Spotify代表音樂產業未來

Don’t tell people what you do,” Per Sundin’s wife insisted as they went to a dinner party several years ago. Sundin wasn’t a banker, used-car salesman or weapons producer, but the head of a record label in Sweden. Back then, being a music industry boss in the Nordic country was a miserable job. Sales had more than halved between 2000 and 2008 as illegal downloading took over. Sundin, who has headed a record label since 1998, was known by international colleagues as the expert on The Pirate Bay, an infamous Swedish website used to illegally download the latest music and films.

幾年前，佩爾•鬆丁(Per Sundin)與妻子參加晚宴時，妻子叮囑他：“別跟別人說你是做什麼工作的。”鬆丁既非銀行家、二手車銷售員，也非軍火商，而是瑞典一家唱片公司的主管。那時在這個北歐國家，音樂產業高管的日子可不好過。由於非法下載猖獗，銷售額在2000至2008年間銳減過半。從1998年起便開始擔任唱片公司主管的鬆丁，是各國同事們眼中的“海盜灣”(The Pirate Bay)問題專家。海盜灣是一家臭名昭著的瑞典網站，人們通過它非法下載最新的音樂和電影。

Today Sundin, now head of Universal Music in Sweden, is that rarest of things: a happy music executive. No longer shunned by colleagues, he is the company expert on something more attractive: Spotify. “Sweden has gone from being worst in the class to the best in five years. We were so down the drain when Spotify came and presented their idea. Today, Spotify is the majority of the success we have,” he says.

但如今，擔任環球唱片(Universal Music)瑞典分公司總裁的鬆丁成了稀有物：一位開心的音樂公司高管。同事們不再回避他，相反，他是公司裏的Spotify專家——而Spotify可比海盜灣更吸引人。鬆丁表示：“瑞典在五年時間裏從差生變成了優等生。當Spotify來介紹他們理念的時候，我們簡直是一團糟。現在，我們的成功主要歸功於Spotify。”

Sundin’s happiness is mirrored by much of the music industry in Sweden. Music sales have increased by more than a quarter from their nadir in 2008 and Sweden has become one of the first countries in the world where streaming services – listening to music over the internet without owning it – make more money for the industry than CDs or downloads. Almost three-quarters of the SKr990m (￡86m) made last year came from streaming.

瑞典音樂產業的諸多從業者也體會到鬆丁的這種幸福。音樂銷售額比2008年穀底時高出逾四分之一，瑞典也成爲世界上首批流媒體音樂服務（即用戶在互聯網上聽音樂，但無音樂所有權）收入超過CD或下載服務收入的國家之一。瑞典音樂產業去年收入9.9億瑞典克朗（合8600萬英鎊），其中近四分之三來自流媒體服務。

Launched in Stockholm in 2008, Spotify has a library of more than 20 million songs that people can choose from. They either pay for the premium service to stream music without interruption or they listen for free but with adverts between songs. Sundin insists that Spotify – in which Universal and other big record labels have minority stakes – has saved the music industry, although the company itself remains lossmaking.

Spotify於2008年在斯德哥爾摩創辦，如今擁有2000多萬首歌曲供用戶選擇。用戶可以選擇付費高級服務，不間斷收聽流媒體音樂，也可以選擇免費收聽，但曲目之間會插播廣告。鬆丁堅信Spotify拯救了音樂產業，儘管它還在虧損。環球唱片等大牌唱片公司持有Spotify的少數股份。

His office is strewn with memorabilia, from a picture of a “Born to Run”-era Bruce Springsteen to gold records of his latest star, the DJ Avicii. Sundin is dressed simply in a black sweater and jeans, his completely bald head glistening under the lights. “It was devastating,” he says, thinking back to those years. “People thought it was OK to steal with The Pirate Bay. It wasn’t nice going to international meetings. Was it close to killing the industry? Yes. Then Spotify came and it was better than illegal downloading. It was super-fast, almost everything was on it, and it was free.”

鬆丁的辦公室擺滿了紀念物，從《Born to Run》風靡之時布魯斯•斯普林斯汀(Bruce Springsteen)的照片，到他旗下新晉明星DJ艾維奇(Avicii)的金唱片，不一而足。鬆丁衣着休閒，一身黑毛衣配牛仔褲，光頭在燈光下閃閃發亮。回憶起難熬的那幾年，他說道：“那是毀滅性的。人們覺得從海盜灣下載盜版內容沒什麼問題。參加國際會議的經歷很狼狽。海盜灣是不是差點毀了音樂產業？是的。後來Spotify出現了，它比非法下載要好。它速度極快，幾乎無所不有，而且免費。”

Spotify’s reach goes beyond its home base. It has more than 10 million paying subscribers and a total of 40 million active users in 58 countries. Many executives hope that streaming – including other services such as Deezer or Pandora’s internet radio – can demonstrate that record labels can still make money in the digital age. Apple seems to be making the same bet with its $3bn acquisition in May of Beats, a smaller streaming service and maker of headphones.

Spotify走出了國門。它擁有1000多萬名付費用戶，而活躍用戶總計達4000萬，分佈在58個國家。許多高管希望流媒體服務——包括Deezer和Pandora互聯網電臺等其他服務——可以證明，唱片公司在數字時代仍能賺錢。蘋果(Apple)似乎也在下同樣的賭注，它在5月份斥資30億美元收購了較小的流媒體服務商Beats。

Jonathan Forster, Spotify’s managing director for the Nordics, argues: “We find ourselves being in this position where Sweden is a crystal ball for the new music industry. And that’s as relevant for what might happen next in the UK or US as it is here in Sweden.” But could this country of just 10 million inhabitants really offer a blueprint for the future of music?

Spotify北歐區執行董事喬納森•福斯特(Jonathan Forster)表示：“我們所處的情況是，瑞典成爲了預知新音樂產業趨勢的水晶球。瑞典即將發生的事情，對於英國或美國同樣相關。”但這個只有1000萬居民的國家，是否真能呈現音樂產業的未來藍圖？

If it does, people like Ash Pournouri will be the winners. The 32-year-old is manager and producer of Avicii, whose track “Wake Me Up” is the most streamed song yet on Spotify, with more than 200 million listens. His At Night Management company is based at one of Stockholm’s most prestigious waterfront addresses. The first-floor office is home to four recording studios of various sizes and a cinema room with an enormous screen. At its heart is a boardroom pimped out by Ralph Lauren almost entirely in black, from the wallpaper to the mixing bar. “I want to show people how successful we are. There is still life in the business, and still a lot of potential for people to make it,” says Pournouri, clad in a black jacket, denim shirt and skinny tie.

如果真是如此，那麼像阿什•普爾努裏(Ash Pournouri)這樣的人將成爲贏家。32歲的普爾努裏是艾維奇的經紀人兼製作人，艾維奇的曲目《Wake Me Up》已是Spotify上迄今播放次數最多的歌曲，收聽量達200多萬次。普爾努裏的At Night Management公司總部坐落於斯德哥爾摩最有名的海濱地帶，辦公樓一層設有四個不同大小的錄音棚，以及一間配有巨屏的放映室。該層的中心是一間會議室，它由拉爾夫•勞倫(Ralph Lauren)設計，從牆紙到調音臺幾乎完全採用黑色色調。“我希望向人們展示我們有多成功。音樂產業仍有活力，對於投身這一產業的人們仍充滿潛力，”身穿黑夾克和牛仔襯衫、打着細領帶的普爾努裏表示。

Pournouri is a fervent believer in Spotify. “I always thought it was the next thing,” he says while sipping a latte. “How do consumers want to consume music? If you mimic the behaviour as much as possible of illegal downloading and make it even easier and for a small payment, then you have the solution.”

普爾努裏是Spotify的狂熱信徒。“我一直覺得它是下一個大熱門，”他邊啜着拿鐵邊說，“消費者希望如何消費音樂？如果你儘可能模仿非法下載的模式，讓整個體驗變得更輕鬆，收取一小筆費用，那你就有了解決問題的出路。”

Perhaps most appealing for him is what he calls Spotify’s “democratic” side. The more a song is streamed, the more an artist is paid. “Not only do you have a platform where you can reach the whole world but you have a way that you can be listened to a lot. It hasn’t been democratic before in any sense. People buy a CD even if they only like three songs. With iTunes you might like it this week but not next week. Spotify is more democratic – people listen to a good song over and over again,” he says.

或許最吸引普爾努裏的，是他所稱的Spotify“民主”的一面。一首歌播放的次數越多，藝人的報酬就越高。他表示：“藝人不僅獲得了接觸全世界的平臺，還有辦法讓自己的作品得到大量收聽。以往的音樂產業從來沒有這麼民主過。人們就算只喜歡一張專輯中的兩三首歌，也得買下整張專輯。至於iTunes，你或許這周還喜歡一首歌，但下週就不喜歡了。Spotify更民主——人們會反覆聽一首好歌。”

Some artists, however, are less glowing. Thom Yorke, the singer of Radiohead, told a Mexican website that Spotify was “the last desperate fart of a dying corpse”. He added: “I feel like as musicians we need to fight the Spotify thing. I feel that in some ways what’s happening in the mainstream is the last gasp of the old industry.”

但有些藝人的反響沒有這麼熱烈。電臺司令(Radiohead)主唱湯姆•約克(Thom Yorke)向墨西哥一家網站表示，Spotify是“瀕死之人放的最後一個絕望的屁”。他補充道：“我認爲作爲音樂人，我們需要反抗Spotify這類東西。我覺得從某種程度上，主流世界發生的事情是舊音樂產業的垂死掙扎。”

Spotify has responded to growing criticism by detailing how artists get paid. It pays out about 70 per cent of its revenues to record labels, who share the pot depending on how often their artists’ songs have been played. On average, that works out to between $0.006 and $0.0084 per stream. Or to put it another way: one million streams would give a label $6,000-$8,400.

面對着越來越多的指責，Spotify的對策是詳細說明其補償藝人的方式。它將自己約70%的收入支付給唱片公司，而唱片公司能分到多少，取決於旗下藝人曲目的播放頻度。平均而言，每次播放可以帶來0.006至0.0084美元的報酬。換句話說，100萬次播放可以爲唱片公司帶來6000至8400美元。

But Spotify argues that to concentrate on the “per stream” maths is the wrong way of looking at things. In total, it has paid out $1bn in royalties to labels including $500m alone last year. It has also persuaded 10 million people to pay $120 a year for music. And it contrasts its fees with others: a “video-streaming service” (presumably YouTube) would pay out just $3,000 for one million listens while US terrestrial radio would hand over $41. Spotify has had some success – notable holdouts such as Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and Metallica have all signed up recently, leaving The Beatles as the main exception. But other bands, such as the Black Keys, refuse to release new music on to Spotify straightaway.

但Spotify辯稱，專注於每次播放的酬金是錯誤的解讀方式。它總共向唱片公司支付了10億美元的版稅，去年一年就支付了5億美元。它還說服1000萬人每年爲聽音樂支付120美元。這與其他服務商的費用形成了對比：某一家“視頻流媒體服務”（想必是指YouTube）只爲每100萬次收聽支付3000美元，而美國的地面無線電臺只支付41美元。Spotify取得了一些成功——齊柏林飛船(Led Zeppelin)、平克•弗洛伊德(Pink Floyd)和金屬樂隊(Metallica)等知名的不合作者最近均與它簽署了協議，使得主要的“釘子戶”只剩下披頭士樂隊(The Beatles)。但Black Keys等樂隊仍拒絕直接在Spotify上發佈新曲。

Per Herrey has known the heights of pop success, winning the Eurovision Song Contest in 1984 with “Diggi-Loo, Diggi-Ley”. He is now a lawyer for the Swedish musicians’ union and is preparing to sue several record labels over the royalties they pay from Spotify. He says the labels, not Spotify, are the villains. “They have stolen the rights of artists. It is betrayal from the record companies. They have snatched the rights and paid nothing to the artists. It’s ridiculous,” he says.

佩爾•赫雷(Per Herrey)經歷過流行音樂成功的巔峯，他在1984年憑藉一首《Diggi-Loo, Diggi-Ley》贏得歐洲歌唱大賽(Eurovision Song Contest)冠軍。他如今是瑞典音樂人聯盟的律師，正準備起訴數家唱片公司，稱它們拖欠向音樂人支付來自Spotify的版稅。他表示，Spotify不是壞蛋，唱片公司纔是。“它們竊取了藝人的權利。這是唱片公司的背叛。它們拿走了版權，卻不分一點給藝人。這很荒唐，”他說。

Herrey says the problem is that the artists do not even get the $0.006-$0.0084 per stream; instead they get between 6 and 10 per cent of that small sum. The rest goes to the record label in what he calls a hangover of the days when the label had to recoup the costs of distribution and pressing. Now those costs no longer exist, Herrey argues that labels should give artists a similar deal to radio, where royalties are split 50-50.

赫雷表示，問題是藝人連每次播放0.006至0.0084美元的酬金都拿不到，只能獲得這一小筆錢的6%至10%，其餘都被唱片公司收入囊中。赫雷稱這種分配方式是舊時代的遺留物——以前，唱片公司要收回發行和壓制唱片的成本。如今這些成本已經不復存在，赫雷主張，唱片公司應當像電臺那樣對待藝人，與他們平分版稅。

Herrey says artists are afraid of speaking out. “I can’t even begin to tell you how many artists I’ve talked to. They are too scared. Sweden is a small market and they are afraid of burning their bridges. Artists are also extremely sensitive to not show their fans they are interested only in money. The winners therefore are the big companies.” He adds that he believes the major record labels offered their back catalogue to Spotify at a reduced rate in return for their shareholdings in the company. Spotify refuses to say how much the labels own but people close to the company say it is less than the 17 per cent or so they were reported to have five years ago.

赫雷稱，藝人不敢大聲抗議。“我都沒法跟你說我同多少藝人談過。他們太害怕了。瑞典市場小，他們不敢斷了自己的後路。藝人也極爲敏感，不想向歌迷們表現出自己只對錢感興趣。結果，大公司成了贏家。”他補充稱，據他所知，大型唱片公司以折價向Spotify提供舊曲目，以換取Spotify的股份。Spotify拒絕公佈唱片公司持有的股份，但接近該公司的人表示，這部分持股不到五年前報道的17%上下。

What is certain is that Spotify is changing the economics of music. Ludvig Werner, the head in Sweden of IFPI, an organisation representing the record industry globally, says: “The music industry has never been so different from one country to another. For instance, 10,000 CD sales in Poland can make more money than being number one in Sweden.” He adds: “Under the old business model, you pre-paid for eternal listening. The downside was if you didn’t like it, if you damaged it. For 90 years, we didn’t know as a business how you listened to a song: was it 10 times or 10,000?”

可以肯定的是，Spotify正在改變音樂的商業模式。國際唱片業協會(IFPI)是代表全球唱片行業的機構，其瑞典分會主席路德維希•維爾納(Ludwig Werner)表示：“各國音樂行業從未有過如此大的差異。例如在波蘭賣出1萬張CD，可能比瑞典的排行榜第一名賺得還多。”他補充道：“在舊有的商業模式下，你預付一筆錢，獲得永久的收聽權。壞處是你可能不喜歡，你可能把CD損壞。在整整90年期間，音樂行業不知道你怎麼聽某一首歌：聽了10次還是1萬次？”

Per Sundin now has the answer in his hands. He flips open his MacBook Air and logs on to a website, Spotify Analytics. Within seconds, he has dialled up information on Avicii. The 24-year-old DJ has been played 129,694,407 times in the past 59 days. That works out at 2.2 million streams a day by 1.16 million different listeners. Sundin calls up some more statistics. A fifth of Avicii’s listeners were in the US, with 17 per cent in Sweden. Males accounted for 60 per cent and Sundin can also see a breakdown by age. “When I wake up every morning I log into this and see what happened yesterday. This is addictive. And this is money,” he says.

如今，佩爾•鬆丁隨時能夠掌握答案。他麻利地打開自己的MacBook Air，登錄一個名叫Spotify Analytics的網站。區區數秒間，他便已經查到關於艾維奇的信息。這位24歲DJ的曲目在過去59天內被播放129,694,407次，日均播放220萬次，聽衆數量達到116萬。鬆丁調出一些更具體的數據。艾維奇五分之一的聽衆位於美國，17%的聽衆位於瑞典。男性佔60%。鬆丁還能看到用戶的年齡構成。“我每天早晨醒來都會登錄這個網站，看看昨天發生了什麼。這讓人上癮，這也是實實在在的業務。”

The power of the data has other effects as well. “The industry gets excited when you talk to them about this. We have an incredible amount of data about what is being played by whom and when,” says Spotify’s Jonathan Forster. Artists can plan tours by targeting cities where they have fans or see where they need to boost marketing. The company is already adding other services such as allowing artists to sell merchandise or concert tickets via Spotify or even send an email when a new song is out.

數據的力量還有其他影響。“跟行業人士談到這些數據時，他們就會興奮起來。我們擁有令人難以置信的海量數據，能夠展示誰在何時收聽了什麼曲目，”Spotify的喬納森•福斯特表示。藝人在策劃巡演時可以選擇那些他們擁有大量歌迷的城市，他們也可以看出自己在哪些市場需要加強市場宣傳。Spotify已經加入了其他服務，如允許藝人通過Spotify出售商品或演唱會門票，甚至是在新歌發佈時發送一封郵件。

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The company that is supposedly the future of the music industry is housed in a nondescript tower block north of Stockholm’s city centre. Get past Spotify’s reception and the offices finally begin to look like a typical start-up. Fridges stocked high with soft drinks, milk and even beer are dotted around, as are big comfortable chairs.

這家被視爲音樂產業未來的公司，坐落於斯德哥爾摩市中心以北一座不起眼的高樓裏。走過Spotify的前臺，辦公室終於開始有了典型創業公司的模樣。散佈各處的冰箱堆滿了軟飲料、牛奶乃至啤酒，舒適的大椅子隨處可見。