TuneCore artists have surpassed revenues of $50m in Australia

TuneCore, the US-headquartered digital music platform for independent artists, has revealed that its artists have earned US$2 billion in revenue since it launched in 2006.

In Australia, where it set up an office in Melbourne in November 2015, artists have generated US$37 million – equivalent to about $52 million Australian dollars.

Artists who distribute through TuneCore keep their music rights and receive 100% of their digital distribution revenue.

“We’re here to help artists connect with and develop audiences while maximizing their digital music revenue – this is our core mission,” TuneCore’s chief revenue officer Andreea Gleeson said.

“We’re showing that indie artists can gain a huge fanbase and make a lot of money.

“We never use a middle man and pay 100% of 100% of revenue from the stores directly to artists, unlike other distributors, many of which claim to pay artists 100% of their revenue, but in fact are distributed by or affiliated with third parties, who take a percentage off the top.

“TuneCore is empowering indie artists, now more than ever, to say F it and take control of their own careers, there’s little holding them back anymore.”

The company hit the $1 billion artist earnings milestone in July 2017.

According to TuneCore, its platform has been used by over one million artists – and thousands of them are earning over $100,000 each.

The firm said it currently pays an average of $1.2 million in royalties a day to artists.

With its main office in Brooklyn, New York, it has six offices in the US as well as the UK, Japan, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, India and, from last month (September), Russia and Brazil.

TuneCore’s biggest acts are from rap/hip hop and R&B, taking in over $100 million from streaming alone in the last year, and making $50 million overall.

The company brands itself as a home for aspiring hip-hop artists. It has 200,000 of them on its books, with 41,000 added in 2020 alone.

Electronic music made $200 million, and rock and pop artists generated $150 million.

Independent artists are the fastest-growing segment in the global music industry, with MIDiA Research).saying they generated $873 million in 2019, up 32% from 2018.