Goo Goo Dolls' John Rzeznik has said that there is not much profit in music sales anymore.
The band's co founder made these comments, adding that he knows 'Iris' has been streamed over two billion times. 'Iris' which featured on the band's 1998 album, 'Dizzy Up The Girl', sold 10 million copies, with the album selling five million.
Prior to that, the Goo Goo Dolls' 1995 album, 'A Boy Named Goo' sold two million copies in the USA.
In this recent chat, John Rzeznik has said that there is no money in music sales anymore.
“Nobody makes any money out of selling records anymore because nobody buys records anymore. You make crap for streaming. People stream your songs and you make no money", he said.
"You’ve got to go out and play live. That takes a lot of time. I just think the business has changed so much. Its not as much fun as it used to be. We get to play live and that’s how we earn a living".
When asked if he went out to buy a Ferrari with his maiden pay cheque, Rzeznik gave this definitive answer.
“I don’t have a Ferrari. I have a platinum record Ford Bronco and from my Spotify billion streams of have a Matchbox car of the Bronco I drive around. That’s my life”, he said.
Elsewhere, John Rzeznik revealed that the band learned to perform live by playing in front of next to no-one every night during the week.
“We were really lucky that we came up much the same ways as those Australian bands in the pub culture. We would go out and play four nights a week", Rzeznik explained.
"You were constantly playing, playing, playing, playing in front of 10 people, 20 people, hopefully 30 people showed up the next time. We were brought up in a culture where record making was important. You created a whole body of work from beginning to end and going out in support of the record to sell those records. The business has flipped on its head now. Theres a handful of very wealthy tech bros that are making all the money".
Rzeznik also had this message to streaming firms, calling on them to change the way they compensate musicians.
“It’s a way of screwing artists out of what they deserve,” stated Rzeznik.
“I would like to remind the people who run Spotify that without artists they have an empty vending machine. I wish all the artists could get together and say ‘no, we aren’t doing this for this crap money’. The truth is if the 10 biggest selling artists in the world said ‘no, we are pulling all of our music until you give us a fair deal’. Then you would see change but that ain’t gonna happen because they are making all the money”.
Back in 2021, Rzeznik performed 'Goo Goo Dolls' live on stage with Billy Joel. Check that out here.
