How Do I Get My Music On Spotify?
How do I, a largely unknown and unsuccessuful musician, distribute my music to Spotify?
Short answer? I use CDBaby for stuff I care about and RouteNote for stuff that’s less important. For me, this means my old band gets released for free through RouteNote and the current project is done through CDBaby.
There ya go. If you just want to know what I use, that gets ya there. But why did I settle on those and how could another service be a better choice for you (particularly in faster turn around genres like rap or EDM)? *Waves hand enticingly* Let’s see!
So if you were to Google “best music distributor” right now, DistroKid would likely be the first choice for alot of people. And it’s not a bad service, they do great work, and are generally faster than other services. My hang up is that they charge $20 per year and I HATE subscriptions. You can pay them $30 once (in addition to that $20/year) to make them keep the music you make on all the streaming services perpetually, even if you don’t keep up with the fees. Otherwise, when you stop paying, they will take it down. Additionally, song recognition platforms like Shazaam are an extra charge with them. The model just seemed a lot more exploitative than the other guys so I avoided them.
But why should you still look at them?
$20 per year is CHEAP if you turn around even one record per year, or if you want to release regular singles (as some believe is current model). Maybe you’re a rapper pushing out records at a super fast rate. This saves you a lot of cash in the long run. You pay your yearly fee, maybe the $30 to keep it on Spotify and Apple Music and everyone else forever and you are good for as many releases as you want to do. If you don’t pay the perpetual $30 charge, $20 a year can be as many records as you want to make. That’s awesome.
Say you make synth wave or EDM or noise core, or some other largely computer focused music. You aren’t limited by money anymore. You can release those tunes you’ve been sitting on that just didn’t have a home. And your listeners get access to a huge discography without you shelling out a ton of scratch. Finish up your tune, upload and repeat. You’re already paying yearly for the privilege, so push as much as you want to put out.
That’s the two scenarios I see DistroKid being more worth it. But if you aren’t super prolific and release on a more regular cycle, here’s why I think you should use CDBaby:
They have been around for ages and distribute to all the big guys for one fee. ($30 for basic $70 for worldwide publishing collection, just do the $70 one)
Their process is straightforward and they generate the UPCs ($20 for the record and worth it in my opinion as generating your own is cumbersome) and handle all the basics just like everyone else.
They include everything in that $70 ($90 with the UPC) price forever. I uploaded an album in 2015 and haven’t paid another dime for the record to sit out on Spotify and Apple Music and everywhere else and I get 85% of the revenue from wherever they distribute. Which, as an unpopular dude making music for the hell of it, has been about $5. This includes Youtube Content ID and Tik Tok. Which is cool. Hopefully you have a bigger following and therefore can generate more income, but I’d encourage you to look into merchandise as a revenue source way before you try to make money from streams. It’s just easier to sell a T-shirt than to get 20,000 plays.
The analytics are okay, the reporting works fine and it’s consistent. I dig it.
CDBaby reporting. Kinda tedious to get through but functional
So I use CDBaby for Derek Porterfield and All of His Friends and I enjoy it, but why do I use RouteNote for An Autumn Rain?
It’s free.
That’s it.
If money is tight. Use these guys. If you can spare the $70 for CDBaby, you’ll be glad you upgraded.
RouteNote is slow, the uploader sucks, I’ve dealt with more mistakes through Routenote and less communication than anywhere else I’ve tried. This is less upsetting because they don’t charge anything.
There are two redeeming qualities beyond price point.
The analytics are pretty to look at.
They have a better royalty share of 90%.
$4.77 over 5 years. I made it. These reports are prettier and better thought out than CDBaby imho.
You can pay $10 per year for premium which gets you 100% of royalties. That doesn’t make sense for me as we’ve already discussed I am just a musician, not a successful musician.
I dig them and if not for the cumbersome speed issues on their site and the random issues I’ve had uploading in the past, I might even use them instead of CDBaby. They lack a bit of polish but really, at the level I play, they offer what I need for NO COST. That’s cool.
Free distribution to all the big guys.
UPC is free.
The downside:
Super Slow to upload
Very little communication
Errors with uploads (my 10 track album uploaded 7 songs but showed 10)
Speed within the site is abysmal
So I’m willing to endure alot of that for my old records because I don’t tour to support those albums anymore. They’re done. I still want fans to be able to listen to them and if it makes me a bit of money, that’s great but overall, I see RouteNote as a barebones distributor meant to just throw your music out there. Beyond that, you won’t get very much, and shouldn’t expect them to compete with services you pay for.
I don’t really care who you end up using. Each service will get your music out there and, in truth, that’s the important part. I hope that whatever you create, you go through the process to publish it. This can feel tedious and overwhelming but you owe it to yourself to finish out that last 10% and make your art available to the world. Not in an attempt get famous or make money or acquire whatever “clout” is, but just to make sure that it’s not dying on your harddrive somewhere at risk of never reaching the ears of some kid that’s been waiting for the unique flavor you bring to their headphones. That’s a cool feeling to find a resonance that matches your own and I hope you go find it.
Want even more info than I can educatedly put here? Ari at Ari’s Take did an exhaustive review of *MOST* of the distribution services. It is absolutely worth checking out. I love his content and hope you find it as helpful as I did. https://aristake.com/post/cd-baby-tunecore-ditto-mondotunes-zimbalam-or
The links above may contain affiliate codes that give me a small commission if you choose to sign up for any of the mentioned services.This helps me afford a crippling coffee addiction and the costs of running this site. If that bothers you, feel free to leave an angry comment on this post. Cheers.
CDBaby, doesn’t have an affiliate program anymore,so you at least know money isn’t my motivation for recommending them
Additionally I can’t get a referral link to DistroKid without the $20/year account, but if you do choose to use them, look around for a discount code. You should be able to save at a minimum, 7% on the first year.
RouteNote makes me money if you do, so hopefully Drake reads this and slaps that RouteNote link to save some scratch.
Thanks for reading.
Start a band.