the tunecore philosophy


TuneCore is all about getting your music heard and available to buy. We want you to earn money from your music and make a living doing what you love. We believe that all artists and bands should have equal access to the channels of music distribution, the physical and virtual stores alike.

Why should you have to give up money from each and every sale of your music? Why should you have to enter into exclusive deals and sign strangling contracts? Why should you have to give up your rights and the ownership of your own music to some other company just to gain access to music stores? TuneCore changes all that.

TuneCore believes that all artists should have affordable access to all channels of music distribution, get all of the money generated from the sale of their music, and all without giving up any of their master recording ownership, copyrights, merchandise rights, live performance income, public performance royalties or any other rights or money.

Enabling you to be heard.

TuneCore is an enabler. Use us when and how you want. We enable you to get digital distribution on all the online retailers non-exclusively and without taking your money or rights. We will enable you to print promotional material, from buttons to posters to t-shirts. We will enable you to produce top-quality audio CDs with full high quality art in ultra-small batches and ship them wherever needed. We will enable you to place your music and items on the shelves of retailers everywhere. TuneCore(tm) will be the ultimate artist enabler.

Your art and music make money, you keep it.

TuneCore knows your music made the money, you ought to keep whatever it earns. We won't try to cash in on your success. It's an honest philosophy: we'll get your music out to the world, get you the best materials to promote it and keep the cost low enough to make it really happen. The rest is up to you. TuneCore will never demand a percentage.

No strings attached.

TuneCore keeps things simple. We don't ask for "membership," we don't have minimums or maximums, we don't insist you stay only with us or even deal with us for a set period of time. Opt out at any time.

Our goals:

Already, TuneCore has forged direct agreements with digital distribution companies around the world. These agreements allow the artists using TuneCore to be paid as much money, if not more, than other bands such as Radiohead, Madonna, Arcade Fire, Modest Mouse, Eminem, etc., that are signed to major record or independent record labels. We've drawn on the resources and knowledge of the owners, staff and employees of TuneCore to create an environment that promotes sharing information.

Meet the founders