Hey, everyone. Anthony Fantano here, Internet's busiest music nerd. Hope you're doing well.

Let's talk about music distros. You know them, you love them. Okay. You don't love them. Yeah, in fact, probably a lot of you don't love them. But I know there are a lot of people in my audience who have had interactions and experiences with these platforms, given that there are a lot of up-and-coming and independent, and aspiring musicians in my viewing audience. And as a result, streaming, music consumption, so on and so forth. It's a regular topic over here, and it's a topic I am regularly searching out new information on all the time.

Enter in my guest for this conversation, Miss Krystle, AKA Top Music Attorney, on her website, on Instagram too, and YouTube, who I recently caught having a conversation with her audience about what music distros she personally thinks are the worst and what some of the worst practices that they engage in are. Because she often has to dive into these contract agreements and TOSs for her job and also helps quite a bit of artists deal with their music distros, I figured she would be a fantastic fit for this conversation to basically shed some light for you guys on what you need to look out for in the music distribution sphere.

Now, I will say for the first few minutes of our conversation, the internet connection was a little bit rough. So what we're going to do is hop right into the bit after the intro where Miss Krystle starts talking about basically AI training, because apparently, some of these platforms have become a gateway for that, too. Okay, let's go.

AF: By virtue of uploading my music to the streaming platforms through this middleman, am I potentially subjecting my music to some AI exposure? I think a lot of musicians wouldn't necessarily think that these distro companies would potentially function as a gateway into that world. And in the contracts and in the agreements that you've seen so far that do make reference to such things, how much or how little transparency have you been seeing in terms of saying your music could be used or subjected to some AI analysis or training or something? That's so vague. There's so little transparency in the world of AI. How much or little specifics are you seeing on this front when that is made mention in these agreements?

MK: Yeah. So LANDR, TuneCore. These are the distributors that have AI programs that you can opt into. Right now in the United States, it's not just music distributors, any company that wants to use your creative stuff for training, including YouTube. YouTube had a little promo recently, and they're like, hey, if you want to just opt in your videos to let us train on them, click this button. Right now, at least in the United States, these companies are trying to protect themselves by getting artists to opt in. There's a step, and that's something. What I'm saying, though, is that they're like, there's a financial incentive. So I go, they're confusing. And I don't know. The rights that are being given away are not worth what potential benefit that is because you can't take it back. So anyway, so these are two of the companies. At least in the US, though, it is often like in the UK, the government right now is looking at changing the law. So actually, it's opt out. So automatically, any AI company could just come train off of your music.

AF: You have to say explicitly in the UK, I don't want my music involved in this. In the US, I want to ask this specifically because I know so far, unfortunately, there's been so little protective legislation passed for intellectual property rights holders and so on and so forth when it comes to AI training. Are these companies offering that stipulation? Like, oh, you have to opt in for this to happen because there is a legal barrier there, or are they just doing it out of the goodness of their hearts? Like, is there actually a law preventing them from just doing it automatically?

MK: Right now, no. But the reason why it's not out of the niceties of their hearts is because they don't want to get sued. And it's because you have these huge lawsuits by the record labels against Suno and Udio, and Claude. So no, they just have good legal counsel.

AF: There is still, there still is enough of a legal gray area to where they're like, we're going to try to cover our butts because this could come back on us if some... And it's happened before, obviously, if some song pops up from our platform and it sounds exactly like Future or something, and it's clearly just ripped off from some song that we own the rights to.

MK: Yeah. Well, and even on... Here's the thing. We've had so much conversation. I'm curious of your take because I got a little bit from some of the stuff I saw on your channel and interviews that you've done. But just on the AI issue in general, it's like, well, do you care? Because one thing I can point out is SoundCloud. I was just perusing through their contract, and I go, oh, boy, this German company, they have it in their contract where they say, if you have your music on SoundCloud, we will use your music for our AI training. So I go, that to me is like a deal breaker. Right? And I go, but it's just more important that people just understand. So if you don't care, if you're like, it's okay, I don't mind. Well, that's a different thing. I'm about awareness, disclosure. For example, if you were making music and putting it out, do you think this is something people should care about if companies are training on our music?

AF: A lot of what you're saying makes me wonder. I've asked this question to quite a few people in the industry who observe it from the business side. Right now, it seems like you have these three big functional, I guess, business positions when it comes to music. Platforming and streaming and exposure, and distribution right now. You obviously have the rights holders and creators. You have the labels, and you have the streaming platforms themselves. You have those distro middlemen, like we were talking about earlier. And I'm wondering, is this hierarchy, is this dynamic going to continue? Because it seems like at least one out of these three major players here doesn't necessarily need to exist. Artists could themselves completely subvert the labels and just go through a distributor or straight-to-stream platforms, put up all their stuff themselves without any representation or anything like that. Or platforms like Spotify could take on more of a SoundCloud model and just literally allow users direct to upload to the platform and essentially pull everything out of the distributors' pockets. Because without that barrier there to prevent your average person from uploading there immediately and directly, the music distributors don't really need to be there. Because we are talking specifically about distros, why does this model continue to exist, especially with platforms like SoundCloud out there? And why doesn't a platform like Spotify just essentially pull the plug on these people, for better or for worse, and say, you know what? You could just directly upload to our platform now. You don't need DistroKid, you don't need TuneCore, you don't need all this stuff. Just come on through and just do it by way of just doing it directly with us.

MK: Once upon a time, there was an opportunity for us creatives to upload our music directly to these platforms. I think that the biggest argument is just technical specifications. We need someone in the middle to make sure that creatives are giving us the correct bit rates and size and wav files and this and that. So we have uniformity in the user experience. That's one. Another is in paying out royalties. I think the infrastructure was just set up to try to help. I think that there was an initial reason for that. It just now there's just such an incredible opportunity for exploitation. When we're dealing with the largest streams of revenue for creatives, because not a lot of creatives sell on their website and make vinyls in CDs, and things like that. So someone jumping in being like, Cool, I'm going to become a distributor. It's a lot of steps, but anyone can do that. One of the interesting things is actually, I've been looking at Universal because I go, well, we have these three major labels. And Universal, I think, is becoming a monopoly, right? And as it's becoming a monopoly, it's now actually purchasing up the infrastructure. It's not just focusing on music catalog acquisition, which was the big thing. It's like you're doing deals with artists, you own their catalog, or you're just outright going and purchasing catalog. Well, now what they're doing is they're purchasing infrastructure, right? So they had the Downtown deal that they're finishing over $700 million for that acquisition. And in that is CD Baby. In that is Songtrust, these companies that independent artists use. I go, okay, that's another concern. So we have the issue of the music distributors themselves, but we also have major labels now coming and just buying up the independent infrastructure.

AF: Do you feel like, I mean, obviously the answer is probably yes, but do you feel like that's just going to make everything we're seeing all the downsides of the distro industry currently just get worse. Is there maybe more incentive or speaking optimistically here, is there maybe more incentive to do things more ethically or do things with more accountability when a company like Universal is owning it and, I don't know, is maybe having to be more careful because are there more liabilities at stake? Do they not want to be ripping themselves off, essentially, by running an ineffective business model on the distro side, if they are, in fact, dipping their toes in that water?

MK: You know what? One of the things on the...is this the best money maker? Kind of piece of what you just asked. Universal as well had put out this business plan to its investors, right? So it's like, for the upcoming year, this is what we're looking at. And in that, they were basically taking the independent DIY model, which is you got to do, sell stuff ancillary to just streaming the music. It's not just music. We need to sell fan experiences. We need to sell merch. We need to do other things. And so that's actually where the industry is headed. Even the music distributors, because I have friends in all kinds of places. And so people will just tell me insider stuff on what these companies are doing. And so it's not just major record labels, it's music distributors as well. Everyone is trying to tap into this. How do we make more money? And for the independent artists who are already following this model, and this is the message to anyone listening to this right now, this is how you can really make a lot of money with your careers that you have to not just rely on streaming. Because we're going to point out the issues and be like, This is bad. But we're also going to talk about, well, how do you deal with this? If you are going to use a music distributor, because you have to, what to look for, and we can talk about that. But it's more big picture and just understanding that, again, just the DIY selling directly to your fans yourself is always going to be the best way to actually have a sustainable long-term career.

AF: Well, you're talking about the fact that artists have to work through a music distributor. One, is that in fact true? Is it 110% a must? And if artists do have to work through a music distributor without necessarily, obviously, turning this conversation into an advertisement for whatever particular two or three distributors you think are the best. Because I think if we were to engage in that, you're following these TOS agreements, you're following these contracts. Any of these companies who are doing maybe good by the listener and by the user now could come out with some shitty contract three months from now where they start breaking promises or they get bought out by another company and they're no longer trustworthy. So I mean, again, is it a must? And if it is, what practices or green flags should musicians be looking for when they are picking a particular distro of choice? Again, without shouting someone out, maybe what are some of the best practices or positive things that you see some distros doing that are like, Oh, okay, that actually signals to me, I should be going in this direction, or this is the company that I feel like I could trust my music with.

MK: Yeah. Well, and look, ancillary to that on the...I think the solution to all this is still always try to cut out the middlemen whenever possible. The way I like to think of this...

AF: Do as much as you can on your own.

MK: Yeah, because I'm like, for me, my new song, I want to have it on music streaming platforms so I can make this as easy as possible for users to find my stuff. I consider streaming platforms my marketing. It's like the end, last thing that I do. Everything before that is how do I directly reach the fan, have an email list, have a website that you can buy something on. So that's always going to be that just do it yourself directly. But with that being said, at some point you go, okay, I want to get my song on Spotify. So you do need to go through a distributor. Look, I did the worst terms for all the distributors that I've reviewed, and I had the three worst. And the way that I think through this, I go, The thing that most creatives want, they want to know what's the cost, All right? How much are they going to pay? They want to know how long that they're going to be required to be on the platform, so to speak. Can you just remove your stuff anytime? Are you locked into a deal for a year, two years, whatever? And then also, what does the contract say? This is what I would say as far as the most important things. Cost, I understand, is usually one of the top tier ones, but most of them are the same or very similar. They have a subscription. The cheapest cost is like $23 bucks, $25 bucks. And then you have a company like maybe Simfy.

AF: You're Are you talking annually or monthly?

MK: Monthly. Monthly? You got it. And some of them also will offer a percentage-based. And so I have personally distributed through most of these, which is why I can be like, I don't just have experience with looking at their contract. I've used them. And so, for example, when I did a deal with with so, so long ago, I was making not a whole lot with my music, and so I just did a percentage deal, and that worked. So it's more of just look at the options and see what makes sense, right? But for me, it's the terms, because I go with, any luck, since all these companies substantially do the same thing. They get your music to music platforms, and then they act as the bank. So they accept all the royalties that are paid from Spotify and Amazon Music and all the places, and then they pay you. And they're supposed to give you accounting. So it really should be that simple. And they have upsells. Let us get your mechanical license. Let us do your content ID stuff on YouTube. And so you can opt into those things. So for me, I just go based on what I care about the most is going to be like with, for example, TuneCore. I still have a real problem, and they're at the bottom of the list for me. And it's because of their contract. It's because it's not just the forfeiture of royalties. We can take your royalties at any time in our reasonable judgment, but we can also give it to third parties. So it says that in their contract, they can literally just give your royalties to anyone at any time. But then also they're making money off of your royalties, and they're the only distributor that does this that I've found so far. So they have an interest-bearing They count. They say, You waive any right to the interest that's been made off of your money. And I'm like, I just don't like that. No, thank you. So, TuneCore is definitely at the bottom of the barrel. But to your point, it's not just the contract, it's the relationship. So, for example, some of these distributors, we've actually gotten some wins. The point of the channel and what I do is to point out these things, and then I go have a little conversation with the company, and I'm like, Hey, let's make a change. And some of them actually have. For example, on Too Lost, we pointed out Too Lost, we're like, we just stumbled on the fact that you are sending people's music to a platform that can be freely remixed and then shared out onto social media. I go, If your users are cool with that, great. But I don't think they know. And so we just strongly encourage them to just disclose, update their website, how does it look? And they actually did that. I think that's cool.

AF: When you're talking about that ability that TuneCore gave themselves, give your royalties to a third party, that's an insane stipulation to work in there. For what reason or scenario would they give themselves that ability? Is it just to be able to have permission for themselves to move the money around if they are staking claim to and we can use it to, I don't know, pay out other Are there creators or users that we don't necessarily have the money to pay or in order to cut corners and keep things in the black? Why would they give themselves that permission?

MK: I'll tell you what they told me because I like to ask these questions as well. A parent company believe owns TuneCore, so it could be that there's a lot of royalties that are being withheld or unclaimed. And here's the other thing that all these distributors, or most of them, I should are doing is that they say, When you stop using our account, you stop paying, you get kicked off, we delete you, whatever. From that time forward, the royalties that come in from your music, we keep. So there's all of these stipulations. There's all these stipulations and these contracts that say, Here are the reasons why we get to keep your money. So it's truly just such an amazing business model. Again, when you go back to how much money these companies are handling.

AF: Oh, and to dig into the other point that you had made a second ago. And I know that, like you said, for a lot of independent and starting musicians, the number one question is always like, How much money are they taking? How much money am I paying to use this service? But I find that for musicians that actually do end up turning it into somewhat of a career, and they're playing more the long game, what ends up being more of a concern than the money that I'm making when I initially enter into the game, as it were, is ownership. Okay, I'm making this money. I have the money that I wanted initially getting in here, but do I actually own the things I'm creating, and do I have full creative control of that stuff and where it lives and so on and so forth? Obviously, there's been a lot of discourse among music and music fans about the deals that labels will lock artists into and things like intellectual property rights and who owns the masters and publishing and so on and so forth. What I want to get into specifically here, because you made a quick mention of it, is the idea that, pairing up with one of these distributors, you get locked in there somehow, which is crazy to me, the thought of that, given that these people are not a label. You're not signing with them some deal where you're getting a big upfront payment, and you're letting them have the ability to profit off of your music because they're exclusively working with you to benefit your career in some form or fashion in an exponential way. So the idea that you would be locked into something somewhat similar just through a distro website is crazy. So I wanted to know, specifically, how aggressive are some of these exclusivity terms that you're seeing through these distros? What are they asking for? What are they twisting artists' arms into? What are they locking them into, specifically?

MK: What I would look at, and for anyone watching, you can do a CTRL-F. If you're looking at these terms, you can find them through Google. You just put in, for example, DistroKid terms of service, and you can find this. But what you're looking for is, does it say that it's exclusive or non-exclusive? And also, just search for the word term. To answer your question, a year is pretty common, especially for the big music distributors. When you get into an ADA situation, the orchard, right? So these ones where it's invite, only it's a different situation. They can be more aggressive in those situations. But that's why, again, that's why I care. So sometimes when I do find with some of these distributors where they're like, basically, you can terminate at any time, I go, okay, I'm less worried then.

AF: Okay. All right. And when you say locked in for a year, you mean you can only distribute your music through our platform for this duration of time? And if, let's say, hypothetically, I don't know, on one of these platforms, and I'm sure you've dealt with this before, you've been hacked or you're having royalties garnished, or you're getting little to no response from those who are supposed to be on the customer service side or something like that. You're basically up shits creek without a paddle. You can't switch over to another distributor if they're being unresponsive in some way.

MK: The catalog is usually the thing that gets locked in, to be clear. For some deals, and again, even Too Lost, so they have their main deal if you just sign up and do a subscription, but they do have special deals where they will sometimes pay in advance, and so they might do something separate. So setting that aside, if someone is signing up and their catalog is distributed on one platform, it's usually that catalog is the thing that's tied up. It doesn't mean new music, right? Again, specific to each one, but what I can say is across the board, that's usually how it works. It's tied to the music itself.

AF: And maybe this question is too technical or specific, but when switching over, does that usually require some reupload or placement of the music itself? Or can you matriculate things over pretty easily when switching distributors, and you maybe already have a catalog that's already uploaded?

MK: Yeah. Here's the thing. It actually is not that terribly complicated, but it is complicated. I did a video recently on this, and I did a free PDF and stuff like that just as far as step one, step two, because here's the thing. In the migration process, some people make a few small mistakes that are huge, which is they will go over to... They're on CD Baby, and then they want to switch over to DistroKid. And so they reupload their catalog, and then there's a crossover that happens. So you'll just have chaos that happens when you have two copies of your music being sent. So you actually have to time it. So you take it down, and you go, Hey, how long is it going to take you to remove it? Okay. And you're in communication with the new distributor. And then the other big piece is the ISRC number. So there's this little barcode, we call it, that's assigned to every song. So when you get your streams and you got your million streams, you don't want to lose those. If you switch a distributor and you just start over, and they assign a new ISRC, then you start from zero with the stream. So we want to make sure with these catalog migrations because my office does catalog acquisition. So now we're migrating for a different purpose. We actually sold the catalog. And so now the buyer needs to make sure we don't lose the streams. There's no interruption of service. For all these reasons, it's know the process before you actually start.

AF: I mean, aside from, I guess, making sure that you educate yourself as much as possible beforehand, I mean, obviously, some of these terms could be changing and evolving as musicians are on these platforms after having looked into them beforehand. After such changes, what do you feel like musicians - what recourse do we and they have in the face of worsening customer service, changing royalties, expectations exclusivity agreements that may not fit the wants of musicians. What is the best course of action outside of just voting with our dollar and just being like, well, I'm just going to switch places, because it seems like no matter where you go, and maybe you can give a general assessment on whether or not things look rosy in the industry as of right now. But it seems like no matter where you go, there are going to be some downsides. And that none of these companies, unless they're forced to legally, they're not going to be working ethically. And are there, I guess, options that are out there for musicians outside of maybe calling someone like yourself and being like, I need someone to pound these people legally and give them a time in order for them to do right by me.

MK: Sometimes you got to hire someone to kick in the door. That is what we do.

AF: Right, exactly. I just find it funny what you describe as like, Oh, these are my interactions with these people. When I repeat, I really hear a lot of musicians talk about this stuff online, saying, I can't get them to respond to me in any way. I'm sure you've written some very scary letters.

MK: No, but that's why we get a response, and it's truly a frustration of mine. Trust me, I love what I do. I'm good at what I do, and we have a very favorable result, pretty much always. But I'm like, the average creative shouldn't need to go through that. That's why I'm so pissed about this. You shouldn't need to hire me to get a response because I sometimes have clients that hire me because they literally just cannot get a response over a technical issue. It's not even having to do with something more extreme like, 'Hey, they're withholding $10,000, $60,000 of my money.' But you made a point. You go. The problem with these agreements is that they're one-sided. No to negotiate them, right? And also, the distributor can unilaterally, all by itself, make changes. And it says that in the contract. It goes, if we determine from time to time that we want to make an update, we will. And then we publish it. We're like, Hey, we made an update this date. But what you should know is that at the time you sign up, go and save the terms of service now. Wayback Machine right now is being sued to death by record labels. So hopefully it doesn't go away, but that's a great thing to go and find the current state of a website, so terms of service in a certain date. But you should do this as part of your process, because under the law, the contract that you signed is the one that existed at that time. So save it because something may change, and whatever. But as far as-

AF: Especially if you're signing away some ownership or exclusivity to work that you're creating, just like, screenshot or save those terms of service that you agreed to at the time on these platforms, because they're always going to be changing.

MK: Yeah. And yes, at some point, you do need to get a lawyer. But sometimes it just makes sense because it's a cost-benefit analysis. If you have $20k, $30k dollars tied up, you're going and paying for a lawyerly letter on scary letterhead to get the job done, it's worth the investment.

AF: Yeah, if that amount of money is tied up for sure.

MK: Yeah, and whatever the issue is, because sometimes we have so many things that come up. But because this issue just continues to escalate, because I told you, we've had some wins. For example, DistroKids is another, I think it's one of the biggest music distributors. My understanding is that they have about 40 %. They distribute about 40 % of the music catalog that's on Spotify right now. So it's big. And we deal with them all the time, literally every day. And what I can say is that they have a terrible terms of service, just like everyone else. But in my actual dealings with them, they're reasonable. They release the money. Do you see what I'm saying? So these are the things that drive my opinion on who is the worst and why. But as far as where we go from here, we ended up writing a letter to Congress. It's gotten to that point where I'm literally like, there has to be some oversight, because as much as I've just been screaming at the top of my lungs about this for the last year, and we've had some wins, this is still happening just at an unbelievable pace, and there needs to be some oversight of these companies. We'll see if we get a response.

AF: Before you head out, one thing I wanted to stress that you made mention of earlier that sounds like maybe an obvious to do that I think a lot of people aren't necessarily engaging in is that making sure that you're building your own website, building your own platform as a musician, as an independent artist. I know it doesn't seem like super cool or hip these days to have an artist, www.artistname.com. But the thing is, all of these social media platforms that we take for granted and we've made a part of our lives without really thinking about it, they're getting more and more enclosed in terms of their ability and capacity to just keep you locked into that platform and keep your audience locked into that platform only. So when those moments do come and it's like, oh, I've just come out with a new CD. I've just come out with a new vinyl, come out with a new this. I'll just link people to this in my story, and they'll go. And it's like, all of a sudden, it's like, oh, wow, nobody at all is seeing this, and nobody's engaging with it. And when I put a piece of content up on this platform, telling people, and maybe my main feed to go check this out or that out or buy tickets for a thing, and they're not seeing it, and I'm being totally shadow banned or it's not being exposed in any way whatsoever. So when that happens, you're totally screwed because you haven't built your own platform. And these companies in these places have made you feel like, oh, this is your space. This is your channel. This is your account that you have, and nobody else has. So it's totally yours, when in fact, it's not yours, it's theirs, and they have full control over how much exposure it gets on a regular basis, no matter how desperately you may try to directly connect and communicate with your fan base. So having that personal alternative platform to actually pitch and sell your stuff on who people are actually engaged with that platform, they're going to see everything you put on there because nobody's saying whether or not it actually makes it to the eyes and ears of your followers. It seems to be a pretty vital thing that a lot of people are letting fall to the wayside because it's just so easy to start a Twitter account. It's just so easy to start an Instagram account without necessarily putting in the work or the thought that you might your own personal website or something like that.

MK: It's so easy to have a TikTok ban. It's so easy to lose your Instagram because someone filed-

AF: Overnight, within minutes.

Yeah. Someone filed a DMCA takedown. It's so funny. You had a little chat with Rick Beato, and you guys were like, No one's ever sued over a DMCA claim. I'm literally in a federal lawsuit over a DMCA takedown on a YouTube video right now.

AF: Oh, yeah.

MK: Separate conversation for later. But no, you're so on the money because you have no control over your audience. So if you've built up a nice following on Instagram, Instagram, one, could get deleted. Two, it might go away. It might be like you at some point soon. Sure, exactly. Taking control of the audience is truly the most valuable thing you could do. Really, I try to tell creatives, I'm like, you have to think of yourself as a music business. Think of yourself like a record label. A record label is trying to make money. It's trying to make its artists famous. In the same way we go, we have to take control and get an email, build up that email list, because then when we drop our new hit single, we don't have to rely on the algorithms anymore. We can guarantee the hundred people on our email list are going to get it. And then that hundred becomes a thousand, and you build. And it's truly amazing when you have control of the audience. But if you do set up a website, and whatever your feeling is on it, you can make your a landing page. It could be so many things. I think people should not get hung up on anything other than what is the place people are going to go to buy from you. Artists forget that they don't give their fans an opportunity to donate to them, to buy from them, and they don't do that. They're missing out on a really amazing opportunity to grow and figure out how to have a sustainable career, even with a very small fan base. I've seen it over and over.

AF: Miss Krystal, I thank you for taking the time and reminding artists out there to be more mindful of the platforms through which they share themselves, their music, and everything that they do. We're going to link to your website and your pages and everything down below so they could check out more of your work, everyone watching this video and watching this interview. And yeah, appreciate you a lot for taking the time.

MK: Thank you for taking the time and just giving an opportunity for us to raise this issue. It's such a big one. So I very much appreciate your time.

Miss Krystal's video going over the worst distro terms:     • Comparing The WORST Music Distributor...  
Her site: https://www.topmusicattorney.com/