Debut Album: CD vs. EP

Hello Bloggers!

Ok, so the time has finally arrived…  You’ve written enough songs you are proud and happy about, you have all practiced your instruments extensively and your band has enough years of experience playing in the local scene…

It’s time to put those demos to rest and get your asses in the studio!

When I say the studio, I mean a REAL studio.  No, not that maze of cables, low-end amplifiers, cheap microphones, what have you, that’s in your basement (although I know of some very decent basement recording studios)!  I mean a studio that offers recordings of professional caliber.  Drums that punch through the mix, vocals that are clear and stand out, guitars that are substantial and pitch perfect.  It’s time to INVEST!  Put your money where your mouth is, get down to business!

I’m not going to get into the topic of recording techniques or studio professionalism.  That will be another blog for another day.  This blog is about a making a decision that will affect at least the first few years of your professional career if not more…

Do we launch a CD or an EP?

Well, let’s review the implications of each, and based on your situation, you will know what’s best for you and your band.

Before you read on, I’d like to emphasize that this is my not so professional opinion.  Everything is debatable.  Feel free to argue any point you disagree with.

CD

Your full-length debut album… Every artist’s dream!

By this time, you might have record label support.  They will take care of distributing your album digitally and placing it in as many retail stores as they can or want to.  If you are really lucky, they will help you figure out the details of the tour designed to promote this album.  They will also take care of putting out the PR Campaign as well as marketing and advertising around your album…What a breeze!

Now, if you DON’T have label support…

All the pressure is on you to carry out all of these activities in order to promote your album.  Everything is in your hands and it is quite a workload.

Of course, you can outsource all these responsibilities, and if you have a manager, he will be the head of the whole operation.  He will be in charge of hiring a tour manager, figuring out the best way to distribute your album and hire a marketing firm (specialized in promoting artists) to launch the PR Campaign and advertise.  Of course, as you might expect, the bigger his workload, the bigger his paycheck!

The disadvantage of launching a full length album before you are ready to do so (meaning you do not have the resources to properly promote it at your disposal), is that it has a high probability of flopping, dragging your returns and your reputation along with it.  This high probability of failure I attribute to the fact that it is you first CD.  Your music is young, and most of the time, the first material launched by any given artist does not portray the full talent capacity of that artist.  It is riskier in the beginning, because artists usually reach musical maturity in the later stages of their career (disclaimer: this is not always the case). With your first CD, you might end up paying a lot more than you expected and you will probably not get the return you wanted.  Also, the fact that your first album flopped probably does not look too good in your band’s bio or press release. 

An album is a commitment and it is a big deal in every artist’s career.  If you don’t take it seriously, nobody else will.  The trick here is to really put the work into marketing and promoting it as hard as you can.  If the album is great, it will speak for itself, and all your hard work will pay off.

EP

A compilation of your 4 to 8 best songs neatly packed into a nice sleeve or case which hopefully (meaning should!) have top of the notch artwork giving it the look it deserves.

Just because an EP is not a CD doesn’t mean it should have inferior sound quality.  This is still a serious project and commitment, just that, unlike the CD, there are lower expectations by record labels and by the overall public.  Yes, I know you are thinking, “What the hell is that supposed to mean!?”…I will tell you what it’s supposed to mean…

When you look at a band’s discography, you realize that by the time you started listening to it, it had already launched two EP’s and probably a full length album (disclaimer: this is not always the case).  You realize that your precious “discovery” has a pretty long history to it. 

The thing is, you never really paid attention to anything prior to when you started listening to them, and the reason they are now blasting away in your IPod is because they worked long and hard to get to where they are now.  There is a long line of misses behind every hit…

You are not disappointed at the fact that their previous work is kind of sucky, and this is what I meant by expectations.

If you launch an EP, and it doesn’t reach the “Billboard Hall of Fame”, your reputation is still intact.  An EP nowadays represents a “sample” of your music. 

In simple terms, it is a bigger deal if your CD flops than it is if your EP flops, and this is why…

It is all about “perception,” a term brand managers are very familiar with.  Nowadays it is probably more about the brand than it is about the music.  The reason all these programming companies send out “Beta” versions of their software is because they are aware that their product might have defects that they have not detected, and so by using the “Beta” label, they let customers know that what they are trying out is not the final version of the product.  This way, customers use the software with no expectations and are not disappointed if it is in fact defective.  The brand is not harmed.

An EP is “perceived” to be a “Beta” version of your music.  It is launching your product, without having to worry about consumer expectation.  To the consumer, meaning those individuals that only listen to the music and are not concerned about or aware of any work, effort or money invested by the artist, it is as simple as:

a)      Artists make CD’s.

b)      Artist’s have tours in which they play live around the country.

I’m not trying to say that the consumer is ignorant.  I mean, why would anyone who is not in the music industry want to know how it works?  The thing is, if you expose a CD to a consumer, they will associate what they hear with your brand, and as mentioned earlier, this is risky, because consumers will compare your work with the work of artists that have an entire discography behind them that has helped them shape their sound to what it is today.

On the other hand, if you expose an EP to the consumer, the consumer will have no expectations of it and they will see it for what it really is: your band’s first material ever released, the “Beta” version of your product.

Conclusion

This is the first material you will release.  You will invest heavily on obtaining professional quality in your recordings, however, this is not what the customer sees.  The customer is only concerned about what they listen to, and therefore perception is key. 

If you have had the good fortune of having a record label representative attend one of your shows, be blown away by your performance and actually sign you to their label, then you can count on them to help you out with distribution, promotion and creating the “buzz” for your production.  In this case, releasing a full-length album right off the bat would be a smart move because you have the tools to make it a success.

As an independent artist kicking off your career on your own, launching a full-length album right away would be very risky taking into consideration that you are competing with CD’s put out by record labels which have tools that they acquired through years of doing business and digging deep into the channels of the music industry.  You are in charge of promoting this album to the extent that record labels do, because if you don’t, it will most likely never get noticed.

Now, if you choose to launch your career with an EP, you have more liberty as to how you decide to promote and manage it.  It is not expected to be a big hit and so you can be more flexible with your promotion efforts.  Another positive is that if it is a big hit, you have blown every listener away and the success of your first EP could land you more opportunities.

So the decision is really up to factors such as at what stage of growth you band is at, how much capital you are willing to invest and how much promotion you can do.  An EP is more geared towards the band that is starting out ready to face the world with a sample of what they are capable of.  A CD is more geared towards the band that is farther along in their careers to the point that they are capable of putting in the work needed to make their production a success. 

-Ian Pescod