Originally Posted By: eddie1261
Originally Posted By: Guitarhacker
Yep.... unless the CD sells into the gold or platinum area, there's not a lot of money in the mechanicals.


I thought the airplay royalties were where you made the bulk of your money. If you get heavy rotation at 10 stations per state, that'd be 500 stations playing your song 12-15 times a day. Does anybody know how much you make per play on commercial radio? I know the streams are close to nothing, like $.0004 per stream or something ridiculous like that.


A song on a gold record generates $45,500 in mechanical royalties.
That is split 50/50 between publishers and writers. $22,750
If there are 2 writers on the song, they split the writer's share.
So they each get $11,375.

So, no, actually there is not "big money" in gold. Platinum would be twice that - again, not "big money".

If you've got 5 or 6 cuts on a gold record, you've made a decent living. For that year, anyway. There are only a handful of writers who get that many cuts in a year, much less on a single record. And gold records aren't a guarantee these days...because everyone can stream everything and never BUY a record. And...songwriters careers are a lot like pro athletes - 5 years is a good run. There used to be a handful of "superstars" who had 20 year careers (they aren't getting cuts now). The majority will have a good year or two.

Here is a list of the current "active" sellers in Country:

http://roughstock.com/news/2017/01/41331-top-10-country-albums-chart-january-23-2016

There are 21 gold or higher. Most of those have been on the charts for a year or more to make those numbers. And if you notice, the really BIG sellers are all OLD GUYS - because their old fans still buy records (CDs). As they fall away and younger acts take their place, these number will continue to fall, because eventually, no on will buy albums anymore. Everything will be streamed.

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