If you've ever been curious about how a record deal might play out for you, or is currently playing out for you, Applied Science has a great simulator for you. Jon Tanners and his team have rolled out the Record Deal Simulator, which in Tanners words might help you realize you're getting screwed by a label.
"In May, we started work on our Deal Simulator, a tool meant to illustrate the economics of different types of record deals," said Tanners. "It started months prior as a simpler tool showing how advances typically get divided by an artist’s team. We set out to build a calculator that reduced sprawling complexities to one elemental question: What does it take to make money in a record deal?
"This calculator doesn’t lay bare the definitive financial realities of a record deal, nor does it encompass other tricky deal points (like term lengths, 360/ancillary rights, collection periods, or delivery and release commitments, for example). It is designed to show how the math works when an artist signs—the path to profitability for creator and company alike, based solely on streams. Put bluntly: You probably shouldn’t use Deal Sim to figure out if you need to audit your label, but it can help you discern if something isn’t adding up."
Check out the full article here and the simulator here.
