Picture copyright
BandLab Singapore
As an already reeling music business is hit by the coronavirus, the proprietor of UK publication NME says the pandemic has introduced challenges and alternatives.
Singapore-based BandLab additionally owns music manufacturers starting from guitar-making to retail and digital platforms.
The virus got here at a time of already seismic change for the business as corporations search new methods to make earnings.
Lately, the recording business has been revolutionised, whereas instrument and journal gross sales fell.
The final 20 years have seen the enterprise mannequin of conventional report labels massively disrupted by digital downloads, whereas the marketplace for musical devices and magazines has been hit by radical adjustments in shopper behaviour.
Because the coronavirus pandemic compounded this already hostile enterprise atmosphere, many corporations within the music business have seen their companies hit onerous.
BandLab’s chief government, Meng Ru Kuok, says that whereas components of his music-focused agency have confronted coronavirus-related disruptions, different areas of the enterprise have thrived.
He says that through the pandemic, his music gear retail enterprise has seen its finest efficiency since he purchased it in 2012, as social distancing measures imply folks have had extra free time.
“We have seen a 300% rise in month-to-month gross sales at our South East Asia music instrument retailer, Swee Lee,” he mentioned.
Print vs digital
A few of BandLab’s most high-profile investments have been in music journalism, an business that has been turned the wrong way up by internet-driven adjustments in how folks devour information.
Though the dwell leisure and publishing industries have been hit onerous by the coronavirus, NME – which BandLab purchased in 2019 – was launched in South East Asia final month.
Media playback is unsupported in your system
That announcement got here after NME entered the Australian market on the finish of final 12 months.
Whilst plummeting promoting revenues and circulation numbers pressure rising numbers of publications to desert print, NME has not too long ago restarted bodily publishing with a month-to-month journal in Australia, its solely present common print version.
Mr Kuok says he has a way of obligation to guard the NME’s legacy: “We really feel there’s a duty not simply to the model, but in addition there’s a duty of being a reputable model.”
And he hinted at new NME-related launches each within the UK and internationally, with bulletins anticipated later this 12 months and in early 2021.
The corporate purchased a 49% stake in US rock journal Rolling Stone in 2016, however bought that holding much less three years later after failing to purchase the remainder of the enterprise.
Mark Mulligan from MIDiA Analysis sees potential for NME as a digital model: “When NME went totally digital, it was seen by many because the demise of the model. However in fact, within the digital period, print can really be a hindrance, decreasing your capacity to succeed in actually international audiences.
“BandLab has a chance to completely re-imagine the model for a brand new technology of music followers, with a world attain it beforehand lacked,” he added.
Picture copyright
NME
NME launched in South East Asia in August
Digital progress
Similtaneously BandLab is continuous to broaden NME, it is usually seeing important progress in customers of its digital music manufacturing platform, Cakewalk.
“Right now we’ve greater than 22 million people who find themselves utilizing our product world wide. Greater than eight million songs are being recorded and launched a month on the platform,” he mentioned.
In one other signal of how the music business as a complete is having to adapt to the brand new regular of social distancing, BandLab is that this weekend holding a digital guitar present.
Guitar.com Reside is a three-day occasion combining a commerce present with interviews, panels, workshops and performances by world-famous guitarists.
Jamie MacEwan from Enders Evaluation mentioned: “A music enterprise like BandLab that connects folks with digital manufacturing instruments and dwell streaming is properly positioned to develop its person base below lockdown.
“Utilizing the NME model to succeed in fanatics world wide is a strong technique. My query could be, how does BandLab intend to monetise and construct on its enterprise from right here?”
Coronavirus disruptions
The pandemic has additionally brought on important disruptions in BandLab’s group of companies.
Uncut, one other UK-based music journal owned by BandLab and the agency’s solely newsstand-focused product, noticed its gross sales take a success as folks stayed at residence due to Covid-19.
In the meantime, the agency’s US-based guitar producers, Heritage and Concord, had been pressured to droop manufacturing for eight weeks owing to lockdown measures.
Manufacturing has now restarted and the corporate says it has seen a surge in orders, which it’s now working to fulfill.
Picture copyright
BandLab Singapore
Meng Ru Kuok based BandLab Applied sciences in 2016
Because the son of Kuok Khoon Hong, the chairman and chief government of Asia’s main agricultural manufacturing group Wilmar Worldwide, he’s usually requested about his billionaire father.
Whereas the youthful Mr Kuok is fast to level out that his firm is separate from the household enterprise, he’s additionally eager to spotlight the debt he owes for the steerage he has obtained through the years.
A key piece of recommendation he says he at all times retains in thoughts is: “When issues are going properly, do not be too completely happy. When issues are going badly, do not be too unhappy.”
From Muse to the blues
So which artists does a music entrepreneur like Mr Kuok hearken to when he is not working?
He nods to his dad and mom encouraging him to study the violin and piano as a toddler, however credit his time at considered one of Britain’s prime public colleges, Winchester Faculty, after which Cambridge College for his love of guitar music.
Rising up listening to British indie bands similar to Radiohead and the Libertines, he says his favorite band in his youth was various rock group Muse.
However now his tastes have matured to incorporate one of many nice American bluesmen: “My favorite artist is BB King.”
“He’s somebody who has a character, had bother in his life and he performed to his final day. Extremely onerous working and had the respect of your entire business.”
