Outdustry’s in-house net-label MicroMu is proud to present a special performance from it’s first international signing, Fink…..

As the first acoustic act on legendary electronic label Ninja Tune, Fink has carved a unique path as a singer-songwriter. With a background in downtempo beat production and top level remix work, his brand of acoustic music is distinctly modern while remaining deeply intimate as a live show; a formula which has seen him share the stage with the likes of Zero 7 and Massive Attack and earned him rave reviews around the world:

“Mean moody and magnificent. One of the most original singer-songwriters around.” - Clash

“…say hello to your new soundtrack.” - NME

“Surprises when you least expect it. Sort of Revolution refuses to succumb to the obvious.” - Mojo

Fink will be performing solo-acoustic for two small shows in Beijing (MAO Live on Nov 5th) and Shanghai (Yuyintang on Nov 6th), followed by a mainstage appearance at Clockenflap Festival in Hong Kong (Nov 8th).

Acoustic legend Wan Xiaoli will be supporting Fink in Beijing. Shanghai support to be announced…

Tickets 50RMB in advance, 60RMB on the door

http://micromu.com

http://douban.com/artist/finkmusic

http://myspace.com/finkmusic

6MicroMu (Buchadian), Project Blog, China Live Music, China Festivals, Large, Events,

贝格集团登陆中国 BEGGARS GROUP LAUNCH BEGGARS CHINA

贝格集团继续扩大其全球网络，如今与其在中国的独家代表Outdustry(格外音乐)合作，并推出了一个中文（www.beigecn.com）网站.

Continuing to broaden their worldwide network, the Beggars Group are working with Outdustry as their exclusive representatives in Beijing and are also launching a dedicated website for Mandarin speakers (www.beggarschina.com).

实物唱片发行将在未来的几个月里由中国当地的京文唱片和台湾的HI-NOTE唱片发行。完整的歌曲目录可以通过音乐移动数字服务公司wa3.cn进行网上查询、认购. 此外，AlT风格的摇滚乐队“British sea power”是这种合作关系的第一个受益者，他们已准备在香港，台湾等地演出，并将于今年10月来北京参加摩登天空音乐节。

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6Press Release, Project Blog, China, Beggars Group, Beggars China, Large,

Chris Anderson has just published his latest book “Free : The Future Of A Radical Price”. In it the Wired Magazine Editor and bestselling author of The Long Tail discusses the economic peculiarities of a world in which goods, services and media are increasingly being made available for what feels like free: How has this happened, and what does it mean going forwards for us both as consumers and producers?

As a market where digital content has largely been free from the get-go, China is an obvious case study along with other developing nations such as Brazil. Chris has therefore devoted a chapter to these markets, looking at how people are dealing with such realities.

I met Chris for breakfast during one of his research visits to China towards the end of 2007 and, amongst other things, outlined the basic concept of MicroMu (不插店) to him a good 8 months before we actually got round to trying the idea out. A year and a half later (and a year into the MicroMu project) and our copy of Free arrives through the post, complete with a whole page devoted to MicroMu as an example of an experimental free music model:

“The moment you put a fee on accessing music in China is the moment you cut off 90% of your audience,” says Peto. “[Paying for*] Music is a luxury for the middle class in China, a flippant expenditure. This model works against that. We simply use free music and media as a way of saying that ‘everyone is welcome’, building a dialogue, building a community, becoming the trusted brand of the grassroots music movement in China. To do this though, we have to become all things to all men: record label, online community, live events producers, merchandise sellers, tv production company.”

*Just to clarify: It is the idea of paying for music and not the idea of music itself that is a luxury for the middle class. The words “paying for” were not included in the original text.

The pressure is on to deliver! Many thanks for the mention Chris and good luck with the book launch.

6MicroMu (Buchadian), Project Blog, China, Outdustry Media, Ed Peto, Large, China Music Industry,

Happy Birthday MicroMu

It seems like it has been a hell of a lot longer, but our little concept record label MicroMu (known in Chinese as 不插店, or ‘Buchadian’), turns 1 year old today. You can feel paternal pride radiating throughout Outdustry HQ as we package up a one year compilation album of b-sides and rarities to celebrate:

MicroMu is our attempt at a sustainable record label model in an environment where people, by and large, aren’t used to paying for music. The solution? Give music (and lots of other things) away for free, build a loyal community around it all, and then support this (largely) through a partnership with a brand who shares your audience. Or, as we say in our label intro:

MicroMu is an experimental, sponsor-driven, free-to-user record label model designed to discover new talent, create original music and reward artists in seemingly impossible conditions.

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6MicroMu (Buchadian), Project Blog, China, Ed Peto, Large, Music,

Outdustry clients Sterling Sound have just mastered a couple of cracking Beijing indie albums. Hedgehog went so far as to say that they “could die happy” after hearing the results:

6China, Client Work, Large, Sterling Sound, Production Services, Project Blog,

The last release on our in-house label MicroMu has been going down a storm. Li Zhi’s live album, ‘There’s Nobody On Gongti Dong Lu’ was recorded at a packed show in Beijing’s Yugong Yishan venue in mid-January.

Since it’s release on Jan 22nd, the Jiangsu folk hero’s first offering since 2007 has been meet met with unanimously glowing reviews across the Chinese internet. At the time of writing, well over a month after it’s initial release, it is still sitting strong at number 6 on uber-review-site Douban’s Best New Release list, ahead of some pretty distinguished company:

6MicroMu (Buchadian), Project Blog, China Music Scene, Ed Peto, Large,

NOTE: This is an extract from ‘Access China’ report, written by Ed Peto, commissioned by UK Trade and Industry Department and British Underground.

The Chinese government is acutely aware that TV is the most effective medium for delivering key cultural and political messages. China Central Television (CCTV), the state-run national station, operates a range of channels, which, in the main part, are barefaced propaganda and state trumpet blowing. Their large scale, televised music galas showcase traditional and government approved music forms and are regularly watched by audiences in the hundreds of millions. These are the kind of viewing figures that excite people about China but in reality the shows are impregnable fortresses of glittery, spandex-clad state guff.

When Pop Idol imitator ‘SuperGirl’ hit China in 2004, the final was watched by 400 million people. The rush of mobile votes sent the government into a panic and severe restrictions were implemented, preventing the show ever happening in the same format again - The idea of a democratically decided pop show proving too much for a one-party state.

Further down the pecking order, regional TV is a bit more conversational about the idea of coverage but the act really has to be sizeable due to the broad audience - mass appeal rules. You have to go to the foreign owned stations to find recognisable music programming.

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6Published, Ed Peto, Large, China Music Industry, China Media, Access China Report, UKTI, British Underground, China, Project Blog, Client Work,

NOTE: This is an extract from ‘Access China’ report, written by Ed Peto, commissioned by UK Trade and Industry Department and British Underground

Publishing is a tricky concept in China. The typical Chinese approach to intellectual property is that ‘ideas belong to everyone’, so while it is difficult to make money out of something tangible like a record or a download, it is VERY difficult to make anything from the intellectual property contained within it. The Copyright Act was only passed in China in 1991, so it is still early days.

The Mechanical Copyright Society of China (MCSC) was set up in 1992 as the sole administrator for composition but it’s effectiveness is often brought into question by the publishers. In the last few years, the majors have taken it upon themselves to either do their own collection or find independents to take it on for them.

While the MCSC claims that they maintain a good flow of revenue back to the western rights owners, there is no mechanical collection agreement in place between MCSC and, say, the MCPS in the UK.

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6Published, Staff Blog, Ed Peto, Access China Report, UKTI, Project Blog, British Underground, China Digital Music, China Publishing, Large, China, Client Work,

NOTE: This is an extract from ‘Access China’ report, written by Ed Peto, commissioned by UK Trade and Industry Department and British Underground

The live industry in China has real potential. The annual Midi Festival in Beijing shows that there is a sizeable live audience for western derived independent music, with a crowd of 20,000 moshing, flag-waving, ironic t-shirt wearing, squiffy-hairstyled rockers per day over four days. The international bands playing were unanimous in saying they “didn’t think this was possible in China”. Those same international bands also had to find their own money to make the trip as performance fees and flights were not provided, so ‘one step at a time’.

The big question is where do those 20,000 indie music fans (and people like them) go for the rest of the year?

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6Published, Ed Peto, Staff Blog, Large, Access China Report, UKTI, British Underground, Project Blog, China Live Music, Midi, Split Works, China Market Entry, China, Client Work, China Festivals,

NOTE: This is an extract from ‘Access China’ report, written by Ed Peto, commissioned by UK Trade and Industry Department and British Underground.

Digital is the hot topic in China. Due to the under-developed, pirate-dominated physical market and burgeoning mobile environment, China is on track to becoming the world’s testing ground for the digital age. The statistics are pretty staggering, with some suggesting a digital market of US$1.5billion by 2010 - With the second largest broadband network in the world, the advent of 3G later in 2007, 460 million mobile users and five million new mobile subscribers a month, who, on face value, would doubt them?

The view from the ground, however, is that all of these statistics need to be taken with a bucket of salt. All attempts by the Chinese government to combat online MP3 piracy, including all public ‘victories’ against pirates, should be seen as totally superficial - a lip service to the lobbying western majors. Internet MP3 piracy remains endemic, with less than 10% (a very generous estimate) of downloaders actually paying 14 pence/download for the privilege.

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6Published, Staff Blog, Project Blog, Ed Peto, Large, Access China Report, UKTI, British Underground, China Market Entry, China Digital Music, China MVAS, China, Client Work,

NOTE: This is an extract from ‘Access China’ report, written by Ed Peto, commissioned by UK Trade and Industry Department and British Underground.

The 90% physical piracy rate obviously puts the kibosh on your average high street retailer. FAB, the only significant legal high street chain is really out there on its own. One large distributor lists only 86 other stand-alone legitimate stores stocking independent content, servicing the whole of China - A worrying figure in a country where you literally can’t move for audio-visual outlets and CD/DVD street hawkers. None of your HMVs, or your Virgin Megastores have dared set foot over here yet.

The arrival of western product in the early 90s came courtesy of ‘saw-gashed’ CDs: Excess stock and deleted titles from western majors attempting to avoid taxation and disposal costs. These CDs had their cases cut to mark them as defective and were then shipped in to China through free-market economic ports like Guangzhou, only to end up on the black market. An end result that can be seen as a partial ‘shooting-in-the-foot’ for the western majors who then had to come in and fight against the pirate networks they inadvertently helped set up.

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6Published, Staff Blog, Project Blog, Ed Peto, Large, Access China Report, China Market Entry, Retail, Physical Distribution, China, UKTI, British Underground, Client Work, China Physical,

NOTE: This is an extract from the ‘Access China’ report, written by Ed Peto, commissioned by UK Trade and Industry Department and British Underground.

Due to piracy and negligible airplay royalties, the western record label model simply does not work in China. In most cases, domestic companies take over an artist’s entire life - Records, management, publishing etc. There is so little money to be made from simply exploiting a master that a label has to ensure it doesn’t miss any area of income in order to survive. This obviously poses a problem to western rights owners/managers looking to make money out of their narrower areas of interest.

The majors are all here doing their stuff, struggling away, but like all foreign companies they have had to enter into joint ventures to operate in China, slashing their already slender profits. They own the lion’s share of domestic pop music but with regards to international repertoire, they stick very much to frontline releases and global priorities with the occasional catalogue title.

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6Published, Staff Blog, Project Blog, Large, China Music Industry, China Market Entry, Record Labels, Modern Sky, Universal Music, Physical Licensing, Access China Report, Ed Peto, UKTI, British Underground, China, Client Work,

NOTE: This is an extract from the ‘Access China’ report, written by Ed Peto, commissioned by UK Trade and Industry Department and British Underground.

Every man and his dog is looking to China as the ‘next big thing’, but should the western music industry executive also be packing Fido into air freight and de-camping to the Middle Kingdom? Before anyone considers investing energy in China, it is important to be aware of just how different the industry is over here. There are some genuine areas of opportunity but let’s start with the grim facts:

• Physical piracy runs at around 90%.
• The average gig ticket is £3 and charging anything over £7 for a concert will alienate the young Chinese music crowd.
• Publishing is a foreign idea to the Chinese and is therefore a tiny, unpredictable source of income.
• All media is government owned or heavily government monitored and, in most cases, requires ‘financial incentives’ in return for coverage.
• Despite a population of 1.3 billion people, the legitimate physical music market was only worth US$86million in 2006, making it the 20th biggest in world.
• All foreign companies must enter a joint venture in order to set up shop in China, handing over at least 51% of their company in the process.
• All music has to go through lengthy and seemingly arbitrary government censorship procedures.
• China is a black hole of statistics, quite often by design, making market research and due diligence incredibly difficult.

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6Staff Blog, Published, Project Blog, China Music Industry, Large, Access China Report, China Market Entry, UKTI, British Underground, China, Client Work,