5 reasons to buy music from Bandcamp

If you’ve ever heard about the ethical issues with music streaming and want to do something about it, one great way to get away from it is by buying music directly from artists. One platform that’s great for doing that is Bandcamp, where artists can directly sell their music and merchandise. Instead of getting paid a fraction of a cent per stream, you can actually support your favorite artists more directly.

So if you’re not sure about Bandcamp and all the benefits from using it, here are some of the main reasons why you might want to buy music from artists on Bandcamp and forego your usual streaming habits.

1 You own the music you buy and it can’t be taken away from you

No DRM software to be found here

When you buy music on Bandcamp, be it a digital copy, a CD, vinyl, or a cassette, you get to keep that music in whichever format you purchase it in. On the flip side, when you listen to music on a streaming service, since you are paying a subscription fee and don’t actually own the music, it can be taken away whenever at the will of the distributor.

As such, all downloads from Bandcamp are free of DRM (digital rights management) software. So you can’t be restricted from using the music at a later date at the will of any copyright holders. Once you’ve downloaded that music, you can’t have it taken away from you.

Additionally, when you buy digital downloads on Bandcamp, you can re-download the music you purchased indefinitely. This is in contrast to other platforms that may only let you listen to purchased media on their platform, like how Apple only lets you download music you previously purchased on iTunes to 10 devices.

2 You can support artists more directly

While streaming services pay a fraction of a cent per stream, buying music gets money into artists’ hands

While streaming services pay artists cents, or even fractions of a cent, per stream, when you buy music on Bandcamp, you’re supporting the artist more directly by giving them money immediately for buying their tracks or albums. Bandcamp itself takes 10% of the profits from physical media purchase and 15% from digital purchases, with the rest going to artists.

Once in a while Bandcamp will have a “Bandcamp friday” event where artists get 100% of the profits from sales. This is an even better opportunity to support your favorite artists, since you can be sure that every cent you spend goes straight to them.

3 You can get high quality lossless tracks

Spotify won’t let you download FLACs, but Bandcamp will

A lot of the time when you buy digital tracks from an artist on Bandcamp, they’ll be CD-quality, which is 16-bit/44.1kHz lossless quality. This is standard lossless quality, and is significantly better quality than the highest quality you can currently get on Spotify.

Lossless basically means that the original sound of the recording is retained, and even though lossless music is still compressed to a degree, it’s not compressed to the degree of the average MP3 file, and the compression is done in a way that still retains the original quality of the music. So by buying lossless music from artists through Bandcamp, you can be sure you’re hearing everything you want to be hearing, so long as you’re listening with wired headphones or speakers, at least.

4 You can buy music from smaller artists that aren’t on streaming services

Anyone can sell their music on Bandcamp, making it great for local acts

To get music on a streaming service, there are a lot of steps to be taken, and it’s really difficult for small independent artists to get on streaming services. But Bandcamp allows bands to simply upload their music to the site without jumping through all the hoops one would have to on a streaming service like Spotify.

So if you’re more interested in exploring local or small bands that can’t manage to get on a streaming service, Bandcamp is a great way to do that. If you go to a local show and see a cool band you really like, there’s a great chance they’re already on Bandcamp, so you can support them directly there.

5 Some artists use a pay-what-you-can model

You can pay less if you don’t have much to spend, or pay more if you want to

Mick Haupt / Unsplash

Bandcamp has the option for artists to sell their music under a pay-what-you-can model, which is great for people who want to support artists but don’t necessarily have much money to do so. Most people who do this are smaller artists, you’re unlikely to find a bigger artist under a label that does this, but it’s a nice way to show support for your favorite local artists even when you can’t fully afford to under normal circumstances.