Tila Tequila and the Future of DIY Music

by jordan | April 12, 2007 at 08:49 am

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The article below details the rise and fall (it all happened so quickly!) of Tila Tequila's single. For those of us who don't know, Ms. Tequila is the gal with the largest number of "friends" on MySpace, which got her the cover of MAXIM Magazine-- it helps if you look like Tila. Anyway, Tequila is a model who leveraged her online fame into a music career, hoping that a percentage of online admirers would turn into customers. It worked, but only kinda.

As little as two months ago, Tila Tequila, born Tila Nguyen, was being hailed as the future of music. The performer had used social networks to amass a fanbase of more than 1.8 million MySpace friends. She'd also generated huge mainstream publicity, and with four years of pinup modelling behind her, was no stranger to the public. She rejected large record company advances to retain total control over her output. She would instead make her single available for digital download through Apple's iTunes store. In short, she'd bypassed the system and looked like the first artist to achieve a global breakthrough digitally, without major label backing.

It all looks rather different, today. Tequila's iTunes single sold only 13,000 copies, netting her around $8,500. It failed to crack the iTunes own Top 50. That's not bad for a single, but it's a poor return on the efforts, and nowhere near what she might be enjoying with the advance from a major label. With no advance to fritter, her chance at the big time might now have passed.

Turns out her indie efforts were not so indie after all: she had big-league agents behind her, and was featured on the MySpace page of the very un-indie Universal Music.

I take issue with the article's tacit poo-poohing of DIY musicians. Yes, it can be done. Ani DiFranco pops to mind: she records her own music, releases her own CDs, and has even driven her own tour van. She exists outside the mainstream industry and makes more money per CD sold and concert played than Madonna. There's also surf guitar icon Dick Dale. And now there's you and your band, even if you don't live in the same town. Podcasting and peer-to-peer has shown us that, whilst th labels still roam the earth, the future is with us. The business model will no doubt change: no more massive advances to blow on coke and strippers, but it's worth it for a career in what you love and a fair wage for doing it.

And, yes, I like typing "Tila Tequila".

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