It looks like Australia will be following in the footsteps of the UK’s PledgeMusic with the launch of a music-focused crowd funding website scheduled to launch in early 2013.
While Australia already has a number of crowd funding websites, including Kickstarter and Pozible, none are singularly focused on music-based financial goals.
Enter Zoshpit. Due to launch in January 2013, the Australian-owned website aims to help up-and-coming musicians find monetary resourcing by reaching out to fans via their online platform.
Zoshpit director Julian Chong states: “by focusing purely on the music industry, we offer features that will help artists showcase their projects to give them every chance of getting funded. It’s a win-win situation for everybody.”
He continues, “artists get to complete projects they’ve possibly only ever dreamed of, and fans can contribute like never before, be connected in special ways and share in the journey.”“Artists get to complete projects they’ve possibly only ever dreamed of, and fans can contribute like never before, be connected in special ways and share in the journey.” – Julian Chong, Zoshpit
Crowdfunding has seen a huge boom in the last few years with established sites attracting artists big and small to their cause. Most recently, Perth rockers Eskimo Joe announced their hopes to fund the band’s next album through Australia’s creative platform, Pozible. The band reaching their $40,000 goal within days and aren’t the first to strike success with the new format.
UK-based PledgeMusic (which deals only with music-related crowdfunding and is run by ex-record company experts) has seen huge artists reach their musical goals including Ian Ball of Gomez, Rufus Wainwright, Ben Folds, The Boy Least Likely To, Martha, and Australia’s own Ben Lee.
The obvious advantages of big and small artists using this mode of fundraising is the element of artistic control and licence it offers. It seems the old model of funding and purchasing music may indeed be long gone, with fans basically paying for their favourite band’s music and dissemination upfront, as opposed to paying for content that’s already been created and distributed.
If the countless number of high-profile artists aren’t enough to convince you that the times are indeed a-changin’, consider that recently, Aussie record label Inertia teamed up with crowdfunding platform PledgeMusic, aiming to provide retail and fundraising platform for the artists on their label; including the likes of The Herd, Chet Faker, Hermitude, Seth Sentry, and Dappled Cities – all of whom will now be offered full access to the PledgeMusic platform as an integrated part of their release campaign.
Zoshpit is due to launch in January 2013 and is currently looking for Aussie musicians and bands to submit projects they are looking to get funded. For more information visit ZoshPit.com.au
