"Iain M Churches" wrote in message
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"Roderick Stewart" wrote in message
om...
In article , Iain M Churches
wrote:
The first point is that the artist is not paid over and over again.
This applies also to everyone else involved in the project.
Staff and salaried people get paid a certain sum per year,
irrespective, in the short-term at least, whether the recordings
they make are a commercial success or not.

Artists usually sign a royalty contract, which stipulates an
advance (not repayable if the record does not sell)
and then a percentage on sales after that.

Doesn't a "percentage on sales" amount to the same thing as being paid
over and over again? The more they sell, the more the artist gets paid,
even though they only did the work once.

Good point. But would you think it right if a band were paid a flat
fee, say EUR 500 for a record that achieved platinum sales?



Sure. Their next fee would be 500,000 Euros and the one after that 5,000,000
if they were *that* good - that's how it works in the rest of the world...