging of the two doesn’t have to mean a loss of artistic integrity if done in the right way.

Earlier in the day the very colorful (read pink) Mark Jones of Wall of Sound was joined by Niels Traedon of Live Nation to discuss ways on increasing income sources from live music. It’s evident that adding value to musical experiences is key and how new strategies are being taken by the mammoth Live Nation to add layers to the old school ticketing model previously adhered to by the brand. Mark Jones provided the artists perspective of the changes taking place in the live music model.

Musically Carl Craig and Erol Alkan’s Disco 3000 stole the show as well as one James Pants from Ed Banger. There was definitely a smaller Irish contingent over this year but with Mano le Tough and Ruari D from Gaillimh on the bill at the Sonar Dome as part of the Red Bull Music Academy, you couldn’t keep us down. Also in attendance were team Bodytonic who we had a good old catch up with in the sun.