If you’re still hoping that your next record will sell 10 million copies amid the current music industry’s crisis, Moby’s here to shatter your dreams. In a way, Moby is the perfect man to deliver the bad news: His 1999 album Play went platinum 10 times, it was the first record to license all of its songs, and he’s friends with David Lynch.
In an interview with LA Weekly’s Liz Ohanesian, Moby celebrated the decline of a wealth-driven music industry and welcomed the dawn of musicians that are in it for love instead of money. As for musicians thinking that marketing will help them sell 10 million records, “That’s delusional,” Moby said. “No one sells 10 million records. The days of musicians getting rich off of selling records are done… Anyone who wants to start a band in 2009 because they want to get rich is, quite simply, an idiot… The older, established artists can get rich, but new artists have to make music for the love of it because there is no real financial incentive, which I think is actually a really healthy thing.”
It sure is a lot easier to record and distribute your labors of love nowadays, but I’d be careful saying those with financial incentives are extinct just yet. For more from Moby, including his relationship with David Lynch, his former Hollywood partying lifestyle, and how he thinks money makes people miserable, click here.