We were talking about some of the problems facing unsigned musicians over lunch at a diner in Allentown , PA one afternoon in 2003. Through this discussion, we made the following observations about recording:

•  Spending a ton of your own money to record a great sounding, commercial quality record only makes sense if you can sell enough records to break even.

•  Getting signed to a major label is virtually impossible. Thus, if you want a record deal and you aren't a Britney Spears clone, you will probably shop your music to an indie label.

•  Most indie labels don't offer major label value to their artists, b/c they don't advance for recording costs, and don't have major label distribution channels, advertising budgets, marketing machines, or radio promotion connections at their disposal.

•  The few indies (and there are very few true indies left these days) that can offer this kind of value are so hard to get signed to, they may as well be majors anyway.

•  The whole digital music revolution has undermined the current record industry business model, because anyone with a PC and a broadband connection can instantly distribute commercial-quality CD audio around the world via the internet.

These observations led us to believe that there's probably a better way, because if an unsigned artist could make commercial quality records on the cheap, they wouldn't need to sell a zillion copies to break even. The artist could use the great sounding records to get better shows, which would attract more fans, which would get them even better shows, where they could sell more CDs, etc.

A.I.R. Syndicate is really an experiment to find out what happens if a bunch of talented acts from our region all get on the same page, record some great sounding records, and work together to promote affiliated artists. If we work together, we believe that we can build a better community for musicians and the fans that support them, both here in the Lehigh Valley and beyond.