Industry Insider | Q&A: Ari and Danny Hest

Aug 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Elianne Halbersberg

           
 

EXPLORING NEW REVENUE MODELS FOR INDIE ARTISTS

Recording artists once looked upon a major-label record deal as the Holy Grail. But now, thanks to the Internet, signing one's rights over — often at the risk of being lost in the corporate shuffle — is no longer the only way to reach the musical masses.

FIG. 1: The subscription service 52 revolves around Ari Hest writing, recording, and releasing a song a week to his fans for a year.
Photo: Malcolm Browne

Singer-songwriter Ari Hest (see Fig. 1) and his manager and brother, Danny (see Fig. 2) , have launched a unique platform for showcasing Ari's music, communicating with fans, and turning a profit. The brothers' Web-based service, titled “52,” allows subscribers to receive a new, original Hest song each week: 52 in 52. The service operates on a three-tiered ($20, $35, or $75) format. The higher the level, the more additional perks you get, such as merchandise, concert tickets, video, and bonus tracks. At the end of the year, subscribers will vote for their 12 favorite songs, which Hest will then remaster and release as a CD.

Ari Hest built his foundation as an independent artist by recording, touring, and developing a following. By the time he signed with Columbia Records, he was a recognizable name in the music world — but not to the degree needed to become a label priority. Released from his contract last year, Hest and his brother began brainstorming for a new way to put out his material, expand his audience, and remain fiscally secure. The result was their service, 52 (arihest.com).

Armed with a MacBook Pro running Apple GarageBand, Hest began writing, recording, and mixing his songs while his brother built their Web site, which launched this past January. And so far, they say, so good. Ari says that he had already written about 25 percent of the material needed; the rest he has to write as he goes. “I'm not doing any covers. I toyed with the idea of doing them or rehashing old songs,” he says, “but it almost cheapens it to me. I want to challenge myself with this.”

FIG. 2: Danny Hest, Ari’s manager, was instrumental in developing the plan for 52. Danny also built the Web site.
Photo: Courtesy Danny Hest

How is membership reaching, or even surpassing, your expectations?

Ari Hest: It's not blasting off, but we didn't expect it to right away. The first month was pretty good, then it slowed a little and it's still steady. We're having a great time with it.

Danny Hest: We set out on a pretty conservative track. My goal was 2,000 members for the year, and maybe five or six times that if it catches on. Frankly, I spent more time on the technical side of it than I wanted to. Now that it has taken off, I can concentrate on referrals and street time to encourage people to join. It takes a little convincing to get fans to try something different, so I'm pleased but not ecstatic. However, I see potential for growth.

I heard that you recouped all of your expenses after one song.

DH: The only expenses are our publicist, Monica Hopman, on a monthly basis, and two years of Web hosting that were paid for up front. I bought three books on how to build a Web site and spent maybe $100 on some digital Web tools. I used Joomla, a free, open-source content-management system. I had built a few sites for Ari before he was on Columbia. I taught myself; I'm decent at it. I learned out of necessity. Ari bought a new hard drive, monitoring speakers, and a mastering program. We did a preorder in the middle of December, and within a week we had almost completely recouped our expenses — so we knew this was a model that could actually work. We're also offering songs in the traditional way on the MP3 store, and we uploaded the first 13 songs to iTunes and got a lot of sales from that, too. We're trying to put as much quality product out there as possible, and he's enjoying seeing the direct correlation to fans' excitement. It's been successful from a business standpoint.

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How big a part did your major-label deal play in building your fan base and making 52 viable?

AH: I have a lot of respect for a lot of people I worked with at Columbia, and they'd agree that my experience there did not expand my fan base. They felt bad; their system wasn't working for me. I was independent before signing with Columbia — and I was selling records almost as much, with a decent fan base.