Q-Time 5 – at a new venue

Upwards of 70 people assembled at The Seven Dials Club in London’s Covent Garden on a sweltering evening in July to listen to, and debate with, a distinguished panel of enthusiastic and experienced industry pro’s, chaired as usual by BBC 6 Music presenter, Tom Robinson.

The panel:

• Kerry Harvey-Piper (manager, owner of Red Grape Music) • Jon Webster (CEO of The Music Managers Forum) • Laura Kidd (musician, artist: “She Makes War”) • Tommy D (producer; KT Tunstall, Corinne Bailey Rae, Catatonia, Right Said Fred) • Ed O’Brien (musician: Radiohead, and founding director of the Featured Artists Coalition)

MPG Full & Associate Members can log in and listen to the recording

Topics discussed:

• With the recent collapse of the Global Recording Database project, should record companies be held responsible for failing to ensure that adequate and appropriate credits are made available to music fans who buy their music via digital download?• I have a new indie-electro band with a completed debut album and a promo budget of £1,000.

Should we: put the album online immediately for free?, do staggered independent single releases accompanied by youtube videos, with the album released a year down the line?, hold off releasing anything while approaching industry – and if so, who to approach? – managers, labels, publishers, financial backers?, pay for a branding consultancy, or management consultancy?, or…?• Should Featured Artists get 95% of performance revenues?

• Is the album format dead? If not, should it be put out if it’s misery?