Update July 23rd, 2010: Another nice example from Gerry Loves Records:
One of the cool things about the new index page and image map features is how they can be used in conjunction with one another to power a label’s music store. Icelandic record label Bedroom Community’s forthcoming site redesign does exactly that:
They’ve customized their header and added an image map to integrate with their site, and they’ve set up an index page on Bandcamp to highlight all of their artists. The artists themselves have individual accounts on Bandcamp, which has the advantage of letting them each have their own design, as well as artist-specific URLs (which is better for SEO):
Note that each artist’s page has navigation built into the header (using an image map), so fans can explore other artists on the roster, and quickly return to the index.
Adding releases to your index page that go to other artists on Bandcamp is easy. You click the Set button in any cell, and then the “change” link:
You can then enter the URL of any artist on Bandcamp, and click the popup menu to choose which release you want to feature on the index page:
Finally, a few weeks ago we added the ability to customize the artist field at both the album and track level (whereas before it was always set to the account artist). This had the effect of better supporting compilation albums, but it also paved the way for label samplers. Bedroom Community’s sampler lives within their account (as opposed to within the individual artist accounts), is linked to from their index page, and looks like this:
Note each track on the sampler has a custom artist name set, which appears in the track listing and in the metadata of the downloaded tracks.
Loads more in the way of label support still to come…
Stoked for this! Awesome…
this is a feature I was really waiting for. the only thing I was really still hoping for is a little more control over the main artist pages, such as adding more pics, links, etc.
Good news!! im glad to hear them!
Nice, should also be useful for publishing remixes and collaborations while keeping it all on the same account. Can you link to an artist who’s external to Bandcamp though?
Hmm, makes me want to start a record label myself …
fantastic, very usefull features for poly project musicians like me.
awesome..too awesome… how much is all this going to cost us once you start charging for it?
Hi Daniel, this is still a pretty accurate description of the plan: http://bandcamp.com/faq#monetization. It’s looking more and more likely that we’ll be going the taking-a-cut route (as opposed to say, the subscription route). Our rates will be very competitive with iTunes, Amazon, CDBaby, and the like (we want to provide you with every reason to direct your fans here first!), and we’ll of course give everyone plenty of advance notice before actually taking any cut.
Dear Bandcamp,
Thanks for being so spectacular.
Brilliant. Just this week, I started a ‘Bandcamp du jour’ on my blog, where I choose great music I’ve found on Bandcamp, and feature it with an embed. One a day (hence, du jour).
Now, using the index feature, I can actually have a Bandcamp du jour site on Bandcamp itself:
http://dubber.bandcamp.com
Awesome. It’s like playing at having your own label, without all the administrative hassles.
Completely unintended usage, and completely excellent. Thanks Andrew, already discovered some great new stuff this way!
brilliant idea!
i am wondering – could you make the boxes that the album/band pics go in drag and drop so they can be moved around in order on the screen?
I agree with Thom, the only thing missing is the ability to reorder the boxes… We like to keep our newest releases on the top…
This is great. I have an issue though when I embed a player into my website. On bandcamp it displays the artist, correctly, but when I embed it, it goes with the default name I signed up with. When uploading I had the option to choose a different artist, so I did. But when embedded it doesn’t display that other artist’s name. Any thoughts? Thanks
Russell, that’s a bug that I’ve got on my list to fix.
ok, this is a great upgrade with features, but the label homepage is now seriously lacking. are there any plans on adding a spot for text? or possibly allowing labels to import a rss feed as “latest news?”
i’m not looking a gift horse in the proverbial mouth, just wondering.
Fantastic. Bandcamp is getting better and better. Thank you!
In the Bedroom Community example, would adding a new artist to their roster mean changing the header image and image maps on all their sites?
Right, they’d need to upload a new version of the header image to each artist site. Not a huge deal, but if your roster changes frequently you might avoid navigation that includes every artist name in the header itself.
I finally had a chance to properly digest this post and realize that it is even greater news than the great news I already thought it was.
My crush on your site intensifies.
Now I just need to find some time to get myself setup properly.
Cheers,
Jeremy
This is great news, I’ve been waiting for for some time now. Just great!
@Russel I have the same problem.
@Joe Hope you get round to fixing it soon!
Thanks for this amazing update. This exactly what I had in mind when I first saw Bandcamp. My net label had already been using it for embedding, now the website is hosted here.
Any plans to implement drag and drop sorting, or add html/text boxes to the index page grid?