RS Group in the new music business environment
Reincarnated music label Rose Sound is focusing on ‘music star commerce’, a K-pop-inspired business model to grow through the pandemic
When leading music label Kamikaze — a subsidiary of RS Music, which has launched many popular artists such as Faye Fang Kaew (FFK), Four Mod and K-OTIC — shut down in 2017 due to digital disruption of the music industry, nobody expected the label to return.
However, in November, RS Music surprisingly relaunched Kamikaze and unveiled a new label known as Rose Sound, the original name of RS. As a result, RS Music now has a total of three subsidiaries, including its successful luk thung label RSiam. Besides the new launch, nine new singers — Risa, Tim, Mewsic, Danumarc from Rose Sound, Gracy, KKP, Utter, Freshybill from Kamikaze and Rome from RSiam — were also introduced at a recent press conference titled “RS Music New Era: Open Your Music Experience”. While Rose Music produces trendy tunes and targets urban listeners, Kamikaze releases pop for people of all ages.
The CEO of RS Group, Surachai Chetchotisak, said that the company has never stopped running its music business despite challenges.
“Music is our source of income and the backbone of RS Group. The industry has simply adjusted to match the business environment. This year, RS Music is entering the market under a model called ‘music star commerce’. Marketing music is not difficult because we have been in this business for a long time and we know when to market. To debut nine singers is certainly a big challenge for us,” said Surachai.
The main source of income for the Thai music industry today comes from streaming services, live performances and social platforms. Most Thais currently listen to music through streaming services such as Spotify, Joox and YouTube Music. According to marketeeronline.co, 5.8 million Thais are active users on Spotify every month while 29 million people are active listeners on YouTube every day. After Kamikaze closed shop in 2017, RS Music released only new luk thung songs but the company still earns money from copyrights of pop songs. At present, RS Music has about 10% market share in the Thai music industry, or 250 million baht.
The head of RS Music, Sukrit Sukskulwat, said that music streaming has allowed even more people to listen to songs.
“People who have mobile phones can easily use streaming services. Since it is convenient, people are listening to music more than ever before. After discovering quality singers, we wanted to create more content for the streaming environment,” said Sukrit.
While making music is the primary aim of the returning music label, Surachai said that their ultimate goal is to create singers who are “super influencers” and later business partners who promote products or businesses. To implement the music star commerce
model, RS Music had to begin by scouting aspiring singers.
“We spent time during the lockdown scouting singers and all of our selections have the potential to perform. They all can sing live and each one of them has distinctive characteristics and interesting lifestyles, so we just have to help them create content in order to increase the number of followers they have on social media. For example, singer Risa was a beauty pageant participant so she has the potential of raising awareness or creating content related to the beauty industry. When young people become professional singers, they can earn more by having their own YouTube channels and by increasing social media engagement and/or becoming product presenters,” explained Sukrit.
“Our singers must have unique lifestyles because this is what makes them interesting. They do not attract fans only because of their music but also because of how they are in their personal life, so it is a criterion which can develop their value further. A good-looking person who can sing but has no interesting lifestyle does not fit our bill because he or she will have no additional appeal to the audience,” added Surachai.
This model is totally different from how singers were created in the past. Before the digital age, good-looking young people were scouted and trained by professional singers and dancers. They had to go through several auditions before releasing even one single.
However, RS Music has eliminated the training process even though it is a critical aspect of producing quality singers, especially in the K-pop industry. However, other music labels still have a training process for their new recruits. Since many K-pop artists are successful on the global stage, the industry’s training system is accepted and used by some music companies in Thailand also. For instance, the entertainment company 4Nologue spends 8-10 million baht per year so their boy band Trinity can go through similar training that K-pop stars do. Similarly, event organisers 411Entertainment sent solo singer Alley to be trained in South Korea for a year before she released her debut single.
Sukrit further explained why RS Music eliminated the training process.
“In the past, we screened five to 10 singers from 20 trainees in an audition. Currently, we are only searching for those five to 10 singers. When we find our aspiring singers, they are 70% ready to release a single, so they do not need to go through the training process. For example, there are currently two singers at Rose Sound, Danumarc who can write lyrics and melodies by himself, and Tim who can also create his own melodies. However, the way we create a singer is similar to K-pop labels because it is all about the characteristics and abilities of the singers,” said Sukrit.
Even though RS Music does not follow the exact K-pop model, they are interested in approaching the overseas market like Korean music labels.
“Our leading luk thung singer at RSiam, Kratae, was planning to collaborate with an English language singer but because of the pandemic, the plan is on hold. We also constantly discuss with record labels that have global networks to release singles together. A singer from Kamikaze, Utter, is able to speak Mandarin and his songs include lyrics in this language. We have plans for him to sing a soundtrack for a Thai TV drama which will release in China. We are already working with the Chinese platform iQIYIm for our drama Return The World To You,” explained Sukrit.
After working with RS Music for 17 years, Sukrit has noted some changes in the music industry.
“Music has become so diverse that we cannot categorise a song as we used to in the past. Every artist can do whatever they want. For example, if a wellknown rapper decides to drop a pop single, people won’t question him. It is like in the past when people listened to music but then platforms changed from cassettes to CDs and now eventually to streaming services. During the pandemic, if we are able to build up a fanbase on social media for singers, they can earn even though they cannot perform at gigs. Moreover, this year, there will be many concerts, including one that gathers former singers from Kamikaze and the new ones also. However, I cannot reveal which singers will be there yet,” said Sukrit.
THE MAIN SOURCE OF INCOME FOR THE THAI MUSIC INDUSTRY TODAY COMES FROM STREAMING SERVICES, LIVE PERFORMANCES AND SOCIAL PLATFORMS