I have torrented on very rare occasions and I was never quite comfortable any time I did it, i.e. it never grew on me and I never became confident. I believe you make yourself a law target or at least what I tell myself.

ANYHOW here's the deal and my question:

If you are going to pay a musical artist, where do you do it? Cheapest place? Or just a site you align yourself with? What sites to do you trust with your money and bank info? What sites do you not trust with your money and your bank info?

I'm personally looking at Bandcamp since I like their scrappiness. Is love of scrappiness a valid reason? (It led me to Ikey..).

//As an aside, I'm perplexed to say in this ultra-lame and vile Most Foul Year of Our Lord 2024 I've have been discovering a lot of great music. I haven't done that in two decades. Now I want to digitally own it.//

Thoughts?
Thanks

    Every time i shop online i use prepay-ed cards. I consider it to be the best option for me. As for music i choose to have non digital.

      stekte right on, thank you. Prepaid cards are the crappiest gift you can give someone since they won't buy gasoline, liquor, groceries most of the time. If music-heads love them, then great. I am someone who had a turntable as a child, then tapes, then CDs. You obviously prefer one of the big three three there which is way cool. I try to lighten my load lately, mp4/flac ok with me.
      Thanks for this POV.

        I am still using my turntable and my cd player. Some years ago i backed up my tapes as flac. The sound from lps and cds is way better than any digital format.

        I use and pay for Spotify. It may not be the cheapest place, but they have a huge collection of music to explorer.
        They take Paypal if you don't wanna put in your credit card.

          brent Unless you want the latest releases charity shops sell CDs for a pittance, eBay has a good selection of music CDs both old and new.
          There are many music collector sites online where you can get music in various formats.
          I prefer to get CDs which can easily be converted to MP3 or other formats using the tools available in the repo.
          MP3 files will play on most modern-ish music systems including car stereos via a memory stick. This makes building your own compilations easy. The tracks can be volume balanced using MP3 gain which runs fine under Linux Wine.

              BuzzPCSOS
              I live in thrift stores and I'm really not interested in any latest releases. I would rather have albums but those days are passed. I spent some days ripping all my CDs. I got tired of all the plastic laying around. That's why digital for me.
              That said, consistent volume levels have always plagued me on playback.

              BuzzPCSOS The tracks can be volume balanced using MP3 gain which runs fine under Linux Wine.

              I really wish I knew that when I ripped all that plastic! Ugh! The curse of MP3 is the varying volume.

                    brent MP3Gain sets a consistent volume level either for a whole album or as each track individually and works with MP3s that are already created.
                    The website explains the reasons for MP3Gain to be in existence far better than I can. My own opinion of the software is that it is a very important tool for anyone with a large collections of MP3s.
                    If you use Wine then it runs well in that environment. I think it is supported in Snap but not in Flatpak.

                    Edit: If you are ripping new it is always worth keeping an eye on quality. Keep bitrates to 320Kbps as long as you have plenty of storage. Most rippers will default to 128Kbps which should be increased to 320Kbps in settings. Good rippers give you the option, not so good ones don't. For Linux my go-to program is Asunder which is in the Repo as notive Solus or Flatpak. Under settings change Encoder to MP3, un-check variable bitrate and move the slider up to 320Kbps for best quality.

                        Bandcamp is probably the best place - it offers the most in terms of formats, has really good UI and is committed to be DRM free. The pricing is completely flexible too. There are also Bandcamp fridays from time to time, where all the money from your purchases go directly to the label/artist - so if you care about supporting them, that's a good way too. My only complaint with it is that if label/artist remove the item, you lose it from your collection too, which is kind of scammy, given that you paid for it.

                          niobleoum My only complaint with it is that if label/artist remove the item, you lose it from your collection too, which is kind of scammy, given that you paid for it.

                          I don't get it. Once you pay them, they give you music to download and keep for yourself on your home computer? Or are saying you pay them the money than you can play it at their website and it's technically theirs?

                              • Staudey

                                • Post #11
                                • Edited

                                Bandcamp is my go-to, especially for "indie" artists. I get FLAC downloads, and I think the share for the artist is okay-ish. (they've been bought by Epic though, which isn't exactly my favourite company, but oh well)

                                Since Google Music is dead now, and YouTube Music (or whatever it's called) doesn't allow you to download actual files, I now sometimes begrudgingly use Amazon to buy MP3 files of more mainstream music. I'd be glad to have an alternative for that, so I don't have to give more money to a trillion dollar company.
                                (also Amazon seems to want to transition more and more to a streaming-only model, sometimes making it almost impossible to buy and download a single track with the mobile website, depending on the current UI iteration)

                                  I infrequently use Bandcamp when I specifically want to support/encourage a particular artist I enjoy, and to own/keep lossless digital copies of their music. I've never had any issues with incorrect charges or misuse of my credit card on Bandcamp, but I use a virtual credit card number through Privacy.com to hide my real credit card number.

                                  Primarily, I use an Apple Music subscription, as my family (or up to 6 people) can share the subscription for one monthly price of $16 USD. Back in the day, I spent way more than that on vinyl, cassette, and CD purchases per month, but now I have accesses to anything I want whenever I want to hear it, and I like that all my friends and I can connect and see what we are all listening to currently. Also, Apple Music just added InTune to their radio service which allows me to more easily connect to indie internet radio stations like Bagel Radio to discover new indie artists.

                                  I'm also blessed where I live to have a local record shop that still (since 1983) sells new and used vinyl for hundreds of artists. If they don't have it on hand, they can usually order it.

                                    beevomit but now I have accesses to anything I want whenever I want to hear it, and I like that all my friends and I can connect and see what we are all listening to currently. Also, Apple Music just added InTune to their radio service which allows me to more easily connect to indie internet radio stations like Bagel Radio to discover new indie artists.

                                    that's not for me, the apple scenario. thanks for your thoughts on bandcamp. You have Bagel Radio...I discover a lot of music similarly: via RadioTray, in our repo. You can hunt for stations to add the the .conf. It's lovely to discover.

                                    beevomit I'm also blessed where I live to have a local record shop that still (since 1983) sells new and used vinyl for hundreds of artists. If they don't have it on hand, they can usually order it.

                                    I miss the days where you'd buy one, take it home, look at the sleeve from to back, the cover, front to back, all the art. Records had a great sound and were such statements on their own.

                                    Staudey Bandcamp is my go-to, especially for "indie" artists. I get FLAC downloads, and I think the share for the artist is okay-ish. (they've been bought by Epic though, which isn't exactly my favourite company, but oh well)

                                    Thanks for your thought on bandcamp. that is more where my idea of artist support. As for the big 3 you mentioned in your second paragraph, I agree. and avoid.

                                            BuzzPCSOS Edit: If you are ripping new it is always worth keeping an eye on quality. Keep bitrates to 320Kbps as long as you have plenty of storage. Most rippers will default to 128Kbps which should be increased to 320Kbps in settings. Good rippers give you the option, not so good ones don't. For Linux my go-to program is Asunder which is in the Repo as notive Solus or Flatpak . Under settings change Encoder to MP3, un-check variable bitrate and move the slider up to 320Kbps for best quality."

                                            Thanks buzz for the numbers. I copied them in a gedit to-do list with the ripped music so next time I will keep an eye on being consistent with this. It was @WetGeek that turned me on to Asunder, I use it.

                                            SethStorm666 I use and pay for Spotify. It may not be the cheapest place, but they have a huge collection of music to explorer.
                                            They take Paypal if you don't wanna put in your credit card.

                                            thank you, I forgot about that. Tried it for a while about 10 years ago I did not like their recommend algorithm. I like the feedbacky distorted music like Jesus and Mary Chain, Velvet Underground but AI back then would pair it with other 90's music and 60's pop and it never got that I was enjoying a specific sound. It could not ascertain that. I'd love to see how far its come in the last decade though.

                                                I've been using Spotify on the Family Plan for years.
                                                For me, my wife, my two children and my sister.
                                                In this case, the costs are also acceptable in proportion.
                                                The difficult thing about this constellation is that you can no longer cancel the subscription without triggering a family war 😉
                                                For myself, I would no longer use a Spotify or similar subscription, but would be perfectly happy with the free version of YT Music and Internet radio stations. I also no longer collect music or want MP3 files on my devices. I've become a pure streamer over the years.

                                                Here's a gem: On flathub there's an app called "Shortwave". It's basically a radio app, BUT, you can download the songs it plays.

                                                  SethStorm666
                                                  Wow, that's a nice hint! Thank you!
                                                  brent
                                                  I recommend checking what Mary Spender, singer-songwriter from the UK and very active online, does to sell her music and stay in touch with her fan crowd:
                                                  https://www.maryspender.com/
                                                  She is a very focused person and thinks hard about how to use the WWW and how not to - she went solely independent and has quite an amount of followers and fans all over the world.
                                                  Highly recommend her YouTube channel as well!
                                                  The Fiddler

                                                        brent
                                                        Bandcamp is my go-to app also, it used to be possible for musicians to control and monitor their output on that platform more than on others, and what I also like a lot is the fact that you can listen to all of the available music AND buy it, so the threshold for me as a possible customer is very low and that makes me buy stuff. No other platform with all of their subscriptions and other ways of hijacking you does that (as far as I know).
                                                        Bandcamp's radio function is also cool.

                                                        Spotify has an atrociously low output of earnings for their musicians and, as a musician myself, I cannot support that kind of politics. $0.004 for a streamed song is revolting taking in to account that Spotify has massive amounts of songs that people stream day in day out, but I'm probably just whining.
                                                        Here's a website that explains how much artists earn from Spotify:
                                                        https://gbtimes.com/do-artists-get-paid-from-spotify/
                                                        The Fiddler

                                                            SOLUSfiddler Bandcamp is my go-to app also, it used to be possible for musicians to control and monitor their output on that platform more than on others, and what I also like a lot is the fact that you can listen to all of the available music AND buy it, so the threshold for me as a possible customer is very low and that makes me buy stuff. N

                                                            this ^^ is valuable, and I agree. I could sample all I wanted and it made me believe they were all about the artist.
                                                            Spotify at .0004 this is probably the most depressing number I've seen.

                                                            SOLUSfiddler She is a very focused person and thinks hard about how to use the WWW and how not to - she went solely independent and has quite an amount of followers and fans all over the world.
                                                            Highly recommend her YouTube channel as well!

                                                            I will check out Mary Spender, thank you. Some musicians get quite savvy about utilizing the internet to promote themselves and so many do not.

                                                            Thanks for these two posts of great info Fiddler. Keep on rocking.